He raised his arm. Emma closed her eyes.
A shot rang out. Then another.
She opened her eyes. Corey lay sprawled at her feet, and someone was running toward her.
“Emma! Are you all right?”
“Sam?” She’d barely raised up when he scooped her up in his arms. Behind him was Nate and . . . was that Sam’s father? “How did you find me?”
“My dad. He remembered the boat dock, and we took a chance that’s where Corey was headed. I was so afraid we wouldn’t make it in time.”
He set her on the bottom of the steps, and she glanced toward where Corey lay. Nate knelt beside him. Sam gasped and she brought her attention back to him.
“Your feet are bleeding. Where are your shoes?”
Emma had been so scared she’d forgotten all about her feet. “He took them. Thought it would keep me from running.”
Sam smoothed her hair back. His brown eyes held hers captive. “He didn’t know you very well, did he?” His lips claimed hers. When he released her, he said, “I’m never letting you go again.”
She laid her head on his chest. “Good. ’Cause I’m not letting you go either.”
75
Three weeks later
Emma climbed out of Sam’s SUV at the Natchez City Cemetery and glanced toward where they’d buried Ryan. Gordon, hoping to mitigate some of the trouble he faced for interfering with an investigation, had shown them where he’d helped Trey bury her brother’s skeletal remains at his cabin. She was thankful they hadn’t dumped them in the river.
Sam waited at his SUV while Emma walked up the hill to Ryan’s grave. She’d come to the cemetery today to say her goodbyes and knelt in front of his headstone. Gordon had confessed that Sheriff Carter had orchestrated the whole sad affair when Trey called him, panicking because Mary Jo and Ryan were dead.
She traced his name with her finger. Ryan Thomas Winters. Ten years of looking for Ryan, and he was so close all that time.
“I’m sorry I didn’t go with you that night and that I was so angry with you,” Emma said softly. She rocked back on her feet while a mockingbird sang in the tree shading the grave. “When we were little, you were the best brother ever. I wish things had been different.”
Things like his addictions. She’d finally come to let go of the guilt from the words she’d hurled at him the night of their birthday. But she also accepted that Ryan alone was responsible for his choices. “I miss you like crazy,” she said. “And I love you . . .”
Emma stood and stared at the tombstone another minute and then turned toward Sam’s SUV. An older black gentleman waited near it and was talking with Sam.
The stranger removed his hat as she approached. “Miss Winters?”
“Yes?”
“I’m Herbert Perryman. The volunteer at Mount Locust said I’d find you here. Could I have a word with you?”
She glanced at Sam.
“I think you’ll be interested to hear what he has to say, and I’ll be right over there,” Sam said, pointing where she’d just come from.
Emma turned her attention to the older man with a gentle smile. “What do you want to talk about?”
“It’s about the slave cemetery at Mount Locust and the cabins,” he said, his words slow. “I was Corey Chandler’s client.”
She stared at him. Emma had decided there never had been a client. “The one who was trying to stop the project?”
“Yes.” He twisted the hat in his hands.
“Why?”
“When I was young . . . well, even before I was born, things that got done to black folks got covered up by white folks, and . . .” He stopped to take a breath. “I just want to make sure the truth is told about how the slave conditions were here at Mount Locust.”
“You think I’ll slant my findings in favor of the owners of Mount Locust?”
“I did.” He studied her, his rheumy eyes watering. “But after I read about what happened to you and your folks and your brother, I decided you would be fair. I’m here today because I want to apologize for any problems I might have caused you.”
“Thank you, and I promise you, Mr. Perryman, my findings will reflect whatever is here, good or bad.” She stared at the ground for a minute. Perryman. It all fell into place, and Emma lifted her head. “You’re a direct descendant of one of the families buried here.”
He nodded. “My great-great-grandfather.”
She tilted her head. “How would you like to help me on the project?”
His eyes widened. “Really?”
“Really. You could help document what we find. How the slaves lived, what they ate, everything.”
“I’d like that mighty fine, Miss Winters. Mighty fine.”
She offered her hand, and he shook it. “I’ll start the project in three weeks. And call me Emma.”
