“I don’t know. I did see him going to the Howe’s a minute ago though. You can go ask him.”
Shit. I burst out the door and started running for Judith’s house.
Sev called after me, “Alex, what’s going on?”
“I think Pearl is in trouble!” I shouted back.
So many horrible thoughts ran through my head I barely processed them, but burning bright and constant was the fear I’d failed Pearl again. Me and my fucked-up, too slow brain. I should have kept my eye on everyone, regarded everything anyone said as a link. Stupid me, not figuring the quiet one as the culprit. Or had I been resistant? I was a quiet one, after all, and I still wasn’t entirely sure what I was capable of in my worst moments.
I slammed into the door of Judith’s house, turning the knob at the same time. Locked. I banged on the wood, hoping, praying I’d made a ridiculous leap in judgment.
“Judith!”
No answer.
Sev and his shorter legs couldn’t be much further behind me, but I didn’t dare waste the precious seconds. I squared my shoulder and rammed into the door, once, twice, and the lock gave. I stumbled in, off-balance and in pain, and almost tripped over George Howe. He was very, very dead. If the glassy eyes didn’t announce it, the gaping neck wound would have. Like Emma. I choked on my own panic.
“Pearl!” I shouted.
“Alex!” she shrieked from somewhere deep in the house.
A male voice rumbled something, followed by her yelp. I leaped over George’s body and careened into the parlor.
I heard Crista’s pleading before I saw her. She stood in the doorway between the living room and some kind of den, hands out, begging. Over her shoulder, I saw Arthur Parrish’s beanpole stature silhouetted against a large window. In one hand, he held Pearl’s arm, stretched to reach his height, as she squirmed. In his other, he held a bowie knife, which he was using to keep Judith at bay.
Something clattered behind me, but I didn’t turn my face away from Arthur and Pearl. Sev’s voice followed. “Alex! What in God’s name…”
He tripped into the room, shock and confusion on his face. Then he pulled his knife and charged forward. I only just managed to grab him and hold him back as Arthur brandished his own blade dangerously close to Pearl’s arm.
“Alex!” Pearl cried again.
Arthur yanked her, sending her scrambling to keep her balance as he turned to me. “Mr. Carrow,” he said. His proper, nasal voice clashed with the circumstances. “You’ve come at a bad time.”
Judith whimpered. “I don’t understand, Arthur. Why would you do this?”
“He wants you,” I gasped. The wound he’d given me hurt so much it was almost blinding. “He was jealous, pure and simple. He didn’t want you marrying Trask, so he followed him into the woods and killed him. And he killed Ed because he had seen evidence, and then he killed Richard so he would be the scapegoat.”
Judith’s mouth fell open.
Arthur almost looked impressed. “And how did you figure that out?”
“You don’t give Fran enough credit. She told me you lied about who had called for the search party and that she didn’t tell you Richard ran away.”
“Ah, I should have known you weren’t clever enough to figure it out on your own—”
“You should have let Richard run,” I snapped. “He would have gone, and everyone would have believed your lie. You didn’t have to kill him.”
“He didn’t run though. That would have been smart, and we all know—” Arthur paused and looked around the room as if expecting a flurry of agreement. “—Richard was not what they call a bright bulb. He came back to hide from Bob Kelly in the library. And that’s when he told me he knew I had gotten in late Thursday morning. Little weasel tried to blackmail me. After everything I’d done for him! So, he had to go. Ed too. Good riddance to both of them anyway.”
“And you followed me to kill me”—my vision was starting to go hazy again—“because I was putting it together.”
He nodded. “I knew you were getting toward something. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be poking around. Besides”—he glanced at Judith—“I understand you have been visiting this household uninvited.”
Judith put out imploring hands. “He’s just a friend, Arthur. Not even a friend, yet. He’s been here, what, a few days?”
“It’s only a matter of time.” He looked to me. “She’s the most cultured woman in this place. Writer from Boston? She’s bright enough to know a ticket out of here when she sees one. Now”—he turned to Judith again—“I don’t think you’ll be coming willingly at this point, so I’m afraid I have to take some liberties.”
