by Terri Reed
Roman tried to restrain her and force her behind his back, but she refused.
Confusion entered Ava’s gaze. “What? Of course not. Where have you been?”
“I survived your attempt to kill me,” Leah spat out.
“You’re not making any sense,” Ava said, her gaze darting between Leah and Roman. “Don’t I know you?” she asked Roman.
Roman didn’t answer. Now was not the time to remind her of their separate social classes.
“BOSWORTH!” Charla screeched again.
“Move,” Roman urged Leah, fully expecting Bosworth to come running with a gun in hand.
“We found the wig, Ava,” Leah said, staying in place. “And this.” She held up the bottle of perfume. “You had it on the day you knocked me over the head and dumped me alongside the road.”
Perplexity showed on Ava’s face. “I have no idea what you’re talking about. And that isn’t my perfume, it’s…” Her green eyes widened. “You two need to leave.”
The sound of running feet echoed down the hall. Roman pulled Leah back and shoved the rolled garment bag containing the wig into her arms. He readied himself to meet Bosworth.
The older man skidded to a halt on the top step. His hands were thankfully empty. “What are you still doing here?”
“We’re leaving,” Roman said, and pushed Leah toward the stairs.
“No one is going anywhere.” Charla Renault’s voice, low and hard, stopped them.
Roman turned to stare at the gun the Renault matriarch held in her hand. A warning signal clanged in his brain. They were in danger from a gun-toting, wheelchair-bound old woman.
“Mother?” Ava cried as horror spread across her face.
Leah gasped.
“Now you’ve done it,” Bosworth muttered.
“Ava, go back to your room,” Charla commanded as the chair whirred forward.
“Mother, put that away before you hurt someone,” Ava said in a tight, shaky voice.
“You stupid girl,” Charla said, shifting the gun in her daughter’s direction and rising from her wheelchair. She walked toward Ava. “Always in the way.”
A stunned silence filled the hallway.
Roman couldn’t believe it. Charla Renault could walk! And apparently was their murderer.
Ava swayed as if she might keel over. “You can walk.”
“Of course, I can walk. But I must admit I enjoy the attention the chair brings,” Charla said as she stopped a few feet from Ava. “You should have listened to your mother and gone to your room. There’s no help for it now.”
Bosworth stepped between Ava and the gun. He held his hands up in entreaty. “Now, Miz Charla, you don’t want to go hurtin’ Ava. She’s all you have left.”
“Don’t make me use this on you, too,” Charla said to Bosworth.
Leah pushed past Roman. “You killed your own son. How could you?”
Charla shifted the gun in Leah’s direction. Roman’s heart jumped into his throat. He tried to contain Leah, to pull her back behind him to safety, but again she refused. She stalked closer to Charla, seemingly unconcerned by the gun pointed at her chest. “How come you tried to kill me? What did I do to you?”
Roman edged toward Charla, gauging the distance between them so he could tackle her before she shot Leah.
“Dylan wanted that brat of yours. He would’ve besmirched the Renault name. I couldn’t allow that.”
Leah’s eyes grew round. “You know that Sarah is his child?”
“Why else would he have wanted to seek custody of her?” Charla gestured with the gun. “You seduced him. Made him want his child.”
“He raped me!” Leah cried.
Roman gaped at Leah. She’d admitted it publicly. Good for her. If only they weren’t staring death in the face, he’d hug her.
Ava gasped, drawing the older woman’s attention.
Roman lunged toward Charla. Deftly, she sidestepped him and aimed the gun at his head. “Oh, no, you don’t. I knew when you came back to town you’d be trouble.” She swore. “If only that idiot Bosworth had done his job and gotten rid of you both, none of this would be happening now.”
Eyeing her finger on the trigger, Roman said, “So you had Bosworth try to kill Leah and me before we could return to Loomis. And he used Ava’s car.”
“Fat lot of good it did,” Charla said, her face twisting with malice as she stared at Leah. “I should’ve killed you when I had the chance. A temporary moment of weakness that won’t happen again.”
