“I feel sorry for his family, not h—”
“And look what he did to you.” His grip tightened around my fingers. “Kidnapped you. Threatened you and your kids. ‘Stay well, Annie. And alive.’”
I felt too sick to respond. My focus remained on the window, the woman’s pleas tumbling over the cars and flashing lights. Bland’s answers began to waver, his voice catching. My lungs felt heavy, congealed. Edwin’s attitude was beginning to burn my stomach, and Bland’s family situation was so pitiful.
Chetterling lowered the phone. “Hear how much Beth loves you, Mr. Bland? Now I want you to open your door and push your weapon aside. Come out with your hands up, and nobody’s going to get hurt. I promise you that.”
“What about my evidence?”
“It’s tested, like I told you. Everything’s done. You know those tests don’t take long.”
Stay well, Annie. And alive.
Edwin’s words spiraled through my head. I felt his fingers in mine.
Something . . . what was it? Something about the way he quoted that note.
Something about the look on his face . . .
His blatant desire to see Bland die. To see this over and done with—now.
Stay well, Annie. And alive.
Stay well—
The realization stabbed my heart with the clean force of an ice pick. I pulled my hand from his and sucked in air.
“What?” Jenna leaned around him.
Edwin frowned at me. “What happened, Annie?”
No. I must be wrong. It couldn’t be. I was thinking wrong, remembering wrong. Think, think! My fingers twisted into fists. I clenched harder, as if to pummel a logical explanation into my brain. Squeezing my eyes shut, I slapped frames of film into my mental projector. Turned it on. Saw myself
standing in my office last Saturday, talking on the phone to Edwin Tarell. Telling him I can’t make our appointment. He asks me why. I blurt to him about the dead roses, the note. “A detective is on his way now, and I don’t know when we’ll be finished, so . . .”
My words trail away. I hear Edwin breathing.
“Bill Bland sent you dead roses? And threatened you? What did he say?”
“Basically to keep away from the case . . .”
“Annie, what is wrong?” Jenna’s voice.
My eyes popped open. Edwin was staring at me. I couldn’t look at him. Couldn’t believe . . .
Please, God, no!
I wrenched my gaze away and out the window. Focused on the top of Bland’s head as he negotiated with Chetterling. My heartbeat stuttered as I tried to think, think. To remember differently.
Edwin laid a hand on my shoulder. “Annie, what?”
I swallowed. When I found my voice it was someone else’s. Strained. Thick. “I didn’t tell you what was in the note.”
“Huh?” He pulled me to face him. I forced my eyes to his.
“I. Did not tell you. What. Was in. The note.”
“What note?”
“The threat I got with the roses.” My throat constricted, the words flattening. “You just quoted it to me. I never told you what it said.”
His face blanched. “Sure you did. You told me over the phone, when you tried to cancel our appointment.”
My head swung back and forth, back and forth. “No. I never told you. No.”
Our voices ran low. Delft and his men focused on the parking lot, paying us no heed. Jenna stilled, watching us.
Edwin shrugged. “Then somebody else did. Probably Chetterling.”
“Chetterling? When did he ever talk to you? I watched him introduce himself to you tonight.”
“You watched? When?”
How neatly he turned the tables, confronting me, his eyes widening with slow understanding. It was just now registering within him—the clear visibility of the lighted interrogation room through the glass. Our well-timed presence.
“What are you—What is this?” He turned a hardening jaw to Jenna. “What are you all trying to do to me?”
Jenna gaped from his face to mine, lips parted.
I could say no more. I could barely breathe. I turned away, my feet moving toward the window, all thought of my own safety chased away. I watched in ascending disbelief, hearing Chetterling’s and Bland’s voices through different ears, surveying the scene through newly horrified eyes.
“Come on, Mr. Bland, it’s time to stop this!” The detective switched the bullhorn from one hand to the other, flexing his fingers. “Your wife is waiting. She wants you safe.”
“Tell me all the test results first! Tell the world what you found.”
