Leaping to one side, he rolled onto one shoulder, meaning to pop back to his feet and smoothly lift the gun. But halfway up, a wave of agony washed over him, the pain of his half-forgotten injury. Blackness slashed across his vision, and by the time he recovered, he caught only a glimpse of receding taillights before they disappeared around the corner.
He cursed violently, certain the old woman had pulled off an escape with the help of her accomplice, and equally sure that by the time he retrieved his truck, he would never catch up with them.
Head spinning, he strained his attention to the breaking point but heard nothing except distant traffic. No approaching sirens, in spite of the gunfire. Perhaps no one else was home, or the neighbors might have assumed the gunfire had come from the rougher area two blocks away.
A sad statement about the area, but Marcus took the silence as a blessing, an opportunity to head back to his pickup. To head back and head out, assuming Caitlyn had left the keys inside it. If not, he could use the hot-wiring skills he had picked up to start the engine, then put New Orleans in the rearview forever. Yet the thought of leaving Caitlyn to face this nightmare on her own wrung the breath from his lungs.
He tried to shrug off his unwillingness to leave, telling himself that what he felt was nothing but an urge to bed her, unlikely and unwise as it was. The beautiful green eyes, the blond hair, the slender curves that called his body like a beacon. Nothing but his hormones leading him to trouble.
But no matter how hard he tried, he knew damned well that he was lying. Lying to himself to think that any other woman would affect him the same way. Powerless to stop himself, he returned to knock at Caitlyn’s back door.
When she didn’t immediately answer, he called, “It’s me! I didn’t see her, but evidently she drew a bead on me.”
Nervous as she was, Caitlyn must have heard the gunshot and the squeal of tires. Was she afraid to draw the old woman’s attention back to herself? “She’s long gone now,” he assured her. “It’s safe to open up.”
He would swear he felt Caitlyn on the other side of the door, wavering between the man she thought she knew and the killer she’d been warned of. A man so evil, he would strangle and then burn the body of a woman he had promised to love and protect.
“If you let me back in, I can explain things,” he said. “I’ll tell you what happened in Pennsylvania. All of it, I swear.”
“Put down the gun,” she called, “and step away. Move back and put your hands up.”
He should turn now, run for his life and for Theo’s future. Run for another chance to set up something with his mentor and the attorney who handled Isaiah’s affairs.
But Caitlyn called him to her, the way the Gulf called to the river. And like the Mississippi, he was compelled to flow toward her embrace.
“Okay.” He turned a moment before squatting. “The gun’s up against the door.”
Moving to a safe distance, he showed his empty hands and waited. The door opened, and she grabbed the pistol, then stood pointing it his way.
“I’m sorry, Marcus,” she murmured. “But you can come inside now.”
Once indoors, he waited while she locked up, and then, at her bidding, walked ahead of her into the kitchen, where he sat at the counter. To his astonishment, she turned her back to him and started scooping coffee into the brew basket.
Wondering if she’d completely changed her mind about him, he asked, “You aren’t worried I’ll sneak up behind you?”
Blond waves swung as she shook her head. “And you’re not worried I’ll turn around and shoot before you make it three steps?”
“Probably not.” He patted the front pocket of his jeans. “Since I ejected the magazine before I returned the gun.”
She whirled around, her delicate brows raised. “No bullets?”
“No offense,” he said, “but being shot once this evening was enough for me, and you seem a little on edge.”
“You think?” A wry smile slanted across her strained face. “But what if that crazy old bat comes back? Or the killer?”
“By then I plan to have charmed you into letting me protect you.” Marcus tried out a grin.
Caitlyn didn’t return it, only turned again to take out a pair of mugs and clunk them down on the counter.
“Are you going to charm me the way you charmed your fiancée, Marcus?” she demanded. “Will you protect me the way you protected her?”
Marcus felt his face hardening like plaster, a mask to cover the violent upheaval inside him. “I thought the world of Samantha. I loved her.”
