[Cutthroat Business 01.0 - 03.0] Boxed Set

by Jenna Bennett

  Yes.

  “We found the same prints in Yvonne McCoy’s house.”

  I felt my jaw drop. “Yvonne broke into my apartment?!”

  Tamara’s voice sounded exasperated. “Of course not. They aren’t her prints. They’re someone else’s.”

  “Whose?”

  “Unfortunately, I have no idea. Someone without a criminal record.”

  “So Jorge didn’t break into my apartment.”

  “No.”

  “And Jorge didn’t shoot Yvonne.”

  “Well...” She hesitated. “We don’t know that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Let me make it simple, OK? The same person who shot Marquita Johnson, shot Yvonne McCoy and tried to shoot you and Rafe. Or if not the same person, then at least the same gun. And the same person who tore up your apartment and left the knife in your desk at work, has at some point been in Yvonne McCoy’s house. We have no idea whether that fingerprint was left last night or some other time. We don’t know if this is one person or two. But we do know the person who broke in at your place isn’t Jorge Pena. His fingerprints are on file.”

  “Maybe he has an accomplice,” I suggested. “Someone who broke into my apartment while Jorge was stalking Marquita.”

  “That’s possible,” Tamara admitted. “I’ll look into it. Known associates. Meanwhile, I thought you’d like to know that your boyfriend’s out of jail.”

  “He’s not my boyfriend.”

  The denial was automatic. If I’d thought about it, I would have kept my mouth shut. Mother looked at me, her eyebrows raised, and I flushed.

  Tamara chuckled. “I got him out without giving away the fact that he’s informing for the TBI, too. Wendell Craig was adamant about that. If I couldn’t do it, I’d have had to let the sheriff keep him in jail overnight.”

  “That’s good. I guess.” I got up and wandered out into the hallway, away from Mother, with an apologetic smile and the phone still stuck to my ear.

  Tamara’s voice turned serious. “Part of me wanted to keep him locked up until we have Jorge Pena in custody. The problem is, Jorge will just bide his time until Rafe gets out, and then it starts all over. It’s a matter of putting off the inevitable.”

  A chill went down my spine. “When you say inevitable...”

  “Don’t worry. I won’t let anything happen to him.”

  “Thank you.” I wasn’t sure I could believe her, or whether she could actually do anything to affect the outcome—and whether anyone could really keep Rafe safe with a contract killer on his tail—but her assurance made me feel marginally better.

  “What are you planning to do tonight? Are you still in Sweetwater?”

  I said I was. “I guess I’ll just stay another night and go back to Nashville tomorrow. Mom and Sheriff Satterfield are going to dinner, so it’s just me. I don’t suppose you want to get together for a bite to eat?”

  “I’m afraid I have plans.”

  “Oh.” She was probably on her way back to Nashville already. “All right, then. Call me if anything happens, OK?”

  Tamara promised she would, and we both hung up.

  “Everything all right, darling?” Mother called out from the parlor.

  I walked back there and stuck my head through the door. “Fine, thank you. I think I’ll go to the kitchen and make myself something for dinner. Since you’re going out.”

  “Oh, no, darling.” My mother is too dignified to jump to her feet, but she did get up rather fast. “Don’t do that. Why don’t you come with me and Bob tonight?”

  “To dinner? I don’t think so. I don’t want to intrude on your date.”

  “Don’t be silly, darling. Bob adores you, you know that.”

  I wasn’t so sure. Bob had liked me for as long as he thought I’d end up being his daughter-in-law one day, but now that I’d turned down—or not accepted—Todd’s proposal, I had a feeling he didn’t like me quite as much anymore.

  Mother was insistent, though, and wouldn’t take no for an answer. When Bob arrived at the door, I realized why: Todd was with him.

  By then it was too late to back out, although I tried. “I can’t do this.”

  “Do not embarrass me, Savannah!” Mother hissed. “Smile!” She pinched me.

  “Ow!” I moved away, holding my arm.

  “Are you all right?” That was Todd, of course, rushing to grab my elbow.

  “I’m fine, thank you. Um... mosquito.”

  Mother smiled.

