Hidden Truths

by Christina Dodd

  “That’s right.”

  She offered her hand. “I’m Corrections Officer Winifred Rinaldo. Something came up and right now, Warden Arbuckle and Assistant Warden Korthauer can’t take you on the tour of the facility.”

  Max was damned sick of getting the prison runaround. “What do you mean, they can’t take me on a tour of the facility? We have an appointment, and not for a tour. I’m here to visit Mara Philippi.”

  “Oh. You’re the one.” Officer Rinaldo eyed him up and down. “I didn’t realize… You know Mara Philippi is one of our most dangerous prisoners. Crazy, cruel and manipulative.”

  “That would be her.”

  “Gossip in town says you’re one of the people who captured her and brought her to justice.”

  “For once, gossip is right.”

  “Your wife also played a hand in it.” Her tone hinted at admiration and compassion.

  Max began to think this woman wasn’t part of McFarrellville’s good ol’ boy network. “A very big hand in it.”

  “And she’s dying.”

  “Yes.”

  Officer Rinaldo said, “Humph.” Her eyes narrowed on him; they were honest and clear of guilt, and she didn’t mind looking him in the face. “Humph.”

  He would bet this woman had good sense and backbone, and maybe even some compassion. “Officer Rinaldo, I need to see Mara Philippi, and I need to get back to my wife before it’s too late.” He noted the gold band on her left hand. “You’re married. Surely you understand that?”

  “I’m widowed.”

  Max heard raised voices from behind the office door. Warden Arbuckle and Assistant Warden Korthauer, shouting about something. He looked toward the office, half-expecting to them storm out.

  Officer Rinaldo looked, too, but the door remained closed. She stood. “I happen to know Mara Philippi was placed in the barred cell you requested. I wasn’t instructed to do so, but since it sounds as if they’re going to be a while, I can take you down there.” She pointed him toward the elevators. “After you.”

  He walked ahead of her—everybody who worked at the prison preferred to guard their backs—and asked, “What’s going on with Arbuckle and Korthauer?”

  “A call came in from Washington, DC. The FBI.”

  “Oh.” Max gave a brief laugh. “Did it?” Dear Nils. Max might not like him, but the guy had the connections and he wasn’t afraid to use them.

  Officer Rinaldo pressed the button to call the elevator. “I don’t know what it’s about, but once it came in, I was told to handle you.”

  The doors opened and he got in. “Are you handling me?”

  “I am. I’m giving you what you came for.” She got in with him and pressed the button for the bottom level. “That’s not what they meant, but in the future, when they decide to order me around, maybe they should be more specific.”

  The elevator dropped. The doors opened. He held them for Officer Rinaldo.

  She shook her head. “After you.”

  “Right.” Max walked down the corridor. “You’re not part of the Arbuckle/Korthauer team.”

  “They don’t have a team. They have a dictatorship that stinks of corruption. Korthauer should occasionally remember where she came from—which is the same place I came from.”

  He was pleased he’d guessed right. “You have the look of a McFarrell.”

  “Except my father came from out of town, so I’m not as inbred as the rest of them.”

  He gave a surprised bark of laughter.

  They reached the small barred door in the corner.

  Inside the cell, a woman sat on a chair, her elbow on the table, her back to Max. Her hair was black, like Mara’s, but hair could be dyed. Her skin was pale like Mara’s, but she lived in a cell.

  “Mara,” Max said. “I’ve come for a visit.”

  The woman didn’t move.

  “Don’t you want to see your old friend?” Max coaxed.

  Still no movement.

  “Come on, woman!” Officer Rinaldo glanced down the corridor toward the elevator. “We haven’t got all day!” Obviously, she anticipated interference from the warden and the assistant warden. Obviously, she intended to win this round.

  The woman in the cell didn’t move.

  “Mr. Di Luca,” Officer Rinaldo said, “I’ve been on the job long enough I don’t have to work down here in the trenches. I didn’t anticipate problems, but I guess I should have. They tell me Philippi was pure hell when she first got here. A few months ago, she got the medication she needed and settled in.”

  Or she escaped and left someone in her place.

  Officer Rinaldo struck her bat against the bars. “Turn around, Miss Philippi. Let’s see your face.”

  Max watched the prisoner intently, noting that she jumped at the sound.

  “Let me find the keys. I’ll get her turned around.” Officer Rinaldo walked toward the end of the corridor.

  Max studied the upright back of the prisoner. He was pretty damned sure that, despite the dark hair and small-boned frame, this was not Mara Philippi. Her shoulders hunched with tension. Mara Philippi wouldn’t be tense. She would be thrilled to see him, to have the chance to somehow torment him.

  Officer Rinaldo came back with an electronic card and a large brass key. She grinned when he lifted his eyebrows. “At McFarrellville Federal Correctional Facility, we cover all the bases.” She inserted the card into the reader and the key into the old-fashioned lock. She opened the door.

  The woman who claimed to be Mara Philippi shot to her feet and turned to face Officer Rinaldo.

  Officer Rinaldo slammed the door, shutting herself in, blocking Max’s view. When she took another step, the Mara imitator turned her shoulder to him.

