Almost Dead

by Lisa Jackson

  “I don’t know how to say this but straight out,” Paterno said. “You have a half-sister, Cissy. She was adopted by a couple named Engles. Sounds like she’s now Diedre Lawson.”

  “And Elyse Hammersly?” Jack spit out.

  “And she killed my—our—mother and kidnapped my son?”

  “It’s speculation, but it fits. Do you know where Diedre lives?”

  Cissy shook her head. “Rachelle would. She owns Joltz and works with Diedre.” Cissy held up a hand as if to stop the tide of information. “Are you sure about this?”

  “You’re the one who came up with the name,” he reminded them. “When I showed you the picture, I only knew the name Engles.”

  “This is unbelievable!” Jack was shaking his head, and he placed an arm around his wife.

  Amen, Paterno thought as he called Quinn again and gave her the updated information. Then, after telling the Holts he would let them know the minute he tracked down Diedre Engles, walked out to have a discussion with the FBI.

  Cissy stared at the door as Jack closed it soundly behind Paterno. Seconds ticked by. The wet spot on the wood floor where the detective’s raincoat had dripped seemed to spread. Paterno expected her to just sit here and wait while her child was being held by a madwoman, a woman who could be her half-sister. But she couldn’t. “Something about this doesn’t make sense,” she said.

  “None of it makes sense.” Jack was pacing in front of the fire, his gaze traveling to the pictures of Beej on the fireplace, then to the toy box where their son’s stuffed animals, little cars, and Legos lay stacked and untouched.

  That great gnawing pain started up again, ripping through her guts, slashing at her heart. In her mind’s eye, she saw Beej standing over the toy box, and her throat burned.

  “Do you trust the police to get our boy back?” Jack asked, his voice verbalizing the very question running through her mind.

  She shook her head. “They haven’t been able to protect anyone, not since Marla escaped. Look what happened to Gran and Rory…”

  “And Cherise and Tanya.” He plowed anxious fingers through his hair. Pain and despair darkened his eyes. “I can’t stand it. I have to do something.”

  “What?”

  “I don’t know, but I can’t sit around and wait one more minute. I’m going to find B.J.”

  “If you leave, the police will follow you.”

  A muscle worked in his jaw. “Do you think that we’re going to get a ransom call?”

  “No.” She was certain of it.

  “And even if we do, don’t you think this person…Diedre has our cell numbers? If we didn’t pick up here, she’d call one of our cell phones.”

  “She’s got my number,” Cissy agreed. The feds had made sure she got her cell phone operational, as she hadn’t had the time. “It’s on the new phone.”

  “Right. So if she’s got Beej, and it seems like she does, then she would call your cell, right?”

  “I suppose. But what is it you want to do?”

  “I want to look for our boy. Right now we’re doing everything she wants, everything she expects. She knows we won’t go against the FBI or the police. That we’ll stay here and wait. I agree with you. This isn’t about ransom money.”

  “What do you want to do?” Cissy asked.

  “Call Rachelle. She knows more about Diedre than anyone else, right?”

  Cissy was nodding.

  “She might tell you more than she would tell the cops.”

  “I don’t want to screw up their investigation.”

  “I want my son back. I’ve got a friend who was in the special forces. He owes me a big favor. I think I’m going to call it in. You talk to Rachelle, I’ll call Sam.”

  A part of her wanted to hold back, to let the police do their jobs. They had the manpower, they had the equipment, they had the knowledge. But Jack was right. They weren’t related to Beej, and they hadn’t been able to stop this horrible wave of killings. Too many people close to her had died already. No one had saved Gran or Rory or Cherise or Tanya. “How long will you be gone?” She hated the thought of being without him, of not being able to depend upon his strength.

  “As long as it takes.”

  “You won’t have a car. The Jeep’s parked out front. If you take it, someone will see you.”

  “Sam will come get me, or I’ll jog to Jannelle’s. I still have a second set of keys for her Lexus, and her house is less than two miles from here.”