  “I’m glad you decided to come,” Todd said softly as he guided me toward the car in Mother and Bob Satterfield’s wake. Since I couldn’t exactly say that I was here under duress, I kept my mouth shut. “I’m sorry my proposal upset you the other night. If I had realized...”

  He trailed off.

  “It’s OK. It’s just... I’m not ready.”

  Todd nodded. “I understand that now. And I promise I won’t ask again until you let me know that you are. I guess I never realized how much your marriage to Bradley affected you.”

  I blinked. He’d been married to Jolynn for a couple of years himself, and yet he thought it strange that my failed marriage had affected me? It made me wonder what their marriage had been like. And how shallow it must have been if Todd could go through two years of it, and then through the divorce, without being affected at all. I mean, Bradley and I may not have had the greatest marriage in the world, and in the end I’d been more humiliated than hurt when it ended, but I hadn’t felt nothing.

  I had to fall back on the manners Mother—and finishing school in Charleston—had drummed into me, in order to make it through dinner. Todd was unfailingly polite, and so were Mother and Bob Satterfield. The only bad moment came when the sheriff mentioned, I’m sure innocently, that he’d had Rafe in his office most of the day. I could see Todd’s mood change.

  “He’s in Sweetwater?” He glanced at me across the table. We were at the Wayside Inn, sharing a table for four.

  “Came down for the funeral yesterday,” his father grunted. “Stayed the night in the Bog.”

  “Oh, dear.” Mother took a dainty bite of her salmon. “Isn’t that place condemned?”

  Bob Satterfield shrugged. “Supposed to be. I guess with the economy, the contractor’s draggin’ his heels. The place is just sittin’ there.”

  Todd looked from one to the other of us, ending with his dad. “What was he doing in your office?”

  “Found him at Yvonne McCoy’s house in Damascus this morning,” Bob said. “With Savannah. You heard about that, right?”

  “Yvonne McCoy getting shot? Of course. Everyone’s heard. How is she?”

  “Seems to be doin’ all right. Still unconscious. But the bullet missed anything vital.”

  “That’s good.” Todd turned to me. “What were you doing in her house this morning, Savannah? With Rafe Collier?”

  “I went to Beulah’s for breakfast,” I said, concentrating on keeping my voice even. And it wasn’t even because I was afraid of saying the wrong thing. I was angry, pure and simple. Bad enough that Todd talked to me in that tone of voice, and interrogated me like this, when it was just the two of us; but I didn’t appreciate him doing it in front of my mother and his father. “I asked Mother to come along, but she didn’t want to.” And if I mentioned that, at least they’d all know that I hadn’t planned to run into Rafe. “He was there. Yvonne wasn’t. When I drove to her house to make sure she was all right, he followed me.”

  It had been the other way around, technically, but I didn’t think Todd needed the mental picture of me chasing Rafe. He was already upset enough about Rafe chasing me.

  “You didn’t mention that during lunch, darling,” Mother said.

  “That I’d run into Rafe? It didn’t seem important.” In light of what had happened to Yvonne, I’d forgotten all about my worry that people had seen me and Rafe together at Beulah’s and that they’d talk and Mother and Todd would be upset.

  Todd turned to his dad. “Wh
at did you talk to him about?”

  Bob shrugged. “Just stuff. What he’s doin’ here, what he was doin’ in Damascus, what he’s been doin’ with himself since the last time I saw him. How well he knew Marquita Johnson and how well he knows Yvonne McCoy. The detective from Nashville had some questions ‘bout things that had happened up there, as well.”

  “Detective from Nashville?” Todd glanced at me.

  “Tamara Grimaldi,” I said. “She came down with a forensic team to go over Yvonne’s house this morning.”

  “They got involved after Marquita died,” Bob Satterfield explained. “Seein’ as she died here, but lived there. We’re sharin’ information.”

  “Of course.” Todd looked miffed. “Well, she’s never going to arrest Collier. She likes him.”

  “If he did something she needed to arrest him for,” I said steadily, “she’d arrest him. He hasn’t.”

  Todd looked at his dad. Bob nodded. “Had to let him go at the end of the day. Wasn’t nothin’ I could do to keep him.”

