Killing Kelly

by Heather Graham

  Both the officers looked at them, somewhat confused. “Okay, where’s the dog?” one of them asked.

  “Still at the vet,” Kelly said. She almost added, He might have been poisoned! But she refrained. She wanted to get through the current situation and out of it. She needed time in peace and quiet to determine her own next action. She wasn’t a fool and she didn’t want to die. But she had been scared to death. And she was very angry.

  “All right, Miss Trent, what happened?” the older officer demanded.

  And she told him. She told him exactly what had happened. As she spoke, she saw that Doug glared at Mel all the while. She ignored him and hoped that Mel was doing the same.

  The officer wrote a report and called for a tow truck. Then he apologized to them all. “I’m sorry, but I don’t think we’re going to be able to do anything. You didn’t see the car at all, right, Miss Trent?”

  She shook her head. “The lights…they were just blinding.”

  “And you really don’t know if it was just a road-hog jerk in the kind of hurry that could have killed someone or if…well, if it was someone playing lethal road games?”

  Kelly shook her head, praying that it was coming to an end, that they were going to let her go.

  “Someone is trying to kill her,” Doug stated.

  She looked at him with horror.

  “There have been several murders across the country of advice-therapist types,” Doug continued, his eyes like steel as they rested on her, his jaw set hard as concrete. “Kelly played an advice therapist on her soap.”

  “I know,” the younger officer said, and flushed. His partner stared at him. “Yes, yes! I watch the soaps on my days off, all right?”

  His partner shrugged after a moment. “Sure.”

  “I think that someone was purposely trying to run her off the road,” Doug said, still staring at Mel.

  Mel, usually calm, dignified and collected, had had it. “You ass! Your car is up there, too!”

  “All right, all right,” the older officer said. “Miss Trent, if you think—”

  “I think that we’ve all been through a bit of stress,” she said sweetly, calmly. She glared at Doug, then looked to Quinn for help. “I can’t tell you anything about the car that sideswiped me. Nothing. And I am so sorry. You’ve got my name, license, insurance card…and the tow truck is coming. My friends here are worried about me, but honestly, there’s nothing to do except for everyone to cool down some.”

  “We can go into the station—”

  “There’s no reason,” Quinn said, producing his wallet and showing his own license. “My brother is licensed, too. There really is nothing that can be done. If Kelly didn’t see anything, and if her report is properly filled out, we’ll just wait for the tow truck, then go get some rest.”

  The older officer peered at Kelly. “You’re sure you don’t want some medical help?”

  “I would be horrified to take the time of an emergency medic to look at a few mosquito bites,” Kelly said.

  As she spoke, the tow truck arrived. The driver was a cheerful old fellow who took a look at the car and then the people. He shook his head. “And no one was hurt?” he said.

  “No,” Kelly assured him.

  “The air bags didn’t deploy?” he asked.

  Again, Kelly shook her head.

  “Need a ride yourself?” he asked hopefully.

  She smiled. “No, I’m fine, thanks.” She took a step toward Mel, glaring at Doug. “We’ve got three cars here. Thanks, anyway,” she repeated. “Mel, I’ll drive with you. The O’Caseys can follow in their cars and we’ll all meet up back at Vinnie’s.”

  Not about to allow an argument, even though she knew that Doug was furious, she slipped her arm through Mel’s and thanked the officers again. Determined to leave behind the site of the accident, she hurried into the passenger’s seat of Mel’s car.

  He crawled into the driver’s seat—and looked at her before starting the engine. “Kelly, I would never hurt you. I can’t even believe that anyone could suggest such a thing.”

  “It’s all right, Mel. I know. And please don’t hold it against Doug. He’s really determined to look after me.”

  She was surprised when Mel laughed. “Actually, I’m indignant, but I do forgive him. I forgive him because it’s all for you. But I’m not going anywhere now. I’m staying right by your side.”

  She touched his shoulder, squeezing it. “Can I use your cell phone?” she asked him.

