Obsession Falls (51 page)
Stunned and deafened, Summer looked up in time to see the helicopter bounce off the edge of the cliff and plunge into the ocean. Flames leaped so high they seared the brown salt grasses and made sea birds scream with fear.
She touched her fingers to her ears, massaging them, hoping to ease that broken, stuffy feeling the great explosion had caused.
Gradually, her hearing returned. The tree crackled and burned. New, smaller explosions came from the helicopter as it submerged. Yet … no gunshots. No screaming. The helicopter no longer ripped the air with its blades. Jimmy was still flat on his back, unspeaking, unmoving …
She wasn’t afraid anymore.
No. More than that. She was thrilled. Exalted. They had won. She and Kennedy had won. They had beaten Jimmy at the game he had fought so deceitfully!
“We did it,” she yelled. She looked at Kennedy, still kneeling on the hard-packed earth. She stood. She raised her fists to the heavens. “We did it! We beat Venom. We won
Empire of Fire!
”
Kennedy nodded. He mumbled … something. The pistol drooped in his grasp; he dropped it as if it had become too heavy. Sluggishly, he toppled over, landed on his side, writhed in agony.
Summer’s brief, meaningless triumph was transformed into abject fear.
Kennedy had been almost killed. With the injuries he had sustained, he could still die. For a game. For a grudge. To satisfy the vengeance of a madman.
“Kennedy, no, please!” She ran to him.
His face was shattered: swollen, broken, bruised. Blood pumped from a wound in his hip—at least one of Barry’s bullets had found its mark.
In the distance, she could hear sirens.
With frantic efficiency, she pulled off her shirt and made a pad, then pressed it against the gunshot wound. “The cops are coming,” she told him. “Stay alive, my love. Please. Stay alive.”
Kennedy looked up at her through a face so shattered she knew no one could ever quite put it back the way it was. “Love?” he muttered.
“Yes.” She was fierce. Desperate. “You’re my love. Please. Stay with me. Stay here. Stay alive.”
“Will … try.” He slurred his words.
He was so hurt. For her. He had saved her. From darkness. From terror.
From Jimmy.
Two police cars and an emergency vehicle pulled in and parked close. Garik got out first, shouting instructions to his heavily armed troopers.
EMTs shoved her aside and went to work on Kennedy. She hovered, watching helplessly as they fought to stabilize him.
He lay panting, crazed with pain, but when they tried to give him drugs, he pushed them aside. Opening his swollen eyes a mere slit, he gestured her close. Through battered lips and broken teeth, he asked, “Jimmy?”
“I knocked him out. I may have killed him.” Summer turned and gestured toward Jimmy’s resting place. “He’s right over—”
Jimmy was gone.
Impossible.
Not impossible. Not for Jimmy.
Summer grabbed the Glock 18 automatic pistol off the ground. She leaped to her feet.
Law-enforcement officers shouted at her,
“Put the gun down, lady, put it down!”
She ran a few steps. She held the pistol out straight, swept the area with the barrel, searching, seeking, ready to protect Kennedy. Ready to kill for Kennedy.
“Put it down, ma’am. Put it down now!”
Then she saw him: Jimmy, standing on the edge of the cliff, highlighted against twilight’s golden sky, looking at her. Staring at her.
He watched her aim. He touched his forehead in salute, then his lips in a gesture of affection. He turned. And he jumped. Like an Olympic diver, he hung for one moment, arms outstretched.
She aimed. She pulled the trigger. One shot. One shot into Jimmy’s heart.
Jimmy plummeted out of sight.
Then … there were no more bullets. In his zeal to defend her, Kennedy had left her only one bullet in the magazine.
She ran toward the cliff. She flung herself onto the ground. She peered over the edge.
Far below, ocean waves crashed against the cliff and battered the rock arches. The helicopter burned in pieces, draped across the boulders, lighting the area with a harsh blaze. Seabirds circled and screamed warnings, and in the swells, corpses floated: seals and sea lions, brutally killed in the crash and conflagration.
