Last Girl Standing

by Lisa Jackson

  She thought that over. Delta asking her for help? Things must be pretty desperate.

  Her cell phone rang in her hand. She gazed at the screen and felt a moment of annoyance when she saw Zora’s name. She shouldn’t have been so nice to her earlier. She hadn’t meant to give Zora carte blanche to call her any old time.

  “Hi, Zora,” Amanda answered, her voice purposely flinty.

  “Did you see the news? Oh, my God. Ellie was on TV giving an interview to Tanner’s dad, the doctor, and he was vicious. Just vicious about Delta! Says she killed Tanner! Made all kinds of accusations. It was really hard to watch. Even Ellie looked kind of upset.”

  “Ellie thinks Delta’s guilty.”

  “I know, but Dr. Stahd was so mean.” She paused. “Do you think she’s guilty?”

  Amanda watched the passing landscape as she headed west out of Portland into the lowering sun. “Jury’s out.”

  “Remember . . . remember what I told you she said at Carmen’s memorial service?”

  Amanda hated guessing games. “Refresh my memory.”

  “She said . . . well, she said . . . you really don’t remember?”

  “Zora.” Amanda was losing patience.

  “Delta said that she wished you and Tanner would just die,” she said in a rush.

  Oh, right. Amanda remembered hearing that from someone, but she’d forgotten it was Zora. She’d half-believed Delta might have been the one to say it to her face. That’s how heated and wild their emotions had all been following Carmen’s death.

  “Maybe she meant it . . . ?” Zora said on a squeak of disbelief.

  “I’m not worried about Delta.”

  “You’re not? You don’t . . . you don’t think she did it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “What’ll happen to her little boy if she did? He’s so adorable. I’d die for a child like that.”

  Amanda was mildly surprised. “You know Delta’s son?”

  “I’ve seen pictures. I just . . . I’m worried, and I’d like to help. Maybe I should call Delta and talk to her. I could be a babysitter. I’m sure she needs help.”

  Something desperate there, Amanda thought, but then Zora was always kind of that way. “Then call her,” she said, adding, “You said were watching Channel Seven?”

  “Yeah, Ellie’s station. You missed it? It’ll probably be on again tonight at eleven, right?”

  “Probably.”

  Amanda meant to hang up, but Zora said, “I kinda want to talk about something.”

  “Zora, I am busy.”

  “It won’t take long. I was talking to Brian about everything, you know? Even about the senior barbeque. We just started talking and . . . you know what he said?”

  Amanda crushed her teeth together, trying to keep from being unspeakably rude and just hanging up.

  “He wants a divorce! I think he’s serious! I don’t even think he ever wanted a baby! His feelings all just came pouring out. I wasn’t going to tell anybody, but I just need to talk. I’m devastated.”

  “Zora . . .” Amanda really didn’t want to go there with her. “I gotta go.”

  “What am I supposed to do now, huh? I think there’s someone else, too; he’s just not saying.”

  “This sounds like something you need to work out with him.”

  “God, Amanda. You were nice to me today. Now you’re not.”

  “I’m just turning into my house, and I’ve still got work to do tonight.”

  “Okay, sure.”

  “And I want to catch the late news, so I’m going to work until it’s on.” Then, because she could tell she’d really hurt Zora’s feelings, she added, “If it makes any difference, I don’t think Brian was ever in love with Anne Reade. He married you.”

  “I don’t think it’s Anne. I think it’s Clarice Billings.”

  “Oh, come on.” Amanda half-laughed.

  “I’m serious. Miss Billings is still really cute, at least she was at the reunion.”

  “Clarice Billings is only interested in her career. Take it from one who knows. Don’t you remember the way she played up to Principal Kiefer? How she leaned on him after he and Bailey’s mom broke up after Carmen’s death? I saw them on a date once that summer, and it did not look like it was going well on her part. I think he bored her to tears. Then she got that better job, probably at his recommendation, and she was outta West Knoll like a shot. Brian’s lucky to have you. You’re younger, sweeter, and better-looking.”

  “You really think so?” Zora asked in a small voice.