  Todd sniffed. I devoted myself to my food.

  We got back to the mansion a little after eight. Todd did not try to kiss me goodnight, and his father did not try to kiss my mother. I was grateful. Mom and the sheriff probably did kiss on their own time, but I had no desire to watch. That would just be too weird. And as for Todd... I had no need for him to kiss me, either. Our interactions were definitely feeling the strain of that unaccepted proposal, mixed now with the guilt I felt over having slept with Rafe.

  I couldn’t wait for him to leave, and take his father with him. As soon as the door was shut behind them, I turned to Mother. “I did not appreciate that.”

  She tried to look innocent. “What?”

  “You set me up. You knew Todd would be coming, and you knew I didn’t want to see him.”

  “You know you had to see him sooner or later, darling,” Mother said reasonably.

  I planted my hands on my hips. “I wanted it to be later. After we’d both gotten some perspective. He’s upset with me. And disappointed. And I’m sure he was hoping that I’d tell him I’d changed my mind and wanted to marry him after all.”

  He’d had a very hopeful sort of look on his face when he first stepped out of the car. Keeping things businesslike had been like kicking a puppy, something I never do.

  “I’m sorry if I upset you, darling,” Mother said, sounding not sorry at all. “But at least now it’s over and done with. And you can get back to the relationship you used to have.”

  I doubted we’d ever get back to the relationship we used to have, but I didn’t say so. “I’m going to take a drive,” I said instead, turning on my heel. “I can’t settle down to sleep after that. I need some time alone.”

  Mother nodded, although there was a tiny wrinkle between her brows. “Of course, darling. Be careful.”

  Fifteen minutes later I turned the nose of the Volvo down the rutted dirt track to the Bog. I had no idea whether Rafe would be there or not—he might have gone back to Nashville after Sheriff Satterfield let him go—but if he hadn’t, I wanted to see him. Apparently having interaction with Todd made me want to see Rafe. The irony was immense, and if Todd had any idea of the way he affected me, he’d probably cry.

  There were no lights on in the trailer, and for a second I thought about just turning around and going back. But no, I was here; at least I should check the door. And—yes!—unlike yesterday evening, Rafe’s Harley was parked under the carport in the back.

  After sharing his bed, I might have earned the right to walk in without knocking, but I knocked anyway. It was only when there was no answer that I tried the doorknob. It turned in my hand and I pushed the door in. “Rafe?”

  There was a sound from the back of the trailer. A rustle and something that sounded suspiciously like a curse.

  I let the door slam shut behind me and started making my way through the kitchen, shuffling my feet and keeping my arms out to feel where I was going. The interior of the trailer was almost pitch black. “Rafe? Are you here?”

  There was more rustling. My heart stopped for a second when I realized that maybe he wasn’t alone. Maybe he had company. Like... Tammy Grimaldi?

  But no. Surely neither of them would do that to me. And she had told me, apparently sincerely, that he wasn’t someone she’d ever be interested in that way.

  Even so, the fear gave my voice an edge. “Rafe?”

  He sounded resigned. “In the back.” I heard more noises. One of them the scrape of a match, and a moment later a tiny light illuminated the dark hallway. I hurried toward it.

  He was in the back bedroom, the one that had been his growing up. There was a bedroll on the floor, and that Penthouse-page of the almost-naked girl on the wall, and that was it. Except for Rafe himself, of course, sitting on the bedroll with his back against the wall, looking almost demonic with the light from an old-fashioned kerosene lamp flickering over his face and over the ridges and valleys of his upper body. The flame reflected in his eyes and created deep shadows under his cheekbones.

  I swallowed. He looked breathtaking, but there was something forbidding about him tonight, something dark and unwelcoming. Like he hadn’t wanted to be bothered with me and wished I’d just leave.

  But at least he was alone.

  “I wasn’t sure I’d find you here,” I said, my voice not entirely steady. He cut his eyes to my face, but didn’t speak. “I thought maybe you’d driven back to Nashville after the sheriff let you go.”

  He shook his head. “Something I gotta do first.”

  “What?”

  He looked at me for a second. “I was expecting someone else.”

