For a suspended moment the air went still. He could hear car doors closing, the crackling static of a radio…and the sound of a gun being cocked.
Pain exploded in his back. And the snow-gray morning turned to night.
Dana couldn’t contain her excitement. If it hadn’t been snowing, if she hadn’t been wearing boots, if she hadn’t been carrying Morty, she might have done a jig down the walk.
Finally, finally, something had gone right. She couldn’t wait to get back to Remy. She wanted to see the look on his face when she showed him what she had.
They had been right. Sylvia had kept a diary. And that inquisitive, wonderful, impulsive, adorable daughter of Remy’s had known exactly where her grandmother stored it.
Grinning, Dana pressed her face to Morty’s fur. “You clever, clever creature,” she whispered.
He dug his claws into her sleeve. He knew they were heading back to the car and the hated carrier. That’s what she had counted on. When she had first tried to leave, he had slipped out of her grasp and raced back into the house. During the ensuing search for her fugitive feline, Dana had gone straight to the closet at the top of the staircase that Chantal had described.
Dana knew she had been absolutely shameless, manipulating confidences out of Chantal that way. She would probably feel guilty for the rest of her life over taking advantage of the child’s innocent eagerness to please D. J. Whittington. But if the square, tapestry-covered book that weighed down her coat pocket held what she hoped it did, it would be worth any price.
“You know that can of sardines I’ve been saving for you, Morty? When we get back, it’s yours, and the heck with the smell.”
He squirmed, but he couldn’t escape this time. With drooping ears and an air of martyred dignity, he allowed her to put him in his carrier.
She was humming as she drove to the main street. Once, when Remy had been John, he’d talked about buying wine. She might do that. She felt like celebrating. This diary could mean Remy’s freedom. It could mean…
It could mean he would have what he needed, his reason for staying with her would be over and he would leave.
Dana faltered for a moment, then lifted her chin and hummed louder. It took a few moments before she heard the siren.
She flinched. Marjory couldn’t have called the police already, could she? She wouldn’t have discovered the diary was missing yet.
Red lights flashed in the opposite lane. A police car was speeding toward her.
Dana’s palms grew damp in her gloves. Should she hit the gas? The brake? Before she could react, the police car sped past. It was followed by an ambulance, then another police car.
Shaken, Dana pulled over to the curb. It was probably some traffic accident, she told herself. None of her business. In her rearview mirror, she watched the progress of the vehicles as they went through the center of town. Her gaze was caught by activity in front of the courthouse. Through the cloud of blowing snow, she thought she saw the glare of camera lights. The ambulance and its police escort turned off at the next block, heading toward the town’s hospital. The camera lights went out. Moments later a white van with a satellite dish on the roof veered away from the courthouse and turned down the street after the ambulance.
Something was going on, and it wasn’t just a traffic accident. Fear clawed at Dana’s heart. She didn’t want to know. She wanted to pretend nothing was wrong. She wanted to make believe…
Taking a deep breath, Dana did a U-turn and followed the van.
The scene at the hospital was a nightmare, the snow-covered sidewalks and trees flickering with flashes of red. Police cars blocked the drive that led to the emergency entrance. Dana skidded to a stop behind the white van that she now saw bore the logo of a television station. She jumped from her car and ran forward through the gathering crowd just as the rear doors of the ambulance were opened.
At least half a dozen police officers flanked the stretcher that was brought out. Dana had no more than a glimpse of the dark-haired man who was handcuffed to the rail on the stretcher’s side. His mouth and nose were covered with an oxygen mask, his face was dark with blood.
She stumbled forward, her body turning to ice. “Remy.”
Flashbulbs glared as he was wheeled inside.
Dana broke into a run. “Remy!”
Before she could take more than three steps, her path was blocked by a middle-aged man in uniform. “Miss Whittington, you’ll have to come with us.”
