Sheila replayed the message, just to make sure she’d heard him right. She was having a hard time comprehending the news that Steve and Eden’s teacher had been “killed.” It sounded like she’d been murdered, but how? She wondered if it had been some kind of drive-by shooting, or a break-in, or what.
Sheila had never met Ms. Warren. She was sorry to hear about her death. But she remembered the woman’s perfume had been on Dylan last night.
What really troubled her, though, was that, right now, Steve was alone in the house with Eden. There was every indication Eden had targeted her mother figures: Cassandra and her real mother. And now she was targeting her stepmother. So far, she hadn’t tried to hurt Dylan or any of the children. But Sheila still didn’t trust her alone with Steve.
Sheila looked out at the tarmac from her window seat as the plane taxied toward the gate. Her legs were cramped because of the space taken up by the boxes under the seat in front of her. Over the PA system, the flight attendant welcomed them to Seattle.
Sheila waited for the announcement to finish before she tried to phone Dylan back. She didn’t want him to know she was on a plane. She’d told him she was subbing for Hallie today.
The call went directly to Dylan’s voicemail. Sheila didn’t leave a message. She figured he was still talking to the police.
She hung up and tried Steve’s number. He answered after one ring: “Mom?”
“Hi, I just got a message from your dad,” she said. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I—I’m fine,” he said. But he sounded anxious. “Are you coming home soon?”
“I should be there in about an hour. It’s just you and Eden at home right now?”
“Yeah, she’s up in her room, and I’m in the kitchen.”
“Dad said your teacher was killed early this morning. What happened?” Sheila noticed the woman in the neighboring seat turned to stare at her. She must have overheard.
“Yeah,” Steve said. “Somebody broke in and shot her in her house.”
“Does she—did she live anywhere near us?”
“No, she lived in Shoreline. It was on the news tonight. You won’t be home for another hour?” He still sounded worried.
“That’s right. This must be such a shock for you, honey. Are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine, I guess.”
The plane stopped at the gate, and the seatbelt sign went off with a ding. All at once, nearly everyone was standing and reaching for the overhead bins.
“What was that?” Steve asked.
“The elevator,” Sheila lied. “I’m in the hallway outside the ballroom. There’s some event going on next door, and it’s kind of crowded.”
The woman sitting next to Sheila shot her another inquisitive look. Sheila tried to ignore her.
“Well, I’ll wait half an hour before ordering the pizzas and salads,” Steve said. “That way, you’ll be here when they arrive. Okay?”
“That’s great. Thank you, sweetie. I’ll see you soon.”
“Okay, bye.” He hung up.
Sheila clicked off. The rows in front of her were starting to clear out. She bent over to retrieve the boxes, which were hard to balance with the photographs sliding around inside. As she waited for the row ahead of hers to empty out, she told herself not to worry. Steve couldn’t have been too upset if he was talking about ordering pizzas.
Still, she didn’t like that he was alone there with that girl.
Sheila knew she’d be driving over the speed limit all the way home.
*
The kitchen TV’s On Demand wasn’t working. Steve had to settle for a Seinfeld rerun to distract him as he sat in the breakfast booth. He’d already seen practically every episode of the show. This was the one with “shrinkage.” For a few minutes, he’d almost been able to forget about his worries—and the kitchen knife at his side. But he’d muted the TV to talk to his mom.
He was about to turn the volume back up when his phone chimed.
It was a text. He thought maybe his mom had forgotten to tell him something, or maybe it was his dad texting from the police station.
But when he checked the Caller ID, it showed UNKNOWN. The last time he’d received a text from an anonymous sender, it had been about his Aunt Molly. He read the cryptic message:
Thought you should see this. Your mother’s a dangerous woman
There was an attachment.
“Shit,” Steve muttered. Once again, he hesitated, knowing that by clicking on the link he might be downloading a virus or spyware. But he couldn’t help wondering what made his mother “dangerous.” He took a deep breath and clicked on the link. An article from The Oregonian popped up. It was from seventeen years ago, dated July 17. Steve stared at the headline:
Portland Woman, 20,
Dies in Fall
POLICE INVESTIGATE CIRCUMSTANCES OF
UNIVERSITY OF OREGON STUDENT’S DEATH
Steve adjusted the phone screen to zoom in on the photo in the article. It was of a very pretty blonde with a dimpled smile. The caption read: “Mary Michelle Driscoll, 20, plunged 17 stories to her death from the top floor of her mother’s Portland apartment building. She had planned to start her junior year at the University of Oregon in September.”
Steve perused the article, which explained that Mary Michelle—apparently Molly’s legal name—had gone up to the roof to smoke. Steve’s mom was the last one to see her alive. It seemed they’d argued, and his mother had left her kid sister alone up there. Steve couldn’t help wondering if his mom had said something horrible enough to compel Molly to leap to her death. The article didn’t indicate that his mother was to blame or that she might have pushed her sister off the roof or anything like that, but it seemed possible. Whoever had forwarded the article to him apparently believed so.