And there, rolling in the surf, facedown, unmoving, and sullenly aflame—a body. Was that Jimmy? Could it be that the man who had caused them so much grief had spread his arms and embraced his own death?
Jimmy Brachler had enticed her to shoot him. Then he had given his body over to the vast Pacific Ocean for disposal. She supposed he had died on his own terms. “Good for you, buddy. I hope you’re happy at last.”
She rolled over and sat up.
Garik stood behind her, his hand on his service pistol. He held out his hand, palm up.
She handed him the pistol, butt-first, then allowed him to help her to her feet.
She looked around. Looked for Kennedy to give a report. Looked for Kennedy to know he was still alive.
The EMTs had placed him on a body board and were moving him to the ambulance. Blood and bandages covered him. Tubes went up his nose and into his veins. Pads held his head in place.
“Wait!” she yelled. “Let me tell him!”
The EMTs paused.
She raced to his side. She leaned close to his ear. “Kennedy,” she said.
He opened his eyes a slit.
“He’s dead,” she said. “Jimmy’s gone.”
He nodded once, a tiny jerk of the chin.
She thought he smiled.
“Gone,” he whispered.
Then the EMTs loaded him into the ambulance, and he was gone, too.
Two Years Later
Kennedy and Summer entered the foyer of their San Francisco penthouse and dropped their bags, and groaned in unison. And laughed in unison.
“It was a wonderful trip,” she said, “but I am glad to be home.”
“I’m glad you liked it.” Kennedy’s blue eyes twinkled at her.
To celebrate the second anniversary of their victory over Jimmy Brachler, he had arranged for six weeks in Provence, just the two of them. Kennedy rented a lovely chateau, they wandered the narrow roads through fields of lavender, ate good food, drank good wine, and made love at every opportunity.
For the first time they even talked about those dreadful days when they had confronted and overcome the fiend who sought to destroy them, and they congratulated each other for surviving against all odds.
They did
not
discuss the eighteen months of surgeries and rehabilitation Kennedy had undergone to return him to his former quality of life, nor whether Summer’s bizarre obsession with the cruel and charismatic Jimmy Brachler had been real, or simply good acting.
Some things were better left unsaid.
The vacation was a delightful break from their usually busy lives; since their marriage at Kennedy’s hospital bed, his firm had grown exponentially. Summer’s vacation-home-concierge business now employed over seventy people and covered the West Coast from Vancouver to Northern California and included the ski areas of Idaho.
By unspoken agreement, they were uncertain about their desire to have children. Their experience with Jimmy had left a permanent scar; they feared to bring their own child into a world they knew could be so precarious.
But still, their life was good, with homes at Martha’s Vineyard and here in San Francisco. They kept a condo in Virtue Falls. They regularly visited Mr. Brothers in Wildrose Valley, and as Mr. Brothers grew more feeble, they helped him with his fund-raiser. Wildrose Valley was becoming a cherished part of their lives.
In secret, Summer had visited the cave that haunted her nightmares, the cave where she had hidden from Dash. With a bright flashlight, she had been able to illuminate the stony walls and floor, and she had discovered her fears were all for naught. The cave was wide and long, but shallow, and the floor was only a few feet below the shelf where she had rested. Yet … yet sometimes, even now, in her nightmares, she fell again into blackness and eternity. And sometimes, she fell into the flames … with Jimmy at her side.
But she never told Kennedy, and in the daytime, the memory of Jimmy had no power to hurt her.
Now Summer wound her arms around Kennedy’s neck and kissed him. “Thank you again. I will never forget the wonderful time we had.”
“Nor will … I.” He glanced toward his office. “Now I need to go … see how many frantic messages I have … waiting for me.” Kennedy spoke slowly, careful as always to form the words as his speech therapist had taught him.
Jimmy’s brutal use of the iron rebar had left a lingering souvenir: Kennedy’s facial nerves had been demolished, and some had not recovered, leaving him with a drooping eyelid, features that seemed slightly lopsided, and difficulty in speaking.