As harshly as the words came out, he wondered if they were true. Or had he merely wanted to love the shy and gentle Sam because she was Isaiah’s granddaughter?
Pain shafted through his chest with the thought, a mix of grief and guilt.
“I would’ve given my life to keep her safe.” Despite what it cost him to speak them, the words were cool and hard as plate glass. “You’re right, though. I did fail her. I thought I could make him understand, but…”
The coffeemaker burbled, weaving the richly bitter scents of chicory and coffee around them like a net.
“You didn’t…” Caitlyn shook her head. “You really didn’t kill her?”
Though hope had been a stranger to him, he recognized it in her voice. Along with healthy skepticism.
“She didn’t die by my hand, but she died because of me.” He willed himself to hold her gaze. “And believe me, I will spend the rest of my life paying, whether it’s in a prison cell or on the road. I’m in hell either way.”
“What do you mean, she died because of you?”
He held her gaze. Lodged for years inside him, the truth had put down such deep roots that unearthing it felt like wrenching his beating heart from his chest.
“I have a brother, Theo…” he managed to say.
Her hand settled atop his on the counter. Her words were even softer. “Go on, Marcus. Tell me.”
“He was such a great kid. A real live wire, and so funny. Everybody loved him.”
Her fingers caressed his, the trust implicit in that simple touch quieting the storm.
“When he was only eight, it all changed,” Marcus said. “He had an accident, brain injury…”
He thought about those first harrowing weeks in the hospital, the heartbreaking years in rehab afterward. Theo’s frustrated outbursts as he struggled to relearn everyday skills, his inability to read or consider others’ feelings, the shockingly violent outbursts that made a return to school impossible.
“A lot of those changes were pretty tough to handle. But we managed to keep him home. Even after our father died, my sister and I…” Grimacing, he shook his head. “We kept the promise we made that we would never dump Theo in a state institution, not even when he grew as big as a young bull and couldn’t understand his own strength, let alone deal with his emotions or anyone else’s.”
“How have you managed?” Caitlyn asked.
“It’s taken everything we both had, everything that we can think of, to keep him safe and happy—or at least as happy as he’s capable of being.”
Laying the gun down on the counter, she filled the mugs. “So you’re saying that your brother—that he… Why would he…?”
“Hurt Samantha?” Eyes hazing, Marcus sipped the bitter coffee. Even four years later, he still couldn’t say the word kill. “After I—when I found her, I knew—I damned well knew—how jealous he was of her. How could I have missed the signs that he had gotten so bad?”
Caitlyn ran her flattened palm along his back. “You couldn’t have known, Marcus. How can anyone predict something so unthinkable?”
He glared at her, neither wanting nor deserving absolution. “He’d gone crazy, absolutely crazy.”
“I’m sorry,” she murmured.
“He thought— Theo had this insane idea Sam had replaced me with some kind of imposter,” Marcus went on. “Because I was happy for a change, looking forward to the future. He decided the only way
to get the real me back was to—to destroy—”
He screwed his eyelids tight, unable to bear the hideous memories playing like a slasher film behind them. Samantha’s body, splayed on her bed. The hideous bruising against the chalky whiteness. His final glimpse of her lifeless face before the flames forced him back. “I couldn’t believe what happened. Couldn’t imagine how I’d missed the signs. I should’ve—should’ve—warned Samantha. Never should have brought her anywhere near our screwed-up family.”
“You blame yourself.” Caitlyn’s soft voice floated nearby. “So you took the blame for him.”
“He was a child—a damaged child. I am the one responsible,” he ground out through his clamped jaws.
“You aren’t. And it was wrong of you to keep the authorities in the dark. What if Theo hurts someone else?”
Marcus shook his head. “He won’t. I’m seeing to it. Paying a fortune for a secure, private facility where he’s well looked after. Selling the pictures I take—selling what’s left of my soul—to keep that promise I made to my father before he died.”