  “Yes.”

  “Or maybe it’s someone else in our class. You think that could be it? At the reunion he kept looking at Delta . . .”

  Amanda pulled around to the back of her house. The two-bay detached garage, which was far enough away from the house to be more of an outbuilding, was filled to the gills with her parents’ stuff that she’d moved out of the house. She preferred to park on the tarmac apron in the back.

  “But I heard him on the phone . . . I’m pretty sure he was talking to a woman.”

  “Then ask your husband. There’re a million reasons people say they want a divorce. Make him give you one. And while you’re at it, tell him to grow the fuck up.”

  She clicked off. Swear to God, dealing with needy people is the worst.

  She thought about how the most gung ho of the do-gooders, Rhonda and Trent, had wanted to help her after Thom’s accident, how she’d agreed during the worst of the crisis, and how somehow they’d both tried to worm their way into a close friendship with her, which she’d neither wanted nor needed. She’d had to cut them out. Pathetically, they’d still considered her the head of the Five Firsts, and that had apparently meant something.

  She’d lied to Zora about taking work home. She’d specifically finished up everything that was pressing while she was at the office. She thought now about going for a run on the cliff path above the river, something she usually did at lunchtime, but it was too late and too dark. Switching on the TV, she set up the DVR to record the late-evening news, then she sat down and watched mindless television until it came on. So Ellie had finally gotten some prime-time air. The powers that be at her station had never put her on hard news before. She’d been trying to sleep her way to the top, in Amanda’s biased estimation, and, hey, whatever works for you, Amanda always felt. She’d done much the same thing, though she’d believed she’d loved the asshole at one time. Since then, she’d learned there was no such thing as love, at least for her. She didn’t feel it, and she had the sneaking suspicion that so-called love was really just desire and lust, and that was basically a chemical reaction in the brain anyway.

  When the news finally came on, Ellie’s segment with Dr. Lester Stahd, who continued with his rantings and accusations, was the lead story. Zora had said Stahd was vicious, which was the right word. Stahd just looked like a madman, wildly grieving for his son. His wife had gotten dolled up for the camera, but she was in the background.

  Amanda watched the segment, reversed the DVR, and watched it again. She ended up watching it five times, taking the measure of the elder Dr. Stahd. No wonder Tanner had been so screwed up. His father was as much of a bullying loser as her own mother. It’s a wonder we make it to adulthood as sane as we are. Parents are destroyers.

  Except Delta’s. They’d been normal and nice. Lovely people, really. Amanda had always been jealous of them.

  It was almost midnight when she decided to text Delta: I’m in. Let’s meet tomorrow around five at my house.

  She didn’t really want Delta seen at the office yet, where the partners and her ex and everyone were around, until she knew exactly what she planned to do for her ex-BFF.

  Message sent, Amanda climbed the spiral stairway to the bedroom she’d used ever since she was a kid. For a few minutes, she hung halfway out the window, breathing in the smells of freshly mown hay and the danker scents from the river beyond. In her mind, she could see the place where Carmen had refused to come out
of the water and accept Clarice Billings’s help. She had it mentally marked, the same spot where Bailey had slipped in, running the rapids by herself without a raft of any kind.

  Foolish children with death wishes. That’s what they’d all been.

  Back inside, she stripped off her clothes, washed her face, and climbed naked beneath her sheets. The cell on her nightstand’s screen lit up, and she heard the ding of an incoming text. Delta.

  Delta: OK.

  “Okay,” Amanda whispered, staring toward her ceiling in the inky darkness, but her inner vision was on Delta Smith-Stahd.

  * * *

  Delta took Owen to school the next morning and returned to her own house with trepidation. There were still no reporters camped out on her door today, which was a surprise and a relief, but since Ellie had given that in-depth report on Tanner, capping it with his father screaming for her head, maybe the reporters felt her story was played out and had moved on to a new one, or at least a new angle. Either way, the lack of press was likely only a momentary reprieve.

  She took a long shower and came out of it feeling marginally better. Tanner was gone. He wasn’t coming back. Life felt almost spookily normal, and she had to keep reminding herself that someone had killed him.

