Almost Dead (34 page)

“
NO
! Diedre—”

She fired. Point-blank.

With a startled cry, he stumbled backward. His handsome face was a mask of shock. “Diedre, no…” he whispered, disbelieving, starting to fall.

Blood ran from the wound in his chest, staining his jacket as he dropped first to one knee, then the other.

“You should have loved me,” she said as he tried vainly to catch himself, smearing blood on the floor.

She blinked.

Realized what she’d done.

Dear God, no. This was all wrong. She loved him.

And yet he’d attacked her!

Her mouth went dry as she remembered how she’d met him, how he’d sought her out, how she’d envisioned a perfect life with him, even thinking she would become his wife. That, of course, had been a pipe dream, the kind of childish fantasy her adoptive mother had always teased her about.

Now she looked down at him, the man she’d loved with all her heart, watching as he bled out. Had he ever really cared about her? He’d said so, but words were cheap.

It had been his idea to not just shake down the Cahills, who were in control of the money, but the Amhursts as well. He’d offered it up and she’d thought it brilliant; he’d told her he loved her, and she, fool that she was, had believed him.

Liar! Prick! She sacrificed everything for him. For them. For his plan. She took all the risks, and now…now she realized that he loved his damned grandson more than he ever loved her!

“What have you done?” he said, staring up at her, trying to lever up on one arm and then falling back, his head cracking against the floor.

“What I should have done from the beginning.”

Diedre fired again, and his body convulsed, blood showing at his nostrils and one corner of his mouth as well as spreading in a dark red stain across his chest. He was already dead. She knew it. But she shot him one more time.

The son of a bitch. He deserved it.

Cissy drove like a maniac through the streets, her gaze scanning the rain-washed sidewalks, her eyes searching for anything that might give her a clue. She tried to call Rachelle again, but still no one answered.
Think, Cissy, think,
she told herself as she pulled up to a light near a low-slung car with rap music blaring from its speakers, the throb of the bass a counterpoint to her own beating heart. Of course. The coffee shop was probably closed at this hour. The police were probably now at Diedre’s apartment, but she wouldn’t be that stupid, that obvious. The house in Berkeley was cordoned off, so that wouldn’t be where she’d run with Beej.

“Come on, come on,” she told herself. Where would she go? Where?
She wanted to be you. She thought you lived a charmed, pampered life. So where would Diedre go.
Cissy thought hard. If Diedre had always wanted a life of privilege, like the Cahills, she would run to the estate on Mt. Sutro, though that was too risky. No. There must be someplace else…someplace she would feel safe…someplace connected to the life she wanted.

“Oh God,” Cissy whispered, her pulse jumping as the wipers slapped at the rain and the light changed. The low-slung car beat her from the stop and roared around her, but Cissy barely noticed. Her mind was spinning wildly. Diedre didn’t think of herself as a Cahill, but an Amhurst; therefore, she would take B.J. to—

Her cell phone rang, and she snatched it from her pocket, saw that it was Jack and flipped it open.

“Tell me you have Beej!” she cried.

“No.”

Her heart dropped.

“Can you get away from the police and pick me up?”

“I’m already out,” she admitted.

“Oh…good. Then pick me up at my father’s place.”

“What’s going on?” she asked, desperate for answers.

“I’ll tell you when you get here.”

“I’m on my way.” She did a quick U-turn at the next corner and stepped on it, making her way to Jack’s father’s condo in record time. Traffic was light, but the streets were wet, the wind gusting as she pulled into the short drive.

Jack was waiting and dripping wet.

“What are you doing here?” she asked as he opened the door and slid into the passenger seat.

“I came to borrow a car. It didn’t work out. Dad isn’t here.” He said it bitterly, then added, “Let’s go. Drive. North.”

“To Sausalito?” she asked, glancing at him. She was already backing out, heading toward the Golden Gate Bridge. “To the Amhurst mansion, right?”

He gave her a surprised look. “You figured it out?”

“I don’t know why Diedre killed Gran, maybe because she knew the truth, but she killed Rory because he was an Amhurst. Marla too.”

“And Cherise?”

“Oh…I don’t know…” Cissy shook her head, but she wouldn’t be deterred. “I just think she would go to the house.”

“And, if Diedre’s out to get all the Amhursts, you, your brother James, and B.J. aren’t safe,” he said solemnly as he pulled out his cell phone. “I’m calling Paterno.”

