A Taste of Death (Maggie Olenski Series) (25 page)

She let her eyes adjust to the darkness for a moment, then, using the faint moonlight coming through the glass doors as well as her memory of cabin layout, found her way back to the circular stairway. A groan welled up from deep inside as she grasped the railing. She felt as though she were at the foot of Mount Everest. But she had to do it. Step by step, inch by inch, Maggie pulled herself up the wrought-iron staircase, abdominal pains now stabbing along with the pain reeling through her head. Her body temperature alternated between feverish and chilled, never staying at one point long enough for her to decide to throw off her jacket or zip it up. When she finally neared the top, she sat, resting her head and shoulders on the last step, gathering her strength.

The urge to sleep wrapped around her like a warm blanket, but Maggie fought it, pulling herself up by the final step. She staggered into her room, aiming for the window that faced Hadley Road and the woods beyond.

She unlocked the sash and, grunting with effort, pulled it upwards. Freezing air rushed at her, shocking her flagging senses to the alertness she needed. She sank to the floor at one side of the open window, kneeling, and took a deep breath, calling out with all the strength she could muster.

"Dan Morgan! I know you're out there!"

S
ilence greeted Maggie. The absolute silence of a winter night. Maggie waited, her eyes straining to see something, anything, through the dark from the edge of the window. She turned to see the battery-powered travel clock beside the bed, the only thin
g
in the cabin that was lit: 5:42.

Maggie thought back to when she had eaten the pasta dish. Dan must have chosen that as the most likely thing for her to eat. Or maybe he dosed everything, she didn't know. But she had worked at her laptop for several hours, not hungry after sharing Regina's casserole with Elizabeth. She remembered hoping the phone would ring with a call from Dyna. Had the line been cut by then, she wondered, since no call had come?

Keeping busy, Maggie hadn't thought of food until at least nine or ten o'clock, much later than normal for her. Had Dan expected her to be ill much sooner? How long had he been waiting out there in the cold woods, ready to force her back into the cabin?

Maggie knew now he had somehow got into the cabin yesterday, perhaps while she was at John's. Dan had left his tracks in the kitchen - the melted snow she had stepped in later and shrugged off. A major error. Talking to Annette, however, had been her first error. Unable to keep anything to herself, Annette must have passed on their conversation to Vickie, who was on her way to t
he restaurant to deliver the parsley
, and Vickie probably told Dan what she had just heard.

Why hadn't Maggie put the pieces together sooner? They had all been there, she realized now. Dyna had told her about Jack's 'womanizing" among his own employees. His hotel was named the Turtle-wick after its co-owners. Dan Morgan's restaurant in Atlantic City, Vickie told her, was the Terrapin.

Maggie would have kicked herself if she had the strength. Every Marylander knew the University of Maryland's mascot was the terrapin. A turtle. The Turtle-wick hotel would of course have a restaurant called the Terrapin. A
nd Dan's wife helped him run it
and probably was one of Jack Warwick's conquests.

Dan waited a long time to get his revenge on Jack. Maggie thought he might not even have planned it until Jack suddenly showed up in Cedar Hill. By then Brenda Morgan was dead. By Vickie's account, she had been a non-drinker, but she was killed in a high blood alcohol-related car accident. Was it an accident, or had Dan arranged it by somehow getting her drunk and putting her behind the wheel?

Maggie knew she might never know, but had Alexander known? Had he seen something on that night after his own car plowed into a snow bank and he staggered drunkenly the rest of the way home? Had he actually seen something, or had Dan only feared he had seen, and remembered, something, and therefore had to be eliminated?

Unable to forgive his wife, who, coming with Dan to Cedar Hill obviously thought she had been forgiven, Dan must have kept his anger simmering until he found the perfect time to kill her - an icy night when the bad roads, plus her intoxication, would be blamed. He might even have gotten away with it until Jack Warwick appeared, stirring up Dan's fury once more. Jack likely had no idea who Dan was, since Dan's work kept him out of sight in the kitchen most of the time. But Dan knew who Jack was, and
he
got his revenge.

Was making a play for Leslie part of Dan's revenge? Would that revenge have been all the sweeter if he could end up with Jack's wife and possibly his money? If so, Maggie had
unknowingly
thrown a wr
ench into that plan
. Was that another reason Dan wanted her dead?

Maggie took another deep breath and leaned to the edge of the window. "Dan, it won't work. I can wait."

Silence.

"I know you're out there, Dan. I can outlast you. Your plan isn't working."

More silence. Maggie leaned against the wall next to the window and grabbed short, quick breaths. She hoped she was managing to sound much stronger than she felt.

"You're nothing but a coward, Dan Morgan" she called out. "You killed Jack and tried to pin it on Elizabeth. A coward! And stupid for thinking you can get away with it. Leslie is right to run from you." Maggie leaned back again, breathing heavily. She waited.

After what seemed like hours, he finally answered
her
. "I could have had her. Except for you! She would have been mine. I could have cared for her."

Maggie called back quickly. "You would have cared for the money that came with her. Jack's money."

"No! I don't need his money. But he ruined my life.
I deserved his life in return –
everything that was his."

"His money, you mean. That's what it's all about. It's all greed with you, Dan. You're as bad as Jack was. You both wanted to grab everything you could. From everyone else."

"No!"

"You think you're better than him, that you had some right to destroy him. But you're two of a kind. Except you aren't as smart. You're just plain dumb. You've murdered twice, three times, and you're trying to kill me. But it won't happen and you won't get away with it. You'll end up in prison, on death row. With nothing."

A bullet flew through the open window, hitting the far wall. Maggie fell back, her heart pounding. But she couldn't stop now. She leaned back to the edge of the window.

