by Tawny Taylor
It wasn’t going to happen. I wasn’t going to save it. I could see that now.
I’d lost it. All of it. Already.
Stunned by the bad news, I exited Hardin’s office. Carrie was waiting where I’d left her--in the lobby. I acknowledged her with a nod and headed toward the door. Outside, I heard the door shut behind me and turned to learn she’d followed me.
“Didn’t you have an appointment with Mr. Hardin?” I asked.
“Yes, but it can wait.” She gave me a kind smile. “You look shaken. I wanted to make sure you’re all right.”
“Thanks. I’m okay.” I didn’t sound okay. I blinked. It felt like the weight of the whole world had just landed on my shoulders. I couldn’t hold it up. My vision blurred. I sniffled. Dammit, I was going to cry. Out here. In the middle of the freaking street. Embarrassed, I dragged my trembling hand across my face. “I should go.”
“Like that? Tell me you aren’t driving.”
Ignoring the worry I heard in her voice, I practically ran to Harper’s car. My head was spinning. Literally. If I didn’t sit down in the next few seconds, I was going to pass out.
Carrie hooked her arm through mine, catching me as I was about to sink to the ground. “Come with me. Can you make it up the stairs?” She motioned toward a building. Her apartment building.
Blinking to try to clear the sparkling stars from my vision, I nodded. “I…I don’t know.”
“I won’t let you fall.” Supporting me, she led me through the door leading to her apartment’s ground floor entry and up the steps. At the top, she unlocked a second door and pushed it open.
Even though I was on the verge of a breakdown I couldn’t help noticing how beautiful her home was. The interior was full of period detail. Thick, heavy moldings enhanced every window and door. The wall was clad in rich-looking stained bead board paneling from the chair rail down to the baseboards. Above, the walls were painted a soft, silvery gray. Shimmering silk drapes bracketed the windows, and deep, layered crown moldings drew my watery eyes up to the ceiling.
“Your apartment is spectacular.”
“Thank you,” she said as she steered me toward her couch. “I love old architecture. They just don’t make buildings like this anymore. Sometime I’ll have to give you a tour. I did some of the renovations with my own two hands.”
“Impressive.”
“A drink,” she suggested, “what you need is a drink. What can I get you?”
I wasn’t thirsty, but I didn’t want to appear rude after she’d rescued me. Besides, she was probably right—I probably did need a drink. “Water or pop is fine. Thank you.”
“Pop?” She smiled. “Such a funny word for a beverage.”
“It’s one of those Michigan things. I meant I’ll take a cola. Coke? Whatever you have.”
“One Coke coming up.” She skittered to the open-concept kitchen at the rear of the apartment. Base cabinets stained to match the wood trim and paneling and brand new stainless steel appliances lined one wall; opposite stood a raw brick exterior wall, polished and coated to a high gloss.
My gaze locked on the brick wall. “That brick is gorgeous.”
“Thank you. I just had to showcase it. Do you notice the size and color of the bricks? They don’t look anything like the ones you buy today.” She fetched a pair of glasses from a cabinet and stuffed one into the small ice dispenser in the refrigerator door. Once enough ice cubes had clattered into the glass, she set it on the counter and raised an index finger. “Be right back. I keep my Coke stored out on the porch.”
“Sure.”
“How’s my brother?” Carrie called as she flung open the French door at the end of the kitchen, revealing a small screened-in balcony area. “I haven’t seen him in a while. Emmy, my daughter, misses him. You remember my daughter, don’t you?” Her question was accompanied by the sound of thumping boxes and tearing cardboard.
“Yes, of course. She’s beautiful. I’ll tell him she misses him. He’s resting today. He spent the night at Silver Sage, helping with the animals.” After a beat, I added, “Please, don’t go to any trouble. If you have to move a bunch of things to get to the Coke, I’m good with water.”
