Final Scream

by Jackson, Lisa

  The world collided.

  Lights exploded behind her eyes, sending sparks of vibrant colors that melded somewhere deep in her heart and far away to the ends of the universe. She lay gasping, drinking in the sight of him and wondering about their future. Together? Apart? Her throat ached with the need to know, the desire to trust him and love him and close her eyes to the rest of the world.

  “Satisfied?” he asked in a voice devoid of emotion. Sitting on the sand beside her, he’d somehow managed to button his pants. Regret shaded his eyes.

  “Yes, but—”

  “This is what you wanted, isn’t it?” The words cut like the bite of a whip, and yet there was more than anger etched in the lines of his face. “Or at least the best I can offer right now.”

  “I don’t understand—”

  He stared across the lake. “You wanted to seduce me and you did.”

  “Me—seduce you?” she said, her senses suddenly clear again, anger chasing away any lingering hint of afterglow. “You followed me out here.”

  “Just like you expected me to. You knew that I couldn’t stay away, didn’t you?”

  “I didn’t—”

  “Don’t lie, Cassidy,” he said, pulling himself upright by his crutch and staring down at her. His mouth, so warm and loving only minutes before, had flattened into a thin, unforgiving line. “It doesn’t become you.”

  The spell of the morning was shattered. “Get dressed,” he said, ramming his crutch into the sand. “Someone else might see you, and you could get more than you bargained for.”

  “You arrogant, self-serving son of a bitch,” she cried. “You think I’d—”

  “I don’t know what to think, Cassidy. Because I really don’t know you anymore.”

  “Chase—”

  “And you don’t know me.”

  He staggered away and she was left staring at the smooth muscles of his back. Seamless and fluid, they served to remind her just how much she wanted his touch, how anxious she was for him to make love to her, how desperate she’d become. “Fool,” she ground out, kicking at the sand and throwing her robe over her shoulders. Cinching the belt, she watched as he disappeared around a bend near the patio. She felt a nagging little thought—something more than her fury—something deeper and worrisome, but she couldn’t, for the life of her, understand what it was.

  Thirty-seven

  Cassidy tossed her purse onto the couch in the den and kicked off her shoes. She was alone. Again. Just like before the fire.

  Chase was keeping his distance. Away from her. Away from the house. He spent hours in the office downtown, or at the physical therapist’s, or anywhere other than home. Oftentimes he’d be gone by the time she got up in the morning and didn’t return until midnight or later.

  She felt him slipping farther away from her and tried to communicate with him, but he was evasive, just confiding that there was a lot of work to do to try and get the sawmill rebuilt and functioning at full capacity. There were plans to build a new on-site office and replace the metal drying sheds that had crumpled in the blaze. The accounting department was trying to reconstruct the payables, receivables, general ledger and profit-and-loss statements, searching through the old records that remained, and any computer files they had, then calling logging firms, trucking companies and lumber brokers, trying to piece together their inventory. The work was endless, he told her, but she suspected he was using any excuse to avoid her.

  Maybe it was just too late for them.

  Though she swam every morning, he never followed her again, and when she touched him, he always reacted swiftly, pulling away and breaking contact. He wouldn’t talk about what they’d shared that morning by the lake, and if she ever brought up the subject, he would leave the room or say tersely, “It was a mistake. Don’t make a big deal of it.”

  Once in a while, he seemed to let down his guard, and when he did, she saw another side to him—one with humor, one with humility, one that felt regret.

  Physically, he was improving. Bit by bit. He was free of his casts. He could drive to town easily now, move around the house freely, and see out of both eyes. He looked like he would survive. The scars to his face were still visible, the skin not yet healed, but in time he would look nearly the same, walk without crutches, be the man she had decided to divorce.

  And when he was finally completely healed, there would be no reason for him to stay in the house. There would be no reason to be married. Why that suddenly mattered so much, she didn’t know. She’d been so close to divorcing him before the fire, before she’d faced the loss of him from her life, before she’d been convinced that his brother had given up his life in that horrid blaze.