“But what about you, Marcus? You can’t just sacrifice your own life by letting the police believe you were the one who—”
“Don’t make me out to be so noble.” Bitterness leached into his voice. “Don’t act as if I don’t deserve everything that’s happened to me.”
“You don’t, and you could still set this straight.”
“How? Witnesses saw me running out of her place. I had to collect myself before I went home, had to calm down so I could deal with Theo without killing him myself. Even if they hadn’t come forward, as her fiancé, I was already the natural suspect.”
“You could still explain, Marcus. Could let them talk to your sister, even Theo. Once he starts spouting all that body snatchers stuff, surely they’ll have to realize—”
“The police are only part of the problem. Samantha’s father is involved in some criminal…enterprises out of Atlantic City. He’ll kill me if he tracks me down, even if he’s doing it only to avenge my brother’s crime. And the authorities would put Theo away, either in a prison or one of those places where they warehouse the criminally insane.”
Shaking his head, he told her, “A place like that would kill him. The cage, the drugs to blot out the world… Even back when it happened, he was old enough and the crime was so violent that he’d more than likely end up certified as an adult and put in an adult institution.”
“It might not be as bad as you think. Surely they’ve made strides in the way mentally ill patients are treated. You could check into it. Talk to an attorney about making this right.”
“I can’t!” he burst out. “I won’t.”
In her eyes, he saw the shifting shadow of emotion. Doubt, he thought, or it might have been foreboding.
Because an instant later the back door exploded inward, and two uniformed men rushed in, shouting, “Police! Get your hands up! Both of you—right now!”
Chapter Fourteen
“Please—no guns,” cried Caitlyn, her heart thumping toward her throat and her hands quivering above her head. “This—this is my house. He’s a guest.”
By the time she had the words out, an older black officer with serious brown eyes had already spun her around and handcuffed her wrists before frisking her briskly. Too stunned to react, she saw his partner, a younger white man built like a linebacker, slam Marcus so hard against the counter that he doubled over.
“Feet apart.” The huge cop’s voice boomed through the kitchen as he kicked at the inside of Marcus’s shoe. “Wider!”
Marcus glared over his bloodstained shoulder, a look the officer rewarded by yanking his hands behind his back. Instead of relenting when Marcus grunted with pain, the man cuffed and searched him roughly, jerking his wallet from his jeans.
“Let him go,” Caitlyn pleaded. “Can’t you see he’s hurt?”
The officer beside her shook his head, his lined face stern. “What we see now, Miss Villaré, is an injured man and a gun, after one of your neighbors called in a report of an intruder and shots fired.”
“That’s right. Someone did shoot him,” she snapped. “And you’re hurting his arm worse by—”
“Did you shoot him?” he asked pointedly, turning until she could finally make out A. J. Timmons on his nametag. “I can understand why you’re on edge. We’ve all been briefed about the murder victims you discovered.”
“No! I never fired my gun. I only grabbed it because some lunatic shot into my house from out front. You can see the bullet holes through the front window. I’ll show you.”
“Who was shooting? Did you see him? Could he still be in the area?”
“She’s long gone, but it was Eva Rill—the same old woman who lured me to the cemetery. She was there, too, when I found the first body. When we…” Her gaze flicked to Marcus, but he kept his eyes straight ahead, his fixed expression offering no guidance.
The two officers exchanged a look before the larger man asked Marcus, “Did Ms. Villaré here catch you tryin’ to break into her place? That why she blew a hole in you?”
“Hell, no,” Marcus confirmed, his face gray with strain. “She didn’t hurt me, and I wasn’t breaking in. And she only…let me inside after I’d been hit.” He paused several times and blinked, as if he were having difficulty keeping his eyes focused. “She wrapped my arm to stop the bleeding and…”
Caitlyn looked from Officer Timmons to his younger partner. “Please—he needs a doctor.”
“And we need answers.” Brows slanting downward, the white cop peered into Marcus’s face. “Especially since our caller reported a man lurking outside. A man matching the description of a person of interest in two murders discovered by Miss Villaré here.”