“No trouble.” She reappeared, a ten ounce bottle in her hand. “Emmy’s at preschool, so I’m glad for the company.” She unscrewed the bottle and poured the contents over the ice cubes before handing the glass to me. Then she poured herself some wine, sat beside me, and lifted her glass. “Are you sure you wouldn’t like something a little stronger?”
“No, thank you. This is fine.” I took a couple of swallows before setting down my drink. “I should be getting back soon. I borrowed my friend’s car.”
“Of course. Just a second. I wanted to talk to you about something.” She guzzled the rest of her wine then hopped up to grab the wine bottle from the built-in wine cooler under the counter. This time she didn’t pour herself more; she brought the bottle with her, sat, and refilled her glass. “Sorry. I’m so thirsty. I had nachos for lunch. Salty.”
Carrie was drinking a lot, considering how early it was. Was that normal for her?
“Sure. What did you want to talk about?” Watching her down a second full glass of wine, I took a handful of swallows of cola. It was cool, crisp. Just right on a muggy day like this. Before I realized it, I was staring at a glass full of ice—only ice. I licked my upper lip.
“Hmmm.” She scrunched up her nose. “I don’t know how to say this...”
“Say what?” A shiver of unease burned up my spine. One part of me wanted to leave. But then again, this was Clay’s sister. They had a rough relationship. And yet she’d been so nice to me when I needed help. I might be able to help smooth things over between them. Wouldn’t that be a good thing? “It’s okay, Carrie,” I reassured her.
“I can trust you, can’t I?”
“Absolutely.”
“Okay.” She sighed. “It’s about the fire. At Silver Sage.”
I perked up. Had she heard something? A rumor? Earlier, when I’d told her about the fire, she’d acted as if she hadn’t known anything.
“What about it? Do you know who did it?”
She nodded. “I do.”
My heart literally did a triple-flip in my chest. “Then you have to tell the authorities. It was arson.”
“Yes. It was.” Her throat worked as she swallowed.
“I’ll go with you if you’re afraid,” I offered, sensing she was reluctant to tell me what she knew. “Were you threatened if you told what you knew?”
“No. It’s nothing like that.” She inhaled. Exhaled.
I waited, my breath caught in my throat.
Carrie knew! I was a second away from finding out who had torched my house. And maybe she’d even know why.
The bad guy wasn’t going to get away with it. Not this time. For once, the bad would be punished. And the innocent protected. I’d learned in life that this kind of justice didn’t come around very often.
And I had Clay’s sister to thank for it.
“Um, the person who started the fire…?” she said, softly. “It was…me.”
Chapter 5
Everything went black for one, two, three seconds. Or was it hours? I didn’t know. I was literally struck dumb with shock.
Carrie had set fire to my house? Carrie? Clay’s sister?
That couldn’t be true.
I’d misunderstood.
Or she was lying.
Or…or she’d done it by accident.
No, she was lying. She had to be.
But why?
Carrie smiled.
Oh, she was joking!
It was a rotten joke. A cruel joke.
I shook my head. “Do you think this is funny?”
“No. I’m sure it isn’t funny. Not for you.” She patted my knee.
“Why would you say that, then? Why make such a stupid joke?”
“It isn’t a joke. Whatever gave you that idea?” She stood, snatched our glasses and carr
ied them to the kitchen.
I stammered, uttering nonsense syllables as I watched her. It wasn’t a joke? Carrie did start the fire?
Why?
No, it didn’t matter why! She was a bitch! An arsonist.
“Why!” I blurted as I scrambled to comprehend what was going on. “I don’t understand. Why would you do this to me? Why?”
“I wasn’t doing anything to you. You were just an unfortunate bystander…collateral damage.” She gave her wrist a cavalier flip. “I knew you’d eventually lose the ranch. You didn’t know a damn thing about running one. I have to give you credit. I thought you would have given up by now. Since you were so damn stubborn, I figured I’d do you a little favor and speed up the process. That way you could get back to civilization.”