  A headache thundered behind her eyes and she took two aspirins before carrying a cup of coffee back to the den. She didn’t bother starting dinner; she’d waited too many nights without so much as a phone call, her meal simmering to rubbery nothing on the stove, her appetite waning as the hours passed and the candles burned down.

  Massaging the kinks from her neck, she selected several of her favorite compact discs and slid them into the player. As music filled the room, she opened her briefcase and slipped a computer disk into her station in the den, then hummed along with Paul McCartney while printing out the information she’d gathered at work. Information about the fire at the sawmill, information on the burned gristmill and information on Marshall Baldwin. She’d spent the past few days at the office, linking up electronically with news agencies across the country, especially in the Los Angeles area and all around the state of Alaska. She’d hoped to find some information about Baldwin before he’d moved north, but so far had come up with nothing. It was as if the man hadn’t existed.

  But he’d sure become visible once he’d started working on the pipeline. She tapped her pen on the edge of the desk and scanned her notes. Though she hadn’t known much about Marshall Baldwin when Bill Laszlo had asked her about him, she was learning more and more each day. She’d called a colleague whom she’d worked with in Denver before he’d transferred to a Juneau television station. She’d called papers, the police, the DMV and even a man she’d heard about who located people. Michael Foster, working from a wheelchair and a computer system linked up with agencies around the United States and the globe, had the reputation of locating people even when they didn’t want to be found. Cassidy didn’t know if he’d tapped into the computers of the IRS or the Social Security Administration or the telephone company, but Foster, a paraplegic, was phenomenal. She’d learned of him about five years ago and had thought of phoning him to help her locate Brig, but decided it would be a mistake considering the declining state of her marriage. Now, however, she had no qualms about placing the call, asking about Brig as well as anyone remotely related to Marshall Baldwin.

  She’d also hired a private investigator, a man who now lived in Anchorage who was willing to look into every aspect of Baldwin’s life, checking out his story from the beginning when he was a nobody working on the pipeline and following him through the years. The private detective, Oswald Sweeny, was a little on the sleazy side, but he was thorough and had recently lived in Oregon, helping find a missing heiress. Sweeny had assured Cassidy that he would spare no expense and “leave no stone unturned in this whole damned tundra” to find out anything and everything about Alaska’s reclusive millionaire.

  No one, not even Chase, knew how deep she was digging. Because no one really understood her motives. It wasn’t idle curiosity that kept her going; it wasn’t even the fact that a mystery had plopped itself right in front of her and nearly taken her husband’s life. It was that she felt compelled to find out the truth because she was convinced that, without the answers to the questions that had haunted them for seventeen years, without the complete story on this latest fire and the enigma of Marshall Baldwin, she and Chase would never be able to step forward, never be able to find each other again.

  It was as if their marriage had been built on quicksand. Not rock-steady to begin
with and now slowly and inevitably sinking. They’d never be able to trust each other, to climb out of the muck, until they faced the truth.

  As she scanned her notes, the fax machine whirred to life and pages started filling the tray. Frowning thoughtfully, Cassidy read the report. Sweeny was slowly unraveling Marshall Baldwin’s life, thread by secretive thread. He’d managed to dig up a woman Baldwin had spent time with in Fairbanks. She was willing to spill her guts—for five thousand dollars. A retired foreman from the crew hired to keep the pipeline running remembered Marshall—a fine, hardworking kind of quiet, good-looking boy who’d had to fight off the women. There were other statements, for the most part vague and disappointing because it seemed that no one had really gotten to know Baldwin, but Sweeny was still looking.