  “Uphill.”

  “Yeah, but I’m in great shape.” He managed a thin, humorless smile.

  “I don’t know,” she said, then looked into his eyes. Clear and determined, they held hers. She knew then she couldn’t change his mind.

  Reckless, bold, irreverent, and bullheaded—when Jack became passionate about something, he didn’t back down, not even, it seemed, to the police or the damned FBI.

  “I’m going, Cissy. Keep your cell on. One way or another, we’ll find our son.” He walked through the house, casually making certain all the shades were drawn, that no one could see inside.

  “Maybe the police will find him first,” she said hopefully.

  “Good. Then I just look like an overzealous nutcase of a father. I don’t care.” He reached for his windbreaker hanging on the hall tree, then stopped as if a sudden thought had cut through his brain. “But you, Ciss. You stay here.”

  “After all your big talk about getting our kid back? You’re telling me to ‘stay,’ just like you would a damned dog? I’m in this too.”

  “Someone’s got to remain here, keep the police thinking that we’re playing by their rules. There’s a chance we’re going to lose B.J., we both know that.”

  “No!”

  “Okay, we’re trying everything we know to keep that from happening, but if it does,” he said, conviction running through his words, “it’ll kill us both.”

  “Don’t say it,” she begged. “Don’t even think it!”

  “And I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if anything happened to you. So you stay put. And safe.” He slipped the windbreaker over his sweatshirt and found his running shoes.

  “I’ll be fine,” Cissy insisted, stiffening her spine. “Do what you have to do, Jack. I will too.” She felt a renewed sense of purpose as he laced the shoes. “You’re right about one thing, though. This monster who’s got him, Diedre or Elyse or whoever she wants to call herself, she’s never going to bring him back to us, never going to let him go.” She was keyed up, anxious, needing to do something. “Okay, go. Get our boy back.”

  “Jesus, I love you,” he said, and she believed him. Strong arms surrounded her, dragged her tight as he kissed her hard, destroying the breath in her lungs with a passion that told her he thought he might truly never see her again.

  That thought was crushing. She clung to him. What if she lost him? Lost their son.

  He drew his head back. “I need a distraction, so that the police or feds won’t see me leave.”

  “You act like you’ve done this before.”

  “Don’t ask,” he said, and looked around the connecting rooms of their house. “We’ll turn off the lights in the back, just leave the one to the stairs and bedroom on, maybe a lamp here in the living room, but I want the kitchen dark. I’ll slip through the garage and crawl out the window on the side of the house while you make a quick call from the landline, just to get the FBI’s attention. Let the dog go outside to do her thing and take the receiver with you. If anyone asks about it, tell them you couldn’t find your cell and were just dialing the cell number hoping it would ring so you could find the damned phone.” He glanced around the house. “Tell them that the dog needed to go out, so you stepped onto the patio.” He looked at her again, his features taut. “I only need a couple of minutes to cut through Sara’s yard and get over her fence. Then I should be able to make my way to the street two blocks over. Two minutes. Got it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay,” he said and started
for the garage but stopped. “Wait!” Taking the steps two at a time, he flew upstairs and turned on the bathroom light and shower, so that the water was running through the pipes. He was downstairs again within a minute. “If anyone asks, I’m in the shower.”

  “And then what happens when the police wait around for you to come out as prune man?”

  He flashed a smile. “Then, darling,” he said, kissing her on the forehead, “we’re screwed.”

  “You were right,” Quinn said as she and Paterno climbed into her Jetta. “Diedre Engles was married briefly to Gene Lawson, her high-school sweetheart. And get this, now he’s a cop with the state police.” She rammed the keys into the ignition and flicked her wrist. The little car’s engine roared to life, and she hit the gas. “I already talked to him, and he told me that yes, she was adopted, grew up in Sacramento with upper middle-class parents she hated. She always wanted to meet—and this is a direct quote—‘the bitch who gave me up.’ She spent years searching for her birth mother, but she and Gene split up before she found her.”