Ava stepped out from behind Bosworth. Tears streaked down her pale face. “Mother, I don’t understand.” Ava gazed beseechingly at Bosworth. “Why is she doing this?”
“This isn’t your mother right now. She’s a little out of sorts,” Bosworth said, his voice resigned and regretful.
Out of sorts? Roman gaped. The woman was outright crazy.
“Enough chatter.” Charla’s gaze darted between the four of them as the gun roamed from one to another like some sick game of Russian roulette.
Roman wasn’t about to wait to see if she was going to make good on her threat to kill any of them. He shifted his weight, preparing to launch himself again at the older woman when the doorbell rang.
It was enough of a distraction. Roman pounced on Charla, knocking her sideways into the wall. The loud retort of the gun firing rang in his ears.
Leah screamed as the echo from the gun bounced off the walls. Her gaze collided with Ava’s and then they both turned to see Bosworth slump forward onto the floor. Bright red blood spread on the hall carpet. Ava shrieked.
Roman quickly disarmed Charla, sticking the gun in his waistband while easily fending off Charla’s attempts to beat her way free.
Feet pounded up the stairs. A man burst into the hall, his expression panicked. “Ava?”
She fell into his arms sobbing. “Oh, Max.”
“Someone call 911,” Leah said as she checked Bosworth’s pulse. “He’s still alive.”
Max gave her a curious glance as he and Ava disappeared back into her suite. Leah went to Roman. “You okay?”
He nodded and dodged Charla’s fist. “You?”
“Good.” Leah had so many questions that only Charla could answer. “How come, Mrs. Renault? How come you killed Dylan? And Earl and Angelina?”
Leah’s questions only seemed to aggravate the woman more. “They deserved it! They wanted to ruin me. They wanted to ruin the Renaults!” She kicked, her arms flailing with useless blows to Roman’s arms while she screamed obscenities.
Shocked by the level of the woman’s insanity, Leah stepped out of the way as Ava and Max reappeared from her suite. Max stepped forward to help restrain Charla, which only served to make her even more angry.
“Let go of me! Don’t let a Pershing touch me!” Charla screeched.
The sounds of sirens hurtling closer brought hope of some order to the chaos. Leah ran downstairs and out the front door to meet the deputies and the ambulance pulling up outside.
“What’s all the commotion, young lady?” Sheriff Reed said as he hitched up his pants over his paunch. “Why are you bothering Mrs. Renault?”
“Oh, come on,” Leah said with exasperation. “There’s a man dying inside.”
She led the way back inside and up the stairs. The paramedics knelt beside Bosworth. “He’s lost a lot of blood. We’ve got to get him to the hospital.”
The sheriff seemed mystified by the situation as he gawked at Charla. “Mrs. Renault?”
Clearly having assessed the situation, Deputy Olsen pushed the sheriff aside and assumed control. “Clayton, Jefferies, cuff Mrs. Renault and take her to the station.”
The other two deputies jumped to do Olsen’s bidding, relieving Roman and Max of the Renault matriarch. They led her out of the house with her hands cuffed behind her back and curses flying from her mouth.
Feeling the need to apologize to Ava, Leah moved to where Ava and Max stood watching Mrs. Renault being loaded into the back of the sheriff
’s patrol car. Ava let out a sob as the cruiser pulled away from the curb. Max comforted her with soothing words.
Leah touched Ava’s arm. “I’m sorry I accused you of…well, of murder. It never occurred to me it could be your mother.”
“What made you suspect me?” Ava asked as she wiped at the tears in her green eyes. Eyes so like Sarah’s.
Roman stepped to Leah’s side, his arm wrapping around her waist. She leaned against him, taking comfort in his presence.
“There was an eyewitness to the murders. He was really scared of someone in this house. We assumed it had to be you,” Roman said.
Ava and Max exchanged a glance.
“Was your witness Chuck Peters?” Max asked.
“How did you know?” Leah asked.
Ava sniffed. “Chuck Peters was the one who called in my brother’s murder.”