“All right, Mr. Bland. We know the shirt belonged to Edwin Tarell. The gun residue is on the sleeve. We lifted Edwin’s print off the weapon. It’s all there,Mr. Bland. Everything you said. Now don’t throw it all away.”
Stay well, Annie. And alive.
Everything happened at once then, those final sizzling seconds that would forever brand themselves into my brain. Edwin sidled up behind me, his fingers around my arm.“What are you insinuating, Annie? Is there some setup against me?”
“You quoted a threat you’re not supposed to know.” The words convulsed off my tongue. “Your shirt shows discharge from firing. Your print’s on the gun. You admitted you lied to Delft.”
“So what? All those things have been explained.” Edwin placed his palms against my cheeks. “Annie, please, don’t tell me you’re thinking . . . This is crazy. Everybody’s accusing me!”
“Come on, Mr. Bland.” Chetterling’s voice outside. “It’s done now. Twenty years, and the truth’s finally out. The world will hear this. Most of all, your family will hear it. I promise you—we found all your evidence!”
“And you’ve got Edwin?”
“He’s here,Mr. Bland. We’ve already questioned him.”
“And you’ve arrested him?”
“Yes. We have.”
Anger creased Edwin’s face. He glared through the window at Chetterling, then back to me. I eased away from him, heart thumping.
“How did you know, Edwin? How did you know what the note said?”
“Your wife is still on the phone, Mr. Bland! She’s crying. She wants you safe. Your boys want you safe. Come on out now. There’s no more reason for you to run.”
Silence. Edwin pierced me with his eyes, looking into me, through me, shock and fear and dread rippling over his face like wind over water.
“Okay!” Bland’s voice rose in triumph. “I’m coming out!”
“Fine, Mr. Bland. Open the door slowly. Slide your gun across the pavement and show me your hands.”
Edwin turned toward the window, mouth opening. His expression folded in on itself, his limbs stiffening.
Bland’s flashers cut off. His car door opened an inch.
“No. No, this won’t happen.” The words tumbled from Edwin, desperate denials. “This can’t—” He shot me a final stunned, pleading glance, then pushed me aside. “No!”
Delft jerked around. Too late. In seconds Edwin pounded past him and through the open front door. “Bland!” He skidded to a stop, stretched out his arms. “It’s Edwin Tarell. See? They haven’t arrested me!”
The sergeant dove outside for Edwin, tackling him to the ground.
“I’m a free man, Bland!” Edwin shouted through the jumble of arms and legs. “They lied. They’re waiting for you!”
A deputy sprang to help Delft. They dragged Edwin inside to safety, flipped him over, and pushed his face into the floor.
Bland’s car door slammed shut. “I knew it, I knew it!” His broken voice ricocheted over the cars and people and blazing beats of red and blue. “You lied, Chetterling!”
“Mr. Bland, listen to m—”
“I’m not listening to you! I’m not listening to anybody! You just want me dead. You’ll never believe me!”
His body rose into view behind the wheel, curses spewing from his mouth. I saw his contorted features, his right hand fumbling, fumbling. And I
knew. My body sprang into action even before my brain could fully register, before Chetterling or any deputy could react.
“Bland, stop!” I raced for the door, thinking of nothing, nothing but stopping this man—the man I’d hated, who’d broken into my home and kidnapped me, the man betrayed who’d run from blind justice for twenty years.
He raised the gun.
“No, don’t! I know Edwin’s guilty!” I threw myself outside, pounded and pulsed by a dozen rotating lights. My feet slid and I went down hard, Chetterling springing toward me, Jenna shrilling my name, my flailing hands pushing the detective back toward safety.
“I love you, Beth!” Bland screamed. “I love you, Eddie and Scott!”
“Bland, stop! It’s Annie Kingston—”
“I love you!”
Chetterling shoved me bare inches behind the car, his own body still a target. I strained upward, shouting to the sky, “No, listen to me, I know Edwin’s—”
“I . . . will . . . not . . . be . . . taken!”
“Blaaand!”
A gun blast ripped the worn fabric of the night.