  This was his chance. He had to see her now. He said, “It’s not her.”

  “How do you know?” Officer Rinaldo asked.

  “Too tall.”

  His gamble worked. The prisoner looked right at Max, her expression the picture of desperation and bitterness.

  He spoke right to her. “My mistake. You are about the same height—but you are not Mara Philippi.”

  Damn it. Damn it. She looked a lot like her, but she really and truly wasn’t Mara.

  The woman who was not Mara now realized she’d been tricked, and with a snarl, she flung herself at Officer Rinaldo, knocking her flat on her back.

  Officer Rinaldo hit her head against the linoleum floor.

  Max thought she had been knocked out.

  But Officer Rinaldo was a fighter. She slammed the flat of her hand under the false Mara’s chin, snapping her head back, then kneed her in the stomach and flipped her onto her back. She pressed her stick against Mara’s throat and said, “Honey, I don’t know who you are, but you’re going to get all the prison time you want.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  MAX WALKED OUT of the prison at 2:14 p.m.

  Once Officer Rinaldo had been satisfied that Max knew what he was talking about, and that the prisoner wasn’t Mara Philippi, she had hustled him to the door and told him to get out of town. She was smart enough to be scared.

  He was scared, too.

  Mara Philippi hadn’t escaped on her own. She had been a master of manipulating people around her; whoever had arranged for her to be traded for a look-alike would kill to hide their crime.

  As far as he knew Warden Arbuckle or Assistant Warden Korthauer were still locked in the warden’s office arguing with the federal government. One of them, or both of them, were guilty.

  As soon as Max got to the parking lot, beyond the reach of the prison’s Wi-Fi dampening field, he pulled out his phone and sent Nils Brooks a message.

  Mara Philippi a fake.

  Nils texted back, Not what I wanted to hear.

  That would be enough to get justice moving in the right dir
ection.

  * * *

  MAX PARKED HIS rental car in the Aloha Motel parking lot in the shade of the single tree and trudged across the hot, sticky asphalt to the door of his room. This morning, in his rush to view Mara, he’d left everything behind: his backpack, his toothbrush, his photo of Kellen and Rae, his tire iron under the bed.

  Now he intended to collect his belongings and leave McFarrellville before the shit hit the fan. After his text to Nils Brooks, it would. He had no doubt it would, but he did wonder, in the end, where the shit would land and stick.

  He used the key card to open the door and walked into a cleaned room. All the blinds were closed. The bed had been made up. His scattered belongings had been stowed in his backpack.

  He stopped in his tracks.

  Which was okay, except it appeared that someone intended it to look as if he’d never been here.

  Uh-oh.

  He took one step back toward the still open door, captured a glimpse of something in his peripheral vision, dodged and caught a wrench on the side of the temple.

  Lights exploded in his head.

  He dropped like a rock.

  Seconds later, he came back to consciousness. He knew it was seconds later because someone was breathing harshly in his ear, pulling him across that disgusting carpet toward the blocked back door. The room was dark; the front door had been closed. There was no way for anyone to know he was in here or what was happening.

  He reacted without warning, twisting, sweeping his left arm behind the knees and slamming the man—it was a man—to the floor.

  The fight instinct was strong, his thoughts swift and logical.

  Last night someone had tried to get in that back door. Last night there had been more than one man. Was there more than one in here? He rolled across that carpet—when he got out of this mess, he’d have to sterilize his whole body—to the bed. He reached under and grabbed the tire iron.

  Someone rushed him.

  He didn’t have time for a solid swing, but swept the tire iron up and at the man’s knees.

  The guy screamed, went down, whimpering, cursing.

  Max knew the voice.

  Jack Shales.

  I’m going to get out of this piece-of-shit little town.

  Dangerous guy. Frustrated, enraged, desperate. Jack pulled a pistol from a side holster and took quick aim.

  Max flung himself to one side as a shot blasted at him. It barely missed him, and a second click made him freeze in position. “Don’t shoot me.” He looked into Jack’s face, hoping Jack couldn’t cold-bloodedly pull the trigger. “I’m Max Di Luca. I’m the football player you admired.”

  “You always had everything you wanted. Came from a rich family. Had the body to play football. Why did you have to come here and screw everything up? No one cared she was gone. No one cared I made a fortune. Then you…” Jack staggered to his feet, rubbing one knee, but he kept that pistol pointed at Max. “You came and poked and prodded until people asked questions.”

  Max squinted, trying not to see the pistol, trying to see the man behind it. “Why would you go to the trouble to get Mara Philippi out? Of all the people, why her?”

  “She had the money. She had the power. She promised us—”

  “Us?”

  “Warden Arbuckle and me. She promised we’d be part of her team. We would make a fortune. I could leave here and never return.” Jack squinted at him, his pale blue eyes rabid with hope, and aimed the pistol at Max’s chest. “You didn’t have time to tell anyone the truth. I’m not going to get caught. I’m not.”

  “Of course I told someone. As soon as I was out of the prison, I let my friend in DC know. Look at my phone.” Which was out of Max’s reach. “You’ll see. There’s a text and a confirmation.”