Steve thought about those irregular sized photos in the family album, from his mom’s childhood snapshots to the wedding pictures. He remembered that photo of her as a young girl on the beach and the shadow in the sand alongside her.
Now that shadow had a face.
He glanced at his Aunt Molly again. She was incredibly pretty and sweet looking.
Who had sent this to him? The most obvious candidate was upstairs in Hannah’s old room.
Steve figured that since Eden’s mother had been messing around with his dad in Portland seventeen years ago, she must have known about Molly. She could have read this article back then. Hell, she could have clipped it out of the newspaper and saved it. Maybe she’d told Eden about the death of Mary Michelle Driscoll.
Switching off the TV, he got up from the booth, taking his phone and the knife with him. He checked the entire first floor. He looked out through the windows for any sign of someone lurking outside in the rainy night. He also double-checked the locks on the doors. Once back in the kitchen, he returned the knife to its slot in the knife block on the counter. He hated giving it up, but he figured he’d look like an idiot knocking on Eden’s door with a knife in his hand. At the moment, he was more afraid of her boyfriend showing up than he was of her.
Steve headed upstairs. Passing his own room, he remembered the bat at his bedside and made a mental note to grab it if the boyfriend tried to get in.
As he approached Eden’s closed door, he thought he heard her crying. Steve listened for a moment, then knocked.
“Yeah, come in,” she answered, her voice cracking.
Steve opened the door to find Eden sitting on her bed in jeans and a red sweater. She wiped the tears from her face and sniffled. “What’s going on? What do you want?” she asked.
“Are you okay?” Steve asked.
“Do I look okay?” she shot back. She wiped her eyes again. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to jump on your case. I feel awful. I was such a shit to that lady in class yesterday. I was trying to act so cool, trying to impress everyone on my first day. Instead, I just came off as an asshole. I was so mean to that poor woman, and now she’s dead.”
Steve noticed th
e phone beside her on the bed. “Did you just text me?” he asked.
She cleared her throat. “What?” Before he could answer, she shook her head. “No, I was following the tweets about Ms. Warren. Did you know she had two kids?”
Steve nodded.
“You should read some of the things they’re saying. Everybody from that class thinks I’m a supreme bitch. I guess some of the things they’re saying about me are true. But a couple of girls even suggested that I killed Ms. Warren. Can you believe that?”
Steve didn’t answer her.
She wiped her face with the sleeve of her sweater. “Did you say somebody texted you? Was it about Ms. Warren?”
He shook his head. “It was about something that happened to my mom around the time my dad hooked up with your mother. Or maybe before, I’m not sure.”
“Well, what was it? What happened?”
“I thought you might be able to tell me,” Steve said.
Frowning at him, Eden leaned back on the bed. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Why would I know stuff about your mother from like seventeen years ago? That makes no sense. Dylan—our dad—grilled me about that the other afternoon, acting like I might know something. What I knew was my father had a wife and family in Seattle, and no clue I even existed. Except for a few other details, that was the extent of my knowledge about you guys until I moved in here. Not that I really care, but what supposedly happened? What’s this big mystery?”
Steve leaned against the doorway frame. He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”
If she really had no idea about it, he didn’t want to tell her. It was a family secret, and Eden still didn’t quite feel like family to him. Besides, she’d piqued his curiosity once again about her possible role in Ms. Warren’s murder. It was interesting to hear that he wasn’t the only one who suspected her.
“Was that you I heard getting up in the middle of the night?” he asked.
“Last night?” She sighed. “Yeah, I woke up and couldn’t fall back asleep. So around three in the morning, I tiptoed downstairs and looked at some of your photo albums in the den.”
Steve figured he had the album she probably wanted to see—the one with photos of their dad around the time when he knew her mother.
“It was weird looking at those pictures of your family.” She reclined on the bed, propping herself up on one elbow. “Like I said, when I was growing up, I knew about you guys, but not really. I realized I had a half sister around my age and two younger half brothers. It was kind of interesting to see all of you back when you were little—this whole family he had that I wasn’t part of.”
“I’m sorry,” Steve murmured.
“What do you have to be sorry for? You didn’t do anything.” She swept some hair away from her face and gave a wistful smile. “Y’know, you were a pretty cute little kid. I think I would have really liked growing up with you, being your big sister. I used to imagine you were this really cool little brother . . .” She let out a long sigh and then sat up. “Anyway, not to sound sappy or corny or anything, but I just want to say that you’re actually even cooler than I imagined. It was fun hanging out with you and our dad this morning. I had a really good time.”
Steve was flattered, but still a bit wary of her. “You said the same thing on the bus—right before you ditched me.”
Eden shrugged. “Yeah, I know, sorry. All that togetherness, all that family—it gets a little scary when you’re used to being alone. I just needed to be off by myself for a while.”
“But you weren’t by yourself,” Steve said, studying her. “Maybe you won’t think I’m so cool when I tell you I went looking for you after you got off the bus. And I finally found you in Volunteer Park—with that guy . . .”