He tugged Pearl again, and she screamed.
“Please!” I called. “Let Pearl go. You know she’s not the one you want. She hasn’t done anything.”
He squinted at her for what felt like the longest second in my life and then tossed her at me. She whimpered as she tripped into my arms. Arthur’s now-free hand clamped onto Judith’s arm, and he moved the knife to her throat. “You’re right, I don’t need her. Now, you, on the other hand.” He sniffed her hair, and she whimpered. “If you will excuse us. Please don’t try to follow.”
He dragged her backward toward the kitchen. I held onto Pearl, who cried into my shirt until they were out of sight. “You all right?” I asked.
She nodded.
“Good. Stay here.” I shoved her against Sev. “I’m going after them.”
He gaped at me. “Are you insane?”
I might have answered him, except I was too busy running through the house. A door to the outside was swinging open, offering me a glimpse of Arthur shoving and pulling Judith toward a truck I’d never seen. Did Arthur own a truck? I’d never bothered to ask, but a car would explain how he got in and out of the woods so quickly.
Within mere steps, I felt my heartbeat in my head, sending fresh blood gushing against the bandages and making me dizzy and slow. He would outrun me, even dragging Judith with him.
They were only a few yards from the truck when something flashed by the corner of my eye. Fran, on her bike, sped past me. She got closer and closer to Arthur. What the hell? She was going to hit him if she… Oh, that was the idea. But that was crazy! I shouted after her. She ignored me, ramming into the back of his legs.
Fran, Judith, and Arthur all went sprawling. I’d only have a few seconds to catch up before Arthur got to his feet. But a few seconds was all I needed. I pounced on him, pinning his arms into the dirt. He shouted and struggled, but by some miracle, I was too strong for him.
Judith pried the knife out of his hand and chucked it some yards away before clambering to her feet and screaming for help. Within a few moments, dozens of people appeared. Maude hurtled from wherever she’d been to Judith’s side, hands and eyes skimming her for injuries.
Kelly and Wallace jogged up, late to the party, as usual. “Can someone tell me what in the world is going on here?” Kelly demanded.
Fran, back on her feet and dirt across her dress, started in right away. “You should have seen it, Mr. Kelly! I was telling Mr. Carrow I never saw Mr. Parrish on Thursday morning and—”
“Someone who’s not you, Miss Gaines.”
Kelly pulled me by the back of my collar while Wallace grabbed Arthur. The librarian twisted against his grip but gave in. His glasses were cracked and bent, and the whole left side of his face was scraped. I glanced at Judith. She too was dusty and bruised, with rents in the knees of her stockings, and she shook. Otherwise, she seemed all right. Maude pulled her closer.
“Arthur k-killed my father,” she stammered, “and tried to kidnap me. And he murdered Walter and Ed too.”
“And Richard!” I panted.
Kelly blinked and let go of me. I tried to straighten and look smug, but that last jump had taken everything out of me. I swayed, but as I was about to fall over, familiar arms wrapped around me.
“Hey, Sev,” I said weakly.
“You really need to stop runni
ng into trouble,” he answered.
“But then you get to come rescue me.”
“Shush, someone will hear you.”
Despite his admonition, no one was listening to us. They were all chattering over one another—arguing, accusing—as Wallace tried to wrestle handcuffs onto Arthur.
“Hey!” I shouted.
Everyone paused and looked at me.
“Sheriff Kelly,” I panted as I leaned against Sev’s arm, “I think you owe Mrs. Ferri an apology.”
He opened his mouth to answer, but I missed what he actually said because I blacked out again.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I came to only a few seconds later to Sev tapping my face. From the ground, I caught a glimpse of Arthur being hustled off. Somehow, I was dragged to my feet and helped into the back seat of a car, where I slumped against Sev’s shoulder. He murmured things at me I either didn’t quite hear or didn’t understand.