  “No.” Jack panted as if he had run a long way. “No. You can’t tell me I’m going to die here. I want out. I hate this town. I hate that woman. I hate—”

  The door slammed open. Light flooded the room.

  Max saw the outline of a woman’s figure holding a shotgun. He curled up into a little ball, made himself a small target.

  The shotgun blasted.

  Blood spattered everywhere.

  Jack fell.

  In a voice mixed with amazement and annoyance, Elyse said, “He was actually going to leave. I never thought he’d have the guts.”

  Max peered around, felt ill. “Those are definitely his guts.”

  Elyse pointed the shotgun at him.

  He said his prayers, sent a kiss to Rae, knew he would be blessed when Kellen joined him all too soon.

  “Get out of town.” Elyse used the barrel to gesture toward the door. “Your wife is dying. You don’t want to be here for the fallout that’s going to follow this crime of passion. You’d never make it back in time.”

  Max grabbed his backpack and his tire iron and headed for the car.

  He hoped the scene in his rearview mirror would be the last he ever saw of McFarrellville.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  SOMETHING WOKE KELLEN from her sleep. A demand. An order.

  Get up. Get up now!

  She found her spirit self at the door of her room, then in the corridor. She looked around, trying to see what she had been called to do.

  Harrison Benchley was at the far end of the corridor, walking alone toward her, and toward his room. He was, as always, cold and without emotion, but in Harrison’s pocket, he held a scalpel.

  Where had he got that?

  He grasped the handle with his prosthetic hand. He caressed the blade with his forefinger. He jumped when its sharp edge sliced that artificial part of him. He frowned fiercely, stopped walking, pulled one of the hands he loathed out of his pocket and stared at it. He experimented, moving his fingers, proving to himself he hadn’t made a fatal mistake. He needed that hand to slit his throat.

  Dependent. Loser. Cripple.

  He would do it tonight.

  His physical therapist had said, I can’t make him want to live.

  Want to live? Worse than that. He’d been working so hard on his rehabilitation so he could die. So he could kill himself.

  Kellen’s gaze zoomed over to the woman in scrubs. As always, she was there at the end of the counter at the nurses’ station, watching him, loving him. His wife, the woman he’d cut out of his life.

  Kellen had to do something. She had to stop him. Before she finished the thought, she was beside him. She spoke to him as she spoke to others. “You want to live. For her. You love her.”

  Her words slid off the bleak shell of his indifference.

  “Listen to me. Listen to me!” She tried to take his arm, but without flesh, she couldn’t touch him. “I’m here,” she said. “I’m talking to you.”

  He remained still, looked around.

  He’d heard her!

  No, he hadn’t. He was simply making sure no one had observed him, that no one would try to stop him. He placed his hand in his pocket again and started walking.

  Kellen kept up with him. “Look at her. That’s your wife. She’s here every day to see you. She loves you. You love her. Look. Look!”

  He was on alert. He observed his surroundings, but he wasn’t really looking. He was so shut off he didn’t see through Megan’s feeble disguise to the woman he had lifted, helped, embraced, loved.

  In another few moments, he’d be in his room, slashing his throat, making sure that even if he was found, no one could possibly save him.

  Kellen had to do something. But she couldn’t touch him, couldn’t make him hear her.

  She had to go back to her body. Now. Now!

  At once she was in her room, staring down at the Kellen on the bed, at her bandaged head. Beneath those bandages, a scar bisected her mostly bald skull. The bruising on her face showed brightly against the pallor of her skin. />
  Kellen knew—she knew—that if she did this thing, if she allowed her spirit to enter her body, she would be alive again, conscious, aware.

  She was being allowed this chance to save a man’s life, but she had a decision to make. If she accepted, her recovery would be miserable, demeaning, difficult and, maybe, might never be complete.

  But what else could she do?

  Harrison.

  Megan.

  Harrison.

  Hurry!

  She slid into herself.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  KELLEN OPENED HER EYES. Her real eyes, the ones in her body. She rested on the hospital bed in the room she recognized as hers.

  Hurry!

  She had to get up, but it took a moment to remember how to use her body, to move her fingers and use them to push back the blankets, to sit up and stare at her bony legs, her skeletal feet, and hope they would hold her weight.

  Because Max had had her removed from life support, there was no IV…but she was bound by a catheter. She looked around, found a pair of scissors resting on a bedside metal tray and used them to cut the tube. She used a tissue to catch the fluid—not much at this point—and she was free.

  Everything sort of hurt: her head, of course, but all her joints and muscles protested their lack of use as she moved her legs, inch by inch, toward the edge of the mattress, dangled them and then, holding the metal railing, stood.

  Pins and needles in her feet. But she didn’t have time to worry about comfort. She needed to walk. Now!

  She practiced a few steps, holding the railing. Good enough.

  She wore one of her nightgowns, thank heavens, but look! A bathrobe. Her bathrobe, hanging on the hook on the wall, waiting for her.

  She smiled. Rae had insisted they leave it for her, for when she got up. Bless that little girl. With all her heart, she had believed Kellen would live.

  Holding the railing, Kellen lifted the robe off the hook and shrugged her shoulders into it. No time to try to work out the difficult process of inserting her arms into the sleeves.