  “Who?” And I admit it, my heart clenched. Not Yvonne; she was in the hospital. Not Tamara Grimaldi; she must be back in Nashville by now. Who else could he possibly...?

  And then my breath stopped for an entirely different reason, and I felt myself turn pale. “Oh, my God! You’re waiting for Jorge Pena to come find you. Rafe... no!”

  His voice was even, calm. “He’ll stick around until he catches me. This way I’ll make it easy for him.”

  “But he’ll kill you!” He wasn’t even wearing a shirt, let alone something like a bulletproof vest. “Please, let Tamara Grimaldi try to catch him. She will! And then you’ll be safe.”

  He shook his head, and I felt panic curl through my stomach. My voice shook. “Please, Rafe. Don’t do anything stupid. I know you can take care of yourself, but he’s a killer. And I don’t want you to die. Not when...”

  He looked up, a warning in his eyes. “Watch what you say, darlin’.”

  I blinked. But before I could speak again, there was a noise outside. Like the crunch of a shoe on the dry ground.

  Rafe breathed a curse. “Someone’s coming.”

  “I can hear that.”

  “I wasn’t talking to you. Now I am. Listen...” He looked up at me, his voice coming faster, losing the lazy Southern drawl. “See the closet? The one in the corner? Get in there. Stay in there. Don’t come out, no matter what you hear. Not until I tell you it’s safe.”

  “But you’ll be all alone out here...” With someone who was probably Jorge Pena coming around the trailer as we stood here arguing.

  “I know what I’m doing. I need you to do as I say so we can both walk outta here.”

  His eyes were black in the low light. I swallowed. “Please be careful. If anything happens to you...”

  “Hold that thought.”

  The doorknob in the kitchen turned and he pointed to the closet. I went. Ducked inside and pulled the louvered doors halfway shut behind me, as silently as I could. And then I squeezed as far into the corner as possible and stood there, shivering in my fancy cocktail dress and my high heeled shoes, waiting for the showdown.

  Chapter Twenty

  I couldn’t see Rafe, but I could hear him. His breathing was slow and even, and if his heart was beating faster, it was impossible to hear from where I stood. Out in the hallway, slow s
teps were coming our way. I held my breath as they reached the door.

  “Hello, Rafael,” a soft voice murmured, and for a second, the world tilted; it was so not what I was expecting.

  Not Jorge Pena, but a woman.

  Jorge’s hypothetical partner in crime? Or someone else?

  I don’t think she was what Rafe was expecting either, because it took him a second to find his voice. “Elspeth.”

  Ah. I had thought the voice sounded familiar, but I’d had a hard time placing it. Now I knew why; I’d spoken to Elspeth only twice in the past twelve years, and only for a few minutes.

  What was she doing here? Surely Elspeth Caulfield wasn’t working with Jorge Pena?

  I heard her footsteps brush the carpet as she came into the room. “It’s been a long time.”

  “I don’t get back to Sweetwater much.” Rafe shifted his weight on the bedroll. “What’s with the gun, sugar? You planning on shooting me?”

  Gun...?

  Elspeth giggled. “Of course not. Why would I shoot you?”

  After a second she added, her voice totally different; cool and businesslike, “Isn’t that Savannah’s car outside?”

  Uh-oh. A lead weight dropped into my stomach.

  Rafe’s even tone didn’t change. “I borrowed it. She didn’t need it tonight. Hot date with Todd Satterfield.”

  “Have you been seeing her?”

  The mix of emotions in Elspeth’s voice was frightening, especially from my perspective. Hurt mixed with jealousy and threat of violence. Not a good combination.

  Rafe laughed. “You think Savannah Martin’d have anything to do with the likes of me, sugar?”

  “I saw you together,” Elspeth said. “At your house.”

  The soft words fell into the silence like stones. My stomach clenched. And not only because of that crazy mixture of emotions in her voice, added to the undertone of chilling, clearheaded insanity—not to mention the gun—but because I realized that it really wasn’t Jorge Pena who had shot at us that night. Just like it wasn’t Jorge who had broken into my apartment and slashed my nightgown and lipsticked my wall. It was all Elspeth. And she hadn’t been trying to shoot Rafe; she’d been aiming for me.