The Sharpest Edge

by Stephanie Rowe

  “I just can’t believe it’s over.” Alan took a deep breath. “Do they need someone to go down there and identify the body?”

  “I don’t think so. They seem to have it covered.” She hesitated. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “I’m fine. It’s just…strange that after all this time, he’s gone. Just like that, gone. I kinda had visions of being the one to kill him.”

  Typical guy. Wanting to be the hero. “Yeah, well, he died before the knife-in-the-bed incident, so don’t get too comfortable. There’s still a bad guy out there somewhere. I’m hoping it has nothing to do with Jimmy, but it might.”

  “So you want me to keep going through the files?”

  “Uh-huh. I’m heading back there now to pick up some personnel files so we can check those out.”

  “Why do you need the personnel files at this hour?”

  “Because we think maybe someone working at the camp is behind this. Sean thinks Jimmy had a partner on the outside.”

  Alan cursed and Kim smiled grimly. “Yeah, that’s how I feel, too.”

  “Is this ever going to end?”

  “It has to, Alan. I can’t take much more.”

  “You and me both.”

  KIM FOUND THE FILES she needed and hit Print, then leaned back in her chair and waited for the documents. Officer McKeen was pacing the grounds, leaving her alone in the office for the moment.

  The reception desk out front had been empty when they came in, with a sign posted indicating the attendant was unavailable and a number to call if help was needed. It was early for that sign to be out, seeing as it was only ten o’clock. They always tried to keep the desk attended until midnight. Kim checked the schedule and Will was supposed to be on tonight. Where was he? Just because he’d broken up with Didi didn’t mean he could blow off work.

  Not that it mattered. She had more important things to deal with, such as the fact that someone other than Jimmy had put a knife in her bed. Who could be after her other than Jimmy? Did it really have anything to do with him, or had someone merely tried to use the knife to throw them off? Yeah, sure, the knife had been an exact match, but the trial had been all over the news at the time. Well-decorated cop goes mental and tries to kill two women? It wouldn’t have taken a huge amount of effort to guess that the weapon had been some big, badass knife.

  So if the incident wasn’t related to Jimmy, then what was it? Could Eddie be right? That it all came down to Helen and her desire to get away from this life?

  Headlights flashed through the office and she started. Officer McKeen came racing into the office, his hand on his gun. “Are you expecting anyone?”

  It had been almost two hours since Sean’s call, proving that he’d done as he said and returned directly to the station. Why did that bother her? She had to accept that it was over between them. He hadn’t loved her enough then, and he didn’t love her at all now. That should make her happy. It was what she wanted. Instead, the thought left a gnawing emptiness inside her. “It could be Sean.” She frowned at the wishful tone in her voice.

  “It’s not a cruiser.”

  “Maybe it’s the front-desk attendant.”

  “Maybe.” He stood next to the window, his gun held next to his shoulder, ready to fire.

  The headlights shut off and Kim heard a car door close. “Who is it?”

  “A woman.”

  She sidled over to the window and peered out through the glass. “I don’t recognize her.”

  The front door opened and shut. Footsteps thudded across the wood floor and stopped outside the office door.

  That’s when Kim realized that the door wasn’t locked.

  A sharp rap made them both jump. “Kim? It’s Helen Collins. Sean told me you’d be here.”

  Helen? She swallowed hard and the officer looked at her, his gun ready.

  “You want to let her in?”

  “I guess so, but don’t leave.”

  “Wouldn’t think of it.” He kept his gun out and opened the door. “Come in.”

  It was the first time Kim had ever met her dad’s wife and she wasn’t anything like Kim had thought. No horns, no tail, no pitchfork. Her skin wasn’t even red. She was wearing jeans, a long-sleeved T-shirt and hiking boots and she had her hair in a ponytail. In fact, she looked as though she belonged at the Loon’s Nest. She stood in the doorway and studied Kim.

  Kim shifted and couldn’t figure out what to do with her hands.

