Cruel Intent

by J. A. Jance

  Several late-breaking additions to the Thanksgiving guest list turned out to be Haley and Liam Marsh; Haley’s grandmother, Nelda Harris; and Marissa Dvorak, who would be having a second Thanksgiving dinner with her own family later in the evening. When Haley had called on Monday of that week, Ali had been up to her eyeballs in wedding planning.

  “Can we talk?” Haley said.

  “Sure,” Ali said. “What about?”

  “You really don’t think I’d be all that weird in college?” Haley asked. “I mean if I went. People wouldn’t make fun of me or think I was odd?”

  “You wouldn’t be odd,” Ali said. “A lot of single mothers go on to school these days.”

  “What if I went to the University of Arizona down in Tucson?” Haley asked. “Would I be able to find a place to live? How would I make arrangements for someone to look after Liam?”

  Leland Brooks had already been on the phone looking for wheelchair-accessible accommodations for Marissa Dvorak. There were some dorm rooms available, but he had also found a terrific three-bedroom house not far from the university. He and Ali had dismissed it as being more than Marissa needed. Now, though, Ali had an inspiration.

  “What are you and your grandmother doing for Thanksgiving dinner?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. Why?”

  “There’s someone I’d like you to meet.”

  So while Nelda Harris joined Edie’s Taser admiration program, Haley Marsh and Marissa Dvorak had sat in one corner of the living room, playing with Liam and the collection of toys Haley had brought along to keep him occupied. The two girls seemed to be having fun together, but Ali spent a lot of the evening worried about whether the meeting—not exactly a blind date but close—would do its magic. When it was time for Marissa to leave, Ali was pleased as Liam clambered up into the wheelchair and gave Marissa a droolly smack of a kiss.

  Nelda Harris saw the kiss, too. She caught Ali’s eye and gave a slight nod.

  She’s thinking the same thing I am, Ali thought. Only time will tell, but I’m betting that kiss seals the deal.

  As for Dean’s parents—the other grandparents, as everyone called them—Ali was relieved when they decided not to come for Thanksgiving. Instead, they flew into Phoenix on Friday night and drove up to Sedona on Saturday morning.

  You’re a grown-up, Ali told herself that morning as she put the finishing touches on a face that still showed traces of bruising. You can be civil. You don’t have to be their friend.

  And that became her watchwords for the day: Be civil.

  The simple outdoor ceremony went off without any complications. It was ably conducted by Judge Ruben Dreyfuss, justice of the peace, who also happened to play in the same community-league basketball team as Chris and Athena. Chris wore a tux, and Athena wore a simple winter-white silk brocade pantsuit. Athena, looking absolutely radiant, walked down the aisle on her own. She didn’t need anyone to give her away.

  Now, with the reception getting under way and the DJ tuning up the sound system, Ali wandered outside only to run smack into Angus Reynolds. He was standing beside the construction-crew break-room picnic table, taking in the view and smoking an enormous cigar.

  “Nice place you have here,” he observed. “Hope you don’t mind. Jeannie won’t allow me to smoke these in the house.”

  For good reason, Ali thought.

  “Chris is a fine young man,” Angus went on. “You must be very proud of him.”

  It was odd to be having a conversation with this stranger, a man who had once been her father-in-law but whom she hadn’t actually met until only a few hours earlier. In a way, he seemed to be talking to her, but he also seemed to be talking to himself.

  “Yes, I am proud,” she said.

  “If he had lived to see it, Dean would have been proud, too,” Angus said quietly.

  Ali felt her eyes filling with tears. She willed them to stop. When they didn’t, she turned away and looked off in the other direction.

  “Is the smoke bothering you?” Angus asked.

  “No,” she said. “It’s fine.”

  “I was wrong, you know,” Angus continued. “I wanted Dean to be a lawyer. I told him that if he insisted on getting a doctorate in oceanography, he’d never amount to anything and he’d never be able to do anything but teach. I didn’t mean it as a compliment, either.”