She looked into the ruddy, farmer’s face of Constable Savard. She saw no sympathy there, none of the amiability he’d shown before. “No,” she said, moving sideways. “Not yet. I have to know if he’s all right. I can’t leave him—”
“Dana, stop it,” a familiar voice said. Hands gripped her arms, pulling her back. “For God’s sake, let him go. It’s over.”
She twisted to see who held her. And looked straight into the eyes of her cousin, Derek Johansen.
No, this was impossible. He was in Florida until next month. “Derek? What are you doing here? What’s going on?”
Snow darkened his sun streaked hair. No humor crinkled the laugh lines around his eyes. “What’s going on?” he repeated. He leaned down, his blue gaze snapping with questions. “That, my dear cousin, is precisely what I flew seven hundred miles to find out.”
Chapter 15
Dana watched her cousin rub the back of his neck wearily as he held the phone to his ear. He was still wearing the tropical print shirt he’d arrived in Hainesborough with. The gaudy turquoise and yellow seemed indecently cheerful here in the cabin. Considering what he’d done, he should have worn black.
It was his fault, she thought, pressing her nails into her palms. He’d been the one to call in the police to check out the resort. He’d been the one who had set off the chain of events that had ended with the man she loved being shot.
She forced her anger down. She shouldn’t blame Derek. Given his outgoing nature and his connections in Hainesborough, she should have realized that word of what was happening would get back to him, that someone would mention the escape of the notorious local murderer Remy Leverette and the sudden appearance of his cousin’s fiancé. Combine that with a casual comment from her sister about the stranger Dana had rescued in the storm two weeks ago and it hadn’t taken long for the keen mind behind Derek’s choirboy face to connect the dots.
With an effort she relaxed her fingers and rubbed her palms over her arms. No, she shouldn’t blame her cousin. He had done his best to help her. He’d taken care of Morty when Constable Savard had snapped the handcuffs on her. He’d found her a lawyer and he’d posted her bail. Then he’d placated the rest of her family, helped her avoid the press and brought her back to the privacy of her cabin.
Except the cabin no longer seemed the cozy retreat it once had been. The piles of paper she and Remy had so carefully gathered and meticulously sorted, the notes they had made, even the diary that she’d been so excited about finding meant nothing anymore without him.
She felt Remy’s absence in everything she saw or touched. She felt it deep inside herself, as if something vital had been ripped away.
She had known she might lose him. She’d known it this morning when she’d slipped from his bed. But not like this, God, not like this.
A car engine sounded outside. Headlights swept past the window in the dusk, heading for the lane. It was yet another police car. Wouldn’t they be finished by now? Was this much activity normal in the case of a police shooting?
Derek had said the main lodge was off-limits until the police finished taking their photographs and measurements. There would be yellow police tape cordoning off the place on the north side where the shooting had happened. Dana hadn’t wanted to go there, anyway. She didn’t think she would be able to handle seeing the trampled snow and the frozen blood.
Derek said a few words and finished his phone call. The receiver rattled into its cradle.
Dana turned her back on the window and studied her cousin’s face, tr
ying to guess what he had learned. She was almost afraid to ask. “What did you find out?”
Derek came over to stand in front of her, his expression grim. “I just talked to the head nurse on the surgical ward.”
Fast. Please say it fast and get it over with, Dana thought. No, don’t say anything. Let me hope for another minute.
“Leverette’s out of surgery. He’s expected to recover.”
The relief that washed over her made her stagger. The world tilted, then righted itself once more.
Derek caught her shoulders to steady her. “Dana, are you all right?”
She pressed her lips together hard to keep the sob inside. She nodded quickly.
“Maybe you’d better rest. It’s been a long day.”
Remy was out of surgery. He would recover. The weight that had been pressing down on her soul, smothering her thoughts, suddenly lifted. “I need to see him.”
“You can’t. He’s under guard, and they’re not allowing visitors.” He paused. “It would be better for you if you distanced yourself from him. He’s a convicted felon.”
“Remy’s innocent. He never should have been convicted.”