Saturday, May 15
Chapter 43
Bland, stop! I know Edwin’s guilty!
I . . . will . . . not . . . be . . . taken! . . .
For the hundredth time, the scene replayed in my mind. The screams, the pulsing lights, the feel of Chetterling’s arms as he pushed me to safety. Night and day, day and night, the film in my head unceasing in its mockery.
“Annie?”
“Mmm.” I raised my stare from the grained wood of the kitchen table. My fingers were wrapped around a mug of coffee, now grown lukewarm. How long had I been sitting here?
“I brought in the paper.” Jenna’s tone ran smooth, soothing. “It’s on the cover again; you want to look at it?”
I shook my head. In the last three days I’d read enough, seen enough on the news. Bill Bland’s photo and Edwin’s and mine intermingled: the triangle of the falsely accused; the greedy, murderous son; and the artist who’d seen the truth. Too late. The media ran wild, lapping up the story like starving dogs. I’d had calls from papers across the country, every national news station, from tabloids and talk shows. Our phones were now unplugged. Those who knew us could call my cell number.
“It wasn’t your fault, Annie.” These, my sister’s words—and everyone else’s—spoken countless times.
“I know.”
My head tried to convince me it was true, but my heart sputtered at the consolation. My actions had been stupid. Stupid. They’d only placed Chetterling in danger. Only prayer could still the ongoing battle within me, and even then, temporarily. Dave encouraged me to keep praying, assuring that God knew my aching spirit. That He would see me through.
At least my becoming a Christian had been well-timed. I wouldn’t want to face these sodden days without God’s help.
“I’m going to make you some breakfast.” Jenna slid the paper onto the table.
“I don’t want any.”
“Yes, you do.”
She opened the refrigerator door and withdrew eggs and bacon.
I made a face at her back. “Jenna, stop bossing me.”
“Somebody’s got to. Look at the messes you get into.”
I closed my eyes. “Oh, please, not now. I can’t take it.”
“Sorry.” She placed the food on the counter, pulled a frying pan from under the stove. “But you started it.”
She was determined to pull me out of my despondency. To remind me that the world still turned, that the kids and I were now safe. That she was still Jenna.
“Did not.”
“Did too.”
My cell phone rang. I glared at it before answering. “Hello?”
“Hi, it’s Ralph. Just checking in on you this morning.”
As he’d done numerous times in the last few days, even though my actions could have gotten him killed. I lightened my tone. “Hi, Chetterling. I’m fine, thank you. Are you working this morning? You of all people deserve a day to rest.”
He chuckled.“No, I’m not working. And frankly, it’s been so long since I had a day off, I hardly know what to do with myself.”
That, I could believe. The man lived and breathed his duty. “Yeah. I couldn’t seem to sleep in either.” I reached out to flip the paper over, saw its headline, and pushed it away. “Anything new to tell me?”
“Yes, a few things. Emily Tarell was finally willing to talk to me yesterday. I took a long time going over everything with her.”
Poor Emily. I couldn’t begin to fathom her latest grief. How I was praying for her. Some day I would talk to her, tell her how this case had pushed me toward Christ. But so far she’d made it clear that she didn’t want to see me. I understood, but it pierced. “How is she?”
“Broken. She tried to deny all the evidence, you know. She just couldn’t believe it of her son. But when he confessed . . .”
“I can imagine. Oh, I feel so sorry for her.”
Jenna broke an egg open and slid it into a bowl, then reached for a second. An omelet. Not that she’d asked what I wanted.
“And how’s Sergeant Delft?”
“He’s all right. Still has mixed emotions. Hates to admit he was chasing the wrong man. But, under the circumstances, he couldn’t have known. He is happy to have the case solved.”
Edwin Tarell hadn’t crumbled easily. He’d clung to his denials like barnacles on a sunken ship until the damning data came in regarding Bland’s trip to California. Then fear of the death penalty had worked toward Edwin’s undoing. Hours of interrogation and the promise of life in prison had finally unhinged his lips.