  “So we finally meet,” Helen said.

  “Yeah.”

  “You’ve been avoiding me. I asked Sean to bring you by the house.”

  “He mentioned it.”

  Helen nodded toward an empty chair. “May I?”

  Kim shrugged. “It’s your place.”

  “No, it isn’t. It’s yours.” Helen sat down. “You and your sister are joint owners with your father. I have no interest in it at all.”

  “So I hear.”

  Helen lifted an eyebrow and Kim saw a strength in her that she’d never seen in her mom. “I’m not here to take grief from you. I’m here because I love your father. Personally, after seeing how you’ve torn out his heart for the past ten years, I’d prefer to send you back to the West Coast and pretend you don’t exist.”

  Ouch. Such a warm and fuzzy woman.

  “However,” Helen continued, “your father loves you and he won’t move on.”

  “Why should he? We’re his real family.”

  Helen’s eyes darkened as she leaned forward. “No, Kim. We are all his real family. You are his first family, we’re his second. But whether you like it or not, we’re all real.”

  Kim pressed her lips together and decided she hadn’t spent enough energy hating Helen Collins over the past few years.

  “Your father needs you, so I want you to get over to the hospital and talk to him. Visit him. Give him a reason to live.”

  Kim narrowed her eyes. “He didn’t do that favor for my mother, did he?”

  Helen looked shocked. “You blame him for your mother’s death?”

  “Of course I do. She was miserable married to him and he wouldn’t let her go, so she killed herself. If he’d let her go, she would have lived.”

  Helen waved her hand over her eyes and looked shaken. “Have you ever talked to him about what happened with your mother?”

  “No.”

  “Oh, wow.” She leaned back in her chair. “I hadn’t realized that.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe it.”

  “Believe what?”

  Helen sat up again. “It’s not my place to tell you. It’ll have to be your dad when he wakes up.”

  “Tell me what? If you know something about my mom’s death, you have to tell me.” Her heart began to beat faster. “What don’t I know?”

  Helen hesitated. “There are circumstances around your mother’s death that complicate things. It’s…” She gave Kim an imploring look. “Listen, I really don’t feel it’s my place to tell you. Ask your dad when he wakes up.” Her voice trembled slightly. “And if he doesn’t, I’ll tell you myself. You can’t go home without learning the truth. But it would be better if you heard it from him.”

  Kim wet her lips, her head ringing. What was Helen talking about? “You married my dad three weeks after my mom killed herself. What’s there to find out about? And I heard that you hate this camp and you’re trying to destroy it. It’s on the verge of bankruptcy and you don’t care.”

  Helen jumped to her feet and slapped her hands down on the desk. “You’re damn right I don’t care if we lose this place. You want to know why? Because it’s killing your father! He lives in the past, yearning for the daughters who rejected him, and it’s destroying him! Until he comes to grips with his past, he’ll never be able to live. I’ve been praying for years for something to set him free so he can live again, and if losing this camp will force him to look toward the future, then I’m all for it.”

  She drew in a ragged breath and, for the first time, Kim realized ho
w exhausted she looked. Worn-out and haggard, but brimming with strength and courage. “You blame your father for killing your mother? Well, if you don’t go visit him, then you’ll kill him the same way. Can you live with that? Can you handle knowing that the man who loves you so much is dying without you?” Helen shoved off the desk, knocking a stapler and a stack of files to the floor. “Grow up, Kim, or get out.”

  Helen stalked out of the office and slammed the door behind her, making the picture next to it bounce on the wall.

  Officer McKeen cleared his throat and moved to the window to watch her leave.

  Holy cow. Kim raised her hand to brush her hair off her face and realized that her hand was trembling. She dropped it down to her lap.

  Headlights filled the room and then disappeared as Helen drove away. Guess Kim had another person who might want her dead. And Helen certainly hated the camp.

  Kim turned back to the computer and began a search for Helen. Then the door opened and Sean walked into the office. He walked in and slammed a huge knife into the desk so hard that the desk shook and a pencil rolled off it.