“What if we’re wrong?” she asked as she eased her car onto the bridge and felt the rolling gusts of wind buffet the Acura.

“Then we look like fools. Still—no harm—no foul.” He left a message with the detective, then snapped his cell phone shut as Cissy drove through the stormy night, over the neck of water separating the Pacific from San Francisco Bay, seeing the winking lights of the city in her rearview mirror.

She felt Jack’s worry and drove steadily onward. “How did you figure it out?” she asked, guiding her car up the hills of Sausalito. “I thought you were going to Jannelle’s.”

“I decided I didn’t need the inquisition or the grief. I called Sam and couldn’t get hold of him, so I jogged over to Dad’s.”

“It’s another mile or so.”

“Two and a half,” he said, “but who’s counting? Anyway, Dad wasn’t in, but I went inside. I know a window that doesn’t quite latch. I was drying off, trying to figure out what to do, whether to wait for him, call you, the police, or what. I was running out of ideas, but as I was in his bathroom off the bedroom, using a towel, I saw his computer monitor. It was on, and Beej’s face was smiling up at me. It’s his wallpaper. So I touched the keypad, and his computer opened to his e-mail. There were hundreds of messages, all written by someone named Elyse, love letters, every one addressed to ‘Dear Jack.’”

“Elyse…Who’s Jack?” She blinked. “Your father?”

“Some people call him Jack, only a few, but apparently she did. Most of them were cryptic, but I figure they were in a hot love affair and that Dad was in on Marla’s escape and the murders, too.”

“Your father…and Diedre…?”

“Sick, I know, but apparently Dad has stooped to a new low. They headed up the long narrow road to the old Victorian manor built high on the cliffs. It should have been empty, but there were a few windows where they could see slats of light cutting through the blinds.

Parked in the cracked, uneven lot was Jack’s father’s SUV.

“Perfect,” Jack said. “I’m going in.”

“Me too.”

“Either wait here for me or, better yet, drive back to town and keep trying to get hold of someone at the police department.”

She cut the engine. “My son is probably in there, and I’m not waiting outside. You told Paterno what’s up, now let’s go inside.”

He hesitated, then reached into his pocket. “Then take this.” He handed her a small pistol.

Cissy violently shook her head. “I don’t even know how to shoot a gun. Where did you get that?”

His lips twisted. “Dad’s closet.”

“It’s loaded?”

“Oh yeah.”

“Then you use it. Really. I would never be able to pull the trigger. I brought a knife. My Pomeroy 5000, all in one.”

“All right, I’ll take the gun,” Jack said grimly. “Stick close to me.”

They each slipped out of the car and closed the doors quietly. Here, on the cliffs over the sea, the storm raged, screaming inland, battering the house and rocks. A shutter banged loudly. Cissy followed close on Jack’s heels. Fear pounded through her brain, but she didn’t let it stop her. Inside this old, deteriorating home, her deranged half-sister, more murderous than their mother, held her child captive. Quietly, they walked up the rotting steps to find the front door unlocked.

Stealthily, nervous sweat drenching her body, Cissy followed Jack inside.

The feds and the crime unit techs had crawled all over Diedre Lawson’s apartment. They’d discovered items connecting her to the crimes, shells for a .38, various disguises and wigs that had hairs that were certain to match those found at Cherise Favier’s home. There were notes and a computer—a laptop—that had already been taken as evidence.

But no Diedre.

No baby.

Paterno walked outside and popped an antacid as the rain poured from the sky. The feds had been so certain they’d caught her that they’d pulled their van from the street in front of Jack and Cissy Holt’s house.

But she wasn’t here.

There was already a BOLF on Diedre’s car and her picture was being circulated to the media, but he was disappointed that they hadn’t nailed her.

Pulling out his cell, he listened impatiently to his messages, hearing a few he dismissed, then, lastly, a call from Jack Holt. “Holy crap,” he said and rounded up Quinn.

“What’s up?”

“We’d better get our asses up to Sausalito. Jack Holt’s decided to be John Wayne.” He quickly explained what he knew. “We’ll call for backup if it turns out to be something more than a wild-goose chase.”

She didn’t argue, just got behind the wheel of her Jetta, and, as Paterno slid inside and pulled the door shut, she circled in a quick one-eighty and sped north.