What the fuck? “You actually think you’ve done me a favor?”
“Oh, absolutely. I could have done you a greater one, though, by warning you about Clay. I never expected you to fall for his lies.”
“What lies?”
“Where do I start?” Carrie the arsonist rolled her eyes. “What hasn’t the asshole lied about? He lies about everything. Even his name.”
What. The. Fuck?
“His name?” I echoed.
This made no sense. I’d known Clay for years. His name was Clay Walker then. It was Clay Walker now. What was she talking about?
To hell with that. Who cared what she thought Clay’s name was? She’d just confessed to arson. I needed to get out of here. I needed to go to the sheriff. Now. Report her. Have her arrested.
“Sure, Clay Walker isn’t his name. I mean, it is now, but it wasn’t always.”
I pushed to my feet. The door. I had to get to the door and get the fuck out. “I don’t understand.” Focused on keeping her talking, distracted, I slowly strolled toward the door.
“They adopted him and gave him the name Clay Walker. He’s a nobody. A rat tossed away by parents who didn’t want him. My parents took him in because they felt sorry for him. And then, because they felt guilty, they gave him the ranch. And the money.” She prowled closer. “It should have been mine. All mine. I’m their blood. Me.” She thumped her chest with a fist. “Why would they give the bastard anything?”
Now I was beginning to see, to understand. The hazy facts were starting to fit together.
Clay was adopted. His sister wasn’t.
But what did that have to do with my ranch?
“You’re jealous, like Clay said,” I said, thinking aloud. That had to be it. Jealousy made some people do crazy things. Terrible things.
“No!” She shook her head. “I don’t want what he has. I don’t want what he is. None of it.”
This girl was seriously crazy. Like, should-be-sleeping-in-a-padded-room nuts. I wasn’t following her logic. Not at all. Probably because nothing she said was logical.
Anyway, it didn’t matter.
I knew the truth. I knew who had started the fire, and (kind of) why. Now all I had to do was get that information to the right people.
“Where do you think you’re going?” She quirked a small smile. “Did you think I’d let you stroll out of here after this?” She flopped an arm over my shoulder and produced a gun from a hidden holster somewhere. She pointed the serious end of the weapon at my face, and my heart literally stopped. “Somewhere I read once that if the bad guy starts talking to you, you need to start sayin’ your prayers. Because you’re going to die. Ever heard that?”
Just about peeing my pants, I shook my head.
She was going to shoot me?
No. No, she wasn’t.
Was she?
Ohmygod, she might.
But people would hear! Didn’t she know that? Didn’t she care?
Maybe not.
“You see,” she continued, “if they think you’ll live, they’ll make sure to keep everything to themselves. That way you can’t go to the police and turn them in.”
“I won’t,” I promised.
She laughed. “Right. You won’t tell.” She motioned with the gun. “Get over there.”
I didn’t move. I couldn’t move. I was too freaking terrified. My muscles were locked up.
“I said get the fuck over there!” she growled through gritted teeth.
I moved a finger, a hand. An arm. A foot. I took a shaky step, then a second. The whole time my eyes were locked on the cold, dark barrel of that gun, expecting a flare of red to blind me at any moment.
“Good. Now sit down.”
Without looking behind me, I bent over and reached back. A chair. No, a stool. There was a stool behind me.
“Oh my fucking God. Are you eighty? Move faster!”
I climbed onto it.
She was going to shoot me. What could I do? What?
“Please don’t do this,” I begged, adrenaline blasting through my body and making my heart practically jump out of my chest with every racing beat.
“Please don’t do this,” she mocked, rolling her eyes. “You are such a whiner. I don’t know why any guy would fall in love with you, even my idiot brother.” She slid the gun along my neck. The metal was so cold. Hard. I shivered. “Lust? Sure. Your body is banging hot. If things had been different, I might’ve found a better use for you than worm food. But…well, some things just can’t be helped. He has to pay. He has to lose everything. Even you.” She sighed as if she were being put out by having to shoot me.