He expected her to get angry or deny it. But Eden just nodded glumly. “So you saw us, huh?”
“You told me he was going back to Portland yesterday.”
“That was the plan.” She stood up. “I really did go off to be by myself, but then he called me and said he was still in town. He wanted to get together and talk. So I met with him.”
“What did you guys talk about?”
She leaned her backside against her desktop. “Well, for one thing, I asked Brodie, face-to-face, if he trashed your mom’s garden. And he said no, but he wished he’d thought of it. Anyway, he didn’t tear apart your mother’s flower beds, and neither did I. Somebody else did. Your dad figured out who did it. Ask him.”
Steve narrowed his eyes at her. “Okay, I will,” he murmured. It was weird, but he believed she was telling the truth. He was curious about who might have destroyed the garden—and why his dad would know. Maybe it was the crazy lady next door, the one his dad had warned him about.
Steve forced himself to put that aside for a moment. He didn’t want to lose track of what Eden and Brodie were doing in the park.
“What else did you and your boyfriend talk about?” he asked.
“Well, you can stop calling him my boyfriend, because he isn’t anymore. We had a very long discussion about that. We’re history.”
“Really?”
Sauntering toward him, Eden patted him on the arm. “Really,” she said. “I don’t think you have to worry about seeing him again.”
Then she headed out the door and started down the hall for the stairs.
Saturday—7:20 P.M.
Snoqualmie, Washington
Brodie leaned on the shovel to rest for a minute. “What was that line from Young Frankenstein?” He grinned up at the shadowy figure standing over him. “What did that guy with the weird eyes say? ‘At least it’s not raining’?”
Actually, the light precipitation worked to his advantage, softening the ground as he dug the grave. Brodie stood in the hole, now about five feet deep. He thought that was enough. No one was about to stumble upon this site. They were in a tiny clearing in the middle of the woods with no nearby trails. To get here, they’d hiked for nearly ten minutes from where they’d parked the car.
But his boss wanted him to keep digging for a while longer. She stood over the grave with a flashlight in one hand and an umbrella in the other. The light was trained steadily on him.
Brodie had been in her employ for five months. It was an interesting client-worker relationship that included sexual favors in addition to weekly cash payments. She’d promised to pay him extra for this grave-digging detail. She was very obliging when he demanded more money for any particular chore—and that included the bonus he’d insisted upon for being an accessory to murder.
She’d already explained to him that the grave was for the son, Steve O’Rourke, who would go “missing” tonight. Brodie had been curious about his role in making the kid disappear. But his employer had told him that Eden had it covered. She was alone with him right now.
This took Brodie by surprise, because they’d been keeping Eden pretty much in the dark about everything. For one, the stupid girl actually thought he was in love with her. The truth was he’d been stringing her along all this time. In fact, it had been tough for him to keep a straight face while she broke up with him in the park this afternoon—like he could give a shit. And like she wouldn’t just cave and take him right back if he told her how much he needed her. Some of these girls who grew up without fathers were such easy marks.
He wondered why all this responsibility was being heaped on Eden all of a sudden. But the answer was pretty clear when he stopped to think about it. He’d screwed up and was being punished because that cross-eyed cretin who’d caught him trying to break into the O’Rourke house was still alive. The local news reported the guy was no longer in a coma. He was actually responding to people now. So how long would it be until ol’ Lazy Eye was sitting up, eating his Jell-O, and describing to the cops in detail everything that had happened to him on Wednesday?
Brodie had already promised his employer that he’d return to the hospital tonight to take care of the guy—for good this time.
He went back to digging. “Y�
��know, I just don’t get it. These plans to whack the O’Rourke kid tonight are really coming out of the blue here. Eden didn’t mention it this afternoon. You usually tell me what’s going on at least a few days ahead of time.”
“Yes, well, there was a sudden change of plans,” she replied, standing over him with the flashlight.
“How the hell do you expect me to do my job when you keep changing things on me at the last minute?” he complained, scooping out another shovelful of earth. “The whole idea was that we’d take our sweet-ass time with this, deliberately driving that bitch toward another nervous breakdown—and then suicide or a fatal accident. I thought the job was supposed to take about a month. And here it’s hardly been a week.”
“Yes, I know,” his employer agreed. “But I’ve had to hurry things up a bit. I didn’t count on your blunder the other day.”
“I told you I’d fix it tonight.”
“There are other things I didn’t count on.”
He chuckled. “You mean, like Dylan O’Rourke not being able to keep his dick in his pants?” Brodie kept digging. “It’s only a matter of time before the police realize he was banging that teacher instead of erasers after school. And when they do, they’ll be watching him and that house pretty damn close.”
“Exactly,” she said. “That’s another reason I’m speeding things up.”
“So when do you think you’ll have this wrapped up?” Brodie asked, hoisting more dirt with the shovel. “I’d like to know how much longer you’ll need me.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the beam from the flashlight go askew. Brodie glanced up to see the light aimed at the trees above them. He realized she was reaching for something in her bag.
The Betrayed Wife Page 32
