“If your name is Tina Mueller, you did. I have a recording to prove it.”
Her eyes were bright with clever processing. “I didn’t kill anyone.”
“Where were you on June 29 between seven and midnight?”
“I don’t know. That was a long time ago. Are you accusing me of murder?”
“Not if you have an alibi.” But then there was the issue of her stepfather’s murder. The detective working the case wanted her extradited.
“I’ll have to do some digging on that. Check my daytimer, and some receipts. My daytimer is in my purse. I’ll go and get it.”
She stood and went to another door off her office. She disappeared from view and Wes waited. When she didn’t reappear, he felt a hunch and went after her. She wasn’t in the adjoining room and the back door was open. Squealing tires and a roaring engine told him all he needed to know. He looked through the door and saw her white Lexus racing down the alley.
He ran to the front and jumped into his SUV, flipping on his siren and lights. Spotting her Lexus swinging onto Main Street, he wove around slower traffic to try and catch her. She turned a corner. He also turned there and saw her turn another one down the street. When he reached that he had lost her, but one of the turnoffs led to the highway. He headed there.
He saw her on the highway.
Racing after her, he closed the distance. She made it to Highway 90 and headed west.
Wes stayed on her bumper.
After five minutes, she must have realized she wasn’t going to get away. She slowed and pulled off to the side. He drew his gun and approached her carefully.
She rolled her window down. Her cheeks were wet from tears.
“I didn’t kill anyone,” she said in a pathetic tone.
“Good. Let’s fix it then. Will you get out of the car?”
She sniffled and opened the car door. Getting out, she didn’t fight him as he handcuffed her and took her to the backseat of his SUV. He went back for her purse and then got behind the wheel.
“I’ll have your car towed,” he said.
But Eileen…or Tina just stared out the window.
He drove her to the sheriff’s office and parked.
“Mark did give me all the papers I needed to start a new life,” she said from the backseat. “In exchange, he made me…do things.”
Wes didn’t open his door to get out. Instead, he turned to look back at her. “What did he make you do?”
“He made me sleep with your father, Darius Colton.”
Darius? Walsh had forced her to sleep with Wes’s father? “Why?”
“He wanted me to try to find some bank account statements.”
“Did you?”
“Yes, but they were nothing unusual. As far as I could tell it was a waste of time.”
“Why did Mark want to see Darius’s bank statements?”
“He never said, but knowing Mark, he wanted to find something to hold over Darius’s head. Mark liked controlling people.” Her shoulders quivered with a shudder. “He liked to control me, too, especially after I broke up with him.”
“And he caught you stealing his wife’s ring.”
She wiped a tear that was rolling down her cheek. “Yes. Sometimes I wonder if he did it just to punish me.”
“By making you sleep with Darius?”
“Darius is an… Sorry, I know he’s your father, but he’s not a very nice man, and Mark was angry that I broke up with him. It hurt his ego, so he needed to make me pay.”
Wes didn’t comment. Darius could be overbearing sometimes. But this whole idea of Walsh choosing Darius for Eileen to sleep with was peculiar. He must have had a reason to want to see the bank statements, but they’d shown nothing unusual. Had Walsh wondered if Darius was involved in money-laundering? That didn’t make any sense. Darius had more money than he knew what to do with. Why would he want to get his hands dirty when he didn’t even need to?
More likely Walsh wanted to find a way to control Darius, just as Eileen said. And to punish her.
“How many statements did you give Walsh?” he asked.
“A whole year’s worth. And there was more than one account. I’m pretty sure it was everything Darius had. I slept with him twice. Once to get the statements and once to put them back after I made copies.” Her shoulders shuddered again. “It was awful. He’s a terrible lover. A selfish one.”
Wes ignored her retrospection. This was his father they were talking about. “Did you keep any copies for yourself?”
“No. Are you kidding? Back then, all I wanted was for Mark to leave me alone. I was glad when I heard he’d been killed.”
“Did he ever contact you?”
“No.”
“Not ever? Not even when he came back to Honey Creek?”
“No. I never heard from him. And if I had, I don’t know what I would have done.”
“Would you have killed him?”
“I told you, I didn’t kill anyone.” She looked right at him in the rearview mirror and Wes had a creeping feeling that she was telling the truth.
“Who killed your stepfather, then?”
Her expression closed and she looked out the window.
Was she hiding something? He’d be sure to let Detective Isaac know what he thought.
Chapter 12
Lily parked in front of the school and watched all the kids climb into buses, walk, ride bikes or get into their parents’ cars. When the crowds began to thin, she started to wonder where her daughter was.
The buses drove away and soon there were only one or two stragglers milling around. Lily got out of the Jeep and went inside the school. Finding the office, she asked the secretary to page her daughter. When that didn’t produce May, Lily asked where her last class was. She went there, but it was dark and empty.
Her heart beat fast. She was getting scared. May. Where was she?
She called Wes’s house. No one answered.
She called May’s cell phone. Nothing. Wes’s cell came next. No answer.
Her dad didn’t have a cell phone.
Driving toward Wes’s house, she tried to calm her trembling hands. What if something had happened to May?
