by Winnie Reed
I sat warily, tense, ready to spring if I needed to. I could get out to the parking lot from here if necessary, or back to the lobby through the glass door I’d been running toward before I fell, like a dope.
He sighed, folding his hands as he stood in front of me. “Emma, I’m afraid you have the wrong idea about what’s gone on this weekend,” he murmured. “I believe Georgia spoke out of turn back there. It was unfair of you to get her drunk, just because you wanted information.”
“I didn’t get her drunk. She had two glasses of wine, and it was her idea to go for that second glass. She was at her wits end.”
“Because of you.”
“Because of the fact that the cops would’ve arrested her for the murder.”
“A murder she didn’t commit. I’d already arranged for an attorney to take her side should the worst happen. She’s my client. It’s my job to take care of her.”
There went my spidey sense, tingling all over again. “Did you take care of her by killing the man who threatened to expose her as a plagiarist?”
When his face went pale, his eyes perfectly round, I realized I might’ve been off in my theory. That wasn’t the reaction of a guilty man pretending to be innocent.
“Me? I don’t even kill spiders. I catch and release them. No, I didn’t kill anyone. But I’m here to protect Georgia from the idiot police who might soon come to the conclusion that she did it. Heck,” he said on a sigh. “She might have, for all I know. She swears she didn’t, but she’s the one he was harassing, isn’t she?”
“You have that little faith in your client?”
“Listen here, missy.” He bent slightly, hands on his knees. There went that hardness in his eyes again. “Whatever they have against her is circumstantial at best. The lawyer I have all lined up for her is ready to tear this town’s police department a new one for even suggesting she did anything wrong. She’s protected. That’s the best I can do. Even if it was her, she was more than likely protecting herself against that maniac. Who could blame her?”
“Was he harassing Deidre, too?” I asked. “Did she ever mention him?”
“Once again, what in the world does Deidre have to do with any of this?” He stood up straight, throwing his arms out to the sides. “Why do you keep bringing her up?”
“Don’t you know who that man accused Georgia of plagiarizing?”
He shrugged. “No. She never told me. She mentioned him, said he was harassing her, mentioned plagiarism. I don’t work with plagiarists, my dear. The entire idea is ridiculous. Besides, she’s the real deal. I can always tell the real deal.”
Jeez Louise. He wasn’t pretending. He really had no idea.
Which meant there was no reason for him to kill Lawrence. He had no clue about the ghostwriting, which meant he had no idea how Deidre and Georgia were related. Or what it could mean for him if his client was revealed to be something other than who she pretended.
“Are you sure about that, Brian? Are you sure you know the real deal?”
We both turned to find Deidre Price standing just inside the gate, which she swung shut behind her. She was perfectly groomed, not a blonde hair out of place, wearing a black shift dress with a white cardigan over her shoulders. The picture of sophistication.
“And this girl picked it up right away, well before you did. You’re not half the genius you believe you are, Brian.” She shook her head. “Honestly, the things a man will take credit for.”
I knew then and there that I was looking at the woman who’d killed Lawrence Miller.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“Have a seat.” Deidre pointed to the chair next to mine. “Now.”
“Dee? What’s this all about?” Brian sat anyway, glancing at me in shock. Boy, he was slow on the uptake. Or maybe he felt the same way about her that I did about Georgia. He couldn’t believe she was capable of doing this.
“Her.” Deidre pointed at me and kept pointing as she approached. “This one. I knew she had something to do with that idiot.”
“If you’re talking about the dead man, you’re wrong. I have nothing to do with him, never did. This whole time, I thought Georgia might’ve done it. I didn’t want to believe she did. I wanted to help her.”
“Congratulations,” she sneered. “You helped her, all right. She would’ve been fine. There wouldn’t have been anything to charge her with—or else the cops would’ve done it already. No, you had to keep pushing and questioning and being a pain in general, and look where it got you.”
“Where did it get me?” I asked, looking her in the eye.
She smirked. “Where do you think?” A quick glance at the pool told me what I needed to know.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Please. You don’t think it’ll look suspicious? Pushing me into an empty pool? What, did I not notice the lack of water?”
“Can somebody please explain to me what’s going on here?” Brian demanded, jumping to his feet.
“Sit down!” she barked.
He sat. I would have, too. The woman had a pair of lungs and a snarl to match.
Why the heck wasn’t there anybody out here but us? Broad daylight, too, though the light was starting to soften and warm the way it did late in the day. Trixie and Nell would be wondering where I was pretty soon.
Deidre slid one hand into her shoulder bag and voila! A pistol. “I always carry when I travel,” she smiled. “I didn’t have it on me on Thursday night, though. I left it in the safe. Silly me.”
“Somebody would’ve heard a gunshot,” I reminded her. “And they will now.”
“Yes, well, maybe Brian and I fought over the gun.” She lifted a shoulder. “Stranger things have happened. Maybe he shot me in the arm or something before I managed to fight the gun away and shoot him. It can all happen so quickly, before anybody gets here to see what all the noise is about.”
“Why would you do this?” Brian gasped.