  “Sure.” He dug it from his pocket. She slipped the vet’s card from her own and dialed the number. Dr. Garcia answered. “Sam still okay?” she asked anxiously.

  “Sleeping restfully,” he assured her. “And you?”

  She arched a brow. Could even the vet know about the accident already? “I’m fine.”

  “You left here in such a state, frankly I was more worried about you than the dog for a while. Don’t worry about Sam. I’m doing paperwork right next to him now.”

  “Thank you so much,” Kelly said.

  “My pleasure.”

  She hung up and turned to Mel. “You know, someone might have tried to poison him.”

  “Yeah, this whole thing is looking just great,” Mel muttered. “You left the soap because you might have been in danger. And God forgive me, I pushed this video on you.” He glanced over at her quickly as he drove. “I pray it wasn’t…”

  “It wasn’t a mistake.”

  “I’m just praying now it wasn’t a lethal mistake,” he muttered.

  They pulled into Vinnie’s parking lot, the O’Caseys right behind them. Once there, she noticed at last that Doug was in nothing but cutoffs. She frowned, looking at him.

  “Long story,” he said with a wave of his hands.

  “I suggest a beer,” Quinn said.

  “Why not?” Mel agreed.

  That Doug was really angry was more than apparent to Kelly. He was stiff as could be as he sat across a table from her.

  The waiter who had helped her was still working, and though the place was hopping, he made a point of stopping by. “You all found one another. Good.”

  The man shrank back slightly when Mel grabbed him by the arm. “This is the young man who told me where Kelly had gone. Right?”

  “Oh, yes, I’ve been telling people what happened all day,” the waiter said cheerfully. He cleared his throat. “Um, my arm.” Mel released him.

  Doug grabbed him. “You’ve been telling people…all day?”

  The poor man frowned, staring at his arm again. Doug wasn’t going to release him until he answered, that much was obvious.

  “Yeah, all kinds of people. Sir…?”

  Doug let go, still staring at him.

  “People around here were concerned. The group from the island has been coming and going, and they all asked. For a while, even all the folks sitting around at the tables were talking about it.” He paused, smiling. “Sure, folks are interested in you, Miss Trent. But it’s a nice group around here. People really care. How did you make out? How’s your dog?”

  Kelly smiled. “Doing well. Thank you so much. The vet is great.”

  “He sure is. Left some fancy practice in New York City to come down here. The Keys have a way with folks, you know? Can’t compete with the big cities for big business and high-powered jobs most of the time, but, hey…it can compete with the sunsets. What can I get you folks?”

  They all opted for beer. The waiter gave Doug a look that suggested he sure as hell needed one, maybe a lot of them.

  As the waiter walked off, a man came forward. “Where the hell’s my boat?” he asked Doug.

  “You might have told me the motor was about to die,” Doug said.

  “You didn’t ask!” the old fellow said. “So where’s my boat?”

  “On the water. We’ll get it towed in tomorrow.”

  The old man grinned. He had a one-toothed smile. “Fix the motor for me, too?”

  Doug glared at him.

  “H
ey, it was worth a try! You can pay me for it. Actually, though, I’d prefer if you fixed the darn-tootin’ thing.”

  “You got any money on you?” Doug asked his brother.

  “Some. And an ATM card,” Quinn replied.

  “Ah, come on. You’re a couple of healthy young fellows. Looks like you’ve been around boats,” the man said.

  “How about this? We’ll see,” Doug said. “We’ll get her towed tomorrow and see what we can do.”

  The fellow smiled, nodded and walked off.

  “What was that all about?” Kelly asked.

  “I’ve been chasing you since I got off the phone and found out you’d left Vinnie’s.”

  “I’m sorry, I couldn’t find you!” she told him.

  “I was right out in the parking lot.”

  “Look, Sam was sick. I had to go,” she said angrily.

  “Clams, anyone?” Quinn said, looking up from the menu. “They’re really good here.”

  “Lay off her,” Mel said.