  Wiping away the fog on the bathroom mirror, she gave herself a long look. Her dark hair lay lank and wet against her neck. Tiny lines had formed at the edges of her eyes and along her mouth, seemingly overnight. Worry had also furrowed creases in her forehead.

  She checked her phone and saw there was a message from Candy: When will the clinic reopen?

  It was with a dull shock that she realized she was the owner of the clinic now lock, stock, and barrel. It had been Tanner’s baby, but unless Tanner had altered his will in the last couple of weeks, it now belonged to her, and she needed to do something about it. This’ll drive Lester Stahd even further out of his mind.

  She wrote back to Candy: I will check with the police.

  After that, she made herself some toast and tea. The raspberries she’d purchased days earlier were starting to shrivel. She was going to have to get back to some semblance of a routine for Owen and her. Just the two of them now, no longer three.

  She felt a rush of emotion.

  Who did this to you, Tanner? Did you know them? Was it personal, or for drugs, maybe, thinking they could score at the clinic?

  All those stab wounds . . . with their knife . . .

  She glanced at the new block of knives sitting on the counter. Grabbing up the wooden holder, she trudged upstairs, pulled down the attic ladder, climbed up, and exchanged it with her original set with its missing knife. She had no explanation for why she “couldn’t remember” that she hadn’t recognized their own knife. Owen would know she’d tried to replace them, but maybe she could keep him away from the police interrogators.

  God, it was all so stupid!

  Maybe she should confess to McCrae? Or maybe to Amanda when she saw her later.

  What if she doesn’t take your case?

  She put herself together and then dressed in nice jeans and a white blouse. Peering through the living room shades, she groaned at the sight of a gathering news crew. Damn. They were back sooner than she’d thought. Not Ellie, at least.

  She thought back to her interview at the police station and what she’d told Quin and McCrae. The arguments and tiffs she and Tanner had gotten into. The one with his father had been over the business, and the fender bender . . . It was amazing how fast that fight had escalated between Tanner and the guy in the other car. She couldn’t remember his name, but he, like Tanner, had taken his dented vehicle to Woody’s Auto Body. Delta wasn’t there when Tanner took it in, but he’d told her later that Woody had slapped him on the back and told him to keep clear if the other guy was there. “He’s mad as hell. Let me call you,” Woody had told him. “Grinning like the idiot he is,” Tanner had related. “Like the accident was my fault. That jackass ran into me!” He hadn’t found his old friend’s jocularity as fun as it used to be, apparently.

  But could a minor traffic accident end in murder? She knew it happened sometimes, but it had been half a year ago. Could this guy really carry a grudge that long?

  You should talk to Woody.

  Her cell buzzed, breaking into her thoughts. She pulled the phone out of her purse and regarded it carefully. Zora. Huh.

  “Hi, Zora,” Delta answered, still looking out at the van across the street.

  “Oh, Delta,” she said in a rush. “I’m so, so sorry about Tanner. I saw it on the news. Do you need anything? Anything at all?”

  “No, but thanks, really. I’m just . . . I don’t know . . . numb.”

  “Do you need food? I could bring over something. Or . . . babysitting? I know your boy is about six.”

  “Owen’s at pre-K. Thanks. I think I’m okay.”

  “Would you just like some company? I’ve had a kind of rough time myself and could use a friend.”

  “Umm . . .” Delta drew a blank. She wasn’t going to meet Amanda till 5:00. No meeting at the law firm, which was fine with Delta. “There’s a news crew here, so I’m planning to leave and just get away for a while.”

  “Come to my house,” Zora invited.

  “Thanks, but I think I’m going to go hit a double feature. I just want time to pass till tonight.”

  “I’ll go with you, if you want me to. I’d love to.”

  Zora had never been so eager to be Delta’s friend since the end of high school and the Five Firsts. “Sure,” she said, and they agreed to meet at the mall cinemas.

  Inside her Audi, Delta pressed the button to lift the garage door and backed out a little more quickly than she’d intended. Luckily, this crew was smart enough not to block the drive this time. Still, the young, balding male reporter from Channel Four came right up to her window as she backed into the street.