The minute Cissy stepped into the foyer, she heard the muffled sound of a baby’s cry. Over the rattle of rain on the windowpanes, the scream of the wind around the house, her own heartbeat thudding in her ears, she was certain she heard her child.

Her knees nearly gave way, and she motioned to Jack to climb the stairs that swept to the second floor above this wide foyer. The house was cold and dark inside, and though she had flitting little memories of playing here as a small child, they seemed in black and white, faded with the passage of time. There had been lush parties here once, and if she thought really hard she could imagine the ghosts of guests long gone, the tiny tinkle of glasses and laughter long forgotten.

But that was fleeting. A millisecond memory, for now Cissy was focused solely on finding B.J.

Behind Jack, she slowly mounted the stairs.

Near the second-floor landing, Jack stopped and tensed. He glanced at Cissy. The sound of a baby crying was closer. Nodding toward the big doors before him, he took the final steps. Biting her lip, Cissy opened the multi-bladed tool to its longest knife, wanting to force herself into the room. It was killing her to wait. She could hear the distinctive sounds of her baby crying, louder and louder, hiccupping and sobbing.

At least he’s alive!

“Mom-mee!” he cried. “Mom-mee!”

Cissy tried to rush past Jack, but he held her back and she felt it too, that this was too easy. Where was Diedre? Motioning for Cissy to step aside, Jack tried the door, slowly edging it open.

Over his shoulder, she saw the silhouette of her son. Standing at the edge of a playpen in the darkened room and crying, his body thrown in relief by a dim fire. “Mom–mee!” he yelled unmoving. She couldn’t see him clearly, but she knew he was upset.

“Oh baby,” she cried, rushing past Jack into the darkness. “Baby, I’m here.”

Jack tried to grab her, but it was too late. She flew into the room and tripped, landing on the floor and staring into the dead eyes of Jack’s father, Jonathan!

Cissy screamed, scooting backward as Jack entered the room. He paused at the sight of Jonathan Holt’s blood-soaked body, his pale skin, his lifeless eyes.

“Dear God,” Cissy whispered, terrified, as she scrambled to her feet.

Diedre had killed Jonathan and left him in the same room with her baby!

Jack’s stunned gaze lifted from his father as Diedre stepped from behind the open door on the landing, her gun trained on him. “Drop it!” she ordered. Jack didn’t comply. “Drop it or I’ll kill the kid! You, too. Let go of your knife,” she said. Unlike Jack, Cissy dropped the Pomeroy utility weapon. Diedre trained her gun on Beej.

“No!” Cissy screamed, still far enough away from Beej not to be able to console him, not to see his little features, only to hear his sobs. It was so dark in here. “Jack, don’t let her do this!” she ordered but felt something was wrong. Off. Jack tossed the gun onto the bed, then knelt at his father’s side to feel for a pulse as the loose shutter banged loudly.
Bam! Bam! Bam!

“He’s dead.” Diedre said it without inflection.

“This is what you do to people you love?”

“He didn’t care about me,” she said and slid a glance at the corpse. “He tried to tell me my mother was dead.”

“She is. You killed her,” Cissy said and through an open doorway heard the rush of the sea, smelled the salt in the air.

“No…that’s a lie. She’s not dead, not yet…. She’s got to look like she did all the killings.” Diedre said, but her face changed as if she weren’t certain of what she was saying. In that moment, Cissy rushed toward the playpen to reach for her son, to hold him. She picked him up and let out an agonized scream. It wasn’t her son at all! It was a lifesized doll propped against the side of the pen, hiding a baby monitor which was emitting her son’s terrified cries.

“You bitch!” She whirled on Diedre. “Where’s my B.J.? Where is he!”

“The only Amhurst heir, beside you and that half-brother of yours in Oregon? Don’t worry about B.J.”

“Tell me where he is!”

“Ciss…” Jack warned.

But Cissy was livid and didn’t care that Diedre had aimed the gun straight at her heart. She wanted her kid, damn it.

“Step back!” Jack yelled, just as they heard the wail of sirens, faintly crying over the lash of the wind and the pound of the rain.

“You called the police?” Diedre demanded, stunned and furious, her voice rising over the wind and the crying of the baby.

“Yes! Yes, we called them!” Cissy suddenly threw the doll at Diedre. Oh God where was he?