“Because she hasn’t been writing her books for years now and doesn’t want anybody to find out,” I announced. “Georgia has been her ghostwriter.”
She didn’t even flinch in surprise at my knowing this, but instead turned to Brian. “And you call yourself an agent. You don’t even bother reading my work anymore.”
“I don’t understand, though,” I mused. What the heck? Might as well stall while getting the answers I craved. “Why did you go out of your way to connect Georgia and Brian if there was a chance of him picking up the similarities in your books?”
“I didn’t think he’d be interested,” she shrugged. “I had to keep her on the hook. Show her I cared about her as more than a word machine. Keep her happy. But then what did he do?”
She shoved the pistol in his direction, her hand shaking. “He picked her up. Raved about her. Put all his efforts behind her. Her! What was I supposed to do, tell him my work was hers? Have my book deal pulled? Become a laughingstock, a pariah? After I worked so hard to build something I could be proud of, something my kids could be proud of.”
“But you didn’t build it,” I whispered.
“I did! I would’ve kept doing it if it wasn’t for him!” She was almost screaming, and I couldn’t help feeling the tiniest bit sorry for her—even if she was holding a gun on us.
“Me?” he gaped, pointing to himself.
“Work harder. Work faster. Pump the books out. More money, more conferences, more speaking engagements. More, more, more. No one can keep up that pace without losing their mind. Not to mention trying to raise two kids on my own at the same time. What was I supposed to do? I needed help!”
“I don’t blame you for that,” I murmured, ignoring the way Brian glared at me. “You had to feel cornered. Like your career was a speeding train you couldn’t control.”
“Yes,” she sighed. “Yes, yes, somebody gets it.”
“And when Georgia came to you with the Lawrence problem, you knew it would blow up in your face.”
“I couldn’t have him exposing me, the idiot,” she spat. “
Thinking he was doing me a favor, keeping an eye out for me. He had the nerve to ask me for money as repayment, like a reward. Can you imagine?”
“He did? The jerk.” I wasn’t even saying that to placate her. He truly was a jerk for trying to take advantage.
“You met him here, by the pool,” I murmured.
“I closed the gate behind us. There was nobody out here. It was dark already, and most people were settling in for the evening. Or gambling their money away, or drinking because they’d gambled their money away. Regardless, we had privacy here. He demanded money. I told him I didn’t think he deserved it, that there was no reward for pointing out an issue like this. I knew darn well Georgia didn’t lift any material from me. I read the book before it was published. I tried explaining about imitation being the sincerest form of flattery. That I know the girl and know she would never steal from me. He refused to listen.”
“He wasn’t a very rational person.”
“No,” she laughed. “He was not. He turned on me, just like that.” She snapped the fingers of her free hand. “I was a hack who didn’t value my work. I didn’t deserve my fame, my reputation, because I cared nothing about integrity. On and on. I told him I wanted to get by, to go to my room. I told him not to bother me or Georgia again.”
The gun wavered. I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.
“He wouldn’t let me pass. Kept stepping in front of me. I shoved him, finally. Maybe I used more force than I intended. He lost his balance and hit his head on the edge of the pool.”
She looked down at the concrete lip. “I didn’t know what to do. I had no witnesses. Nothing to prove it was an accident. I couldn’t come out and explain what he said, why he’d cornered me, without risking the truth of my ghostwriting arrangement coming out in the end. I thought, well, it’s all over now. No more troubles. I locked the gate behind me so no one could wander in.”
“I can honestly say I’m sorry I happened to come down for a swim.”
“You should be. Because between that and your nosy attitude, you’ve gotten yourself into this mess. You should’ve left it alone.”
“Like you told me to when you slid that note under my door?” I ventured.
“Yes. Like that. But you didn’t listen. Georgia told me you wanted to help her through this. The kid has no idea that I did it. She came to me as a friend. I said I wanted to thank you for being so nice.”
“Some thank you,” I muttered.
“Shut up. I’m tired of your smart mouth and I’m tired of you in general. This could’ve all worked itself out if you would’ve stayed out of it.”
“You’d think I would’ve learned that lesson by now,” I murmured, more to myself than to anyone assembled.
“It’s a shame you never did.” She raised the gun and I realized she wasn’t playing around. This was the real deal. She was going to shoot me where I sat.
I’d never understand what came over me, not if I had a million years to figure it out.
My whole life flashed before my eyes in the moment I threw myself from the chair. Mom. Dad. Darcy. Lola, my little fluff ball who needed me. Raina. Deke. Joe. All of them and so much more, images popping up in front of my mind as I hurled my body across the patio, catching Deidre around the waist.
I was moving way too fast to stop.
We went over the edge, into the waterless pool. A horrible cracking noise filled the air, filled my head, filled the entire world just a split second before the bottom of the pool rose up to meet us.
Lucky for me, we were at the shallow end of the pool. Only four feet down. Even so, the impact knocked the wind out of my lungs and left me dazed.
It did the same to Deidre, who lost her grip on the gun she’d fired as I took her down. It skittered across the pool floor, but I had the feeling she wouldn’t be scrambling to grab it any time soon. She was out cold.
I rolled away from her, breathless, and stared up at the tinted glass overhead.