  “Your book Blood Dreams starts with a woman stabbing her husband to death,” he called through the closed window. “That’s either a macabre coincidence or a blueprint for murder. Care to comment?”

  “Oh, no,” Delta whispered beneath her breath. They’d found her e-book.

  She put the car in DRIVE and started forward, the man trotting alongside her window.

  “Any other scenes we should expect to see come to life?”

  Asshole. She pressed her toe to the accelerator, and the Audi jumped forward as if in a race.

  Chapter 20

  Quin was already at work when McCrae came through the back door of the station at 6:00 a.m. and headed for the break room, his mind full of thoughts about Delta Stahd. Before he could get settled, Quin found him and beckoned him back to his office. Corinne walked slowly by the door and stopped, looking in on them.

  “You see the news?” Quin asked McCrae.

  “Yep,” he clipped out. Ellie O’Brien’s report on Tanner’s life had been fine, but the follow-up with Lester Stahd had devolved into accusations, condemnations, and recriminations against Delta that held only enmity and rage, no facts.

  He looked back at Corinne, who said, “Social media’s exploded, too, about half for and half against her.”

  “You’re still in her camp?” Quin asked him.

  “I’m not going to make any judgments about her on hearsay and emotion. I’m going to go through the clinic records. Talk some more to the employees. See if there are any grudges. Any previous break-ins, that kind of thing. Find some possible motives.”

  “Mr. Hurston is coming in to talk to you,” Corinne said.

  “Why?” McCrae asked.

  She shrugged lightly and left.

  McCrae looked at Quin, who said, “Might be a good time to go to Eugene.”

  “In the heat of the Stahd homicide? No. And why’s Hurston coming today?”

  “You sure you didn’t say something to Corinne about Carville?”

  “Positive.”

  Quin shook his head. “Hell hath no fury . . .”

  “I don’t have time for thi
s,” he muttered.

  “Go before Hurston shuts you down and takes over the Stahd case.”

  “The Stahd case is ours.” McCrae was positive. “I’ll go when things cool down a bit.”

  “Then I’ll go,” Quin said determinedly. “Before Hurston gets in the way.”

  McCrae knew the mettle of Timothy Hurston better than anyone. He liked convenience, tidiness, cases that were neatly tied up and made him look good. The man was running for the state senate, a true politician. He’d decided Bailey’s and Penske’s deaths were a murder/suicide and, by sheer force of will, had slashed down any argument McCrae and others in the West Knoll PD had to offer. Hurston was much loved by the upper brass, so he’d gotten his way. Case closed. A feather in his cap. He’d obviously also since convinced Corinne that he was correct in his assessment of the crime, as she was apparently helping him.

  And maybe it was a little bit about her twisting the knife on McCrae, as she knew how he felt about the man’s findings.

  “I’ll go,” McCrae said. “And I’ve got a meeting with Coach Sutton later tonight.”

  “Good. I’ll keep checking with the lab, see if they’ve pulled any other DNA from the crime scene, and I’ll talk to the employees again.”

  “I’d like to be in on any other interviews,” said McCrae.

  Quin nodded. “Let’s connect later. Trade stories. I’ll make sure your trip to”—he looked to the open doorway and lowered his voice, changing course—“Hurston won’t know where you are.”

  “Good.” If Hurston should so much as catch a whiff of someone challenging one of his settled cases, he’d move heaven and earth to keep them from overturning it.

  Quin added, “There was a bar fight with the Crassleys last night. I’ve put Corolla on it.”

  McCrae snorted. There was always a bar fight with the Crassleys.

  He re-gathered up his belongings and headed out, calling Delta on the way. When she didn’t pick up, he left her a voice message, telling her he would be busy for most of the day, but she could call him and leave messages and texts, and he would get back to her. He also added that, if she needed anything immediately, she should call Quin. Maybe Quin wasn’t Delta’s biggest fan, but he was a fair man, and the way Stahd Senior had eviscerated her on television wouldn’t sit well with Quin’s innate chivalry.