  With a sigh she tapped the pages together and stuffed them into the growing file she kept locked in the drawer of her desk. She withdrew the thick sheaf of papers—newspaper clippings, police and fire reports, pictures, anything she could locate about the fire that had killed Angie and Jed. She still couldn’t look at pictures of Angie without feeling an overwhelming sense of sadness, and though she’d never liked Jed Baker, she hadn’t wished him dead. His family had never gotten over the loss of their son. When no culprit had been found in Jed’s murder, the Bakers had made scathing comments about the inadequacies of the Sheriff’s Department, then moved from Oregon, relocating somewhere in the Midwest, far away from the memories and the pain. Cassidy would hate to contact them and bring up all the agony again, but she would if she had to. If it meant finding the guilty party responsible for either or both fires and if it meant that she’d know more about Marshall Baldwin. Or Brig.

  Chewing on the end of her pen, she flipped through the papers until her fingers came to the picture of Marshall Baldwin, brooding and dark. Who was he? Maybe he wasn’t Brig. Maybe he was a man who resembled the McKenzies, a man who had his own personal reasons for hiding his past. He could have experienced an abusive childhood, or been running from the law, or avoiding the responsibilities of a wife and kids he didn’t want to deal with. He could have been involved in something illegal and was running from a deadly partner or the mob or a million other things.

  Or he could have been Brig McKenzie, and Chase was lying. Again.

  She closed her eyes for a second and listened as McCartney sang an old Beatles tune and her throat thickened.

  Yesterday. Love was such an easy game to play…

  What was Baldwin’s purpose? Why, of all the sawmills in the Northwest, did he choose the Buchanan mill, and why, if he wanted to deal with Buchanan Industries, didn’t he call Derrick or her father? There was more to the story, more than Chase, who’d met with Baldwin, was willing to tell.

  Oh, I believe in yesterday.

  “Stop it,” she muttered and changed the CD to something less melancholy.

  She made a few notes on the legal pad, questions for which she needed answers, then rewrote them on the computer, her fingers moving easily over the keys. Was there a connection between the two fires? Was Marshall Baldwin the guilty party or a victim? What about Chase? Willie? Other members of her family and Chase’s? Where was Sunny? Was her escape from the hospital planned? As far as Cassidy knew, Sunny had left the hospital, hitched a ride with a farmer and ended up at the Buchanan estate, though Dena and Rex had denied ever seeing her. Had she gone to visit Willie? Cassidy doodled, her mind turning over the information only to end up back where she started.

  Felicity’s words echoed through her mind. What was it she’d said? Cassidy concentrated. Something about hoping the guy in the hospital died so that they didn’t have to worry about any more fires. If Marshall Baldwin had been the arsonist and if he’d acted alone. But what if he had an accomplice? What if he came back to harm Chase…But why?

  She was so wrapped up in her work, she didn’t hear him come in. The music was loud enough over the hum of her computer that she missed the rumble of an engine, the crunch of tires on gravel and the creak of the screen door. Before she knew what was happening she saw a ghostlike image in her computer screen. Chase’s reflection. Her heart jolted as she turned and found him eyeing her notes.

  “Been busy, haven’t you?” he asked, contempt edging his words. “So now you’re an investigative reporter again. I knew it.”

  He was spoiling for a fight; she could see it in the tense lines of his face, the way his fingers wrapped over the hand hold of his crutch.

  “This isn’t for the paper.”

  “Sure.” He didn’t believe her.

  “When you married me, I was a reporter.”

  “And you regretted giving up your job in front of a camera to come back here and work for the newspaper.”

  “That’s never been a problem.”

  Making a sound of disgust, he shook his head. “I’ve always wondered how you went from a tomboy who spent more time with horses than she did kids her own age, to reporter.”

  “You know the story, I needed to leave home. Life after Angie died was…well, it was hard.” Why was she explaining everything to him all over again? Defensively, she said, “Look, I’m just trying to piece together what happened.” She punched a button on the keyboard, saved her notes and switched off the computer.