Another pause, this time longer. “Dana, I know you’ve always had a soft spot for strays and underdogs, but don’t let some misguided sense of compassion blind you to the truth.”
His words were like an echo of her own doubts, the doubts she had overcome days ago. She met his gaze squarely. “I’m in love with him, Derek. And I’m not going to rest until I finish what he started.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m going to prove his innocence. And you, my dear cousin, are going to help.”
“I came here to help you, not him.”
“Then it’s the same thing.” She smiled. “Remy and I are in this together. The only way to clear my name is to clear his.”
The cop on guard duty pushed open the door to Remy’s room. “You’ve got a visitor, Leverette.”
Remy concentrated hard to get the water glass on the tray table. He didn’t want the cop to see his weakness. His grip was too shaky to hold the glass steady, but he could only use his left hand—his right was handcuffed to the bed.
Since he had awakened in this room three days ago, Remy hadn’t been allowed any visitors. No one had come through that door except cops and hospital staff. There had been plenty of them, too many to count, but there were only two people he wanted to see.
Instead of a doctor or another uniformed officer, a bald man in a camel-hair overcoat entered the room, strode past the cop and walked directly to the side of the bed. “You are Remy Leverette, I presume?”
Remy started to nod, then hissed at the pain the movement caused. “Yeah.”
The man placed a twenty-dollar bill on the tray table beside Remy’s glass. “Would you give me that bill, please?”
What was going on? Was this some kind of sick cop joke? “Why?”
“Once I receive your payment, I will officially be your lawyer, and we can tell that beagle at the door to go polish his gun.”
Remy eyed the money. A lawyer? It had been three days. He was wondering when the vultures would descend. “The last Legal Aid guy didn’t play games like this.”
“Sir, I am not here at the request of Legal Aid.” The man removed his coat and draped it over a chair, revealing a charcoal wool suit and an elegant burgundy tie. “My name is Evan Packard. And considering what I’m charging by the hour, you would be wise to complete our transaction as quickly as possible.”
“Whoever told you to come here made a mistake. I don’t have any money to pay you.”
“You have twenty dollars to start with, and it appears you also have generous friends.”
“Who?”
Packard glanced at the policeman behind him, then looked pointedly at the bill on the table.
Remy didn’t like lawyers. He didn’t trust them. But lately he’d come to realize that trusting too little could be as bad as trusting too much. He put his fingertips on the bill and shoved it toward Packard.
“Very good,” Packard said, slipping the money into his breast pocket. He flicked his fingers dismissively at the policeman, waited until the door had closed behind him, then pulled a chair next to the bed and sat. He spoke before Remy could form his first question. “First of all, I want your version of how you were shot.”
“My version? Like I told the cops, I was surrendering.”
Packard’s head gleamed as he nodded. “Excellent. That agrees with Constable Savard’s findings. You were shot in the back, you were unarmed, and the measurements taken at the scene suggest you had been stationary. Second,” he continued with no perceptible pause for breath. “How incapacitated are you? What’s your prognosis?”
“They got the bullet out. They say I’ll be fine. From what I’ve heard, they’ll be transferring me to the infirmary at the Kingston Pen as soon as I can be moved.”
“Then I shall have to work quickly.”
“Before we go any further, I want you to do something for me.”
“Very well, what would you like?”
“I want you to find out what happened to Dana Whittington. And if she doesn’t have a lawyer, I want you to forget about me and help her.”
To his shock, Packard laughed. “You two must have read from the same script.”
“What?”
“I’m well acquainted with Miss Whittington. It is she whom her cousin initially hired me to defend.”
Despite the agony in his ribs, Remy gripped the side of the bed and sat forward. The chain at his wrist clanked noisily against the railing. “How is she? Was she charged? The cops won’t tell me anything.”
“Yes, she was charged with aiding a fugitive, but we hope to have the charges dismissed. That’s why—”
“Where is she? Is she all right?”