But as before, in business he managed to get his point across, and in their personal life, he never spoke hastily or in the heat of the moment.
She sometimes wished she would acquire that trait.
“Go on,” she said. “But don’t stay too long. We’re both so jet-lagged we almost fell asleep in our soup.”
“Is that … what that was? Soup?” He grimaced. “First-class airline meals … cannot legally be called … food.”
“I know. We should have grabbed a sandwich in the airport.” She yawned.
He gave her a push toward their bedroom. “I’ll be in … soon.”
She nodded, grabbed the strap on her duffel bag, and dragged it down the hall and into their bedroom.
She had decorated simply, in the Japanese style, making the view the centerpiece of the room. On a clear night, from the wall of windows, they could see the Golden Gate Bridge, and across to Marin County.
Tonight was not a clear night. Rain splattered on the glass and clouds swirled around the building. Good news for a city suffering from drought.
As she walked in, soft lights automatically illuminated the room. One of the spotlights had been shifted to shine directly onto the table on her side of the bed, to illuminate a twelve-inch-long, elegantly wrapped box, and beside that, a tall, cut-crystal vase filled with dozens of long-stemmed red roses.
Wine and roses.
She sighed, and smiled.
Kennedy had arranged to make every moment of their vacation perfect. So she would not tease him for forgetting that she hated those freakishly long-stemmed dark red roses. She always thought they were appropriate for vampires on the prowl and excessively dramatic tango divas. Still, it was the thought that counted—that, and the card, thrusting up from the center of the flowers, and the small gold-wrapped box with it.
Wine and roses
and
jewelry.
“Oh, Kennedy.” She reached for the gift, yanked her hand back, and sucked on her thumb. Someone had failed to remove one of the thorns. She looked closer. In fact, someone had failed to remove
any
of the thorns. Kennedy needed to have a word with his florist. She reached more carefully for the card and gift, and when she had them, she just as carefully pulled her arm back.
She opened the card.
Always and forever you, Summer, my darling.
How unlike Kennedy. And it wasn’t his handwriting, either. He must have called it in to the florist …
The card’s sentiment made her wonder if she’d received the right bouquet. Not that Kennedy hadn’t sent her flowers—the security in their building was too good to think anything else—but maybe somebody had made a mistake about
which
arrangement he had ordered.
Man, she would be sad if whatever was in this box wasn’t hers, either. He loved to send her jewelry. She loved to receive it.
She tore off the wrap.
Kennedy walked in, bag in hand, and stopped. “What … are those?”
She faced him. “I knew it. This was a mistake, wasn’t it?” She gestured at the vase. “You didn’t send flowers and wine, either, did you?”
“I … did … send flowers.” He frowned. “But not … those. And not wine. Not … for tonight.”
“Then this is a mistake, too?” She showed him the box.
He stared at it, his eyes narrowing.
“Oh, well. I already unwrapped it. Let’s see what it is.” She tore off the wrap. She flipped open the box, and stared uncomprehendingly.
There, nestled in black velvet, was a round gold medal hung on a shiny red ribbon.
Had she somehow won the Olympics?
He placed his bag by his closet. “What is it?”
She read aloud, “‘Winner Double Gold … San Francisco International Wine Competition.’”
Goose bumps rolled from the back of Summer’s neck to her toes.
They looked at each other.
They looked at the wrapped box of wine.
Summer’s little finger, the finger that no longer existed, burned with remembered pain.
She untied the satin bow.
“Don’t!” Kennedy said, and started toward her.
Too late.
The ends fluttered apart. She pulled off the lid. With eyes half-blinded with foreboding, she stared at the label: a masterly painting of a ruined castle perched high on the ocean cliffs, and from its ramparts, a glorious eagle flying free.
She screamed, and fled toward Kennedy.
But she couldn’t run from the terror the name had etched into her brain:
Gracie Wines
Cabernet Sauvignon
Summer Forever