Her cell rang, making her body jerk. She looked at the number. It was May.
“Oh, thank God.” Relief washed through her as she pressed the button to connect the call. “May. Where are you?”
“Mom?” May sounded shaky. And she was crying.
Dread plunged to her core. “May? Where are you? Are you all right?”
“Lily, Lily, Lily,” said a man’s voice. He must have taken the phone away from May.
Oh God, oh God, oh God.
“I’ve been waiting a long time for this.”
Brandon.
“If you so much as touch my daughter, I’ll tear your eyes out with my bare fingers.”
“Just outside town is an unmarked road. It’s past an old cabin that’s falling apart. You’ll see it on the right.”
She knew the one he meant.
“I want you to take that road until it forks. Take the left route until it dead ends. You’ll see my camper.”
“You let her go or I’ll make sure you die before anyone can send you back to prison.”
“You come here, sweet Lily, and you come alone, or the girl will take your place. If you call anyone for help, I’ll kill her. Understand?”
Lily couldn’t find her voice.
Brandon disconnected.
Swallowing, she breathed through her nausea. To think of him doing to May what he’d done to her…
She’d kill him.
Lily swung the Jeep around and floored it on the highway. She wasn’t far from the cabin.
Should she call the cops? 911? No. He’d kill May if he heard sirens.
Wes.
She brought his number up in her cell phone address book and pressed Send. It rang and rang and he didn’t pick up. Where was he? What was he doing?
His message system beeped. “We
s, this is Lily. Brandon has May. He’s kidnapped her.” She did her best to describe the area where he’d taken her. “He warned me to come alone. He said he’d kill May if I didn’t do as he said. He said he’d kill her, Wes.” She knew she sounded frantic, but she was frantic.
She came to the dirt road and flew down it. She had to reach May. She didn’t want to leave her alone with that monster. But she didn’t have a gun. Or a knife.
A pen would work. If she could stab one of his eyeballs maybe it would penetrate to his brain. She leaned over to the glove box and dug around. The Jeep swerved with her effort. She found a pen.
A camper came into view. She slid the Jeep to a halt and waited, leaving it running. She wanted him to come outside, hoping he’d have May with him.
The door opened and he stood there, curling his index finger, beckoning her to come to him. Damn it.
Tucking her cell in her back pocket, she got out of the Jeep, holding the pen at her side. Slowly she approached, seeing a gun tucked into the front of his jeans.
“Where is she?” Lily stopped walking. “Show her to me.”
Brandon jerked his head at where May must be, and she stumbled next to him.
“Mom!” May shoved Brandon and raced for her. Lily caught her daughter against her and guided her so she stood behind her.
“Did he hurt you, baby?” she asked, watching Brandon step down the stairs of the camper. He looked a little unsteady. Had he been drinking?
“No.” May was crying.
Lily reached behind her and took May’s hand, pressing it against her back pocket.
Sniffling and beginning to regain control, May slipped the phone from the pocket as Brandon drew near.
“Run,” Lily said. “Get to the Jeep.” It was still running.
“I don’t want to leave you.”
“Do what I tell you. Run. Now.”
Brandon pulled the gun from his jeans and aimed for the Jeep. He fired and one of the front tires blew.
Lily’s heart crushed under the weight of apprehension. Now what?
Pushing off Lily’s back, May started running. She went for the Jeep anyway.
“May!” Lily shouted. Then, to her horror, she saw Brandon aiming his gun at May.
She charged for him. He wasn’t far from her now. The gun went off. She tackled him, landing on top of him on the ground. Her right leg felt funny and it took her a second or two to realize she’d been shot.
He punched her and then hit her with the gun. She got dizzy and disoriented and fell off him. The pen slipped from her fingers and fell to the ground. Brandon started to climb to his feet.
Determined, she pushed him the same time she swung her leg back over him, straddling him and stopping him from stand ing. He moved the aim of the gun toward her. She grabbed it with both hands and deflected his aim as he fired again. She picked up the pen and stabbed him, going for his eye but hitting his cheek.
He yelled and smacked her hand away. Lily stood and kicked his wrist, the one that held the gun. It flew from his grasp.
Staggering, her leg not supporting her well, she kicked the gun so that it skittered across the gravel surface, out of his reach.
He sprang to his feet and bashed her head with his fist again. This time it knocked her to the ground and her vision fogged. She was vaguely aware of him going toward the Jeep.
“Run, May!” she yelled. “Get out of here!”
She was getting weak. Rolling to her butt, she saw blood soaking her jeans. She was bleeding. Badly.
May was fighting Brandon off, kicking at him from the driver’s seat and struggling to keep him from taking the cell phone from her. She dropped the phone and Brandon picked it up. She tried to take it from him. When he smacked her, Lily saw red.
She rolled to her hands and knees and crawled toward the gun. Hearing May cry out, she looked back. Brandon was dragging her from the Jeep. But May bit his hand and he yelped. She got away.
“Run, May!” Lily screamed.
And she did. May bolted down the road.
Lily reached the gun and took hold of it. Rolling onto her backside, she started firing.
