Black Rock Bay

by Brianna Labuskes

  Mia kept running.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  IZZY

  “It’s not what you think,” Cash told Izzy, as he closed the front door behind them. “I was at the lighthouse. But I didn’t hurt them.”

  Izzy pressed her palm to where her headache throbbed, vicious in its relentlessness.

  “You have one chance to tell me everything,” Izzy gritted out. “And then I’m arresting you on obstruction charges.”

  Cash smiled sadly when she opened her eyes. “You guys keep forgetting I’m a lawyer.”

  “You really want to test me right now?” Izzy asked, and his face slipped back into an impassive mask once more.

  “I was grounded that night, like I told you,” Cash started without preamble. “But I snuck out. The window in my bathroom is right above the back porch’s roof. It wasn’t hard. I think Dad even knew I was going.”

  “Okay.”

  “Lacey had told me to meet them all at the lighthouse. I was . . .” He sucked his bottom lip between his teeth. “Hesitant. If you can imagine. I’d punched Ash earlier.”

  “But you went anyway?”

  “I got there too early. No one else had showed yet,” Cash went on. “I went up to the tower—there’s some grating up there. Sat and watched the sunset.”

  “Can we stick to the pertinent details here, Bishop?” Izzy rolled her finger in a get this moving gesture.

  Cash sighed. “Asher and Mia showed up first. They didn’t see me, and I didn’t go down. They could be weird sometimes.”

  “Weird how?”

  “I don’t know,” Cash said, but he wasn’t meeting her gaze. “Think it screwed both of them up.”

  “What did?”

  “Us. Me and Mia.” Cash shrugged. “Asher and Monroe. Mia always said she wasn’t jealous, but . . .”

  If the question even had to be asked, there had probably been truth to it.

  “Anyway, Monroe showed up after a while. They talked a bit, but I couldn’t hear what they were saying.” Cash shoved his hands in his pockets, rocked on his heels, and stared at a spot just beyond Izzy’s shoulder. “I just remember not wanting to be there, wanting to be home again.”

  “Did anyone else come in?” Lacey. Did Lacey come in?

  “No, just them,” Cash said, and she didn’t know if she believed him. Or if he thought it was the truth.

  But Lacey must have been there at some point. If Izzy was right about her.

  “When did you realize something was wrong?”

  Cash pressed his lips together before taking a deep breath. “It went quiet. I’d never felt that kind of quiet before.”

  “What kind?”

  “The kind that feels like death.” Cash finally met her eyes. Sweat beaded along his upper lip, and he licked at it, his tongue dragging along the skin there. “I ran down.”

  The truth? Maybe. “You did?”

  He thumbed at the space between his brows, and she wondered if his headache mirrored hers. “Believe me, I didn’t want to. Back then, though . . .”

  They both paused. They both knew Izzy could see what he was now, could see the cracks in his character that everyone else seemed to gloss over.

  “Back then I thought I was brave.” The corners of Cash’s lips tipped up in self-mockery.

  Izzy stayed still.

  “There was so much blood. God.” He pushed his fingers through his hair. “I, um . . . Mia was on the floor, and when she looked at me . . .”

  His eyes dropped down to his lap. The tick of a clock somewhere behind him counted the hesitation, each second more damning than the last.

  When he drew in a breath, Izzy’s pulse tripped because he still hadn’t mentioned Lacey being there. But Izzy had to be right about it. Who else could Charles have meant? Her.

  Except . . . Except there was another her.

  “When Mia looked at me. She said”—Cash paused, glanced up—“she said, ‘They weren’t supposed to cut that deep.’”

  Izzy’s brain tripped. “What?”

  Cash shoved his fingers through his hair, yanked. “God, I ran over to her—she’d just done the one wrist—it was pretty shallow. I took the razor from her, and she just smiled up at me.”

  “It was just the three of them?” Izzy clarified again. Lacey. Where had Lacey been?

  Her. Her. It had to be Lacey. Everything else fit.

  For the first time since Izzy had stepped into the house, Cash’s attention really focused on her. “Who else would have been there?”