  “All right, I’ll do the ordering and the three of you will all take a breath,” Quinn said firmly.

  The tension at the table could have been cut with a knife. No one spoke. Then Kelly turned to Quinn. “Clams sound good to me.”

  By the time they reached the resort that night, Kelly was really exhausted. And no one was prepared for a furious Jane.

  “A phone call! One of you could have given me a simple phone call!” Jane stared at the group of them, shaking her head. “You’re all filthy, do you know that? I’d better get some explanations. And why am I not asking about the dog, you wonder? Because I called the vet, of course, a man who actually answers his phone!”

  “Jane, I’m sorry. Really sorry!” Doug told her. He reached into his pocket and produced his cell phone, showing her that it was dead. “I took it swimming.”

  “Oh, great. You went swimming.” She pointed at Kelly. “You lost yours, right?”

  “Yeah…it didn’t seem to matter much at the time,” Kelly said.

  “Actually…” Doug murmured, reaching into his other pocket. “It’s not lost. I found it on the dock.” Kelly arched a brow in his direction. Her phone was as dead as his. “At least I have it,” he told her.

  “Well, that’s true. It’s not lost anymore.”

  Jane spun on Quinn. “You have a phone.” She frowned. “And what are you doing here?”

  “I was just in the neighborhood?” Quinn suggested.

  “But you have a phone, right?”

  “I’m sorry, too, Jane,” Quinn said diplomatically.

  Then Jane turned on Mel. “You have a phone, right? Or did you go swimming, too?”

  “No, I have a phone,” Mel said. “I just didn’t know we were supposed to call.”

  “I didn’t know what the hell had happened or what was going on!” Jane accused them.

  It was time to tell her, Doug decided. “Jane, actually…there was an accident.”

  “An accident!” she said. “All right, I know Sam is okay and you all look fine. Was anyone hurt?”

  “Your car,” Kelly told her.

  “Oh?”

  “I was sideswiped, run off the road,” Kelly said.

  “But…you’re all right?”

  Kelly nodded. “I’m really sorry, Jane. I’ll see to it that it’s fixed.”

  “The car is the least of it. I have insurance,” Jane said. “You were sideswiped? Run off the road?”

  Kelly nodded.

  “Did they get the guy? No, of course not,” Jane said, answering her own question. “It would have been some idiot in a real hurry, then too much of a coward to make sure that you were all right. Some ass who would leave a driver stranded in the middle of nowhere!”

  She was angry, disgusted. They all knew that kind of driver. It didn’t occur to Jane that there might be any more to it, so Doug decided not to push the point. Hell, maybe Jane was right. But he didn’t believe that—not for a minute.

  “All right, I’m going to go shower,” Mel said.

  “We’re locking up for the night,” Doug told him. He still mistrusted the man. The only reason he was willing to give Mel the benefit of the doubt was the fact that he really had dialed 911 into his phone. And even though a voice at the back of his head warned him that it might have been a cover-up, he was going to force himself to be decent to the man—for Kelly. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t be watching him.

  “So I don’t have a car?” Jane murmured after they had said good-night to Mel.

  “I don’t think it’s in bad shape, but it was towed to the nearest station. We can check on it in the morning,” Doug told her.

  “You might have been killed!” Jane told her, truly horrified by the thought.

  “I always buckle up,” Kelly said. “And now I’m really glad it’s a habit.”

  “Anybody want a drink? I want a drink!” Jane said. She delved into the minibar, pulling out a miniature whiskey. They all stared at her as she twisted the top and swallowed it down, making a face. “No one else?” she said.

  “I want a bath more than anything in the world,” Kelly said.

  “Then I’m getting out of here. Except I’m taking another drink. My room didn’t come with an open minibar!” She took out another miniature, then looked them all over again and shook her head. “Good night.”

  “Wait, I’ll walk you to your room,” Quinn told her.

  She frowned. “It’s only a few doors down.”

  “I’ll walk you.”

