As I gathered my wits about me, I told the nurses that I had had a bad dream. They seemed annoyed at that and left me alone. I thought about telling them I was in a lot of pain, but I didn’t want them to drug me up.
As soon as they left, I called Ethan. I told him everything that Annabelle had said. I also told him to get rid of all of the food in the house immediately. He said that he was feeling much better. So, we figured that Annabelle had probably stopped the poisoning when she pushed me down the stairs. She was probably too afraid to go back into the house.
He agreed with me about the food and got rid of all of it. He had the cook restock everything. He told the cook to make sure that all of the food was locked up tight in the refrigerator and the pantry when she wasn’t in the kitchen.
Even though it was still very early in the morning, I called Sam Perez. He was at my bedside within the hour. He already knew about the accident. He said there was no way to prove that someone shoved me, so there was nothing he could do about it. This time was different.
I told him about Annabelle’s visit and everything she said to me. The first thing he did was to call my doctor and have him order an arsenic test on me. They still had my blood samples from when I first arrived. Then he called Ethan to come in and one was done on him too.
The results came back positive for both of us. Then we had everyone in the house tested. Everyone else came back negative. Jackson rarely ate at the house, so he was fine too. How she poisoned just us, and no one else, was a mystery.
Sam put an APB out on Annabelle, with no luck. I don’t know how she did it, but that girl was like a ghost. She was still wanted for questioning in the poisoning of Jackson. She knew how to hide, that’s for sure.
When I got home, we beefed up security. I felt like I was living in a prison, but we had children and we couldn’t risk her harming them. It did appear that she just wanted to hurt me and Ethan, because she hadn’t poisoned anyone else in the house besides us. I still didn’t want to take any chances.
Chapter 35
Several months went by with no word from Annabelle, and no more incidents at all. I figured that she had probably taken off for good after our talk in the hospital. She had to know that the police were actively looking for her.
Late one afternoon I took the girls for a walk around the ranch. The ranch hands had all gone home and it was my favorite time of the day. The twins were getting so big and loved running and jumping around on our walks. I just kind of let them do their thing, while I daydreamed.
We turned a corner, around one of the sheds, near the stables, and Annabelle was standing there. I wasn’t expecting anyone and she startled me. I jumped and she laughed. It was kind of a creepy laugh.
“Annabelle, why don’t you just go away and leave us alone? You know the cops are looking for you, right?” I asked as I caught my breath. The twins were looking at a butterfly they just discovered and didn’t even seem to notice us talking.
“Cute twins. I hear they are Jackson’s,” she said, while glancing over at them.
“My girls are none of your business. Stay away from them and stay away from me,” I told her, and I was serious.
“I don’t give a rat’s ass about your kids. I’m here about something else.”
“Really? What exactly is that?” I was losing my patience with her.
“I want the Picasso. For everything you did to me, I deserve it.”
“Excuse me? Everything I did to you? What exactly is that? I can’t wait to hear it. This ought to be good,” I snapped back at her.
“Well, first of all, you showed up at my house,” she explained.
“Wait, what? Your house? You were the housekeeper. It was never your house, not ever.”
“It was my house for a lot of years before you showed up. Then you came and got to be the daughter that they loved and spent a lot of money on. I got nothing. It was all your fault.”
“Oh my god, you are delusional,” was pretty much all I could say to her. “How did you even know about the Picasso? I didn’t find out until long after you were gone.”
“I’ve been around. I hear people talk,” was all she said.
“Really? And, please tell me what else I did to you.” I know I sounded annoyed, and I was.
“You stole Jackson from me. We were in love and you came along and ruined it!” she screamed at me.
“Seriously Annabelle? Jackson was never in love with you. You are a crazy person. I’m not giving you the painting. I’m not giving you anything. You need to leave right now or I’m calling the police. In fact, forget that. I’m calling them anyway.” I was through dealing with her.
When I reached into my back pocket for my phone, I fumbled it and dropped it to the ground. When I bent over to pick it up, Annabelle ran toward the twins and grabbed Jackie. She pulled a pocket knife out and held it to her neck.
I gasped.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, Annabelle.” I put my hands up, palms toward her. “Please put her down. This is between you and me. She’s just a child.” I had never been so scared in my entire life. I knew what she was capable of.
“Oh, now you’re going to take me seriously,” she said smugly.
“Please. I’ll get you the painting. Just give her to me.” I was pleading.
“Fine. We’ll wait here while you go get it.”
“There is no way in hell that I’m leaving you here alone with her. Give her to me and I’ll go get the painting.”
“No you won’t. You’ll go in the house and straight to the phone to call the cops.”
She was right about that. I started to cry.
“God, you’re pathetic. Go get the damn painting!” she demanded.
“Put..her..down..right..now..Annabelle.” I heard Jackson’s voice, but didn’t see him. He was slow and methodical in his speech. He sounded serious. We both looked around, but couldn’t see where he was.