Bland hadn’t left Kansas until around Sunday noon—more than twenty-four hours after someone placed twenty-five dollars under a pot outside Roses by Redding. In addition to his wife and boys, numerous witnesses in the tiny town swore to sighting Bland that morning—a gas station attendant, a neighbor, the newspaper boy. And the final straw—a witness to the drop-off of the money came forward. It had been dark, but the woman saw a man’s face briefly illuminated by a streetlight.
She’d identified Edwin Tarell.
“Also, Annie, Delft finally got through to the producer of American Fugitive. They’re not updating the segment. They’re just canceling it.”
“No surprise. They’re hardly going to want to show how their own hired artist got the wrong man killed.”
“Annie.” Chetterling’s tone contracted. “It’s not your fault.”
“I know.”
When Edwin cracked, the ancient truth spilled out. On the night of the murders, he’d slipped back inside his town house after throwing away his shirt only to catch sight of a shadowed figure raiding his garbage can. For twenty years, he’d known Bland possessed the telltale piece of clothing, plus the gun with his prints. Edwin had set Bland up; now Bland had outfoxed him. All plans to help find the fleeing “killer” fell away. Edwin could only hope Bland would stay on the run.
And it worked—for two decades until the American Fugitive show.
Edwin’s attempts to force the canceling of my drawing had been acts of sheer desperation. His anonymous call to the Record Searchlight about the TV show had helped point suspicion toward Bland.
Chetterling sighed. “Well. I’m going to let you go. Please call if you need me.”
His patience made me feel so small. “Thank you, Ralph. For everything. You were always there. You lost a lot of sleep, not to mention putting your life on the line for me.”
“Don’t worry about it. All part of the job.”
Maybe. But holding a hysterically sobbing female wasn’t. Which is exactly what he’d done—somewhere amid the chaos of shouts and running feet and Bland’s body being pulled from the car. All of it caught on camera for the titillated nation to see.
Jenna poured egg and milk mixture into the pan, then turned to lay pieces of bacon in a dish for the microwave. My sister. Ever competent. Ever in control. She was dragging me o
ut to a firing range next week to teach me how to shoot. No excuses accepted. Lesson to be followed with the purchase of a gun to match her own. Chetterling had backed her up on this. I’d wanted to strangle them both.
I clicked off the line, and against my better judgment, reached for the paper. The story focused on Bland’s wife and two sons. Last name Smith—the false identity he’d bequeathed to them. Vaguely, I wondered about the legalities of their keeping it. Neighbors talked about the man they knew as Tom, a longtime accountant at a local hardware store. They’d never have guessed his past. He was quiet, stayed in the background. Had never been real friendly, though. Always seemed to look over his shoulder. Curt. Had strict control over his family. But a fiercely loving father, a loyal husband.
A bookstore owner said he bought a lot of mysteries.
The funeral was scheduled for Monday.
Three deaths—all of them, in truth, Edwin Tarell’s fault. He was as much to blame for Bland’s suicide as if he’d pulled the trigger himself.
Still. If only I’d moved quicker . . . Realized sooner . . .
“Don’t accept that false guilt,” Dave had chided me yesterday. The number of times he’d checked up on me the last few days had rivaled Chetterling’s. He’d even shown up on our doorstep with a casserole. A man. Bringing two women food. He’d prayed with me in our great room—right in front of Jenna. She hadn’t even questioned my newfound faith. Guess it wasn’t the time. No doubt we’d have some conversations about it soon.
Jenna fixed me a plate with half of the bacon and omelet and slid it before me. My stomach growled. It did smell heavenly. Serving herself the remaining portion, she sat down at the table.
We ate in silence.
She glanced at me out of the corner of her eye. “What would you say if I wanted to move in here permanently?”
“What do you think I’d say? I’ve been trying to get you to do that since last summer.”
“True. So now’s the time.”
“To what do I owe this grand decision?”
She gave me a look. “To the fact that you can’t take care of yourself.”
“Oh. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
I feigned vital interest in chewing a piece of bacon.“What about your consulting in the Bay Area?”
Stain of Guilt Page 24