  The three of them stared at it, stuck blade down into the wood, fingerprint powder all over it.

  Kim began to shake again and sweat trickled down her temple. She pressed her hand to her scarred thigh and dragged her eyes off the knife to look at Sean.

  She didn’t even have time to form a question before he snapped out his terse statement. “You’re staying with me.” It wasn’t an option.

  “What happened?”

  He walked over to the window. “That knife was in the trunk of the tree right outside your front door. He was waiting for you tonight.” He turned to face her, his voice accusing. “And you were going to go home.”

  She stared at him. “I did go home. I was in the driveway when you called and I decided to come back.” She couldn’t stop the trembling. What if she’d gotten out of the car? She looked at her bodyguard, who appeared rather shocked. What if Alan was right about cops on the take and Officer McKeen was one of them? What if he’d set her up? What if he was going to let her get out of the car and drive away? Or worse, what if he’d been planning to help kill her? She stared at his young face and felt terrified.

  Who was she supposed to trust?

  Sean glared at Officer McKeen. “You’re relieved of this assignment. Take the knife back to the station for processing. It’s already been fingerprinted.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  She could trust Sean. Maybe not with her heart but with her life. He was the one man who could keep her alive. Who would keep her alive. And maybe, just maybe, his anger meant something more than a cop being protective of a civilian.

  Officer McKeen grabbed the weapon and ducked out of the office, leaving Sean and Kim alone. She stared at him, at the rage rolling off him. “Get your stuff,” he said. “We’re leaving. Now.”

  She took another glance at the gouge the knife had left in the desk and decided not to argue.

  Chapter Eleven

  Sean was too angry to talk on the ride home, and Kim didn’t try to engage him. He kept waiting for her to demand more information about the knife or Jimmy, or to declare her independence and insist that she sleep at her house, but she said nothing. She simply sat with her feet up on the dashboard, her arms wrapped around her legs and her knees pulled up to her chest.

  How close had it been tonight? Would it have been another warning or the end?

  “You think Officer McKeen is dirty?” She was resting her chin on her knees, staring out the windshield.

  “Why do you ask? Did he do something?” Sean was instantly alert.

  “He didn’t stop me from going to my house.” Her voice was far calmer than he’d expected. “Alan thinks that cops might be willing to help out Jimmy, cop to cop.” She didn’t look at him. “He tried to convince me you might be dirty.”

  “I assume he wanted you to ditch me and let him protect you?”

  She nodded.

  “The best way to get to you is to get you away from me.”

  Kim slowly turned to look at him and he was chagrined by the emptiness in her gaze. The resignation that horror actually existed and she had to face it. “It’s not Alan.”

  “When did you first meet him?”

  “I met him at a party.”

  “Before or after Cheryl started dating Jimmy?”

  Kim’s eyes narrowed. “After.”

  “He approach you or you approach him?”

  “We were seated next to each other at a dinner party.”

  A dinner party. Hah. When was the last time he’d been to a dinner party?

  Kim frowned. “What’s so funny?”

  “Nothing.” He swung into his driveway, certain they hadn’t been tailed from the camp office. And he’d been looking. Nevertheless, he pulled out his gun and scanned the woods for a few minutes.

  An unknown enemy was the toughest.

  “Let’s go in.”

  He let her into the cabin and set the alarm behind them. Last night, it seemed cozy. Tonight, it was claustrophobic. Too much tension between them. “I’ll take the couch.”

  Kim didn’t argue. Instead, she sank onto the sofa and hugged a pillow to her chest. It was then that he noticed that she was shivering. “Cold?”

  She shook her head.

  “Scared?”

  “Mad.”

  He couldn’t stop himself from smiling. “At me?” He pulled out a glass and stuck it under the faucet. “Want a drink?”