  “Why did she hate her adoptive parents?”

  “Who knows? Gene didn’t. They were decent enough people, if a little distant. Anyway,” she said, rounding a corner fast enough that the wheels chirped, “Gene said the older she got, the more, as he put it, ‘psycho’ and ‘obsessed’ she became, to the point that when she refused counseling, they divorced. No kids.”

  “Does he think she’s capable of plotting an escape and committing a string of murders?”

  “He told me he didn’t know what she was capable of, but that she was extremely smart: high IQ, but really messed up. His diagnosis: she’s got some major wires crossed.”

  “So he wasn’t surprised?”

  Quinn stepped on it as a light turned amber, then switched lanes as if she thought she was a race-car driver. They were driving without sirens or lights, converging on the townhouse where Diedre Lawson lived. On this one, they were taking a backseat to the FBI, but Paterno would be damned rather than miss the snagging of the woman who had sprung Marla Cahill only to kill her.

  “He didn’t expect her to turn out to be a serial murderer, but surprised? No. He didn’t have many good words to say about his ex-wife.”

  “They never do.”

  Quinn slowed to a stop two blocks from the townhouse. From here, they could watch the feds in action. Paterno stared through the rain-spattered windshield as the agents surrounded Diedre’s residence.

  Would there be a gun battle?

  Or would she lay down her weapon and surrender?

  He wasn’t betting on it.

  That would be just too damned easy. The truth of the matter was that he had a bad feeling about this showdown. It was true that the woman seemed to be slipping up, her actions in the last few murders not as carefully planned as Marla’s escape or Eugenia’s and Rory’s murders. She was losing it. Definitely, he thought as he reached into his pocket for a pack of gum. But he still thought this was just too easy.

  He felt in his gut that Marla’s killer wouldn’t go out unless it was in a damned blaze of glory.

  Would that kid never shut up?

  Jesus H. Christ, she’d fed him, given him a bottle, and changed his damned diaper. She’d even attempted to bathe him, but he had squirmed and struggled. She just wasn’t cut out to be a mother, Diedre decided, just like that bitch who had borne her.

  Marla!

  Now there was a head case.

  “Oh, shut up!” she yelled down the hallway to the room she’d set up for him, a room with a playpen and blankets and some of those dumb stuffed animals that always looked so insipid. She figured he’d wear himself out eventually, but man, oh, man, her head was thundering, pain throbbing through her skull. She popped another couple of ibuprofen, but she really needed something stronger, something prescribed by a doctor, a painkiller that would knock the throbbing ache out once and for all.

  It was all because of Marla. Diedre didn’t remember having headaches before she’d finally tracked down her real mother—in prison, no less! Talk about bad karma! Worse yet, she realized everything she’d wanted in life: a family with social standing; a beautiful young mother; a world of privilege…everything that should have been hers. Gone. Gone! Because her damned mother had given her up for adoption. Not that her adoptive parents were all that bad, but they were just boring, ordinary people who didn’t really seem to care about her as she’d grown. She’d wondered about that, but it was all mixed in her mind. Then there was her father. All she’d learned about him, after digging for years, was that he and Marla had been involved in a very short, very hot affair, and guess what? Marla had ended up pregnant.

  Marla’s parents, Victoria and Conrad Amhurst, had been mortified at their daughter’s promiscuity and condition. Talk about living in the dark ages! They’d talked her into going to Cahill House, where she’d met her husband, much to the horror of Eugenia. That old bat! She’d recognized Diedre before she’d died because she’d always kept track of her, through Cahill House. Hypocrite. She got what she deserved. Diedre still felt more than a little satisfaction when she remembered Eugenia’s last frightened minutes as Diedre had forced her over the railing.

  Served her right.

  The baby’s wailing had finally lessened a bit, and Diedre’s headache abated a tad too. Thank God. She walked into the master suite of the Amhurst mansion and looked through the windows to the sea. It was weird to think that her grandparents had slept in here, even made love. Her skin crawled at the thought of it, but it suited her perfectly, and at least her own dead parents had left her a small inheritance that had allowed her to afford the rent on the townhouse, the place she considered her “cover,” as well as the bungalow where Marla hid out.