“Emma! Are you all right?” Brian ventured to the edge of the pool once he figured everything was safe.
“Oh, dandy,” I groaned. “Every bone in my body now aches and I might have a broken wrist, but there’s no lead in my body and I’m breathing. So. I’m still winning at life.”
No thanks to the unconscious author lying next to me.
Chapter Twenty-Five
“We’ve got to stop meeting like this.” Joe stood with his hands on his hips, looking down at me while paramedics treated my wrist.
“It’s not the same this time,” I reminded him, wincing when one of the guys turned my hand from side to side.
“Looks like a sprain, but you’ll have to come get it x-rayed anyway,” the medic decided. “We’ll give you a sling for it.”
Joe sighed. “You’re lucky that gun was pointed to the patio and not at you when you hit her.”
“No need to tell me.” I shuddered just thinking about it. “How did you even know to be here?”
“I have a scanner at home. The minute I heard shots were fired at the hotel, I knew you had something to do with it.”
“Cute,” I grumbled.
“But true, isn’t it? Here you are, having gotten yourself into actual, physical danger this time. A sprained wrist and everything.”
“It could’ve been worse.”
“No need to tell me,” he said, echoing my words.
“How is she?” I asked, nodding toward the pool. There were paramedics and police in there with her.
Joe cast a disdainful look behind him. “She’ll live. A real bump on the head, thanks to you.”
“She deserved worse, but still, I felt sorry for her.”
“Stop. You can’t mean it.”
“I do.”
He sat next to me. “She didn’t have to pull a gun on you and her agent. She didn’t have to cover up what she did and leave Georgia holding the bag.”
“She felt like she didn’t have a choice,” I argued. “She was cornered. On a runaway train, and there was no way to make it stop. It was her own life, but she had no control over it. Lawrence pushed her over the edge. And even then, it was an accident. I totally believe it was. She wasn’t thinking rationally. She had her name and her career and even her kids to protect.”
“Damn, Emma.” He wore a wry grin as he rubbed the back of his neck. “You find a way to get me to see the other side of a situation more often than I like.”
“Emma? Emma!” Trixie and Nell fought their way through the crowd on the other side of the gate. “Emma! What happened now?”
“I’m okay!” I called out, waving with my good hand which still happened to be caked with dried blood from when I tripped.
I thought Trixie was going to pass out for a second and almost called out for somebody to help her, but Nell made sure she stayed on her feet.
“I’ll go talk to them,” Joe offered as he stood.
“Thanks. I guess they’ll wanna come with me to the hospital, too.”
“Hmm. Twice in one day, Harmon.” His smirk softened into something more like a smile. “At least you won’t be there alone.”
“You weren’t alone,” I reminded him as he turned toward my aunties.
He paused. “You’re right,” he murmured, looking at me over his shoulder with that same crooked smile. “I wasn’t.”
“Your mother is never going to forgive us. I hope you know that.” Trixie hadn’t stopped pacing the tiny, curtained-off section of the ER since we got there.
“It’s gonna be fine. You had nothing to do with it. It wasn’t your fault.”
“We wanted to keep you out of trouble,” Nell sighed. “And look where we are.”
“Once again, not your fault.” Maybe it was the pain meds, but nothing in the world could possibly bother me. I felt loving, generous, totally zen.
Not even the knowledge of what Mom, and even Dad, would most certainly put me through when I got home could break my mood.
“You could’ve been killed,” Trixie argue
d.
“But I wasn’t, thanks to my cat-like reflexes.”
“Hmph. Cat-like. Says the girl who tripped over a planter and skinned her palms.” Nell snorted.
“Hey. They came through when it counted. Like when I had to keep that woman from shooting me.”
“I just can’t believe she would do something so horrible,” Nell stroked my hair. “I’ve admired her for so long.”
“You admired her writing,” I pointed out as gently as I could.
“I admired her,” she insisted. “Her story. What she managed to accomplish.”
It would’ve been mean of me to point out that her story, while interesting and inspiring, could’ve been packaged as a marketing ploy by none other than Brian Murphy, savvy agent that he was. Or by her publicist.
And that either way, it didn’t make her a saint.
Instead, I patted her hand. “She was in a bad position. A terrible one. I don’t take it personally.” And I didn’t, at least not right then. Maybe I’d feel different when the meds wore off.
“I’m surprised Detective Sullivan didn’t join us,” Trixie murmured, winking at Nell. She couldn’t be in such a terrible mood if she was winking like that.
“He knew it wasn’t his place,” I explained, rather than reminding her how awkward it would’ve been and how they both would’ve peppered him with questions until his head spun. “I have my family with me. I didn’t need anybody else.”
“He sure is handsome,” Nell sighed.
“And he came on the run when he thought you might be in trouble,” Trixie added with a twinkle in her eye. “That sounds like something special to me.”
“It’s nothing special. We’re friends. Friends do that for each other.”
“You and Raina would do that for each other. Trix and I would do that for each other, or for your mom. But him?” Nell whistled. “That’s not just friendship.”
“You’re going to make me regret having you come along to the hospital,” I warned.
