by Lis Wiehl
As soon as she was inside, Ophelia closed the door behind her. The house was blessedly cool.
“Most of my neighbors work during the day,” Ophelia said, “but I don’t want anyone wondering who you are or remembering what you look like.”
“If you don’t feel safe having me here,” Allison said, “I could go.” She had only met this girl yesterday, and now she was asking to be sheltered from a killer. Then again, their lack of a preexisting relationship make it unlikely anyone would look for her here.
“No,” Ophelia said after a long pause. “It’s okay.”
White spots were dancing in front of Allison’s eyes. “Do you mind if I sit down?” she asked. “I’m feeling kind of shaky.”
Allison waited for Ophelia to ask a question or demand an explanation. All she said was, “Sure.” She seemed devoid of curiosity. It was oddly soothing, allowing Allison to try to float in the in-between, to push away the thoughts of what had just happened.
For places to sit, she had her choice of a well-used green leather recliner or a navy blue futon couch. She chose the couch. The centerpiece of the room’s decor was not the small flat-screen TV but a carpeted cat-climbing structure with multilevel platforms and even a few ramps. A ginger tabby rested on top, and a small black cat with bright green eyes sprawled on another level. Something was missing from the room. It took Allison a few seconds to figure out what it was. There wasn’t a single picture on the wall.
A black-and-white cat slinked out from under the couch. It wound its way around Ophelia’s ankles, letting out plaintive meows.
“Maizy wants to go outside, but I don’t let her,” Ophelia said, bending down to pet her. “It’s destructive to native bird species, plus she would run the risk of being struck by a car.”
Allison felt as though she had stepped onto another planet. Only a few minutes ago her sister had died in her arms. Now she was having a conversation about the ethics of keeping an indoor pet.
Tinny music began to play. Allison jumped. It was coming from Lindsay’s purse, which she was holding on her lap.
“It’s my sister’s phone.”
“Don’t answer it.”
“Let me just see who it is.” Allison opened the purse and tried to locate the phone with just her eyes. It scared her to touch it, as if it would somehow broadcast the fact that she was alive. But then she saw the display. “It’s my husband.” She flipped it open and turned away, giving herself the illusion of privacy.
“Hello.” She kept it short and neutral, just in case.
“Oh, darling, you’re alive.” Marshall’s voice broke with relief. “Oh, Allison, when Nicole walked into my office just now, I thought you were dead.”
“I’m alive, Marshall. But Lindsay really is dead.” Hot tears filled her eyes. “This guy pretending to be a bank robber shot her. I talked to her before she died. One minute she was there and the next minute she was just . . . gone.”
“Nicole told me.”
“The terrible thing is that he shot her because he thought she was me.”
“Nicole told me that too.”
“She died in my stead, Marshall.” The tears spilled down Allison’s cheeks. “It’s my fault that my sister’s dead.”
“You can’t tell yourself that, Allison. You have to look at reality. When we took her in, Lindsay was headed for death. You saved her.”
“Saved her for what?” Allison said bitterly. “Saved her so she could be murdered in my place? It’s such a waste! All those years I spent worrying. I thought she would die of an overdose, or be murdered by one of her customers, or that Chris would finally kill her. But for this to happen now? Just as she was getting her life back together?” Allison wept at the injustice of it, at how her sister’s plans and dreams and endless practice espressos all added up to nothing. “It’s not fair. Lindsay finally turned her life around, and now it’s all ended before it even began.”
“But it did begin, Allison,” Marshall’s low voice insisted. “She had a year sober. A year where she had dreams and worked to make them come true. It’s terrible that she won’t get to see them fulfilled, but how much worse would it have been if she had never had a dream at all?”
“But she’s only thirty-one, Marshall. She’s just a baby, and now she’s dead. She’s never going to fall in love with the right man or have kids or grow old.” Just as Cassidy would never get that Emmy she had always longed for. “Why is everyone dying?” Her voice broke.
