The Eleventh Victim

by Nancy Grace

  “Betty? I’m home!” C.C. called out after he opened the screen door, flipped on the wall switch, and dumped his bags in the floor. He’d just have to make the best of it…for now.

  True, he’d lost his reputation, Tina, the bench, the governorship…but he still had Betty.

  And more important, he had Betty’s money.

  After the dust settled, he could regroup and get his campaign back up and running again. Show ’em C.C. was still in the race.

  “Sugar Pie?” he called, leaving his bags lying there in the hall and making his way through the house. Betty usually unpacked them for him.

  Speaking of pie…

  She usually welcomed him home with a homemade peach pie, hot from the oven.

  Sniffing the air, he smelled only a hint of Lysol and all the musty antiques Betty’s family was so hung up on. He briefly remembered when he’d placed a glass of ice tea on her grandmother’s antique buffet without a coaster. It was as if a possum got in the house and climbed on the dinner table, the way they’d all rushed around.

  Walking room to room, he noted she’d changed things around a bit. Bought some new furniture, gotten rid of some of the old—including his favorite recliner, he noted, as he glanced into the living room. He loved that thing!

  She’d probably just sent it out to be re-upholstered. It had seen better days. Or better yet…she’d ordered him a brand new one! To surprise him now that he’d be spending more time here with her.

  And he would—in the immediate future, anyway.

  “Betty?” he called, making his way to the kitchen in the back of the house and opening the screen door out into the backyard.

  The house was silent.

  And not just the house. It had been so long since C.C. had been back home to Dooley County for any extended period of time, he had actually forgotten how quiet it was. Even with the kitchen door wide open, he couldn’t hear a sound.

  Finally a dog barked in the distance…and that was it.

  What the hell would C.C. do with himself, stuck here with Betty for who-knows-how-long, and nothing to do?

  Turning back and heading into the kitchen, he went directly for the high cupboard where he kept his stash of bourbon…he stopped in his tracks.

  There, squarely in the center of the table, sat a big, yellow manila envelope, his name scrawled on the front in black Sharpie, Betty’s handwriting.

  Something told C.C., even before he opened the flap, this was not a love note.

  He was right.

  In fact, it was quite the opposite.

  Divorce papers…along with all the newspaper clippings about the trouble he’d gotten himself into at the Pink Fuzzy.

  There was a note from Betty, too.

  Don’t bother looking for me. I’m on a Carnival Cruise to the Bahamas with John David. P.S. don’t bother going to the bank. And remember, the house belongs to my aunt Fruttie.

  So.

  That’s how it was.

  His wife had run off with the farm overseer, leaving him high and dry.

  C.C. found a bottle of bourbon and took it out onto the back steps.

  There he sat in the hot, still darkness, slapping at mosquitoes and blowing upward through his bottom lip to keep the gnats off his nose and eyes. He couldn’t stay here—glancing at the papers in the folder, he saw that even the lawyers said so.

  He wondered what Tina was doing tonight. She’d gotten over the tranny, but she’d told C.C. how “the trust was gone” between them.

  God, he missed that girl. For the rest of his life, he’d go to sleep remembering the routine to “Freebird” she’d finally worked up. It was a doozy.

  C.C. sat in the silence awhile longer, looking out the screen door into the backyard. Hell, he could make a comeback. He still had a law license.

  He could always practice law.

  75

  St. Simons Island, Georgia

  THE MOON RODE HIGH AGAINST A BLACK VELVET SKY. VIRGINIA parked her Jeep and got out just at the point before sandy grass turns to pure beach. She reached back in to cut the lights so as not to scare the sea turtles.

  It was that time of year, the magical few months when, only under the cover of darkness, the loggerhead sea turtles swim ashore, find their way across the sand, dig their secret nests, and lay tiny eggs. Endangered, according to the feds, they searched the world and chose the Golden Coast to raise their young. A safe haven…until now.

  Inside the Jeep, the wieners, the whole yapping bunch of them, made it vociferously clear they wanted out.

  “Sshh! I promised a ride, not a walk.”

  They didn’t care what she’d promised and continued yelping frantically like all their little lives depended on getting out the one window.

  The turtles would not appreciate the wieners’ sincere attention, so Virginia pressed the button to automatically lower the window on the driver’s side, just enough to give them some air, but not escape.

  “Don’t even think about it, or it’s no treats forever,” she told Sidney, turning to find his watchful gaze on her, both ears standing straight up in the dark of the Jeep’s cab.

  Just to be on the safe side, she raised the window another quarter inch.

  “I’ll be right back.”

  The salty air whipped Virginia’s hair when she stepped away. She had eased up, hoping her engine wouldn’t disturb the turtles.

  They were here first, after all, inhabiting the beach long before the Indians roamed the coast, before the Spanish came searching for gold, before slaves were finally set free, before German subs trolled this very shore, spying on the Rockefellers and Gettys who summered here.

  Now Palmetto Dunes was set to do what even the German subs didn’t…destroy their habitat.

  Walking out halfway to the water, she sank down on the damp sand, sitting Indian-style, her body still aching from the beating.

  What next?