When we got back to the house, the doctor Mr. Gaines had brought around was sitting on our porch, confused and frustrated. I got hauled inside and poked at. He declared me lucky to be alive between the hit, the blood loss, and the shock of overexertion. I could almost hear Martin in his indignant tone, though unlike Martin, he laid off the hour-long speech about how I was a self-destructive idiot.
I tried explaining to Sev everything that had happened with the murders while the doctor ran stitches into my scalp, but I got jumbled, and in the end, I was fairly sure he hadn’t gotten any of it. He simply said it all sounded very fascinating, and that I should tell it again after I’d had some rest. When the doctor left, I was put back in the brass-post bed, and Sev stayed in the chair next to me until I fell asleep.
I woke up sometime later to the sound of a door opening and closing. It was night, and the lamp on the nightstand was on. It gave a soft, yellowish glow to the room. Both windows were open, letting in a cross breeze and the sound of cicadas. I felt less dazed, though my head was still very sore. I reached for Sev where I had last seen him, but he wasn’t there. Only the rosary beads remained on the chair. Despite our earlier conversation, I still sat up in a panic, sure he had snuck away, and unsure of what exactly had happened after Arthur Parrish bolted.
But as I listened, I heard a hushed, excited conversation, though I didn’t understand. I shook my head to clear it and realized the reason I couldn’t figure out what they were saying was because they were speaking in Italian. The door opened a crack, and Sev poked his head in. His expression softened when he saw me sitting up.
“Good, you are awake. Are—”
“Is Pearl okay?” I asked. “I can’t remember.”
“She’s fine,” he assured me. “A little shaken and worried about you, but otherwise, she is fine. I just got her to bed, though, so—”
“Enough.” Bella swept past him. “I do not have all night,” she said as her heels clacked on the wood, sending little spikes into my aching head. She stopped next to the bed and peered down at me. Her hair was in disarray, and she had sweated through her clothes. Kind of smelled too. That was something special, the Queen of Sin not drowning everything in the heavy notes of ambergris and roses. Sev shut the door behind them as I leaned against the headboard.
“You look as bad as I feel,” I mumbled.
She frowned. “I will forgive you for your smart mouth since I know you’ve taken some hits in the head.” She sighed, and her icy energy thawed. “I have come to thank you for finding the true killer. The librarian, I understand.”
I waved a hand or tried to. “He would’ve snapped anyway, and they would have had to let you go.”
“Perhaps. Or perhaps they would have kept me because they could. Sheriff Kelly is a nasty man. But now he will get what is coming to him.” She leaned closer. “You should learn to accept gratitude.”
“I might, except I know you’re trouble.” I looked her square in the eye. “Why’d you have Leo Manco killed?”
Sev looked startled, Bella less so.
“Did Crista tell you that?” she asked.
“No, I figured it out between all the back and forth. After years with no problems, suddenly the feds show up and administer a little rough justice to an employee? Meanwhile, no one’s actually living in this house. Then there’s a man here who no one has seen before or since who happens to have been on a ‘hunting trip’ during that whole time. One who the police conveniently couldn’t find afterward.” I blinked back my increasing headache. “I assume Wallace was in on it rather than Kelly? He hopped to it pretty quickly when you started bossing him around.”
“Bella, did you really?” Sev asked with a tone more appropriate to asking a child if they had put a frog in their sibling’s sock drawer.
Bella’s gaze bored into me. “Will you tell her?”
“No. I don’t think that will help anyone. I just want to know why.”
She sighed. “Very well. I found out Mr. Manco was going to turn on us, not just go to the police, but to the federal men. I would not have worried so much except he was very close. He knew everything about Crista’s first husband and knew where the body is buried. I could not trust him, so he could not stay alive.”
Sev frowned like hearing the story hurt. “Why would he betray us?”
“Their baby. He had the idea he wouldn’t be a good father unless he got away from us.” Bella gave me a side-eye. “He found no peace with himself.”
“Couldn’t just have scared him straight?” I asked.
“No. I have someone break his legs and then what? He adds that to the list of things I’ve done. He was very driven; nothing I could have done would have stopped him.”