Roman stiffened. “The sheriff didn’t say anything about that and it wasn’t in the police reports.”
“That’s because Sheriff Reed is incompetent,” Max said with a good dose of antagonism lacing his voice.
“Did Dylan really rape you?” Ava asked, her voice shaky.
Roman’s arm tightened around Leah’s waist, bolstering her courage. She nodded. “At the company Christmas party four years ago.”
Fresh tears spilled from Ava’s lashes. “I’m so sorry. For everything my family has done to you.”
Touched that Ava would apologize for something not of her doing, Leah said, “You weren’t party to any of it. Besides, you’re my daughter’s aunt. I hope you and I will be friends.”
Ava smiled. “I’d like that.” Ava sighed. “I’d best call our family lawyer, Mr. Fayard, for Mother.”
Max shook Roman’s hand before he accompanied Ava back inside the Renault home.
A buoyant sense of weightlessness hit her, making Leah’s limbs weak and her head fuzzy. She wasn’t a murderer. She was liberated from the oppressive guilt that had hung around her shoulders for so many months. Though she didn’t have her memory back, she was free to start over. To love. And she did love. She loved Roman.
She turned in his arms and drew his lips to hers, putting all the love bubbling in her heart into the kiss.
“Hmm,” he murmured as they broke apart. “What was that for?”
“For everything. For your belief in me. For pursuing the truth. For making me realize that keeping the past a secret doesn’t help. It only hurts more.” She grinned. “For just being you. I love you, Roman.”
The shocked expression in his dark eyes made her wish she could retract her words. Clearly, the feeling wasn’t mutual.
“Leah—”
She put her fingers to his lips. “Don’t. I’m not asking for your love in return. I know I was only a job to you. But you gave me a second chance at life and for that I’ll always be grateful.”
Releasing her hold on him, she stepped back and wrapped her arms around her middle. “I’d like to meet Sarah now.”
Roman stood in Clint Herald’s living room, watching the reunion between Leah and Sarah with tears misting his eyes. Tenderness welled in his soul to see the blissful way Leah gazed at the little blond girl with the pretty almond-shaped green eyes of the Renaults. Even though Leah couldn’t remember her child, love was evident in the softness of her gaze and the smile on her beautiful face. Roman’s insides clenched. She’d gazed at him like that when she confessed her love.
He still couldn’t believe she loved him.
But more important, he didn’t know how he felt. He couldn’t let himself examine his feelings. Not when he wasn’t free of his debt to his mother. He had to extract justice for what she’d suffered before he could even think of returning Leah’s love.
Clint, standing beside Roman, wiped at his own eyes. “I don’t know how we can thank you for bringing Leah back to us.”
Uncomfortable with all the mushiness, Roman clapped him on the back. “No thanks needed. I was just doing a job.”
Clint gave Roman a funny look. “Right. Well, whatever the case. We’re grateful.”
Roman nodded in acknowledgment. He’d done what he’d set out to do. Bring down Earl Farley’s murderer. Only the murderer had come as a complete shock. Not Leah Farley, as Roman had first assumed, but Charla Renault.
The town was abuzz with the news of Mrs. Renault’s break with reality and her killing spree. She would be spending the better portion of her days in a mental institute, while Bosworth would recover from his gunshot wound in the state penitentiary for being Charla Renault’s accomplice.
Now it was time for Roman to resume his quest for the man who’d raped his mother and sent her into a suicidal depression.
“Look, tell Leah goodbye for me, will ya?” Roman said as he headed toward the door.
“You should tell her yourself,” Clint said with a frown.
Roman gave a negative wave of his hand. “I don’t want to interrupt.”
He made it out the door and to the sidewalk before he heard the door open behind him.
“You’re going to leave without saying goodbye?”
He closed his eyes at the hurt in Leah’s voice. “It just seemed easiest.”
“For you,” she scoffed. She stalked toward him. “Where are you going?”
She knew, he could see it in her eyes. “We’ve had this discussion.”
“And haven’t you learned anything?” she said, her hands planted on her hips. “You saw what anger and bitterness did to Charla Renault. You want that to happen to you?”