“Jackson, I know that’s you. I would know your voice anywhere. I’m not afraid of you. Come out here where I can see you. I’m not putting her down. I want the painting, so I suggest you go in the house right now and get it for me.” She was determined.
We both heard the gun click and he seemed to come out of nowhere. I saw him walk up behind her and put it against Annabelle’s head.
“Okay, okay, I was just kidding. I wouldn’t hurt her. You know I wouldn’t do that.” It was Annabelle’s turn to be scared.
“I don’t know that. You’ve already killed several of our horses and tried to kill me, Madison and Ethan. I know what you are capable of,” he told her. “Now give her to Madison. Right now!” he yelled.
I walked up to them and reached for Jackie, who had started crying during all the yelling. Rosie was hanging onto my leg and whining the whole time. The girls obviously didn’t understand what exactly was going on, but they knew something was wrong, and they were afraid.
Just as I took Jackie, Annabelle swung around and tried to grab the gun. It fired. Annabelle dropped quickly to the ground. I burst out crying and Jackson came over and hugged all three of us. Annabelle wasn’t going anywhere. She had been shot through the head.
“I need to call Sam,” I told Jackson, pulling away from his embrace.
“Wait. I don’t think that’s a very good idea.” He let me go and stood back, looking at me very seriously.
“Why not? It was self defense,” I told him.
“I know. But it doesn’t look that way. I shot her in the head. That looks like murder.”
I looked at Annabelle, laying in a heap on the ground. There was a lot of blood. “I see what you mean,” I said. “But, what choice do we have?”
He thought for a minute. “Take the girls in the house and then come back out. I’ll figure something out.”
When I got back about 15 minutes later he was in the stable getting gloves, shovels and a wheel barrow.
“What are you doing?” I was afraid to ask.
“This is a huge ranch. We are going to bury her
. No one ever needs to know.” He took everything and started heading toward the body.
“I don’t know, Jackson. This sounds like a really bad idea to me.” I was scared, but followed him anyway.
He stopped short and turned toward me. “Do you want me to go to prison for the rest of my life?” I had never seen him so serious before.
“Of course not,” I answered back.
“Then let’s do this. No one is going to be looking for her here. They all think she is on the run. I don’t want to take the chance that the cops think we killed her to get back at her for poisoning all of us.”
“Yeah, that’s true. But, I don’t know. This just seems like a bad idea.”
“Look, Madison. She tried to kill us and she threatened to kill Jackie. She held a knife to her throat. That is unforgivable. I want her to rot in an unmarked grave. We need to be done with her once and for all.” He sounded very determined. He hated her with everything that he had for everything terrible that she had ever done to us. I knew the feeling.
“Yes, that is unforgivable. And, I don’t want us to go to jail for this. It was all her fault. If you hadn’t shown up, she might have killed our daughter. I’ve never despised someone so much in my life.”
“So, are you good with this?” he asked me.
“I’m good.”
We found a perfect spot quite a ways from the main house, but still on my property. We figured it was risky to be on the property, but it was probably best because we could keep an eye on everything. It would be easier to keep people away from that area than if it were somewhere that people went hiking, or hunting, or something.
We spent the next two hours digging a hole, burying her, cleaning up the area where she was shot and returning the shovels and wheel barrow. We would haul off the wheel barrow and shovels as soon as we had a chance and buy new ones.
“We have to promise each other never to tell anyone, ever, about this. This has to be our secret. Agree?” Jackson asked me.
“Of course. Don’t worry, Ethan will never know. I think we did the right thing and I will never tell anyone,” and I meant it.
He saw the look on my face and walked over to hug me. I started crying.
“Sweetheart, it will be okay. You’re safe now. It’s all over. She won’t be able to hurt any of us ever again.” I felt so safe in his arms. I finally felt like I was at home, and safe. I was no longer a girl lost.
“One more thing,” he said, releasing his arms from around my waist. “Go home. Go find your husband and kiss the girls for me.”
I did as I was told.
A NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR
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Michelle
A Reckless Life
Tyler Mystery Series - Book 2 - The Prequel
CHAPTER 1 Preview
ABBEY
The storm was raging wildly outside and I had never been so scared in my life. When I first got into the driver’s seat of the car, there were ugly, dark clouds and I could see that a storm was brewing. However, I could not have been prepared for what actually hit us. It came out of nowhere. One moment, it was just dark and gloomy, then all of a sudden, the winds blew at what seemed like a hurricane force. It was blowing so hard, I was having a difficult time keeping the car on the road. We were hit with severe winds that seemed to come from every direction. Through the darkness I saw a window shutter on the second floor of an old house violently tear away from its hinges and fly through the sky, disappearing quickly. I thought about how happy I was that it didn’t hit the windshield of the car I was driving. I felt that it took every bit of concentration I had to keep from being blown away, and honestly didn’t know if the car was going to keep four wheels on the road or not. I suddenly had visions of Dorothy, along with her house and dog being lifted higher and higher into the sky.