“And Crista never needed to know.”
Bella looked away. “I did what had to be done to protect everyone. It was one friend’s happiness or everything I ever built, everything my father built, and all the people who fit into it. I made the clear choice.”
Clear enough if the things she had built weren’t criminal all the way through, but I was in no position to fight, both literally and figuratively. And if Leo Manco had torn down Bella’s empire two years ago, where would I be now? Not in fucking Chickadee, Vermont, but also not with Sev. Maybe I wouldn’t even be alive. “Why did you come up here when you knew very well who had killed her husband?”
“She is still my friend, Mr. Dawson, and when my friends call, I come. As you well know.”
“I think you need to rethink what it means to be a good friend.”
Sev mumbled something under his breath in Italian that was probably something along the lines of begging for forgiveness, maybe even tossing in something about my brains being scrambled. Bella held up a hand, and he stopped trying to apologize for me.
“He is a clever man and brave. I’m beginning to see why you like him.” Bella’s mouth twisted into a nasty smile. “Have I told you I like that you’re not afraid of me? I can find work for a man like you.”
It took me a few seconds to figure out what she was saying. “No, thanks. I’ll take my chances with the publishers.”
She shrugged. “Your choice. But you only need ask.” She put a small notebook on the side table before turning to go.
“Wait.”
She turned back and rolled her eyes. “You are testing my patience now.”
“Why did you let Kelly keep you in a cell for days? Even with your gang all mixed up, I’m sure you could have gotten someone besides me to get you out.”
Silence.
“Yes, Bella, why?” Sev asked.
“He’s making you bold, darling cousin,” she said. “My business is my own.”
He stared at her and asked her something in Italian. She seemed taken aback for a moment, but she answered. As soon as she finished speaking, she spun on her heel and clicked her way out. He trotted after her, and they disappeared into the foyer. I caught a few muffled sentences. The front door open. More conversation—Italian, of course—through the window, followed by Bella’s heels on the stairs, the slam of a car do
or. A flash of headlights beamed through the window before moving away. A moment later, the front door opened and shut again. Sev reappeared and let out a long-suffering sigh.
“I wish you wouldn’t pull tiger tails,” he said as he returned to his chair. “One day, she won’t be so forgiving.”
I shrugged. “She seems to like you, so I figure we got a couple more months at least. What’d you say to her, anyway?”
He remained thoughtful and quiet for a few seconds, fiddling with the rosary. “I asked her when she last received at church. And she said she had at Dario’s funeral, but she shouldn’t have.”
“I don’t know what that means.”
He waved a hand. “It doesn’t matter.” He went quiet again. “I think she stayed in the jail to punish herself.”
“You’re kidding! She made us run in circles and almost got me killed because she was sulking?”
“I wouldn’t say sulking. She knows what she’s done. And with Dario gone, I think she is thinking about what could happen to her.”
“I mean, great, she’s sorry, but she should have warned us she was going to be all depressed and religious.”
He sighed. “She is family.”
“Family isn’t everything! My dad was shit, all right? Horrible. Worse than Taggart ten times over. And I have no problem leaving his memory in the gutter. Mom too. She walked off without me. I don’t owe her anything. You don’t owe Bella anything. You don’t owe anything to people who bring you down, make you be something you don’t want to be.”
Sev watched me in silence for a moment and then said, “Imagine someone breaks in here and threatens us. Wouldn’t you rather have a big, vicious dog between them and us than nothing at all?” He picked up the notebook Bella had left and handed it to me. “And there are other benefits.”
Curious, I opened it. It contained a list of names, addresses, and numbers of people in the writing business, people everywhere from small-time magazines to the New York Times. Connections, presumably. Some had been underlined, circled, or starred, some all three. I shuddered to think what the coding meant—some of it couldn’t be good. But the gift was sweet of her if kind of twisted. Maybe that was how she kept the wolves at bay: providing a woman’s touch in a game otherwise filled with dead bodies and ruin.
Boiling Over Page 21