  She shook her head, a dismissal she didn’t know if he’d let her get away with. “What happened after you found her?”

  “I don’t know, I think I was yelling at her,” Cash said. “It’s kind of hazy. But I remember I was terrified. I grabbed her shoulders at one point, pulled her to her feet, and shook her a little. She looked doped up on something, so I slapped her across the cheek like they do in movies.” His cheeks flushed red at the admission.

  “Did that work?”

  “Yeah, it was like a light had switched.” Cash nodded. “She went wild, thought she could help the other two but . . .”

  It was too late.

  A fucking suicide pact. This whole thing had been an actual suicide pact. Or at least an attempt. They weren’t supposed to cut that deep. What did that even mean?

  Her.

  “When did you leave?” Izzy asked.

  “After she ran out, saying she was going to get help.” Cash shrugged. “I couldn’t stay there. You don’t . . . you don’t know.” His eyes snapped to hers. “There wasn’t anything else I could do.”

  Something slid into place. She kept asking how Earl had gotten there so fast.

  “You called your dad.”

  He nodded, just once.

  “Henry Jackson and Jimmy Roarke weren’t helping cover up a crime Earl committed,” Izzy said slowly. “They were helping clean up after you.”

  “I didn’t . . . I didn’t do anything,” Cash said, his voice small.

  “Right. You didn’t.”

  Cash flinched, the blow squarely landing. He didn’t defend himself.

  So where did Lacey come in? “There were just the three of them,” Izzy repeated, almost without putting sound to the words.

  “You keep saying that,” Cash said. “Why?”

  Izzy made a decision. “Because, if I’m right about everything else, there should have been one more.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  MIA

  Lacey was behind Mia.

  Mia could sense it more than hear it, as she dodged through the branches. Broken, brittle limbs caught at her exposed arms, and blood trickled from her hairline, dripping off her jaw into the hollow of her collarbone.

  The lighthouse was close. It had a door. She could lock it. Maybe the phone line was even working. She couldn’t picture it. Everything that had happened before this moment, this chase, this consuming desperation for survival, was lost to adrenaline.

  There.

  The clearing. Up ahead. Her thighs bunched as she picked up her pace, careful not to stumble again, careful not to give up her seconds—minutes maybe—of advantage.

  A meadow stretched out before her, open, wide, and exposed. It was what stood between her and the relative safety of the lighthouse. The potential vulnerability scared her, terrified her so that panic throbbed along with each step she took closer.

  It was evening, but early evening, so there was no bright moon to betray her movements, no silver to catch on pale white flesh. Just a blue-tinged darkness that should shroud her in shadows. If she was lucky.

  She paused just at the edge of the tree line, the animal in her whimpering at the thought of going out in the open. But the only other choice was to stay and be caught.

  And she was not prey.

  Mia took off. Her mind cleared of anything other than the siren’s song of safety.

  Time stretched, like it always did on the island, stretched and became meaningless beyond the distanc
e her feet ate up. It stretched, it stretched, and then it snapped back. And she was there. In front of the door, grasping at the knob.

  It refused to budge beneath her numb, frozen fingers, and the frustration nearly took her to the ground.

  Key. It was a shout inside her own head, loud and demanding.

  There was an extra key. She’d used it when she and Izzy had come.

  Mia did drop to the ground then, but it was only to scramble in the drifting snow for the fake rock. It took two tries to get it out, the metal eventually falling into her trembling hands.

  But it had taken her too long.

  A gun pressed against the base of her neck, and Lacey’s silky voice cut through the wind. “You know I’m not a killer, darling, but even I have my limits. Open the door.”

  It wasn’t over, it wasn’t over, the animal howled, pacing beneath the pressure of the barrel.

  Still, she stepped into the little room, didn’t try to take Lacey down in the open.

  In the lighthouse, there was so much more to work with than there had been when she was bound on the floor in the abandoned house’s kitchen.

  The fear quieted, the roar of it, which had been so loud while she had been fleeing, settling into a buzz beneath her skin, bringing everything into focus. The rustle of Lacey’s coat as she moved, the pungent must thick in the air, the splintered boards against her feet.