“Allison, listen to me. We’re all dying. All of us. We don’t know the day or the hour. It could be tomorrow or it could be in fifty years. But we are all appointed to die. And Lindsay must have come close to death a dozen times. A hundred. Would you rather she had died in some nameless alley with a bullet in her chest or a needle in her arm?” He took a deep breath. “Instead, your sister died right with God and happy about her life. She died with you there to comfort her. She died knowing she was loved. And she died fast. A lot of people can only wish for those things.”
Was Marshall right? It was true that Lindsay had died when her life had meaning and purpose. Not when she was hating herself, as she had for years and years. Allison took a hitching breath and swiped at her eyes. “It’s just so hard.”
“Of course it is, babe. I wish I could be there with you.” He paused. “But I think I’d better go for now. Nicole said a detective could be here any minute to give me the news. I’m going to have to pretend that she already told me that you’re dead, and make him believe that I believe it. And then she said I should get out of town so I won’t have to worry about letting the truth slip. We argued about it. I still don’t know if it’s the right thing to leave you all alone.”
“But I’m not alone. And I’m safe now. I’m safe as long as the killer thinks I’m dead.” And Marshall himself would be safer out of town. Allison couldn’t bear to lose both her sister and her husband.
Suddenly she realized another flaw with the little plan they had made. “Marshall, what about my mom? She needs to know the truth. If we let her think that I’m dead and then she learns it’s really Lindsay, that’s even crueler than the truth. Can you tell her what really happened?”
“But once I do that, the cat’s out of the bag. If Nicole thinks I can’t keep quiet, then your mom certainly won’t be able to.”
It was true. Her mother had never been a good liar. “I think you probably need to take her with you.”
“Your mom?”
In Marshall’s tone, Allison could hear his resistance. Then he heaved a sigh.
“You’re probably right. This whole thing feels so rushed, but I guess we don’t have any other choice,” Marshall said. “Oh. Someone just pulled into the parking lot—I think it’s a cop. I’d better go.”
“I love you.” She meant those three words more than she ever had before.
“I love you too. Remember the psalm we memorized last year? Hang on to those words.”
Allison snapped the phone closed. Then she put her hands over her wet face. What were they doing? What was going to happen to them?
She knew the verses Marshall was referring to. When their Bible study group chose Psalm 27 to memorize, she was sure none of them had dreamed of taking the meaning quite so literally. The Lord is my light and my salvation—whom shall I fear? . . . When the wicked advance against me to devour me, it is my enemies and my foes who will stumble and fall.
She started when Ophelia pressed a paper towel into her hands. Allison wiped her eyes and blew her nose on the thick paper.
The other woman looked at her and then away. “I’m sorry about your sister,” she muttered. “I don’t have a sister, but Felicity, one of my cats, died a few months ago and I was very sad.”
Allison digested this in silence and finally settled on saying, “Thank you for your sympathy.”
She just wanted to lie down and close her eyes, but Ophelia had other ideas.
“Okay.” She cocked her head and made a humming noise, regarding Allison. �
��The first thing we’re going to need to do is change your appearance. Everyone always wants to go blond, but I think you would look more convincing as a redhead.” She cleared her throat. “Maybe while I’m at the drugstore getting the hair dye, you should take a shower. You still have some, um, blood, here.” Ophelia touched the hollow of her throat. “By your cross.”
Allison thought of how Lindsay’s eyes had lit up just before she died. What had her sister seen? “Okay.”
“Let me show you the guest room and the bathroom.” Ophelia turned to go down the hall, and Allison followed.
“Your house is so quiet.”
“When I moved in I had extra insulation blown in the walls. The blinds are also noise-reducing.”
The same white honeycomb shades Allison had seen in the living and dining rooms were in the guest room as well.
“You don’t like sounds?” Allison asked.
“Street noise is very distracting. And now because it’s so hot, I have to have the central air on. That whooshing sound is a constant annoyance.”
Allison nodded, even though she had been unaware of it.