Then the thunder and lightning came, jolting me back to reality. The thunder was so loud, I nearly jumped out of my seat and gave out a small cry of alarm. My passengers looked at me, but said nothing. They were as terrified as I was. It was certainly nothing I had ever experienced before. It felt like the sky was very angry and was making sure everyone on earth knew it. The roar was deafening. The flashes of light were so brilliant, and so close, that I had to squint my eyes for a moment, not watching the road for a precious few seconds.
Then I realized that the lightning was nothing, because once the rain hit, I could barely see where I was going. The windshield wipers on the car were moving as fast as they could, yet it wasn’t enough. Not even close. The rain seemed to come out of the sky in huge sheets of water, like ocean waves, descending down on us so hard and fast that the wipers just couldn’t keep up. I had to slow the car way down, I had no choice. We would never arrive at our destination in one piece if I couldn’t see where I was going. Only an idiot would be out driving in this storm. I had called an ambulance, but crazy enough, there were none available. I was told that it could be two or three hours before one was available. Seems the heavens were tormenting everyone that night.
Because I could barely see in front of me, I was driving slowly when I came upon some debris in the road. If I had been driving faster, I would have surely hit it, stranding us there. I didn’t even want to think about that. Unfortunately, there was no way to go around the debris, so I had no choice but to get out and move it. My passengers were in no shape to help me really, and didn’t offer. I didn’t even look their way. It was all on me, that was clear. As I opened the car door I cursed to myself for being so stupid to not take the time to grab a jacket when I left the house. I was only wearing a pair of jeans, tennis shoes and a t-shirt. As I got out, I was instantly drenched. Then a big gust of wind hit me and slammed the car door so hard, I would have lost a hand if I hadn’t forced my way out so quickly.
Ducking my head down against the weather and trying to brush back the soaking wet hair from my face, I slowly pushed my way to the front of the car. There was a small tree and a rusty old car door, of all things, blocking our way. I was so determined in my task that I hardly noticed the cold. Without a second thought, I wrenched the tree up with all my might and backed my way across the road, dragging it carefully. There were broken off branches, resulting in deadly wooden skewers all up and down the tree. One wrong step, a tumble, and visions of me spiked on a wooden skewer and bleeding to death right there in the road flashed in my mind. So, I treaded carefully. When I reached the side of the road, I laid the tree down gently and went back for the car door, which was surprisingly heavy. I dragged it slowly out of the way, just enough for me to drive around it.
It was then that I noticed I was shivering and ran back to the car. No one else had thought to bring a jacket either. We had been in such a hurry to get going that it hadn’t crossed our minds to dress warmer. As I jumped back in I reached over and turned the heater dial up to the highest position, hoping for a quick blast of heat. It worked. A few minutes later we were very toasty, even though I continued shivering. I was no longer cold, just scared to death that we wouldn’t reach our destination in time to save her.
About 15 minutes later, a large tree branch, or perhaps it was the entire tree, flew into us and hit the driver’s side of the car with such a loud bang that I jumped and temporarily lost control and skidded sideways. As I frantically hit the breaks and turned the steering wheel into the slide, I started to regain my composure as I saw the tree fly over us, continuing its journey into th
e darkness of the night. I was able to get us going back in the right direction and continued along. I was so happy at that moment that I had slowed the car down to not much more than a crawl just a few moments before.
“Watch where you are going, Abigail. Are you trying to kill us?” My passenger in the backseat yelled over the storm. That was the first thing she had said during the entire ride. She was bleeding and in a lot of pain, so had only been moaning up until that point.
I was by far the youngest person in the car, but at that moment, I was in charge, and I was in no mood. “Shut the hell up!” I yelled back. “I need to concentrate.”
I heard a loud huff from the back seat and not another word was said. Oh boy, was I ever going to pay for that later. But, at the moment I didn’t care. I needed to get us to the hospital in one piece.
I continued driving for another few minutes, more nervous than ever. The storm was not letting up, but I was determined to get through it, to fight the forces of nature, and to win. Nothing else on earth mattered at that moment. When we reached the narrow bridge that crossed over the river, I could see that the water was very high and raging wildly. It was actually overflowing the banks and threatening the bridge itself. I didn’t know how that was even possible. How long had it been raining? Certainly not long enough for that to happen. But, there it was, right in front of me, very close and threatening.
While crossing the bridge, it suddenly felt like we hit a patch of ice, which was impossible, because it was a summer storm. But that’s what it felt like. I had the steering wheel in a death grip. The car started skidding and there was not much I could do about it. I took my foot off the gas and turned into the skid, knowing that was what I was supposed to do, but it wasn’t helping. The car seemed to have a mind of its own. I could see, and feel, the bridge railing coming straight for us. For a moment I wasn’t sure if we were skidding toward the railing or if it had broken loose and was flying toward us. It felt like it was all happening in slow motion.
Girl Lost Page 22