  Lacey came in behind her, shutting the door as she did. She pouted at Mia. “You ran away. But we were having so much fun.”

  Mia didn’t respond, didn’t fall into the trap of engaging with the woman. Instead, she started to assess items as potential weapons or dismiss them as useless.

  “Well, I can’t say I’m disappointed,” Lacey continued. “Back where it all started, huh? Fitting, I guess.”

  The jewelry box had sharp edges. The table was too heavy to lift.

  “It actually adds a bit of poetry to my plan,” Lacey said, her voice going singsong to try to goad Mia into answering.

  If she broke one of the pictures on the wall, she might be able to use the glass. The poker by the fireplace was perfect, but far. The books were probably too light.

  “You don’t want to hear my plan?” Lacey pouted again, her lip slick with spit in the thin light filtering in through the window.

  They were standing in shades of darkness. At least outside, the snow had helped a little. Now it was nearly pitch black. Lacey paced closer, probably wanting to see each emotion flick across Mia’s face. “All right, you don’t want to play? You’ll just have to wait and see, then.”

  Before Mia could say anything at all, Lacey pulled out her cell phone. Mia thought of her own useless one, probably filled with messages from Izzy.

  Lacey held the gun up to her own mouth in the shhh gesture, before winking at Mia.

  She grinned, a flash of white teeth, when whomever she’d called picked up. Then she began to whisper, a quiver turning the words frantic, terrified, urgent.

  “Oh, Detective Santiago, you have to help me. It’s . . . It’s Mia. She’s . . . I think she’s going to hurt someone. We’re at the lighthouse. Please come. Fast.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  MIA

  “Izzy’s not even on the island, you know,” Mia said, with a calm she actually felt. The chase was over. This was no longer about predator and prey but rather opportunity. And Mia was good at opportunity.

  Lacey tucked the phone away into her jacket pocket. “My sources say otherwise, darling.”

  Mia hid her surprise beneath a question. “Sources?”

  “You know, when you have a past to hide, it doesn’t take a lot of persuasion to agree to certain favors.”

  “Ellen,” Mia said, and it wasn’t a guess. “You blackmailed her.”

  “Oh, darling, that’s such a dirty word.” Lacey’s smug Cheshire cat smile was back. So pleased with herself. “She wasn’t even a challenge.”

  “But I was?” Mia asked, because beneath everything else was an echo, faint but clear. You are my masterpiece.

  “Deliciously so.” Lacey stepped toward her but then seemed to think better of it. There was still blood smeared in the dip between her nose and mouth from where Mia had slammed into her. “Even more now. Harder to read. But everyone has their buttons.”

  “What are mine?” Mia asked. Izzy was on the island, Izzy was coming. There was no way she’d believe Lacey. All Mia had to do was stall.

  “Hmmm.” Lacey tapped the barrel of her gun against her lips, thinking. “Asher. Always has been.”

  Mia sucked in a breath, something slotting into place. “It was you, in the woods that first night.”

  “Did you think you were going crazy?” Lacey’s voice was gleeful. “Did Detective Santiago think you were going crazy?”

  Yes. To both.

  “No.” Mia shook her head.

  “Don’t lie, precious,” Lacey cooed. “I heard you call out his name.” She leaned forward. “It’s the guilt.”

  “What else?” Mia said, ignoring the taunt. “My buttons, what else?” It was an obvious delay tactic, but Lacey didn’t seem to mind.

  “Hmm, Cash,” Lacey said easily. “Though he should never have been. You were so much better than him. But he’s still there, isn’t he? Under your skin.”

  Mia just smiled. “If you think so.” Anger. It was so much easier to work with. Maybe she could even provoke her enough to drop her guard.

  “Oh, darling, don’t try to lie,” Lacey said smoothly, but she stepped closer. “I saw you two on the docks.”

  Were you jealous? But Mia swallowed the question, loath to be predictable. She bet Lacey loved when people were predictable.