  “Oh, Lord!” she said, looking from Quinn to Doug. “The two of you make me nervous as hell! All that stuff about locking the doors and now I can’t walk a few steps on my own.”

  “I need to get to Doug’s, shower, then on the phone with Shannon,” Quinn said. “Let her know I’m staying the night.” He turned to Doug. “Key?”

  “Yeah, hang on.” Doug went to the kitchen counter and found the pack of keys he’d been given for his room, keys he’d never used. He gave them to Quinn, who motioned his head toward a manila envelope he’d left on the sofa. Doug nodded.

  “In the morning,” he told them. “Good night.”

  As Quinn walked Jane out, Doug heard her muttering. “An accident! Someone might have been killed and you all didn’t even think to call me and tell me you were all right!” Naturally Quinn began to apologize again.

  Kelly was already starting up the stairs as Doug closed and locked the door. “I’m taking a bath,” she said.

  “Yeah,” he murmured.

  She stopped suddenly, turned around and looked at him. “You’re angry, aren’t you? Because I went with Mel.”

  “I wish you hadn’t, yes.”

  “Mel would never hurt me.”

  “You shouldn’t trust anyone, Kelly. Anyone.”

  “You are angry.”

  “He has an ex-wife who is about to take him to court.”

  “If you’re going to condemn a man for that, you could look at almost every male I’ve met in all my years in the L.A. area.”

  “He was there, Kelly. In California.”

  “Never in Ohio.”

  “Maybe that death wasn’t related.”

  “Maybe none of this is related!” she reminded him.

  “Kelly, I know you’re not a fool. In one day, Sam wound up in the vet’s office and you were nearly killed. Don’t trust anyone—including Mel Alton.”

  “What about you?” she asked softly.

  He stared back at her. “Maybe you shouldn’t trust me. But I’m all you’ve really got right now.”

  She didn’t smile and didn’t reply. She just turned and continued up the stairs.

  He watched her, feeling the ache of tension creeping into his shoulders. He stared after her a long while, then turned to the manila envelope of records Quinn had given him. Picking it up, he walked over to the computer desk and sat down.

  An hour later, he was still staring at numbers. Phones, addresses, connections. There were calls between Marc Logan, J
oe Penny, Mel Alton and Lance Morton. Naturally. They were all business associates. And there were also calls to Matt Avery. Doug found those interesting. The ones between him, Joe Penny and even Mel Alton were explainable. But why had he been in contact with Lance Morton and Marc Logan? There had to be something to that.

  With names and numbers swimming before his eyes, he set the file down and walked around. He missed Sam and understood better just how crazed Kelly must have been.

  He walked up the stairs, noting that although he’d been losing more and more of the dried sand on his feet and ankles since they’d left the scene of the accident, he was still dry and dusty with the stuff. His shoulders were red, burned from the heat today. He felt like a salt log.

  Upstairs, he found the room dark and silent. Not wanting to disturb Kelly, he slipped into the bathroom and into the shower. When he walked out, Kelly was in the doorway, sleek, naked, arms crossed over her chest, staring at him.

  He towel dried, staring back, stunned by his own libido. This was surely serious. His focus kept slipping. And though he’d come out of the hot shower limp as a rag, he was now rising like a banner.

  “I thought you were sleeping,” he said, the words sounding inane to his ears.

  “Obviously I’m not.”

  “What the hell are you mad at?” he demanded.

  “You.”

  “Me! You’re the one who went off with your agent.”

  “You have to quit acting like the strong arm of God!” she said, pointing at him.

  He dropped the towel and walked over to her, pointing back. His forefinger poked her breastbone. “I swim half the distance from a stinking boat I halfway commandeered to get to a dock to chase you up and down the mainland only to find you in a ditch! And you’re telling me to quit?”

  She stiffened, staring at him, eyes burning. “Yes!”

  “You little diva!”

  “Oh!” She tried to think of something. “Would-be cop!”

  “I was a cop.”

  “I am not a diva.”

  “You need to learn sense!”

  “And you…you can’t bully everyone.”