“Maybe we can work something out?” I suggested, desperate. Her plan was a train wreck. She was going to kill me? Then what? If her goal was to make Clay suffer, why kill me? “There are lots of ways to make him suffer.”
I needed to stall her as long as possible if I was going to survive this. Wasn’t that what they said?
She considered my offer for a moment, giving me a glimmer of hope. Then she smashed it to smithereens by shaking her head. She inched the tip of the gun’s barrel up the side of my face. “No. Not possible. I can’t have this hanging over my head for the rest of my life. You’ve got to go.”
I squeezed my eyes shut as the gun’s caress moved closer to my temple. Would I know when she pulled the trigger? What would I feel? Would it burn? Or would everything just stop? “I can leave the state. You know I wouldn’t mind that. Then you could tell Clay I was dead. Then, after watching him suffer, you could kill him too and have the money. All of it. Everything. Mine too. I don’t care anymore.”
“You know the problem with that plan?” she asked as she jabbed the gun at my forehead making me practically pee my pants again. “I don’t trust you. You’re too sneaky.”
Me sneaky? That was funny, coming from her.
“Besides, I’ll get everything anyway, once you both are dead. Now, let’s get back to work. Turn around. Face the counter. Pick up the pen.”
Turn around?
Was she going to shoot me in the back of the head?
The stool swiveled by itself, propelled by a kick from my captor. I slapped my hands on the counter to stop from doing a complete three-sixty.
Laid out on the smooth stone counter were a pen and a single piece of paper. What were they for?
“You’re going to write your suicide note,” she informed me.
“No one is going to believe I killed myself here. In your apartment,” I reasoned.
“Sure they will. Because all the proof will be here. The note. The motivation—plenty of people saw you stagger out of Hardin’s office. Even the video.” She pointed up, I assumed at a security camera.
“But they’ll see all this footage too. Of you threatening me with a gun.”
“Of course they won’t. Because I know how to edit video. Do you think I’d be so stupid?” She laughed. “Now, get writing. And make it believable.”
She needed this note to make it look like a suicide. So if I refused, did that mean she couldn’t kill me?
I stared at the paper.
“Write!” she yelled.
“I’m thinking.”
She shoved the gun in m
y ear.
“If you think that’s going to help me concentrate, it isn’t,” I muttered as my entire body trembled. “I can’t think with that gun crammed in my ear canal.”
“Pick up the pen.” When I didn’t move, she clicked the gun.
I squeezed my eyes and grabbed the pen.
I wished I could call Clay and warn him. He would be next. If I couldn’t save myself, I wished I could at least save him. But there was absolutely no way I was going to get my hands on a phone.
I stared down at the paper.
If I couldn’t save either of us, could I at least make sure Carrie went to prison for what she’d done? I would need to word this letter in such a way that even someone who didn’t know me would see it was a fake.
I started by addressing it to Mom and Dad, hoping that would raise a red flag if the authorities did an investigation on me.
“Good,” Carrie grumbled sliding the gun up to my temple again. “Now keep going.”
I was glad Carrie and I hadn’t gotten to know each other well. She wouldn’t pick up the inconsistencies in the letter.
From that point the writing flowed. I created an entirely different life, complete with regrets I’d never felt and promises and mistakes I’d never made. I wrapped it up with a vague, I never expected things to end like this when I had so much to look forward to and signed it.
If Carrie didn’t like it, too bad. She’d either need leave me alone while she found some more paper or accept it.
She snatched it up and read it while I watched, my breath blocked in my throat by a huge boulder. She squinted in a few places, which made me hope she might insist I write a new letter. But after reaching the bottom of the page, she smacked it down on the counter. “It isn’t perfect but it’ll do,” she snapped. “Now the fun part.”
The contents of my stomach roiled.
My heart slammed against my breastbone.
She shoved the gun harder against my left temple.