“I’m going to take care of the anger and the bitterness,” he said, not seeing the connection at all.
“Your killing that man won’t relieve you of anything. Only God can.” Her face softened as she pleaded with him. “Don’t you see? You have to accept the past and look to the future.”
“I can’t.”
“If you do this, if you seek justice for what happened to your mother by killing this man, you will only exchange anger for guilt. And the bitterness will never end as long as you have unforgiveness in your heart.”
He stepped back, shocked by her accusation. “Are you suggesting I forgive this man? Are you nuts?”
“Forgiveness isn’t for him. It’s for you. It’s so you can find peace and love. So you can let God’s love fill you. As long as you harbor unforgiveness in your heart, you’ll always be empty and wanting.”
Exasperated and irritated by her words, he held up his hands. “Whatever. I’m leaving. I’m really glad you’ve had your happy ending. Now I need to go get my happy ending to what was started twenty years ago.”
Not able to stand the disappointment and pain crumbling in her expression because it hurt too much to know he was the cause, he turned away and strode to where Mort waited in the truck.
No way, no how was he going to forgive his mother’s rapist. And he was angry at Leah for throwing that up in his face. She didn’t understand his need to make right what he hadn’t been able to do as a child.
He had to make sure justice was served. Even if that meant killing a man.
ELEVEN
Leah sank to the ground as Roman climbed into the truck and drove away, out of her life for good.
She hurt so badly for the pain he suffered, but more for the wounds he was about to inflict on his soul.
“Dear Father God, please. Please, don’t let him do this. Make him see how wrong he is.”
She buried her face in her hands and sobbed for Roman and for herself, for the love crowding her heart for a man who didn’t love her back.
“Mommy?”
Sarah’s little voice, so scared and uncertain, pulled Leah out of her own misery. Though Leah had no memories of Sarah, her heart recognized her the instant they were reunited. She opened her arms to the child standing a few feet away. Sarah rushed into Leah’s embrace. Leah buried her tears in Sarah’s downy hair.
Please, God, take care of Roman.
Two days later, Roman’s plane touched down in Hattiesburg, at Miss
issippi’s Hattiesburg-Laurel Regional Airport at ten in the morning. He rented a car and bought a map. Plotting out his course for the address provided by his Baton Rouge police buddy, Karl, he resolutely drove down the four-lane highway through the rolling, piney countryside toward the junction that would take him near Lake Serene where, according to the map, Ethan Stumps lived.
At the junction he exited and followed the signs for the lake. About thirteen miles later, he slowed the rented sedan as the street he was searching for appeared on his right. Heart beating like a million birds taking flight, Roman headed down the lane through an older neighborhood full of single-level homes, some of which were badly in need of repair. He slowed as he checked the addresses until finally he stopped in front of a weathered square-shaped house. He got out of the car. Yellowing grass edged the walkway leading to the front door.
Roman fisted his hand and knocked.
From somewhere inside, a television blared. Roman banged harder, fire filling his chest. A moment later, the door opened, revealing a thin, mousey brown-haired woman. Her doelike gaze searched Roman’s face. “Yes?”
Roman hesitated. He hadn’t done his research. He always did his research, but he’d been so focused on getting to Mississippi and to Stumps that he hadn’t checked to see if the scumbag had a family. “Ethan Stumps?”
The woman stepped farther out of the door and pulled it closed behind her. “He’s sleeping.”
Irritated, Roman said, “Wake him up.”
She bit her lip. “Y’all the police?”
Caught off guard by the hope in her eyes, he blinked. For a moment he thought about lying. But what was the point? “No, ma’am.”
Her shoulders sagged and panic entered her eyes. “I won’t wake him.”
Clearly the woman was afraid of Stumps. “Are you his wife?”
Her lips thinned. “Yeah.”
Roman’s instincts flared red hot. Stumps was a rapist. It wasn’t outside the course of plausibility that he was an abuser, as well. “Are there kids in the house?”
“My Angie’s over at the Becks’ house,” she answered.