Leaving Eileen in the holding cell, Wes went back to his SUV for his phone. He checked the screen and saw Lily had tried him twice. A sense of extreme foreboding slammed him. And then he heard someone shouting. “Sheriff! Sheriff!”
He looked up to see a boy running toward him. Levi Harrison, the boy May was seeing.
“You gotta come quick!” He waved his cell in front of him, skidding to a stop in front of him. “It’s May. Somebody’s got her and her mom. She called me, but she got disconnected when he caught her. She tried to tell me where they were, but he cut her off.”
“Get in.”
In the SUV, Wes dialed his voice mail. Lily’s voice streamed fast, telling him what he needed to know. He raced for the west end of town, lights and siren blaring for the second time today.
Damn it. He’d have gotten her call before now if he’d had his phone with him, but the drama with Eileen had preoccupied him.
The campsite wasn’t far outside of town. He swerved onto the dirt road and saw May jogging wearily along the side. Wes stopped and Levi jumped out to help her. She was crying hysterically. Levi held her and guided her into the SUV, seating her in the middle and holding her to his side.
May babbled incoherently about what had happened. Brandon shooting out the tire, fighting her until she got away.
Shooting Lily….
Wes could hardly contain his fear. Or his fury. Minutes later he reached the dead end. He saw the Jeep and two bodies. His fear escalated until his head felt bloodless.
He faced the two teenagers. “You two stay here. Don’t move.”
Levi nodded.
May leaned forward, her hand on the dash, searching the scene in front of them. “Is my mom all right?”
“Stay here,” Wes repeated. He handed the radio to Levi. “Tell Ryan to send an ambulance.”
Levi took the radio and when Wes saw that he knew how to use it, he shut the driver’s door and ran toward the bodies. One was Brandon Gates, shot in the chest and neck. He wasn’t moving and looked dead. There was no gun on the ground next to him so he passed him and went to Lily.
She lay sprawled on the ground a little farther away, a gun close to her unmoving hand.
“Lily.” He knelt beside her and checked for breathing. It was warm and glorious against his cheek. He felt for a pulse. Weak, but there.
He looked back to see a thumbs-up from Levi.
Help was on the way.
Chapter 13
Lily woke to bright lights and stabbing pain in her right thigh. Lifting the covers over her, she saw a bandage. It all came rushing back. She searched the room. Wes sat in a chair beside her, his head bowed in sleep. There were flowers everywhere. Who were they from?
She rolled her head to see Wes again. Watching him sleep took her mind off the pain.
As if sensing her stirring, his eyes opened and his head straightened, his gaze finding hers. In the next instant, he came alert and propelled himself from the chair to go to her, leaning over her, sliding one hand alongside her head and taking her hand with the other. She smiled.
He kissed her. “I’m so glad you’re awake.”
“What happened?”
“You were shot in the right thigh and it nicked your femoral artery. You lost a lot of blood. The doctor was confident, but wouldn’t say with any certainty that you were going to make it.” He kissed her again. “We were so worried.”
“We?”
“Your dad and May were here. They went home this morning to rest, but they’ll be back soon. You had surgery last night. It was late when they finished.”
“Lily.”
She looked toward the door where the voice had come from. Her dad stood there, his face a contortion of relief and repentance. He walked into the room.
Wes stood, giving her hand a squeeze. “I’ll give you two a few minutes.”
And she realized he and Shay must have talked.
Wes left the room and her dad moved the chair closer to the bed and sat. He clasped his hands between his knees and took a moment before he began. Finally he looked up at her.
“Lily…I’m sorry. When Wes called and told me what happened, I thought of losing you before…” He got a little choked up.
“It’s okay,” she said, reaching her hand out.
He took it between both of his. “I don’t want to leave this earth without knowing my daughter. Because I don’t really know you, Lily.”
Moisture burned her eyes. She’d wanted this for so long. Her dad.
“I can see you’ve changed,” he continued. “And I also realize your mom and I could have done things differently with you when you were growing up. I should have been there for you more.”
“I’m not looking back. I made a lot of mistakes. You aren’t to blame for those decisions.”
“You are different now, Lily. And it breaks my heart to know what happened to you is the reason you changed.”
“I like to think I would have changed anyway.” She smiled.
“Then that’s the way I’ll think of it, too.” He looked toward the flowers on the windowsill and on the counter across the room. Color exploded everywhere.
“Between Wes and Levi, the whole town knows you’re here,” he said. “Mary and Jake Pierson sent flowers. So did Bonnie Gene and her husband. Finn, too.”
Recalling what Finn had told her about Rachel, Lily wondered how long before the two ran into each other. It would be quite a spectacle. More gossip for the town, that’s for sure. Something new to focus on.
“Maisie Colton even sent you something,” Shay said. “It’s the big bouquet of yellow roses.”
“Maisie sent flowers?”
“Wes told her what happened. He also told her he was going to marry you so she’d better change her tune where you’re concerned. So she sent flowers.” Shay laughed wryly.
The words gave her a jolt. Marry her?
“Won’t be long before the whole town sees what I do now,” he said. “A strong woman who’s full of integrity.”
“Dad.” She wiped the tear that slid down her cheek.
The Librarian’s Secret Scandal Page 18