  “Does he know?” Mia asked instead.

  “Oh please, he’s an idiot.” Lacey’s lips twisted, dismissive. “You know he was there that night? He’s the one who stopped you from going through with it.”

  Mia’s vision tunneled, her mouth tangy with her surprise. “What?”

  “Then he ran off like a coward dog. He’s been absolutely eaten up with guilt ever since. It makes him so fun to play with.” She paused. “It’s the only thing interesting about him, you know.”

  Lacey leaned in, her eyebrows raised. “Do you want to know what’s even better?” There was that giddy, dreamy quality to her voice again. “He saw me, outside, before you did. He thinks I’ve been keeping his secret for all this time.”

  She giggled then, and somehow the girlish pleasure in it was worse than the rusted wind chimes.

  Something Cash said on the pier came back to Mia. “You made him think your father was contacting you again. The nightmares.”

  Lacey grinned, that Cheshire cat smugness making her features hard, ugly. “Can you imagine? If he’d gone off to find my father? Who, by the way, is a rotting vegetable. But Cash would find a little present there, just enough evidence to cement his belief that dear old Daddy Bell killed my beloved mother.”

  Mia’s nails dug into her palms where her fingers had curled into fists as Lacey laughed again.

  “He’d finally have something to do with all that exquisite guilt,” Lacey continued. “He’s quite slow on the uptake, but I was finally making headway with him. The nightmares really sold it, I will say.”

  Playthings. That’s how Lacey saw people, not as humans but as dolls to be used for her enjoyment. Appealing to her humanity would be pointless here.

  “Really,” Lacey continued, “it was the only thing keeping me entertained in this joke of a place.”

  The disdain dripped from the words. “Why did you come back here, then?”

  Rage rippled across her face, before it smoothed out again. “Daddy Bell isn’t as dumb as he looks sometimes.”

  “He cut you off,” Mia guessed. The Bell mansion was deeded to Lacey, but the rest of her life would have been funded by her parents. The punishment of banishment was perfectly cruel for the little sociopath.

  Lacey pouted. “I should have solved the problem before he disco
vered my games. I would have inherited millions. But he gave the money away. To charity.” She practically spit the last word. “The only thing that was left was enough for that shitty little house he’s rotting in and his medical care. I can’t get to that trust he set up.”

  “That must have really pissed you off, huh,” Mia said, goading. She wanted Lacey as angry and sloppy as possible by the time Izzy got there.

  But instead of sinking further into her rage, Lacey smiled, all sunshine again. “That’s where Cash came in. My little guilty white knight, trying to save the day.”

  Mia sighed and shifted tactics. “Izzy’s not going to believe you, you know.”

  Straightening, Lacey dabbed at the blood beneath her nose. In the dim light, Mia could already see bruises forming beneath her eyes. “Which one of us looks like they’re the victim here?”

  Mia didn’t call attention to her state of undress, but Lacey must have noticed the way Mia couldn’t help but grip her own arms, her body hungry for warmth. Lacey shrugged out of her own coat and tossed it to Mia. “Put it on,” she said, with a little jab of the gun.

  Despite whatever part the jacket was about to play in the scene Lacey had planned, Mia was grateful for it. The heat from Lacey’s body lingered in its fabric, and Mia sank into it, ignoring the intimacy of the action. Tears gathered behind her closed lids at the reprieve from the cold.

  Lacey tilted her head to study Mia, then nodded once, satisfied.

  They both heard it at the same time. A tiny scrape of boot against stone.

  Izzy.

  Lacey flashed her one more bright smile and then whispered, “Catch.”

  On instinct alone, Mia grabbed the gun from the air, the weight of it so welcome and familiar that she didn’t stop to think before she pointed it at Lacey.

  In the next heartbeat, the door swung open, and Izzy was in the room.

  Mia knew it looked bad. It was designed to.

  “Drop the gun,” Izzy said, as she charged through the door, her fingers fumbling for the light switch. The bulbs buzzed to life above them. The glow wasn’t enough, but at least they were no longer dealing with shadows.