Danielle’s voice trailed off and Nikki prompted her. “Only this time, what?”
“Time’s almost up!” the guard bellowed.
“Only this time, she wanted information about you.”
“About me?”
“Yeah,” Danielle looked down, and then back up. “She started calling me all the time, asking me so many questions. At first, I didn’t tell her anything, but she kept the guilt trip on me and well, I must admit, I fell for it. I told her things about your marriage.” Danielle looked at Nikki.
Nikki’s jaw set, but she didn’t say anything. She nodded for Danielle to continue.
“At first, I thought she was just being helpful,” Danielle said. “I told her about when Psalm was sick and she was the one who insisted I offer you that credit card hookup. Remember when I offered it the first time and you shot it down? Well, I told her and she said I should make sure you took it.”
Realization dawned. “So she was the one who went to the press?”
Danielle squirmed. “I think so.”
“And everything just fell into place like clockwork,” Nikki concluded, her mouth drawing into a tight line. “I just handed her my husband on a silver platter. I lied and deceived at every turn and she was just conveniently there to help him through his time of trouble.”
“I’m so sorry,” Danielle said. “But it gets worse.”
“How?”
“I think she’s killed before.”
Chapter 119
William bumped past Olivia and headed down the hall to the bedroom he had stayed in for too long. He put yesterday’s clothes into his duffel bag, shaking his head the entire time. He had to admit, at least now, that he had known Olivia had expected something from him. But he had ignored what he knew to be good judgment, allowing her to help him with his campaign.
She was a powerful woman. Rich. Accomplished. And she had lavished all her attention on him. She had bought him nice things, catered to his needs—would have done even more, if he had allowed.
And now, she was demanding payment.
He knew he had to get to his wife. He had been away for much too long.
“William, you can’t just walk out on me, not after I’ve put so much into you.” Olivia shook her head. “I’ve invested quite a lot into you.”
He heard her words and his back stiffened. “Look, Olivia, I’m going to leave and there is nothing you can do about it.” He grabbed the bag from the bed, and finally turned to face her.
He was staring straight into Olivia’s narrowed eyes. And she was pointing a .22-caliber handgun at him.
Chapter 120
Nikki sprang from her seat, wildly shaking her hands in front of her. “William, I’ve got to get to William!”
“What?” Danielle’s eyes looked frightened.
“She’s going to kill my husband!” Nikki spoke as if talking to a child. It all seemed so obvious to her now.
“What are you talking about?” Danielle still didn’t get it.
“You just said she kills when she doesn’t get what she wants. And I know William. He’s not going to go along with what she wants. My husband loves me.”
Nikki had no time for explanations. She quickly said her good bye, promising to come back. It was all Nikki could do to restrain herself from breaking out in a full run as she exited the building. When she hopped into the car, she dived into her purse for the business card she had shoved in her wallet. She punched in the number to Luke Marks, the assistant district attorney she had met with when her part in the credit card scam hit the papers.
“I know who killed Reverend Chance,” Nikki exclaimed into the phone after getting Luke on the line.
“Who is this?” Luke wanted to know.
“It’s Nikki Broussard. Get someone out to Ontario Street!”
“What are you talking about?”
She rattled off her suspicions, not caring that she probably sounded incoherent. She shouted out Olivia’s address, a number Nikki had memorized when she found out her husband was staying there. Luke told her not to go to the property, to wait for the police, but she knew she could not sit back and do nothing, not while her husband’s very life hung in the balance.
Nikki’s hands were shaking and sweaty. She ran every red light she saw, laying her palm flat against the horn.
She realized that all her suspicions of the past few months had just been a weak attempt to push William away. Her lack of faith had caused her to run away from so much. She hadn’t trusted God. She hadn’t trusted her husband. And she hadn’t trusted herself. At every turn, she rejected the idea of trust because she didn’t want to be hurt. And now, it was this newfound trust that fueled her mad dash across town. She knew her husband had not cheated on her with this woman. William loved her, and what’s more, he loved God. And that meant there were just some things he would not do.
And she knew she had to bring him home.
Alive.
Chapter 121
“What are you doing?” William tried to speak calmly, but his stomach fluttered and he wondered yet again why he hadn’t stayed at the hotel, or better yet, gone home to his wife last night.
“I told you, you owe me,” Olivia said.
“I don’t owe you anything. You’re crazy.” He knew he probably shouldn’t talk like that and make her even madder.
“Crazy or not, I don’t appreciate how you’ve gone back on our agreement.”
“We had no agreement.” Maybe he shouldn’t call her a liar right now either. After all, she was holding a gun.
“Yes, we did,” Olivia said. “Did you think I was helping you just out of the goodness of my heart? Everything I do is calculated. Don’t you know one of the fundamental laws of physics, that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction? Well, I’ve just adapted it a bit. For every action done against me, there is a certain reaction, sometimes equal, but most times much worse. No deed against me goes unpunished.”
“But I didn’t do any deed against you,” William tried to reason.