  Marla, who was going to go down for every murder Diedre committed. Diedre had her alibis all set, and Marla had none. It was perfect, though in the back of her mind, she felt a tiny little schism of fear cut through her brain, something that didn’t seem to fit, though she couldn’t quite sort it out. Whatever it was, it would have to wait.

  Where the hell was Jack?

  She checked her watch and frowned. She’d told him to come here, right? This is where they always met. This was the place she considered their “home.” After all, she really did have Amhurst blood running through her veins, and once all of the other pretenders to the throne were dealt with, she truly would inherit it all.

  That’s not right. It’s not what you planned…remember?

  The headache behind her eye flared again, and she decided not to think too hard. She just needed Jack to show…and then…

  The noise from the baby’s room had disappeared altogether. Diedre tiptoed down the gallery hallway and peered through the door she’d left ajar. He was sleeping. Curled up with a lop-eared fuzzy bunny Diedre had bought for him. He almost looked angelic lying in the playpen, but she didn’t step into the room, didn’t want to risk waking him. She wasn’t sure what she thought about him.

  Walking back to the master bedroom, she let her fingers trail over the wrought-iron railing as she gazed down three floors to the foyer below. This incredible Queen Anne home was hers. This mansion that had been abandoned and left to go to seed because of Marla’s incarceration would soon be brought back to life!

  Marla would go back to prison…or…She frowned as she concentrated. Or she would be dead. Marla would be dead. That would be better. She’d decided that Marla had to die, right? So she couldn’t drag Diedre down? She rubbed her forehead and shivered. She was just under so much stress that sometimes she got a little mixed up. Just a little. Despite what the ridiculous psychiatrist had said. What was it? Something about paranoia or schizophrenia or delusions. Didn’t matter. He was a kook with his bald head and gray beard and tiny little glasses…always staring at her as if there were actually something wrong with her.

  But she wouldn’t think of Dr. Lazio Bennett III now. Not when she had time to spend alone with Jack…. Wait a minute. Was that right? Of
course it was. Jack was one of the very few people who knew who she was. She didn’t have to go by that damned alias around him, didn’t have to pretend. He loved her as Diedre, and that was perfect.

  She climbed the stairs to the turret and walked outside to view the sea. It was dark, a few lights mounted on the sea wall offering views of the raging, frothing whitecaps and angry surf. The sky was dark, the wind gusting and fierce, rain slashing from the black sky.

  It was wild and savage, and she wondered what Jack would say if she suggested they make love here, on this balcony, with the storm raging around them.

  If Jack would go for it. She turned her gaze inland, the wind blowing her hair over her eyes, and she saw the headlights on the road leading to the estate. Her heart skipped a beat, and she forced the door open and hurried down the circular stairs to the floor below. She was on the second floor when she heard the key in the lock, and a few seconds later, he walked through the front door and into the foyer.

  He was wet too from his dash across the parking lot. He stood dripping on the floor, his gaze lifting upward to clash with hers. “Jesus Christ, Diedre,” he said, no flash of a smile slashing across his face, no spark of intelligent humor in his blue eyes, “what the hell have you done?”

  Chapter 22

  Cissy looked at the clock for the fourth time in as many minutes. Jack had been gone over an hour, and she hadn’t heard a word. Nor had the police called or stopped by. She chanced a peek through the blinds, and, miracle of miracles, the van that had been parked up the street for days was gone.

  Had the FBI seen Jack leave and taken off after him? Had they considered him a risk to the investigation and arrested him? Where was he?

  She paced in front of the fire, barely noticing the flames licking the porcelain logs or her own reflection in the mirror. What if she lost them both? Not only B.J., but Jack as well? She felt sick inside. Jangled. Her restlessness was making her crazy, her nerves wound tighter than a watch spring. She had to do something.