by Joanna Wayne
He answered the door in a pair of cutoff jeans and no shirt or shoes even though the temperature was only in the high fifties. He stared critically at Meghan. “What happened to you?”
“I was in a car wreck,” she lied.
“I’m sorry.” He looked confused. “How can I help you?”
“My name is Meghan Sinclair and this is my partner, Durk. We’re here to see Edward.”
“He’s not around right now. I’m Evan, his brother. What do you want to see him about? Perhaps I can help.”
“Someone called me from the phone number. I think it might have been Edward.”
“Perhaps. It wasn’t me.”
“Do you know how I can get in touch with him? I heard he was in some trouble with the law and I thought I might be able to help him,” Meghan said.
“Are you certain you’re not from the Dallas Police Department?”
“Positive. I’m a private detective.”
“As far as I know Edward doesn’t need anything or anyone investigated.”
“Really? Because a friend of mine told my partner and me that Edward was eager to talk to someone about helping him get out of trouble with the law.”
“They’re mistaken. Edward’s not in any trouble.”
Either Evan was lying or he was in denial.
“Then you don’t know how I can get in touch with Edward?”
“Not at the moment.”
“What about later today?”
“Why don’t you give me your number? I can have him call you.”
“There’s not really any reason for him to call me if he’s not in any trouble,” Meghan said, baiting him.
“He didn’t do anything,” Evan insisted. “He’s assured me that he is walking the line, but he says once the cops pin one thing on you, they try to pin everything on you. There’s a Detective Smart who I believe has it in for my brother.”
Evan was clearly the enabler. He’d probably been making excuses for his twin brother all his life. A stalker. A pervert. A serial killer. Get real, Evan.
She’d love to snoop around the house and basement and see if there were any more suitcases full of bones lying around.
She was about to ask to use his bathroom just for a chance to snoop more when a couple of dogs started howling and yelping as if they were in a major fight. Evan excused himself to go and see what was wrong with his dog. Durk followed him.
Meghan went straight to the basement.
She opened the door and flicked on the light. Nothing happened. The bulb had most likely burned out. But there was enough light from the hall that she could see the pictures pasted on the walls.
A mix of paintings and photographs of men having sex with women dressed in similar clothes to what Connie had described. Vulgar, disgusting, pornographic images that made Meghan’s skin crawl.
Meghan held on to the railing and took the rickety steps all the way down. There was just enough light from the open doorway to let her see shapes and outlines.
It surprised her how neat the area was. She took a few steps away from the stairs and that’s when she saw it. Her heart jumped to her throat. She didn’t even try to hold back the scream.
Chapter Seventeen
Durk heard the scream and took off running, racing through the house and calling Meghan’s name. If he’d let something happen to her… No, he couldn’t think that way.
“Meghan!” He called her name again.
“Down here. In the basement. Call Detective Smart. Call him now.”
He took the dark steps two at a time. He saw the body before he saw her. The man was dangling by his neck from a gnarled rope that hung from an old meat hook in the ceiling.
Meghan was slumped against the wall, a little green, but not hurt. He scooped her into his arms just as Evan reached the bottom of the stairs.
He let out a bloodcurdling scream and then wrapped himself around the legs of the dead man.
“They killed him,” he cried. “They killed my brother. They never gave him a chance.”
“It looks as if he hanged himself,” Durk said as he dialed 911.
“Because they wouldn’t leave him alone,” Evan wailed. “They were never going to leave him alone.”
Sobs racked Evan’s body.
Durk didn’t know if Edward Byers was guilty of murder. That would be for a judge and jury to decide, but he knew that at least three people were dead. Roxanne Latimer. Ben Conroe. And now Edward Byers.
For the first time he understood a little better why Meghan threw herself into these cases with such reckless abandon.
Justice should be served.
They were all three still in the basement with the body when sirens screamed and cops rushed the house.
There were a lot of unanswered questions, but Smart could take charge from here on out. He was taking Meghan home.
* * *
MEMORIES FLOODED Meghan’s mind as she walked out of Evan’s house and into the blinding afternoon sunshine. Shock and grief convened in frenzied waves as the events of the investigation leading up to her attack stormed her mind.
Durk pulled her in his arms to steady her.
“It’s all coming back to me,” she murmured. “Everything.” Tears filled her eyes and ran down her cheeks. “We had him. Ben was the one who put the final pieces together. We knew it was Edward. We were so close.”
“It’s okay,” he soothed. “It’s all over. You got your man.”
“But I lost Ben. The world lost Ben. Mary Nell lost her husband and the father of her child. Oh, God, if we could only go back. If things had gone the way we planned.”
Durk helped her into the car, then put his arm around her shoulder and held her while she cried.
“How were things supposed to go down the night you were attacked?”
“Nothing should have happened that night. I met with Edward that afternoon. I knew he was the one who’d killed Roxanne and others, as well. But I needed more evidence.”
“So you were going to let him abduct you and take you prisoner?”
“No. Nothing like that. I had it all planned. The date, the time, the place. I would go to the police and talk them into putting a wire on me. When he made his move they could be there in seconds.”
