“No. I don’t get to judge you, but he does.”
Penfield pointed to Ben’s gravestone.
“Emma gets to judge you, too,” Penfield continued.
He turned from Slater and started walking toward his car.
“So that’s just it? What are you going to do?” Slater called after him.
Penfield stopped and turned back to Slater.
“You get to live with it all, just like I live with my mistakes. God forgive us both.”
Penfield turned away again and headed for his car. He climbed inside and took one last look at Slater. The sheriff had his back to him and was looking at the gravestone of his former partner. Penfield didn’t know if Slater truly felt regret. Maybe he did. Maybe he didn’t. It didn’t matter, though. It would all probably be over soon.
***
Slater left the cemetery but decided to make a detour before heading home. If Sally was willing to tell Penfield everything, then who was to say who she would talk to next? He knew there was no way she could prove any of it, but it didn’t matter. The scandal would destroy him. He’d worked too hard to let an old mistake bring everything down. Sally Tatum would regret threatening him. She’d known what she was doing. She told Penfield for the sole purpose of it getting back to him. The message was clear, only she had no idea who she was messing with.
Slater pulled into Sally’s driveway. He didn’t see any other vehicles there, and he hoped that meant Charles Ray wasn’t home. He walked up the porch stairs and rang the doorbell. Sally answered a few moments later. They just stared at each other. Finally, Slater broke the silence.
“May I come in, Sally?”
Sally pushed the screen door open and held it until Slater walked through. She turned from him without saying a word and led him back to the living room. The blinds on the back windows were open, and Slater could see the tree where everything had happened years ago.
“What do you want?” Sally said, and she sat down on the far end of the sofa.
Slater took a nearby chair.
“I’m sorry for what happened to your family. I wish I could have stopped it. I didn’t know Wilton was back.”
“There was nothing that could have stopped him.”
There was a long moment of silence.
Then Sally asked, “You’re here because of that detective, aren’t you?”
“He doesn’t have your best interest in mind.”
“And you do?”
“How is any of this going to help you? What’s done is done. We have to move on and put it behind us.”
“How do I do that? Everything has been taken from me.”
“Not everything. You have Charles Ray.”
“He knows it all now. He was here when I spoke to the detective.”
“You can’t talk about these things. I have a department to run. You’re hurting this community.”
He waited for Sally to respond, but she didn’t. She just looked at the floor between them.
“Please. We just need to let it all go. It’s going to crush us all if we don’t. Haven’t other people paid enough for our mistakes? Let’s not hurt anyone else,” Slater said.
“I told myself to be ready for this.”
“Ready for what?”
Sally reached into the drawer of the end table beside the sofa and removed a small revolver.
“What are you doing?” Slater asked.
She pointed the gun at him and pulled the trigger.
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Acknowledgements
Thanks to Lyna Tucker for editing this book. Thanks to Polgarus Studio for formatting this book.
Thanks to you readers for investing your time in reading my story. I hope you enjoyed it.
Alex Penfield and Henry Atwater will return.
About the Author
Robert W. Stephens is the author of the Alex Penfield novels, the Murder on Maui mystery series, and the standalone dark thrillers Nature of Evil and The Drayton Diaries.
You can find more about the author at www.robertwstephens.com.
Visit him on Facebook at www.facebook.com/robertwaynestephens
Also by Robert W. Stephens
Alex Penfield Novels
Ruckman Road (Penfield Book 1)
A jogger has spotted a body on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay at Fort Monroe, but the body has vanished by the time the police arrive. The jogger tells Detective Alex Penfield that she recognized the man as Joseph Talbot, a neighbor who lived inside the stone walls of the old Army fort. Penfield goes to Talbot’s house, only to discover he’s placed video cameras in every room. Penfield learns the cameras were placed to capture strange occurrences in the house that Penfield eventually sees, too. Are there logical reasons for these mysterious events and the disappearance of Joseph Talbot, or is Penfield losing his mind from the trauma of a recent shooting and other dark events in his past?
Dead Rise (Penfield Book 2)
Detective Alex Penfield has to solve a murder case before it happens. His own. Retirement never suited Penfield, but there’s nothing like a death omen to get you back in the saddle. A psychic colleague warns the detective that his own murder is coming. When a local death bears an eerie resemblance to the psychic’s vision, he can’t help but get involved. As the body count rises, the case only gets more unfathomable. Witnesses report ghastly encounters with a man sporting half a face. And the only living survivor from a deadly boat ride claims he knows who’s to blame. There’s only one problem: the suspect’s been dead for 20 years.
Standalone Dark Thrillers
Nature of Evil
Rome, 1948. Italy reels in the aftermath of World War II. Twenty women are brutally murdered, their throats slit and their faces removed with surgical precision. Then the murders stop as abruptly as they started, and the horrifying crimes and their victims are lost to history. Now over sixty years later, the killings have begun again. This time in America. It’s up to homicide detectives Marcus Carter and Angela Darden to stop the crimes, but how can they catch a serial killer who leaves no traces of evidence and no apparent motive other than the unquenchable thirst for murder?
The Drayton Diaries
He can heal people with the touch of his hand, so why does a mysterious group want Jon Drayton dead? A voice from the past sends Drayton on a desperate journey to the ruins of King’s Shadow, a 17th century plantation house in Virginia that was once the home of Henry King, the wealthiest and most powerful man in North America and who has now been lost to time. There, Drayton meets the beautiful archaeologist Laura Girard, who has discovered a 400-year-old manuscript in the ruins. For Drayton, this partial journal written by a slave may somehow hold the answers to his life’s mysteries.
The Murder on Maui Mysteries
Aloha Means Goodbye (Poe Book 1)
It’s Poe’s first visit to Maui after numerous invitations from his best friend, Doug Foxx. The vacation quickly becomes a disaster, though, as Foxx is arrested for murdering his girlfriend, a wealthy and world-renowned artist. Can Poe prove his friend’s innocence, and can he win the heart of the beautiful detective who arrested Foxx?
Wedding Day Dead (Poe Book 2)
Poe’s life couldn’t be better. He’s just relocated to Maui, and he’s dating the sexy detective, Alana Hu. Things take a turn for the worse, however, when Alana’s ex-lover returns to the island. Soon, Poe’s relationship with Alana falls apart, and he’s dragged into another murder investigation where he’s also one of the prime suspects.
Blood like the Setting Sun (Poe Book 3)
Poe now works as
an unlicensed private investigator. His first client is the eighty-year-old owner of the Chambers Hotel. She’s convinced someone is trying to kill her. Her main suspects? Her adult children. Poe thinks she’s a bit senile, but then the lady shows up dead. Poe is thrust deep into the Chamber’s family history, and it’s much darker than he could have possibly imagined.
Hot Sun Cold Killer (Poe Book 4)
Poe is hired by Zoe James to discover the truth about her mother’s death a decade ago. The police ruled it a suicide, but was it murder? As Poe conducts this cold case investigation, the bodies soon pile up until the killer has his sights trained on Poe. Can Poe uncover the truth before he ends up dead?
Choice to Kill (Poe Book 5)
Poe helps Alana with a case that is deeply personal to her: the murder of a childhood friend. At first, the case seems fairly straightforward. Soon, though, Poe realizes that things are not always as they seem. He’s up against his most ruthless adversary to date, and he’ll have to face his worst fear.
Dead Rise: An Alex Penfield Novel Page 22
