SLEEPING DOGS (Animal Instincts Book 6) (12 page)

I started telling him the entire story of how I’d learned that Susan was alive. He waved the gun at me. “Hurry up. I don’t need the entire story, Sherlock. You’re brilliant and we know it. So where does she live?”

“How did you know that she was pregnant? I know that you figured out that I had no clue about that. I knew she had to have a strong reason for staying away, even after all this time, but I hadn’t settled on her having a child.”

Gillespie’s face was growing red, and I could see sweat forming on his forehead. He was definitely rattled at this point, and more likely to make an error. That’s what I was counting on. The more time that passed, the more chance I had of getting him off focus.

“I certainly didn’t deduce it from a set of bloody footsteps. She told me. Then three days later, Belinda Frias told me the same thing. I had to get rid of one of them, and even though your sister was younger than me, I wanted a life with her and not the maid. So Belinda had to go.” His hand trembled, and he spun quickly as my mother groaned from the floor. I hadn’t heard a peep from Siever. I wasn’t sure if he were dead or passed out or just listening to us talk.

“So you killed the maid when you all got back from Cedar Point?”

“Best plan in the world. We came home. The front door was open. She’d apparently left something in the house. I walked in first. She was there. She greeted me, and she patted her stomach as we talked. Like we’d made something. I got so angry that I grabbed a knife from the kitchen and killed her. My parents found me covered in blood, and they concocted a plan to make it seem like she’d been dead before we came home.”

“But there were people – witnesses – who said otherwise.” I kept watching his face, seeing if he was continuing to get more agitated, but he’d seemed to have not gotten worse. He still sweated and swung the gun wildly, but he seemed more in control than before. This was not a good development.

“Your good buddy, Siever, fixed that. Ditched the reports, put off the witnesses. Hell he even got my parents to move to Mexico. Murderers might be extradited from south of the border, but he hadn’t heard of any cases where material witnesses had been sent back. So I was safe. Susan was safe and the kid was safe. Until you started butting in.”

“What are you going to do when you find Susan?” I asked, fearing that I already knew the answer.

“If she gives me the kid, I might let her live. If not, then I’ll kill her and take the kid. Finally this family will have what it always wanted, a real live kidnapping of its own.”

My entire body ached at his statement. I thought about all the pain and suffering I’d gone through in this family, thinking that someone had been kidnapped. I wasn’t sure if I was strong enough to do that again. I was sure that I’d withdraw from the world again, and I was liking my weird little forays into society.

I saw a color out of the corner of my eye. The Countess had come back and was perched above us on the bookshelves. She’d been a stray before I’d adopted her, and she’d never quite relinquished her sense of self-preservation. I would like to think that I talked to her and told her what to do, but I’m sure some people would call it animal instinct to protect their human.

As if we had planned it, The Countess leapt onto Gillespie’s head, and I dove low. With a single swipe, she scratched across his face and eyes. He screamed in pain as I hit him with all my strength at the knees. I heard something pop in his left knee as we went down. He screamed again. I grabbed the gun away from him and left him on the floor as I called the police.

It was some hours later when I saw Sheila in the doorframe of my house. She stepped forward and gave me a smile. “So was it worth it? Was it worth the human cost to know exactly what happened?”

I nodded. One of the paramedics said that I was suffering from an adrenaline overload, and I wanted nothing more than to be left alone at this point. I wanted to go back to my solitary life where I stayed below the radar.

My mother had been taken by ambulance to a local hospital. I hadn’t seen Siever when he’d been wheeled out, but he was alive but in dire shape after losing so much blood. I’d stayed behind and answered questions for the police. The experience reminded me of Susan’s disappearance, and I kept wondering if she would visit now or allow us to visit her. Gillespie had admitted most everything to me, and Siever had heard part of the conversation as well. So he would be put away for a long time.

Sheila patted my arm and checked me over. “You look okay,” she said with a hint of a question in her voice.

I took her in my arms and kissed her. Maybe it was the adrenaline or the thought of someone else walking out of my life, but I kissed her like I meant it.

When we broke, there was a man standing beside us. He was tall with dark hair and eyes that looked like they’d seen everything life had to offer. He had a ridiculous cleft chin, and a body that looked like it visited the gym more than his job. His hands were on his hips, and he looked like he wanted to say something about us.

“Griff, this is Zane. He’s from IA.”

I nodded, remembering what she’d texted early about the police files. They were still hidden, so it was unlikely that Zane would be finding any evidence of wrong-doing on my dining room table.

“Sheila, is that any way to introduce me?” he said smoothly. “Let’s try this again. I’m Zane. I’m Sheila’s husband.”

~ END ~