"Killing your wife was part of the plan, wasn't it, Dan? She was simply an inconvenience, just in your way."

"She deserved to die!" Dan's voice had risen in pitch. "
She lied," he cried. "
She betrayed me."

"Of course she lied. Of course she betrayed you. Who wouldn't?"

"She pretended. Always pretending. Claiming innocence! I couldn't stand it! I had to kill her!"

"And Alexander knew, didn't he."

"He was always in the way."

"He saw you, didn't he? He knew you killed Brenda."

"She deserved to die!"

"Because she betrayed you? But why not? How could she ever have loved you? You're a fool, Dan. A coward and a fool! Who could love a fool?"

Silence again. Maggie listene
d, hardly breathing, every fiber
of her body listening. Then she heard it. Footsteps running through the snow. Toward the cabin. He was coming. And fast.

Maggie had to move quickly now, fight the weakness and her reeling head. She lurched painfully in the dark against the door frame, not daring to pause, moving frantically along the hallway wall to the wrought-iron stairway. She reached the first step when she heard it.

Thump!

He was at the side door, kicking at it.

Maggie's heart stopped, then beat again, double time. She dropped to the top step, sliding down the staircase as rapidly as she dared, head bouncing against the curving side railing, hands reaching blindly, backside thumping from step to step nearly as rapidly as Dan Morgan's foot kicked at the door. She had just reached the bottom of the staircase when a hea
rt-stopping shot rang out. He’
d shot the lock off!

Maggie scrambled on all fours to the far end of the sofa. Crouching, she grabbed for the afghan draped on the top and flicked it over herself, hoping desperately that in the darkness she would blend into the shape of the sofa, invisible. It was all she could think to do in this small, open layout. It was all she could do, and she prayed it was enough.

Dan burst through the door, then stopped at the edge of the kitchen, listening, possibly scanning the area. Maggie held her breath, pressing against the sofa as tightly as possible, all her senses alert as she fought to ignore the pain still attacking her within. She felt a rush of icy air come down from the open window in her room and heard a crash. Had the wind blown something over? Or was it Ali? Maggie had forgotten all about him. Had he knocked against something in his own scramble for safety? She had barely formed the t
hought when she realized Dan
heard it too.

H
is steps pound
ed
up the stairway and into her bedroom. Maggie immediately flung off the afghan. She might have only seconds to act. Could she do it?

Her own breath coming in spasms, Maggie heard Dan's grunts and bellows of fury above her as he failed to find her. She searched frantically through the shadows of the living room. Where was it? Where was it!

She heard a door slam against the wall above, then another crash and a piercing yowl. Ali.

Run, Ali! Run!

Maggie's fingers suddenly closed over what she wanted, and a rush of excitement coursed through her. She heard Dan's pounding steps as he charged from the bathroom to Dyna's room, another closet, and finally back into the upstairs hall. She scrambled with shaking limbs to do what she had to do before he came down.

Maggie saw his dark shape loom at the top of the stairs as she stood in the shadows below, her hands reaching up to the side railing. Dan, holding his rifle in both hands, came running down the stairs, ready, she was sure, to find her there and kill her. But his legs encountered something unexpected. The fireplace poker Maggie had jammed between the wrought-iron decorative swirlings of each side railing caught him just above the ankles. He fell, full force, head slamming against the floor, rifle flying out of his hands.

Maggie leaped forward, grabbed the rifle and jumped back. Shaking now from fear as well as from whatever was eating away at her insides, she cocked the rifle and struggled to hold it steady as she aimed it at Dan. Light in the room had increased from faint moonlight to the dark grey of pre-dawn. She could see Dan's shape on the floor breathing,
stunned, and motionless. For a moment
. Then he began to stir.

"Stay right there, Dan," she ordered, her voice sounding strangled to her ears.

Dan groaned, his hands going to his head. His head lifted, and she saw it turn toward her, looking at her. Was he sizing up the situation? Calculating his chances? He pushed himself, grunting, to a sitting position.

"I have your gun, Dan. Believe me, I'll use it if you make me." But could she? Her hands were shaking, despite all her efforts to control them. Dan must see that. She saw him shift slightly, and she tensed. Would she be able to shoot if she had to? Would her fingers work? Most of all, could she take a life? She had to, to save her own. But could she?

Dan sud
denly sprang up with an animal-like
roar, lunging at her.

A shot rang out.

Maggie watched in
horror, as he sank to the floor. He groaned, spasmed, then lay lifelessly, unmoving. She looked at the rifle in her hands, then up to the broken side door which Dan had rushed through in what seemed only seconds ago. Regina White stood there, framed in the gray light behind her, her gun pointed downward as she watched Dan Morgan's body for any signs of life. After a moment, satisfied, she returned Maggie's stunned gaze and spoke, softly, with a hint of sadness.

"Some people the world will be a whole lot better without."

M
aggie awoke with a groan, gradually realizing she was in a hospital bed. She vaguely remembered figures in scrub suits working on her, pumping her stomach. Looking to her left she saw the IV attached to her arm, dripping in precious fluid. She felt wrung out, but the awful pain, nausea and dizziness was gone.

Had it all been a dream? A nightmare? She moved slightly on the bed and was instantly aware of acute soreness a
t scattered points of her body –
shoulders, legs, but mainly backside. She pictured ugly bruises in those areas and knew exactly how they had come - not from any dream but from bouncing off walls and sliding for her life down that iron staircase.

Maggie tried to pull herself upward, but stopped when her rubbery arms buckled. She knew there must be an electri
c control for the bed somewhere
but decided the effort of looking for it outweighed the benefits for the moment. She tried to think back to how she had got here, but her memory seemed to have large holes in it.