“But Edward figured it out?”
“He was shrewd. Always cunning. He never made a mistake. That’s how he got away with so many murders for so long.”
“Yet he went to jail for stalking a coed?”
“I can’t imagine what happened there. But he didn’t slip up with Roxanne.”
“How did he take her from the pub without anyone hearing her cry for help?”
“She never cried for help. She was meeting her lover. They’d met in a chat room on line and then exchanged private email addresses. They were finally going to meet in person that night. The text was her signal to dump her friends.”
“How did you learn that?”
“Through the computer of one of her friends. Roxanne had used it a few nights when hers needed repairs. Fortunately, the computer had gone on the blink at just the right time to record her last messages.”
“But not in time to save her. So sad,” Durk said. “A young life wasted to satisfy a depraved pervert.”
“And Edward killed over and over and over again. Someone had to stop him. But why did we have to lose Ben?”
“Somehow Edward figured out that you were not what you seemed. The only way to stop you from having him arrested was to kill both you and Ben.”
“We won’t know the full truth until the investigation is complete, but at least we know that Edward Byers won’t go on killing innocent women to satisfy his need for cheap thrills.”
“Let’s get out of here,” Durk said. “This time when we get to the ranch you really can relax.”
“I’m not going back to the ranch, Durk. The threat of danger is over. If I went back now, it would be about us. And there is no us.”
“If that’s the way you want it.
”
“I’m not the one who made the rules.”
* * *
MEGHAN SAID GOODBYE to Durk, probably for the last time, and then walked to her bedroom and fell across the bed. They’d made a stop at her office on the way back to her condo. It had seemed the fitting place to say her goodbye to Ben.
Tomorrow she’d go see Mary Nell, but she just couldn’t handle it today.
She’d lost Durk forever, too. She closed her eyes, sure exhaustion would take hold. Instead a new surge of memories took hold.
Meghan stepped out of the elevator and headed to her condo. A lot of preparation remained to be done before tomorrow evening, but her main priority now was kicking out of the 4.8-inch stilettos and shedding the sickening blond wig. Those along with the schoolgirl dress and the Christmas-red lipstick made her look like a cross between Little Bo Peep and Lady Gaga.
Just the way lover boy liked his dates to look—
perverted, demented soul that he was. He’d gone to such lengths to set his brother up for his crimes. He thought he was too smart to get caught. He had a plan for every eventuality. He had no conscience, no guilt, no shame.
That’s why he’d show up tomorrow night, never suspecting that she’d be wired. This time when he went in for the abduction, the police would be waiting. This time she’d play by their rules.
But she had to work fast. She had a date with a killer. Evan Byers was about to meet his match.
Meghan jumped from the bed as the truth rolled in her mind.
They’d gotten it all wrong. Edward wasn’t their killer and he wasn’t the one who’d attacked her. Evan was the guilty one. He’d plotted, he’d schemed and he’d carried out his plans. The only thing that had kept him from abducting and raping and torturing her had been Bill Mackey.
And once she was in his possession, he’d have gone back to put the bullet in Ben’s head, using her gun. It had all been a sick joke to him, a mockery of everything decent in the world.
Something moved behind her. Meghan jumped from the bed as someone grabbed her from behind.
“Did anyone ever tell you that there’s such a thing as being too smart, Meghan Sinclair?”
The question was rhetorical. He was on top of her with one hand over her mouth and the other ripping away her blouse.
“Time to get dressed for your lover, Meghan. And it won’t be Durk.”
Meghan struggled to get away. She could not die at the hands of this madman. She refused to be just another victim. She couldn’t bear to be a participant in one of his depraved fantasies.
But the fight was futile. Even healthy, she’d have been no match for his strength. She finally quit fighting it and let her mind float back to how it had felt in Durk’s arms the first time they’d made love.
They’d been magic from the very first kiss. She’d thrown the magic away. Now she would never get it back.
Chapter Eighteen
Durk pulled into traffic and let the facts surrounding Edward’s suicide try to fall into some kind of cohesive pattern. They refused.
It didn’t add up. It would have made more sense if brainiac Evan was their serial killer. He had the gray matter between his ears. He had the look to pull it off. He had the basement where he could have tortured his victims—and created a fake suicide. He had the opportunity to hang the revolting pictures—all part of a detailed plan to convince the police of Edward’s guilt.
Edward had…nothing.
Could the real killer have possibly fooled them all? Durk took out his phone and called Meghan’s condo. Her phone rang six times before the answering machine picked up.
Adrenaline rushed through him as panic set in. Evan could have fooled them—but only if Meghan’s memory had not fully kicked in. Edward and Evan looked nothing alike. She’d had a coffee date with the killer. Even though her attacker had been masked, she could have easily told the Byers twins apart just by their builds.
Durk swerved into a U-turn, leaving a line of cars blowing their horns and shouting curses as he sped back to Meghan’s condo. He grabbed his pistol from beneath the seat and took the stairs to the fifth floor, running so fast his feet barely skimmed the wood.