“I’ll be there.”
He turned and slowly walked to his car.
Emma walked back to Sam, who drew her into his arms. “Are you ready for next week?”
She nodded and then lifted her head. His dark brown eyes captured hers. “Are you?”
“Let me think . . . I have the ring, the pastor lined up, and the honeymoon planned. Yeah, I’d say I’m ready, unless you want to elope tonight.”
Her lips quirked in a smile. “As wonderful as that sounds, our parents would kill us.”
“And my sister too.” He checked his watch. “Isn’t that shower she’s throwing for us in half an hour?”
She gasped. “We better hurry.”
Sam opened her door, but before she slid across the seat, Emma turned once more toward Ryan’s grave. She would miss her brother, but she finally had peace.
Come on! It was almost midnight, and the light in Cora Chamberlain’s bedroom blazed like a neon sign.
He ground his teeth as rain poured from the skies, running off his black slicker.
Tornado watches had been issued for the area, and while those were as common as thunderstorms around Natchez in the springtime, he never remembered a June tornado. Still, it’d be his luck for a tornado to hit the town tonight. Especially since nothing else had gone right, starting with the phone call an hour ago from Miss Cora that had him standing in a copse of woods outside her antebellum home.
“You’ll never believe it, but I discovered more journals—three to be exact!” Even at ninety-two, Miss Cora’s reedy voice had not lost its haughty, imperious tone. “I now have proof that my grandfather Chamberlain was innocent of murder. Do you know what this means, Sonny?”
No one called him by his boyhood nickname except the aging spinster. “Of course I do,” he said. “You’ll be able to clear his name.”
“Yes! My father’s greatest wish was to restore his grandfather’s reputation,” she said. “I do wish I knew where I put that first journal. Then I would have the complete set to publish.”
“That was unfortunate, but maybe one day you’ll find it.” Not happening. Not when it was in his possession.
“Well, you’ll never believe who actually killed Zachariah Elliott, but I think I’ll make you wait until tomorrow to find out,” she said.
It wasn’t the identity of the real killer that had him waiting for her bedroom light to go out. He’d always heard that the devil was in the details, and it was the details surrounding the murder over 150 years ago that promised to increase his bank account.
Miss Cora had promised not to tell anyone that she’d found the journals, a promise not that hard to extract since it was after ten o’clock when she phoned him. Anyone else she might tell was already in bed asleep. Except for Ainsley Beaumont, but Miss Cora was old school. If she told you something, you could take it to the bank.
When he asked where she’d found them, she’d babbled some nonsense about showing him tomorrow. Well, he wasn’t waiting for tomorrow.
He rubbed his hand over his eyes, wiping away the rain. There was no way she would let him take these three journals home to read, not after she’d misplaced the fi
rst one. It had taken him a while to convince her that she hadn’t given it to him.
The corner light on the first floor dimmed to black. Hopefully a sign things were turning around. He’d give her thirty minutes to fall sound asleep before he entered through the cellar and crept up the secret passageway that opened into the library on the first floor. It was where he should find the journals since the library was where Cora was writing the book that would clear her grandfather’s name.
The woman was remarkable to navigate computers the way she did at ninety-two. Too bad she had to die. But it shouldn’t be too hard to make it look as though she’d died of natural causes in her sleep. A pillow should do the trick.
A sudden pop of lightning was followed almost instantly with thunder that shook the ground. He looked up as more lightning revealed a thick wall-cloud. He didn’t have time for violent weather tonight.
However, maybe the noise of the storm would hide his breaking and entering, and he wouldn’t have to wait thirty minutes. He slipped away from the woods and dashed to the cellar steps at the back of the two-story house and descended to the doorway. When another bolt of lightning lit up the sky, he used a branch that had fallen from the nearby Magnolia tree and broke the glass pane above the handle just as the follow-up clap of thunder shook the windows.
Once he unlatched the door and was inside the cellar, he eased behind the stairs and stood still, letting rain run off his slicker and listening for any sign he’d been heard. When no telltale footsteps sounded, he used the flashlight on his phone to illuminate the wall and find the small hole in the second panel of wood.