On the counter of the small bathroom, Ophelia had laid out a neatly folded but much washed T-shirt and soft cotton drawstring shorts. They sat between a brand-new white towel and a lidded glass bowl filled with cotton balls. “I figured you’ll probably want to change. The waist on the shorts is elastic, so they should fit you. And the towel is for you. It’s the guest towel. So please don’t touch my towel.” She pointed at a faded lavender bath towel hanging on the towel rack.
“Okay. I won’t touch your towel.”
Ophelia nodded, looking satisfied, apparently oblivious to the note in Allison’s voice.
“When you’re at the drugstore, could you get me something too?”
Allison told Ophelia what she wanted, then threw the dead bolt after Ophelia left. She was turning to go back to the guest room when her eye caught on Lindsay’s purse. Taking a deep breath, she sat down on the couch and shook out its contents. Doodled sketches of signs for Lindsay’s Lattes and More. Plastic chips from Narcotics Anonymous that looked like poker chips but marking varying milestones of sobriety: one month, two months, six months. ChapStick. Lipstick. A pair of earrings made from peacock feathers.
And a plastic accordion of snapshots. Some were of people she didn’t recognize. One was of Lindsay’s old boyfriend, Chris, and Allison found herself hoping it was truly old, as if she still needed to save Lindsay from him.
Another photo was of the two sisters in front of a Christmas tree. Allison was about ten, Lindsay seven, both in their pajamas, half dazed with sleep.
Here were she and Lindsay sitting on the hood of the station wagon, two sets of long tanned legs in cutoff shorts. They were making bunny ears behind each other’s heads, grinning as widely as they could. Allison didn’t remember the picture, but she knew who had taken it. Their dad.
Out of the two dozen or so photos, there was only one that showed him. He was leaning against an old red Mustang he had sold the year she was born. His hair was longer than she ever remembered it being, his face open and without care. He had been younger than she was now.
Allison flipped through the rest of the photos, looking for more of their dad, but didn’t find any. Yet he was in every photo Lindsay had kept of their family, because it was his eyes that had framed the shot, his voice that had directed them, his hand that had pressed the button.
And suddenly Allison was crying again, crying for the loss of Lindsay, the loss of her father, the loss of her family. Only she and her mom were left.
When Ophelia returned thirty minutes later, Allison was dressed in the clothes the other woman had left her, her hair still wrapped in the towel. She was beginning to feel as if she had entered some strange limbo, a place between heaven and hell, between the pain of Lindsay’s death and the knowledge that it had been meant for her, between grief and revenge.
“I purchased what you asked for.” Ophelia held out the plastic bag from Rite Aid.
Without a word, Allison went into the bathroom. Three minutes later she was staring at a pink plus sign on a white plastic wand.
Allison was pregnant.
Her sister was dead, and she was carrying a new life.
CHAPTER 30
When she saw the plus sign on the pregnancy test, Allison’s first reaction was a fear so strong it nearly overwhelmed her. A voice inside her screamed that she had to get out of this house, get out of this city, get out of this state. She had to run away and hide. Not just to save herself, but to save the new life inside her.
But where would she go? Where could she guarantee that the killer couldn’t find her? Where could she live freely and without fear? In her bones Allison knew that if the man who had killed her sister discovered she was still alive, he would hunt her down and correct his mistake.
But she couldn’t die. Not when she was carrying a new life. Allison rested both hands on her still-flat abdomen. She had prayed for this pregnancy, begged for it, longed for it.
But for her prayer to be answered now? Now, when her friend was dead, her sister was dead, and her own life was on the line? When everything could be over before it even began?
Why now? Allison asked God silently.
The answer came to her like a lamp being lit in the darkness. For I know the plans I have for you . . . plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.
Allison made herself take a deep breath. God did have a plan for her, she reminded herself, and this baby must be part of it. This pregnancy was a reminder that she still had hope and had a future.
And she wanted to live! To live without fear. And to do that, she could not hide. She would not. Instead, she would find this guy and make sure he was locked up for good. In the mirror, Allison met her own shadowed eyes, then lifted her chin.