“As far as I know she is in good health. She is free on bail and staying with her cousin.”
Remy exhaled slowly and eased back into the pillows. So she was safe, she was free. At least temporarily. “Her cousin. That would be Derek Johansen. You said he was the one who hired you?”
“Yes. And he is continuing to pay my salary.” Packard tsked and shook his head. “There is a certain amount of irony to the situation when one considers that Mr. Johansen was the one who instigated your arrest in the first place.”
So it hadn’t been Dana. Remy had already discarded that suspicion. It had dissolved along with the rest of his doubts in that shining moment of revelation.
The days since his arrival at the hospital were a blur of pain and frustration, but his memory of the instant in the snow, when he’d recognized his love for Dana, was as vivid now as it had been then.
If only he could live over their final morning together, if he could go back and tell her what she wanted to hear, what he’d been too blind to see and afraid to say…
Right. Sure. With good behavior, in another twenty-five years maybe he’d get the chance.
Packard was still talking. “Mr. Johansen quite correctly deduced that the best strategy to use to eliminate the charges against Miss Whittington would be to clear your name. While I’ve made considerable progress to that end already, we do have our work cut out for us.”
Hope sparked, quick and vicious. He wanted to believe, but he didn’t dare. “You said you made progress?” Remy asked, his voice hoarse. “How?”
The corners of Packard’s mouth pinched into an impatient expression. He was obviously a man who preferred to follow his own agenda during a conversation. “Actually, you did that yourself by your actions before you were shot.”
“What?”
“If you had been in the act of fleeing, the shooting would have been justified, but as you were stationary and in the act of surrendering, there was strong evidence to suggest the shooting was deliberate. That was our first break.”
“Do you mean that because I chose not to run…”
“You’ll obtain your freedom more quickly th
an if you had chosen to escape,” Packard finished for him. “My goodness, this case if full of ironies, isn’t it?”
Remy’s head was reeling. He wanted so much to believe what he was hearing, it hurt.
“We could file a suit against the officer responsible,” Packard said. “But since he is already facing far more serious charges, there may not be much point.”
Remy hadn’t bothered to ask. He hadn’t thought it mattered who had pulled the trigger. All cops were the same—the enemy, not to be trusted. “Who was it?”
“Detective Charles Sibley.”
“Sibley shot me? That son of a—”
“Please Mr. Leverette. Let’s endeavor to keep on topic here. Detective Sibley has been charged with attempted murder for his unprovoked shooting of you during your surrender. Combined with the new evidence which Miss Whittington has provided—”
“Wait. What evidence? What did Dana find?”
“Why, your late wife’s diary, of course. It was very, ah, explicit, shall we say?”
Remy whispered an oath. Sylvia’s diary. He hadn’t been sure it even existed. Dana had believed it did. She hadn’t given up.
Dana. It hurt to think about her and not be able to see her, touch her, hear her voice, taste her kiss…
“The diary provided grounds to execute a search warrant at Sibley’s residence,” Packard said. “As a result, he has also been charged with obstructing justice for withholding evidence.”
“What?”
“He was in possession of records from your home and your business that confirm your alibi for the day of your wife’s murder.”
The spark of hope flared so brightly, Remy couldn’t breathe. He listened to the lawyer in silence.
“Sibley’s animosity toward you is well known, yet apparently he withheld this evidence not only to convict you but to protect himself. He was your late wife’s lover, Mr. Leverette. Once all the evidence is processed, Detective Sibley will be charged with the murder of Sylvia Haines Leverette.”
Detective Charles Sibley. It all seemed so obvious, once you knew where to look, Dana thought. She had wondered more than once what was wrong with Sibley and the Hainesborough Police Department. She hadn’t pursued that idea, because she had attributed the problems with Remy’s trial and conviction to his influential in-laws, Sibley’s personal bias against him and to a small town’s collective long memory of his father’s repeated problems with the law.
Fugitive Hearts Page 22