With that, his cold glance banked off her, leaving her chilled despite the heat.
Timmons looked up from his examination of Reuben’s pistol. “This gun’s not even loaded. No residue or odor from a recent firing, either.”
“Do you believe me now?” Caitlyn asked him.
“Officer Holcomb and I are just gathering information,” the big cop said, before sneering down at Marcus. “So who did shoot you, Mr.?…?”
“No idea,” Marcus said, not bothering to hide his own scorn.
No idea? Caitlyn stared at him as fresh doubt arrowed through her. Was he keeping Paine’s name out of this because he knew the businessman had department connections? Or because he’d killed her old boss?
Anxiety seared her stomach, and she forced herself to hold her tongue. To listen until she could process what was happening.
The big man, Holcomb, frowned at Marcus. “So was it the old lady?”
Marcus shook his head to indicate that he didn’t know, his mouth a stubborn line. But his waxy pallor told Caitlyn that he was fighting pain and blood loss as much as the shock of being cornered after so many years on the run. Trapped and hurt, with no possible escape, she was willing to bet he was less worried about his personal future than his ability to keep providing for the same brother who’d destroyed it.
Despite the circumstances, she ached to go to him, to take his hand and offer comfort, to remind him of the peaceful oasis of the quiet meal they had shared, and the fragile trust that had prompted him to speak to her of secrets he’d kept bottled up for years.
Holcomb flipped open the wallet he had pulled from Marcus’s back pocket. Plucking a driver’s license from the plastic sleeve, he turned it in the light and scrutinized it carefully. “You have another ID somewhere?” he asked. “Maybe a real one this time?”
Looking back toward Holcomb, Marcus lifted his good shoulder in a shrug and jerked a nod toward Caitlyn. “Take off her cuffs, why don’t you? She’s no threat to anybody.”
Though he was clearly struggling to look and sound in control, Caitlyn was alarmed to notice he was swaying slightly on his feet.
Looking to the officers, she said, “You have to call an ambulance before he passes out again. At least let him sit b
efore he falls down.”
“You’d like some coddling, wouldn’t you?” Holcomb asked Marcus. “Like to stall us so you can sneak away again. Well, it’s not happenin’ on my watch.”
Timmons shook his head at his partner. “We’ll be getting him checked out before questioning. And he can sit down at the table. He’s not going anywhere.”
Turning away, he used the radio from his belt to call for an ambulance. Once finished, he pulled out a key and unlocked Caitlyn’s handcuffs. “This man a friend of yours, then? ’Cause it’s tough to imagine you’d let a stranger into your house under the circumstances, much less worry over his health.”
“He was bleeding badly.” Caitlyn rubbed at her freed wrists. “And I had a gun.”
“You trusted your life to an unloaded weapon?” Timmons eyed her so dubiously that she had to snap her jaw shut to keep from blurting the explanation that Marcus had disarmed her and removed the magazine to insure she wouldn’t shoot him.
Realizing how easily she might say something that could cause one or both of them trouble, she followed Marcus’s lead and refused to answer any further questions. When Officer Holcomb turned from looming over Marcus to press her, she shook her head and told both officers, “Just let me speak to Detective Lorna Robinson. I’m only going through this once.”
Better Robinson than her partner Davis, a man who drank with Josiah Paine and who had suggested she was using these murders for publicity. From the way they were behaving, Caitlyn suspected these two officers might well share Davis’s opinions.
Timmons nodded. “We’ll be glad to take you to the station. Detectives’ll definitely want to talk to you.”
Willing the ambulance to hurry, she looked again to Marcus, who was sitting with his eyes closed. “Can’t you take his cuffs off? At least free his hurt arm?”
Ignoring her request, the veteran went to meet another officer, who showed up at the back door. By the time the two of them had finished conferring, a siren heralded the arrival of the EMTs.
Phantom of the French Quarter Page 11