  How long could her band of misfits, amateurs all, thwart the multimillion-dollar plans of powerful developers and local politicians in league with God-knows-who.

  Speaking of God, it had been a long time since Virginia had had any contact with Him/Her.

  Now was as good a time as any to break the ice.

  “God, it’s me, Virginia. I don’t blame You if You don’t accept this call. I know You only hear from me when I need something.” She hesitated. No other way to say it, so she tried the direct approach. “But guess what? I need something. I need help to stop this.”

  She nodded her head backward toward the construction site in the distance. She knew He’d know what she meant by “this.”

  “This is Your creation I’m trying to save. This beautiful beach, and all Your creatures that call it home. I’ve kind of run out of ideas. Show me what to do. Help me, please. Amen.”

  She fell silent—and so, it seemed, did the world around her. The water lapped ever so gently; even the breeze seemed to ebb.

  Gazing out at the dark sky, she wondered if God had heard her prayer, and whether He had a plan, because she certainly did not.

  Suddenly, coming out of the dark behind her, a car motor, the gas gunning. Virginia jerked around, twisting from the waist up to look backward.

  She spotted headlights just a few yards away, barreling toward her on the beach.

  Scrambling frantically out of the way, she had no time to move…it was too fast and too close…a huge Escalade with the brights on, plowing across the sand, straight at her.

  “No, no!! God, no!”

  Face down, she braced herself, throwing her arms over her head in what she knew would be a futile effort to protect herself from the SUV’s crushing tires. For just a second, she heard nothing but her own panicked breathing and music blaring from the car’s stereo, and…

  A miracle. The tires on the white metal behemoth ground to a halt, wedging down into deep, wet sand just feet from where she lay, arms still over her head.

  She had been so sure it was gunning for her, but maybe she was wron
g. Maybe—

  The driver’s side door flung open, and a man stumbled out. The Escalade’s stereo continued pumping out Glen Campbell’s “Wichita Lineman.”

  She got to her feet quickly, peering at him. She couldn’t make out his features against the headlights cutting through the dark, but his voice was slurred and angry. Did he actually try to run her down?

  “Who the hell are you?” he shouted out.

  “I’m Virginia Gunn, who the hell are you?”

  Eugene sagged against the car. Virginia Gunn…Virginia Gunn…he knew that name

  It came to him through a haze of alcohol. Here was the thorn in his side…the thorn that had already cost him hundreds of thousands and possibly millions if investors started to pull out. Obviously the two “friends” he hired to take care of Gunn didn’t finish the job. Here she was…alone…on the beach…an isolated beach.

  His prayers were answered.

  He quickly closed the few feet between them, pulled back, and threw a right punch straight to her face, landing just below her left eye. She went down hard, sprawled on the beach again.

  The blow was blinding and the next thing Virginia knew, she was facedown on the beach with a mouthful of sand.

  He aimed a hard kick straight to her right thigh…and she cried out in pain. But she scrambled with amazing tenacity, clawing at the sand to get up and run, her feet digging into the sand, slowing her down.

  She took off running toward the dense undergrowth surrounding the construction site.

  Enraged, Eugene gave chase and, just as she made it to the edge of the site, caught her by the shoulder of her jean jacket. Wrenching her backward, he felt the two of them tumble to the earth together.

  When they landed hard on the sand, she was on her back and his hands were around her neck, clamped hard, determined to rid himself of her, for good.

  Virginia could see the stars shining behind Eugene’s face, just inches from her own, and she clawed at his hands as they locked around her neck. She was too tired, she couldn’t fight him off.

  The stars were going out; the world was turning dark.

  She knew she was dying, there on the beach she had tried to save. Somehow, it seemed fitting…for a moment.

  Then, instinctively, she doubled her legs in front of her chest and, using her knees and feet, heaved Eugene’s weight off her body.

  Suddenly, she could breathe again; the stars reappeared twinkling above her. Sucking in air through burning lungs, she careened toward the trees with Eugene at her heels.

  He caught up with her just as she reached the edge of the forest, grabbing her at the waist and spinning her around. A pair of brutally strong hands encircled her throat once more, closing off her windpipe.

  It was at that precise moment she became aware of a rustling in the undergrowth, and then, erratic barking.

  The wieners. The wieners had managed to squeeze their little bodies through the cracks she’d left them in the windows to breathe, escaping the cab of the Jeep and were there, beside her, beneath her, all around her.

  The barking took on a fever pitch and they began yapping, gnashing the air, nearly screaming, and all the while biting every inch of Eugene’s suited body they could get their teeth into.

  “What the hell?” He released Virginia’s neck and batted his arms at the fierce little dogs, blindly stumbling back to fend them off.

  Sidney leapt through the air and managed to take a bite of the upper thigh, latching there and hanging on wildly, his eyes glaring straight up into Eugene’s face. Kicking and hitting at them all, Eugene stumbled back and lost his balance, landing with a dull thud.

  Everything went quiet.

  The wieners encircled the spot where he lay, all of them wheezing for air.

  Virginia stood up, peering through the dark. What happened?