Once he triggered the latch, the door swung open noiselessly, and he quietly climbed the steep stairs. At the top, he unlatched the sliding door and pushed it to the side and stepped into the library. He’d found the secret stairway as a young boy, and as far as he knew, no one else was aware of it.
Once again, he stood perfectly still while the storm raged outside. So far no tornado sirens sounded. When he was certain Cora hadn’t heard him, he flicked on the light from his phone again and scanned the room, stopping at her desk.
He frowned. Where were the journals? They should have been if not on the cherry desk beside Miss Cora’s laptop, then on the table beside it. Sweat beaded his face. He had to find them. If he didn’t, and she published them, he would lose his advantage . . . and five grand a month.
A thorough search revealed no journals. Could she have taken them to her bedroom? What if she had referenced them on her computer? He stood behind the desk and booted up her email, relaxing after he found nothing pertaining to the journals in her sent box.
“You! What are you doing in my house?”
He whirled around. Miss Cora stood in the doorway, looking like an avenging angel with her white robe cinched around her and her finger pointed straight at him. “Sonny?”
“Where are they?” He took a menacing step toward her. “The journals. What have you done with them?”
She turned her head slightly toward the bedroom. He’d been right. She’d taken them to her bedroom. He rushed past her, knocking the old woman down. He ignored the resounding crack her head made when it hit the floor. On her bed, he found one journal on the table beside her bed. Where are the others?
He quickly returned to the library and shook her. “Where are they?” he demanded, then frowned. Her face was the color of ashes. He felt her wrist. No! She couldn’t be dead. Not until she told him where the other two journals were. Maybe in a safe somewhere?
He froze at the sound of a door opening.
“Cora! Wake up! There’s a tornado coming!”
Rose, Cora’s sister.
“Where are you?” Her voice, so like her sister’s, rose to a high pitch. “We have to get in the cellar!”
Maybe he should kill her too. No. The police would assume Cora fell and hit her head, causing a brain bleed, but two deaths would cause suspicion.
He would find a way to return and tear the house apart if need be to find those other journals. He could not take a chance on anyone else finding them.
“Cora! Where are you?”
“You check her bedroom, and I’ll check the library.”
He didn’t recognize the new voice, but there was no time to think about that. The door had barely closed behind him in the secret passageway when the woman with the voice he didn’t recognize cried, “Oh no! Grandmother, quick! The library. Cora may have had a stroke!”
It could be no one other than Ainsley Beaumont.
Seconds later he heard her say, “Siri, call 911!”
Acknowledgments
As always, to Jesus who gives me the words.
To my family and friends who believe in me and encourage me every day, thank you.
To my editors, Lonnie Hull DuPont and Kristin Kornoelje, thank you for making my stories so much better.
To the art, editorial, marketing, and sales teams at Revell—Michele Misiak, Karen Steele, Erin Bartels—thank you for your hard work. You are the best!
To Julie Gwinn, thank you for your direction and for working so tirelessly with me and for being my friend.
To the rangers who have patiently answered my questions, thank you! Any mistakes I make are totally on me.
To my readers . . . you are awesome! Thank you for reading my books.
Patricia Bradley is the author of three series—the Logan Point series (Shadows of the Past, A Promise to Protect, Gone Without a Trace, and Silence in the Dark), the Memphis Cold Case novels (Justice Delayed, Justice Buried, Justice Betrayed, and Justice Delivered), and the Natchez Trace Park Rangers series (Standoff and Obsession). Bradley is the winner of an Inspirational Readers Choice Award and a Carol finalist. She is cofounder of Aiming for Healthy Families, Inc., and she is a member of American Christian Fiction Writers and Sisters in Crime. Bradley makes her home in Mississippi with her two fur-babies, Suzy and Tux. Learn more at www.ptbradley.com.
www.ptbradley.com
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Table of Contents
Cover
Praise for Standoff
Books by Patricia Bradley
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Contents
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Sneak Peek of the Next Book in this Series
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Back Ads
Back Cover
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Obsession Page 31