She laughed, her voice cackling and shrill. “Oh, yes you did.” Olivia stepped behind him. He looked around, but she urged him forward with the gun, out of the bedroom and up the hallway. He walked, keeping his eyes straight ahead as he prepared to make a sudden move to the right and twist her up and force her to drop the gun from her hand. But she barked at him, “Right there!” The moment was lost as they finally stood in the living room and she moved again to face him.
“You tried to use me for your own gain. You thought you could get all you wanted out of me and then not pay. Life doesn’t work like that. Look at my father. All my adult life I’ve been building him up, his credibility, his wealth, his power. And then he goes and lets what he did years ago come back and jeopardize all of us. I told him from the start to leave those casinos alone, but he wouldn’t listen.
“He finally left them behind and became a changed man. Building a church, leading the community. But I knew I was going to have to punish him when those gambling stories hit the papers. If he had just listened to me, he wouldn’t have had to die.”
William’s brows shot up. He could scarcely believe what he was hearing. “You killed your father? But why?”
“Don’t you listen? I just told you. All of my hard work of positioning him to run for office was going to go up in smoke. I kept telling him to let me handle things, to let me run his campaign. But he was too stubborn. So I didn’t have a choice.”
William stared at her as if she had to be crazy. “You didn’t have a choice?”
“You remember how he kept going against everything I said, William,” Olivia said. “I had to do something quick. Then I got the idea of handing the election to you.”
“How did you know I would accept?”
“Because I wanted you to. And I get what I want.” Olivia said the words matter-of-factly.
William laughed, but not with mirth. It was dry and full of cynicism. “So it’s like that for you? I thought
you loved your dad?”
“Oh, I did,” she said. “I loved him very much. And we could have run a very successful campaign, if his past hadn’t compromised it. I don’t play to lose. And we would have lost with his skeletons tumbling out of the closet like cans in an overstuffed pantry. I had to take care of the situation. My way.”
Her eyes were cold and her voice sent icy fingers marching down his spine. How could he never have noticed how unfeeling Olivia was?
“So, all your dad was, was a situation?”
“Don’t make it sound so bad!” Olivia said. “Did he tell you he had two illegitimate daughters, twins? One is your wife’s best friend. Danielle. All he did was get himself into situations. And that would have come out too, with the election. I had to do something.
“And I chose you. You should be honored. Most men would have been. Yet, you seek to throw my generosity in my face.” Olivia talked with the gun, jabbing it in his face to punctuate her sentences.
William’s mind raced. How could he get her to put down the gun so he could make a break for it? If he rushed her fast and caught her off guard, it’s possible he could knock the gun out of her hand. But if he faltered . . .
“Olivia, let’s talk about this,” he reasoned. “Maybe we can work something out after all.”
She wagged the index finger of her free hand at him. “Do you think I’m dumb? I know you’re just trying to say anything to save your skin. It won’t work.” She sighed. “It’s really a shame. My late husband learned that the hard way.
“I really hated to have to poison him like that. Do you know it took a week? I had to be so careful. But he had to go because I realized too late that I had married the wrong man. And you already know, I don’t like failure. I couldn’t have a divorce on my hands.”
William couldn’t believe his bad luck. There were 400,000 people in the area, and he had somehow gotten hooked up with this crazy vigilante woman who didn’t like divorce but had no problem with murder.
“I had to kill my sister’s boyfriend too. Danielle made such bad choices in men.”
“Troy? You killed Troy? Why?”
“Two reasons,” Olivia said. She seemed to gain some satisfaction out of these confessions. It was as if she needed to brag that she had outsmarted so many people. “One, he wasn’t right for her. And two, she was getting out of hand. I had been able to keep a handle on her with threats to send her back to the hospital, but I needed something more. I thought pinning a murder on her would come in handy. It did, too.”
“You had her arrested?” William somehow knew the answer.
“I had to find some way to shut her up,” Olivia said. “She was acting really jittery and I couldn’t keep watching her while I was so busy with you. And I didn’t want her unstable behind to go off on a tangent.”
“How could you just be so cold?” William shook his head in disgust and shock.
Olivia shook her head. “Sweetie, you just don’t listen. Calculated. I’m calculated. That means I’m smart. A genius.”
“If you’re so smart, why are you going to ruin your life by killing me? Don’t you know you’re going to get caught? I mean, we’re in the middle of your living room.”
“Tsk, tsk. Do you really think I’ve not thought this through?” Her voice rose. “I’m a bit annoyed that I have to do this. After all, I just won an election for you and now I’ll have to start all over with a new candidate. But I think what I’ll do is say that, well, you were just so drunk after last night’s parties . . . and well, you had been coming on to me all along, I mean, you kept harassing me. And me, being the timid woman that I am, I was intimidated, which is why I allowed it to go on for so long. But finally, it got to be too much. You tried to attack me and, just thank God, I was able to grab a gun my father bought for me years ago for protection and I shot you in the struggle.”