  In the moonlight, she could see Eugene sprawled out on the grass at the sandy base of the tree, eyes wide open staring straight up into the night sky.

  She edged closer.

  Was he playing possum, trying to lure her into a trap?

  Or was he really…dead?

  Cautiously, she circled him a few times and then went closer. His foot was still entangled in the vine that tripped him. Surely he hadn’t hit his head hard enough on the roots to kill him…had he?

  Cautiously, Virginia inched over to his side.

  Blood was oozing from the back of his head into the white sand.

  She crouched beside him, trying to revive him.

  Placing her hand under the back of his head, just under his skull at the top of his neck, she found it…the top of a rock protruding up from the sand…the rock that tore into Eugene’s skull.

  But it wasn’t just a rock; something was carved deep into the bloodied stone.

  Pushing him aside, she dug away the sand with her bare hands.

  It was a marker.

  A slave marker dated 1843.

  LUCY MINERVA AND OVID STOKES

  FROM PALM POINT PLANTATION.

  PROPERTY OF PIERCE BUTLER NO MORE.

  IN DEATH WE ARE FREE.

  1843

  Virginia looked up at the night sky and smiled. They weren’t just building high-rise condos on the beach…they were building high-rise condos on a sacred slave burial ground.

  Her fight was over.

  God had taken her call after all.

  76

  New York City

  CANCELING THE DAY’S APPOINTMENTS TO STAY HOME HAD seemed like a good idea this morning.

  But now that Hailey had spent hours alone in her apartment, pacing, paranoid despite the lowered shades, locks, and a .38 at her side…

  Maybe she’d feel safer somewhere else.

  Here, she couldn’t help but feel like a sitting duck. He’d gotten past the doorman and locks once before. He could do it again.

  She paced relentlessly from room to room, making tea, straightening things that didn’t need to be straightened, ignoring the phone every time it rang.

  It had been ringing a lot.

  Dana had called several times, leaving messages.

  “Hailey, are you sick? Why aren’t you here today? Call me. I need you.” She sounded like she was crying. “Greg dumped me.”

  Of course. Hailey knew he sounded too good to be true.

  “Hailey, it’s me again. Please call me back. I’m so upset.”

  Man trouble.

  “Hailey, come on…I’m sorry to keep bugging you, but where are you? Pick up if you’re there.”

  She felt vaguely guilty, but she couldn’t talk to Dana. She couldn’t talk to anyone.

  Including Adam Springhurst, who had also called. She’d thought about it. Adam had it all: the degree, the successful dentistry practice, looks, charm…but something was sideways. Maybe it was just her. Even after all the years, she wasn’t ready for the dating scene, the dinner conversation, retelling all your funny stories to a different person every Saturday night. It probably had nothing to do with Adam at all.

  Bottom line…she couldn’t trust anyone right now, including Adam and Dana. Not until this was resolved, one way or another.

  It didn’t make sense of course…but Dana was the only person in the city who could have gotten into, or let someone into, her apartment to plant the murder weapon, even if unintentionally.

  She had a copy of Hailey’s keys. And then there was the night Hailey had been attacked, in Dana’s office…right after she’d found out about Melissa. Hailey was almost positive she’d heard Dana just moments before the first blow.

  Hailey sternly stopped herself. Looking out her window down the twenty-one floors to the avenue, she felt ashamed for suspecting her friend. Hailey wished she could be a different person…a sweet, trusting person. The person she was before Will’s murder, before she spent so many years surrounded by violent crime. She wanted desperately to be that way again.

  But the world had changed her.

  As the day wore into night, Hailey sat alone in the darkened a
partment, clutching yet another cup of tea gone cold. She couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat, couldn’t call anyone because she didn’t dare trust anyone.

  There had to be an answer, something she was missing. Who knew so much about her? And who knew so much about her last serial murder prosecutions in Atlanta all those years ago? Where did her Tiffany pen come from and who planted it? Would they stop at merely framing her for her patients’ deaths? Did they want her to be shamed? To lose her bar license and psychologist license in one fell swoop? Who wanted her behind bars? Who wanted to destroy her reputation and credibility? Or was she the next victim to die with four metal prongs slicing through her lungs?

  Cruise.

  It all made sense.

  But the pen…how did he conceal it for all these years in prison? Wouldn’t it have been discovered? Taken away? Returned to her…or at the very least confiscated from him?

  Hailey had torn through her apartment inch by inch today, exploring the heating and cooling units and behind the fridge, checking the washer/dryer, inside commode tanks, and inside the other light fixtures; checking for slits in mattresses and sofa cushions; searching inside fuse boxes, the dishwasher…even inside the air purifiers.

  Other than finding her files askew, she’d found nothing else.

  She should be relieved.

  But she wasn’t.

  Someone was playing a game with her…a deadly game.

  She couldn’t just sit in the dark, wondering, waiting.

  Her life depended on it.

  It was nearly midnight when she strapped on the .38 under a raincoat and headed down to Second Avenue to hail a cab.

  The streets of Manhattan were nearly empty. Hailey held her arm up in the air. Almost immediately, a cab materialized.

  It took less than twenty minutes to get to her office downtown.