He knocked once and then burst into the condo. Muffled sounds sent him running to the bedroom.
“Drop the gun or I kill her.”
Evan held a knife in his right hand, the tip of it pressing into the flesh just below Meghan’s jugular vein.
“Let her go, Evan. It’s over. I figured it out and I’ve already called Detective Smart. You’re going to prison and have a whole new set of playmates.”
It was a bluff. Evan didn’t buy it.
“I said drop the gun.”
“You can kill her, Evan, but you can’t kill us both before I take you out.”
“I’m not kidding. Drop the gun.”
He wasn’t kidding, but he was sweating bullets.
But so was Durk, deep inside where it could only be felt. He dropped the gun before Evan panicked and sliced Meghan’s throat.
“I’m going out of here with Meghan, just as I’d originally planned. Stand back, Durk Lambert. You’re not in control this time.”
With the knife still at Meghan’s throat, he tugged her to her feet and held her in front of him as he made his way to the door.
“Bitsy, you come back here now!”
The overly friendly dog from across the hall raced through the door Durk had left open. He jumped up, his front paws reaching to the middle of Evan’s back. Evan lost his balance, and in that split second Durk took him down.
They wrestled over the knife while Bitsy’s owner screamed and Bitsy almost licked a yelping Evan to death. By the time the fight was over and the knife was in Durk’s hand, Sara Cunningham’s entire extended family had gathered in the hallway to watch the show.
“Someone call 911,” Durk said as he kept Evan pinned to the floor.
It wasn’t until after the cops had left with Evan in cuffs that Durk finally got to pull Meghan into his arms. Adrenaline was still pumping through his veins. His heart was pounding. His emotions were in overdrive. But there was one thing he was certain of. “I have never been so scared. I don’t want to ever let you go. I love you, Meghan. Boy, do I love you.”
“I love you, too, Durk. I did from the very first kiss. I remember it all now. I was wrong, so very wrong. I love what I do, but you are the most important thing in my life.”
“We’ll work it out, Meghan. Somehow we’ll work it out. And we’ll get a very large dog.”
Epilogue
Strings of pearly blue Christmas lights sparkled in the low branches of the oak trees that Hugh’s grandfather had planted years ago to shade the house from the afternoon sun. Christmas carols wafted through the air accompanied by the sounds of laughter and tinkling glasses as the first of the guests began to trickle in at the Bent Pine Ranch.
But for now it was mostly family. Carolina liked it like that, though it made her miss Hugh even more. He’d have loved being here tonight, seeing his three sons so very much in love and the family growing.
And as cautious as Carolina had been about Meghan in the beginning, she had to admit she loved having her around. She kept things exciting. Best of all she made Durk happier than she’d ever seen him.
Tommy came up and grabbed Carolina’s hand. “Wanna dance, Gramma?”
“I do if you’ll be my partner.”
“Be your partner.”
She went with him to the dance floor and let him dance around her while she swayed to the music.
It was going to be a wonderful night.
* * *
THE DANCE FLOOR was packed. Meghan liked it that way. It meant she got to snuggle all the closer to Durk.
“You’ve outdone yourself tonight. You look stunning.”
“With my shaved head?”
“It’s starting to grow out. Besides, it reminds me how lucky I am that you’re alive. And you do look fantastic. That red dress looks dynamite on you. Your go
rgeous legs look a mile long in those gold stilettos. And you can still walk. Amazing.”
“I can do more than walk in them.”
He nuzzled her ear. “I can’t wait for you to show me, but maybe you should save that until we’re alone.”
“I just might show you a thing or two tonight. When is your mother going to make the promised surprise announcement?”
“Soon, I’m sure.”
“Then we should move over to the edge of the dance floor. She wants the family all together for this.”
Meghan could barely hide her excitement. She loved Durk so much she was constantly giddy with excitement. He seemed to love her just as much, but there had been no mention of marriage.
Was that what he’d meant by “we’ll work it out”? That they’d be lovers and nothing more? At one point in her life that would have been more than enough. She’d always been so independent.
But she hadn’t been in love then. Now she wanted it all. The ring and the commitment. And a few years down the road—when she was ready to slow down and perhaps teach private investigating instead of living it—she wanted a family. Two kids at least, maybe three. Definitely a boy who looked like Durk.
But first, a husband. And she had a sneaking suspicion that the surprise announcement was supposed to be an engagement. Only Durk still hadn’t asked her to marry him and time was running out.
A few minutes later, the band quit playing and Carolina stepped to the microphone.
“I want to welcome all of you to share this blessed holiday season with us. But this week our family received an extraspecial holiday blessing. It’s especially fitting this time of the year when we celebrate the birth of a baby, God’s son, for us to share our news with you. Only I’m going to let Damien and Emma do the honors.”
Damien wrapped his arm around his wife’s shoulder. “Belle’s father finally made his decision. His new wife is pregnant and they’re moving back to her home country of Guatemala. He’s asked Emma and me if we will adopt Belle legally. We’ve said yes.”