She shook her head at the sad notion. “Sadly, our newly elected mayor was just a lowlife pervert. And it really won’t be a stretch of the imagination, especially with your wife’s fine reputation as a call girl and a credit card thief.”
William hoped Nikki would not have to come to identify his body. Maybe they would get Mac instead. “So you really do have this all planned out, huh?”
“I told you, I do,” Olivia said, leveling the gun straight at William. “And I believe, this time around, I’ll run for mayor myself.”
Chapter 122
Nikki ran out of gas a block from Olivia’s house. She had slowed at the light, but when she pressed the gas to accelerate, the car sputtered and stopped. Nikki desperately tried to get the car to start, but it was no use. She slammed her palm against the steering wheel. “Not now!”
Nikki had been riding on empty for what seemed like days now, so running out of gas wasn’t a total surprise. She hopped out and started running down the street. She had to get to her husband.
She had only been to Olivia’s home once before, when the woman had hosted William and her for a dinner a few months ago, back when Reverend Chance was running for office.
Her body temperature rose as her legs pumped furiously, negating the autumn’s cool bite. She stumbled up the stairs to the elegantly appointed wood frame house and fell into the door. Sirens blared from behind as blue lights flashed, but Nikki didn’t wait for the police. She banged on the door and twisted the knob, pushing with her body strength at the same time. Surprised that it was unlocked, she stumbled into Olivia’s living room.
Olivia whirled around, a gun in her right hand.
Nikki heard a shout from William, but all she could feel was a burning sensation as a bullet tore through her upper body and she fell into darkness.
Chapter 123
It all happened so fast. William saw Nikki burst into the living room at the same time Olivia raised the gun and pulled the trigger. The bullet hit his wife a split second before he dove to disarm Olivia. He knocked her to the floor and the gun flew across the room.
The room immediately filled with uniformed officers who scurried about like ants, filling every available space. He knelt down beside his wife. From somewhere behind him, he heard two officers asking Olivia to remain still.
“Baby, baby!” William knew he shouldn’t move Nikki, but he immediately scooped her into his arms, her sticky, warm blood darkening her sweater to almost purple. “Somebody, help my wife! Help my wife!”
He stumbled out the front door with her in his arms, his mouth wide open, calling for help even as paramedics rushed toward him. Flashing bulbs blinded him, but all he could see was his unconscious wife lying on a stretcher as her blood seeped out of her body.
Danielle sat on the flat mattress in the cell she had called home for the past few days, her shoulders slumped, her eyes on a spot of grime situated exactly halfway between her feet. She felt as if she had aged ten years.
“Esperanza!”
Her head snapped up. “Yes?”
“Come on with me.” The female guard offered no smile, no explanation.
Danielle rose slowly to her feet and shuffled behind the woman. She did not care what would happen to her. She felt as if her life had already ended.
The woman led her to a tiny room and another woman handed Danielle the clothes she had worn the day she was arrested. She looked up, confused.
“You’re free to go. Your charges have been dropped.”
“Dropped?” As the realization sank in, she let out a whoop. “Oh, I can’t believe it!” The strength left her legs and they buckled under her. She would have fallen if the guard had not caught her.
She cast a quick glance around, wondering if this was a setup. Maybe they were out there, watching her, waiting for her to say or do something. Maybe they wanted to take her back to the hospital. Maybe Olivia was behind this. But for the moment, Danielle didn’t care. All she knew was that she was free.
“Oh, I’m so happy! I thought I would never again see the outside, my house, my car, my friends.”
“Well, it looks like you hav
e some good friends indeed,” said the woman who handed back Danielle’s street clothes and personal belongings that had been confiscated when she was booked into the correctional facility.
Without knowing all the details, Danielle felt her release had something to do with her best friend, not Olivia, after all. Nikki had come to her rescue, again. Nikki would be there for her. Nikki would help her through whatever lay ahead. They had endured a lot. Danielle knew Nikki was the sister she had wished Olivia would be. That thought gave her comfort.
“Yes, I do have some good friends.”
Danielle tightly clutched her belongings to her chest and walked out into the free world.
Chapter 124
William was the first person Nikki saw when she opened her eyes following surgery on her left arm. The bullet had made a clean exit, but because of the amount of blood she had lost, doctors wanted to keep her under observation for a while.
“Hi,” William said, leaning down to kiss her forehead.
“How are you?” she asked.
William laughed. “Seems that I should be asking you that.”
“Oh, I’m fine,” Nikki said, shrugging the shoulder that wasn’t bandaged. She recalled the events leading to her hospitalization. Danielle’s confessions had unraveled the tale of Olivia’s murderous plot. Nikki felt grateful to Danielle for sharing her painful past. She silently vowed to find professional help for her friend so Danielle could deal with her mental scars. But Nikki would sort all that out later. For now, she wanted to focus on her family. She looked around the hospital room.
“Where is Psalm?”
“She’s at my mom’s,” William said.
“At your mom’s?”
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