  One of his shoulders was propped against the door casing, and he was still using a solitary crutch. His shirt was open at the throat, and each day he was healing, he more closely resembled the man she’d married. Dr. Okano had warned her that he’d never look the same, that he’d require extensive plastic surgery to repair the flesh over his broken nose, shattered cheekbones and jaw, but that he’d still be a decent-enough-looking man. So far, the doctor seemed to have called that one. Chase was still handsome, despite the redness and scars.

  He cocked his head toward her computer. “Can’t you leave it to the police? Old T. John seems pretty determined to catch his man.”

  “That’s what bothers me about this, Chase. I’d think you’d want to know what happened—that you wouldn’t rest easy until you found the son of a bitch who did this to you.”

  “I do. But I’m not going to become obsessed with it. Look at this,” he said, gesturing to her desk, covered with notes and articles and a barely touched cup of coffee. “It’s like you can’t think of anything else.” His gaze landed on the picture of Marshall Baldwin and his lips flattened. “I don’t know what you’re hoping to find, Cassidy, but I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed.”

  “Why?”

  His eyebrows slammed together and his gaze was unforgiving. “You’re still trying to find Brig, aren’t you?”

  She shook her head. “No, but—”

  “Aren’t you?” he demanded again, his voice rough, his expression hard to read.

  “I just want to know the truth.”

  “Do you?” He arched a dark brow. “And if you find out that Baldwin was Brig and now he’s dead? What then?”

  “At least I’ll know.”

  “You’re hopeless!” Was there a hint of wistfulness beneath the harshness of his words? “Grasping at straws.”

  “The man was clutching a St. Christopher’s medal when he died.”

  “So?”

  “I—I gave Brig a medal like that on the night that he left.” Inside she was shaking, her heart beginning to pound as she finally admitted what she’d never breathed to another living soul—not even her own husband. He’d suspected that she’d given her virginity to his brother, but he’d never really asked, and they’d both avoided the subject. Past loves were, for the most part, a taboo conversation. Off-limits. “I was with him that night, Chase. He’d been at the fire and swore he didn’t set it. I believed him, talked him into taking Remmington and…and gave him the chain and medal.”

  “Jesus.” He hobbled to the bar, reaching for a bottle. “I don’t want to hear any more.”

  “I thought I loved him.”

  “This just gets better and better,” he mocked. “I suppose he loved you, too.” Chase
splashed some liquor into a glass.

  “I don’t think so.”

  “You don’t think he loved you, but you clung to his memory for all these years? You’re unbelievable, Cassidy. Damned unbelievable.” He took a long swallow, then wiped his mouth with his sleeve. His face was twisted and pale, as if fighting a losing battle with long-buried feelings.

  “Look, I know I made a mistake. I know that you and I have this unwritten rule that we don’t discuss our sex lives before our marriage, but—”

  “You slept with him.” The statement was flat, without any condemnation.

  “Yes.”

  “Christ.” His gaze met hers in the mirror over the bar.

  “You suspected.”

  “I don’t want to hear the sordid little details, okay?”

  “Look,” she said, walking up to him, seeing him stiffen. “All of this has got to end, Chase. Even though I believe T. John has the best intentions, I’m not sure he’ll be able to sort it all out.” She reached for his glass. Lifting it from his fingers she took a sip. Scotch hit the back of her throat and drizzled a burning path to her stomach. “I’m just trying to put it all to rest. For us.”

  His eyes darkened a shade. “Us?”

  “Is that so hard to believe?”

  “Damned impossible,” he said, but his words lacked conviction. He stared at her long and hard, his eyes studying the contours of her face as if seeing her for the first time in years. Reaching forward, he touched her cheek slowly. Tenderly. With fingers that trembled slightly. She leaned into his open hand.

  “A lot of people wear religious necklaces—chains, crosses, stars, medals,” he argued. His breath was irregular.

  “I know.”

  His thumb traced her cheekbone. “You can’t pin your hopes and dreams on a piece of tarnished medal.”