  “No to both.” She stared blankly at the empty fireplace. “I’m mad at all of this. At Jimmy for starting it. At whoever’s playing the game now. Is it a friend of Jimmy’s? Is it Helen posing as a cohort of Jimmy’s to throw us off the trail? She could have gotten the details of the attack from Cheryl….” Kim frowned. “Of course she could have.”

  The glass overflowed, and he shut off the faucet. He couldn’t believe what he’d just heard. “What did you say?”

  “Helen.” Kim was sitting up, her eyes bright. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of that. I know Cheryl told my dad about the attack. Helen would totally know what kind of a knife was used.” She threw her fist into the pillow. “Don’t you get it? She’s trying to throw us off track by making us think it has something to do with Jimmy. Did you tell her he’s dead? Of course, she doesn’t know. You told her I was at the office, so she went to the house and stuck the knife in the tree.” Her face paled. “Oh, my gosh. What if she came to the office to kill me tonight but couldn’t do it because Officer McKeen was there? Did you tell her he was there? No wonder she was pissed.” She jumped to her feet. “We have to get to the hospital to protect my dad. What if she tries to finish him off?” She sprinted toward the door, but Sean grabbed her wrist as she went by.

  “Kim!”

  “What?” She tried to twist free. “Don’t you get it? When she finds out Jimmy is dead, she’s out of time. She’ll have to kill him. Let go!”

  “There’s an officer on your dad’s room already.”

  She stilled, her breath panting. “There is? You knew it was Helen all along?” Her brow furrowed. “Then how could you send her to the office tonight?”

  “Because she’s not a killer. She loves your dad.”

  “She’s crazy! Just ask Officer McKeen what happened at the office.” Kim took another step toward the door.

  “Kim. It’s not Helen.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because I do.”

  She stared at him and some of the fear left her eyes. “You believe that?”

  “Of course, I do.” He studied her. “You trust my instincts, don’t you?”

  She sank onto the pillows again. “Honestly, Sean, I don’t know what to think anymore. Finding out you were going to marry me for my dad is…well…it makes me wonder if I knew you at all. Even if I do believe in you, how do I know I’m right?”

  He sat down on the couch next to her. “That’s how I felt when you left.”

&n
bsp; “I guess I was right to leave if you didn’t love me.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Wow. I never thought I’d hear that from you. Does that mean I can finally let go of the guilt I’ve been shouldering?”

  “You felt guilty?”

  “The whole time.”

  He smiled. Couldn’t help it. “I thought you’d forgotten about me.”

  “I thought you’d forgotten about me.” She fiddled with the edge of her T-shirt. “When you joined the Army, I worried about you, but no one ever had any news. I made Cheryl ask my dad every time she talked to him.”

  “I wanted to forget about my life here.”

  She frowned. “That’s what I was trying to do as well, but I had to come back for my dad. Why did you come back?”

  Trying? So she hadn’t succeeded in forgetting about him or what they’d had? A glimmer of hope lit up in his chest. “I don’t know why I came back. Nowhere else to go, I guess.”

  “That’s sad.”

  “Or maybe it’s good. Not everyone has a place to come back to when the world sucks.”

  “Are you going to stay?”

  “For now. You?” He caught his breath, then let it out when she shook her head.

  “Only until this nightmare is over. My life is in L.A. now, but until we catch whoever it is, I’m staying.” She pursed her lips. “You’re my best bet for staying alive.”

  “I can protect you only if you stay at my place and let me be your shadow.” He’d said it before, but she had yet to accept it. Only a few hours ago, she’d been on her way back to her own house to stay.

  But this time, she nodded.

  His heart skipped a beat. She was accepting their intimacy and he wasn’t sure if he was glad because it would make his job easier or for another reason…. “Then we’re going to have to figure out how to deal with each other.”

  “Any suggestions?”

  “Pretend we’re strangers?”

  She looked doubtful. “You really think that’ll work? I mean, our history isn’t exactly two dates and one drunken night of debauchery.”

  He smiled. If only it were that simple. “Maybe our relationship was so mixed up in your family that it was never about us.”