When she came out of the bathroom, she found Ophelia sitting at the dining room table, which was empty except for a pen and a notebook. The black-and-white cat was in her lap. Even standing ten feet away, Allison could hear it purring.
“I took that test you got for me. I’m pregnant.”
Ophelia looked down at the cat and rubbed behind its ears. “Is that such a good idea?”
If Allison had been expecting congratulations, she hadn’t been factoring Ophelia into the equation.
“Well, it’s not exactly like I planned to be the target of a killer at this point in my life. But my husband and I have been wanting a baby.”
Not exactly trying, though. They had been too scared to try on purpose, too scared to even talk about it. If they didn’t voice their hopes, it wouldn’t hurt so much when they were dashed.
Setting the cat on the floor, Ophelia said, “Do you feel okay?”
“I feel fine.” Allison remembered the parking lot at the VQ, the bathroom at the bank. “Although I have thrown up twice in the last few days. I figured it was just from the heat and the stress.”
Ophelia shot a glance at her belly. “You don’t look pregnant.”
“Of course I don’t. I’m only a few weeks along. About as early as you can be and still have it show up on the test. You don’t really start to show until the second trimester.”
Eighteen months ago Allison and Marshall had greeted that first pregnancy with such joy. He had gone with her to every doctor’s visit, pored over What to Expect When You’re Expecting, held her in bed at night while they giddily batted back and forth ridiculous baby names. (“Opal Moon!” “Twelve!” “Oak!” “Rotator Cuff!”)
Allison had just been entering her second trimester when things went horribly wrong. She remembered Dr. Dubruski’s intent face as she moved the ultrasound wand over Allison’s belly. Slowly the doctor’s expression had changed from concentration to consternation. Even though she had been flat on her back, Allison had felt as if she were falling. Marshall had gripped her hand, and it had felt like the only thing tethering her to the earth.
A few days
later she had joined the invisible club of mothers who had miscarried. Her dreams for their baby had ended in blood and pain, in sadness and even shame that she must have done something wrong, no matter what Dr. Dubruski said.
Now the only person who knew about the new life within her was this strange woman Allison had met just yesterday.
“I should call my husband.” She walked over and picked up Lindsay’s phone from the mantelpiece where she had put it earlier.
“Wait a second,” Ophelia said. “Didn’t you want your husband to leave town? Because if he learns that you’re pregnant, he might feel that he needs to stay to protect you.”
And just when Allison had been thinking this odd woman didn’t understand human beings at all . . .
“You’re right. Having the killer think I’m dead is the only advantage we have.” She set down the phone. “And we have to get this guy. We have to. For Lindsay and for Cassidy.” The thought of her sister and her friend gave Allison new strength. She remembered the almost jaunty way the man had loped out of the bank. “I’m not going to be whimpering in some corner, waiting for him to come back for me. The only real way I can protect this baby is not to hide, but to go after this guy and get him before he gets me.”
“The hunted becomes the hunter,” Ophelia said, offering Allison a small smile.
“Exactly. Only to do that, I need you to help me track him down.”
“Today we have a different problem from the one you presented me with yesterday.” Ophelia steepled her fingers. “It’s both more complicated and perhaps more easily solved. We need to figure out why someone would want to kill both Cassidy and you.”
“It has to be somehow connected with what we do.” Allison took a seat across from her. “Our personal lives do overlap, but that’s all grown out of our professional ones.”
“The Triple Threat,” Ophelia said.
“That’s right. And I think all three of us have actually been targets. On the day Cassidy was murdered, Nicole told me that someone had tried to run her down while she was out jogging. At the time she thought it was just a careless driver, but now I don’t think it was any coincidence. I think it was somebody trying to cover his tracks. Then Cassidy was murdered and Rick was framed for it. And I’m supposed to be dead in a bank robbery gone wrong. For some reason, someone wants to kill the three of us. But I can’t think of anything we’ve done that merits three murders.”