  Ali remembered that conversation, not because she’d heard it but because Dean had told her about it in excruciating detail.

  “And do you know what he told me?” Angus asked. “That no matter how little money he made, he’d rather be a dirt-poor teacher any day instead of being a rich lawyer and selling his soul to the devil.”

  Dean never mentioned that part, Ali thought. He seemed to have left that out.

  Angus blew another puff of foul-smelling smoke into the air before he continued. “So I told him that if he was going to be that pigheaded, he was no son of mine, and I was writing him out of my life. If he wanted to go off and screw up his life and be poor until his dying day, he was on his own. And that’s what I did, too. I wrote him out of our lives, and I wrote you and your wonderful son out of our lives, too. Pretty stupid, wouldn’t you say?”

  Again Ali said nothing.

  “And now Chris is a teacher,” Angus said thoughtfully. “Where do you suppose that shows up on the DNA, the propensity for being a teacher instead of being a lawyer?”

  “It may have more to do with being stubborn than it does with DNA,” Ali said. “Chris’s stepfather was adamantly opposed to his being a teacher, too.”

  “I see,” Angus said. “But thank you for letting us come, Alison. Considering how we treated you and Chris, it’s far more than we deserve, and it means more to my Jeannie than you can possibly know.”

  “You’re welcome,” Ali said. “I’m glad you’re here.” And when she said that, she really meant it; she wasn’t just being civil.

  Edie Larson stuck her head out the door to the tent. “There you are,” she said. “Everybody’s looking for you, Ali. They’re getting ready to cut the cake.”

  Without a word, Angus Reynolds crushed the end of his cigar out in the ashtray on the table. Then he offered Ali his arm.

  “Shall we?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Ali said quietly. “Let’s.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  J.A. Jance is the Top 10 New York Times best-selling author of the Joanna Brady series, the J. P. Beaumont series, three interrelated thrillers featuring the Walker family, and the Ali Reynolds series: Hand of Evil, and Edge of Evil. Born in South Dakota and brought up in Bisbee, Arizona, Jance lives with her husband in Seattle, Washington, and Tucson, Arizona.

  ALSO BY J.A. JANCE

  ALI REYNOLDS MYSTERIES

  Hand of Evil

  Web of Evil

  Edge of Evil

  JOANNA BRADY MYSTERIES

  Desert Heat

  Tombstone Courage

  Shoot/Don’t Shoot

  Dead to Rights

  Skeleton Canyon

  Rattlesnake Crossing

  Outlaw Mountain

  Devil’s Claw

  Paradise Lost

  Partner in Crime

  Exit Wounds

  Dead Wrong

  Damage Control

  J. P. BEAUMONT MYSTERIES

  Until Proven Guilty

  Injustice for All

  Trial by Fury

  Taking the Fifth

  Improbable Cause

  A More Perfect Union

  Dismissed with Prejudice

  Minor in Possession

  Payment in Kind

  Without Due Process

  Failure to Appear

  Lying in Wait

  Name Withheld

  Breach of Duty

  Birds of Prey

  Partner in Crime

  Long Time Gone

  Justice Denied

  AND

  Hour of the Hunter

  Kiss of the Bees

  Day of the Dead
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  TOUCHSTONE

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  New York, NY 10020

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2008 by J.A. Jance

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Touchstone Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

  TOUCHSTONE and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Jance, Judith A.

  Cruel intent / by J.A. Jance.

  p. cm.

  “A Touchstone Book.”

  1. Reynolds, Ali (Fictitious character)—Fiction. 2. Internet—Fiction.

  3. Blogs—Fiction. 4. Housewives—Fiction 5. Serial murderers—Fiction 6.

  Arizona—Fiction. I. Title.

  PS3560.A44C78 2008

  813'.54—dc22 2008013649

  ISBN-13: 978-1-4165-6387-7

  ISBN-10: 1-4165-6387-3

  Visit us on the World Wide Web:

  http://www.SimonSays.com

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  { EPILOGUE }

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR