Authors: Emilie Richards
J
ulia was alone when she heard Bard’s BMW pull into the drive. Maisy was out for the afternoon. Maisy’s way, Julia supposed, of giving her the gift of silence.
She had hoped to hear from Christian about the opening hunt, but he hadn’t called. She knew she would have been welcome at Claymore Park for the breakfast, but there had been too many reasons not to go, not the least of which was the man knocking at the door.
She got to her feet and found her way, opening it to face him.
“Hello, Bard.”
“You knew it was me?”
“I know the sound of your car. Do you have anyone with you?”
“I’m alone. May I come in?”
She stood back and allowed him to enter.
“Maisy and Jake home?” He sounded as if he hoped they weren’t.
“Maisy’s gone shopping. Jake took Callie and Tiffany to Lilith’s cabin in the mountains for the day.” She made her way toward the living room, managing it with only one shoulder bump. He didn’t try to help her, for which she was grateful. “I could get you tea, or something stronger, if you’d like. But you’ve probably just eaten.”
“As a matter of fact, no, but I don’t want anything.”
“Oh? You didn’t stay for the breakfast?” She felt for the big armchair in the corner and sat.
“There was no breakfast.”
She knew she was frowning. “I’m sorry? Did I hear you right? Peter had caterers setting up tents and—”
“Julia, let me talk, okay?”
“What’s going on, Bard?”
“I…This isn’t easy. I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this—”
“Oh God.” She envisioned Christian hurt. She brought her hands to her face, forcing herself to breathe. “What—”
“Peter’s dead.”
She was stunned—and fervently glad at the same time that it wasn’t Christian.
“There was a chase up Little Sergeant Hill. The pack split. I was in charge of the hilltoppers, but they couldn’t make it that far. Most of the first flight didn’t even make it. The woods are thick, and it’s as steep as a tree. We should have stayed away from the area entirely and gone after another fox. But that was Christian’s call, wasn’t it? A goddamned mistake.”
“What happened?”
“The pack split, like I said. Christian took off after a couple of the younger hounds. I guess he can’t be faulted for that. They were rioting, and he knew he had to bring them back. Unfortunately they were charging uphill, through some of the worst terrain. Peter rode after Christian.”
Julia knew how unusual that was. The huntsman was in charge of his hounds and the master his riders. “What happened? Did he fall?”
“No, he took a bullet to the head.”
She couldn’t think of anything to say.
“A couple of riders went after the two of them when they didn’t return. They heard the shot before they reached the clearing. Peter was on the ground, and Christian was standing over him.” He paused. “The gun was in Peter’s hand, Julia.”
Her mind was scrambling wildly for an explanation. “Whose gun?”
“Peter’s. Christian wasn’t carrying one.”
“How can this be?” She couldn’t imagine the scene Bard had described. Peter, dead, a gun in his hand. Christian standing over him, watching Peter’s blood pool on the rocky ground.
Almost déjà vu.
“They’ve taken Christian to the sheriff’s office,” Bard said.
She got to her feet in a panic. “They’ve arrested him?”
“I wouldn’t call it an arrest. They asked Christian to accompany them for questioning. Very politely, too, from what I was told. Christian called them on his radio. It took the deputies a long time to get up there. You can imagine it, can’t you? They barely made it up the old logging road, then they had to walk the last five or six hundred yards. They led him away. Someone took his horse, a couple of us gathered the hounds. One deputy stayed behind.”
“Peter was like a father to Christian. He couldn’t have killed him.”
“You don’t have to tell me.”
Julia lowered herself to her chair. “You don’t think he killed Peter?”
“Me, of all people, huh? No, Peter killed himself. Peter was the reason Christian went to jail all those years ago. Robby killed Fidelity, and Peter covered it up at the same time he was trying to have Christian freed.” He gave a harsh laugh. “Talk about leading a double life.”
She felt physically ill, dizzy and nauseated, as if her body was trying to reject this latest tragedy. “How do you know this? Is that what Christian said?”
Bard didn’t answer right away. When he did, there was an edge to his voice she had heard a thousand times before. “And if he’d said it, it would have been law, wouldn’t it? He could say anything and you’d believe him.”
“Yes, I would.”
“But not me.”
“You’re right again.”
She heard him get up and begin to pace, restless, as always, and anxious to get on to something else. “The morning of the day Fidelity died, she came to see me. She’d been having an affair with Robby—”
“Affair?”
“Yes, Julia, they’d been sleeping together all summer. And neither of them told you, did they?”
“I knew she was flirting. I…”
“She confided in me. She was short on friends she
could
tell, I guess.”
And Bard had been safe to talk to. Not one of Fidelity’s closest circle, who would criticize her behavior, not one of the drug crowd she was trying to avoid. Someone comfortably at the edge of her world, the way Bard had been when Julia herself needed him.
Her voice wasn’t much louder than a whisper. “She was trying to build his confidence. That’s what she told me when I cautioned her to leave him alone. I didn’t think Robby would understand the way she was flirting with him. I didn’t know how far it had gone.”
“You were right. He didn’t understand. All those years of watching Fidelity sleep around, and he still didn’t get it. So when she called it quits, he fell apart.”
“It’s my fault. I asked her to leave him alone. I—”
“Robby Claymore had the self-control and emotional resources of a gnat. He loved her. She didn’t love him. He killed her. Period.”
Once upon a time she had been grateful to this man for telling her what to think. Now she felt another prick of gratitude. This time Bard’s narrow view of the world was right. No one had been at fault except the tortured young man she had called her friend.
“This is such a mess,” he said.
“You said Fidelity came to see you. What did she say?” She paused as the truth formed into something darker. “And why didn’t you ever tell anyone?”
He sighed. Not the sigh of impatience she had so often heard, but something deeper and more revealing. “She said she broke up with Robby on their ride that morning and he acted like a wild man. She said he was so unreasonable, he frightened her. She rode her horse back to the stable right away and took off to find me.”
“And what did you tell her?”
He cleared his throat. He wasn’t a man who suffered the pangs of guilt often, but she heard guilt now. “I told her that any man she broke up with would act like a wild man. I flattered her into feeling better. And I told her he’d get over it.”
“And how did you feel when you found out she was dead?”
“How do you think I felt?”
“Not bad enough to report the conversation. You kept silent, didn’t you? You let Christian go to prison when you knew it was Robby who’d killed her.”
“I didn’t know. Not for sure. There was no proof he’d done it. Christian was on the scene. It was Christian’s knife in Christian’s hand.”
“You knew who killed her!”
“I suspected, okay? But I didn’t have one shred of evidence. Just a private conversation with Fidelity about a man with a childish crush on her. Robby had an alibi. Peter said they were together all afternoon. No one ever reported seeing Robby near South Land at the time she was killed. And he was Christian’s best friend. I thought if Robby
had
killed her, he would come forward to save Christian from going to prison.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“And how would it have looked if I tried to finger Robby and I turned out to be wrong? The Claymores are my neighbors. Peter was Master of Foxhounds. I would have been drummed out of local society as fast as you can say Mosby Hunt.”
“You had a duty. Not to the club, but to decency. You kept silent because you wanted Christian in jail.”
“I really don’t know anymore. I didn’t think it would go as far as it did. I thought if Robby killed her, the truth would come out. Meantime, I was making inroads with you. When Christian was convicted, I thought he’d get out on appeal….”
“And you kept silent!”
“Yes, damn it. I kept silent.”
“I want a divorce, Bard.”
“I had that part figured out.”
“I want a quick one. Go somewhere and do it. Nevada. The Caribbean. Just make sure it’s legal in Virginia.”
“We have a lot to work out first. Property, for instance.”
“Keep your damned property. I don’t want a thing that has your name attached to it. You can make a cash settlement, if you want, so you won’t look bad to all those people you have to impress, but I don’t need your money, either. Just get me out of this marriage. Immediately.”
“We have a child to consider.”
“Do we? Since when has Callie’s welfare mattered to you?”
“You’re being unfair.”
She tried to tamp down her fury, and managed to a little. “So what do you want? The occasional weekend so you’ll look like a real father?”
“I’m not going to pretend I love Callie the way you do. But I’m the only father she’s known. You can’t believe it would be good to have me simply walk out of her life, can you?”
She closed her eyes. “Can you tell me the truth for once? Why do you care?”
“Because on paper she’s my daughter, and right now she doesn’t know any different. I haven’t been a great father. I don’t have it in me. But I’d miss her, and she’d miss me. That’s the important part, isn’t it? She wants to make me proud. Maybe I can find a way to let her know that she has. At least until she doesn’t need me anymore.”
She wanted to rage at him, and she wanted to cry. Everything he’d said was true.
“Can we work it out?” he asked.
“For Callie’s sake.” She hesitated. “And with Christian’s permission.”
“Christian…”
“The man your silence condemned to prison.”
“I doubt it.”
She knew Bard had taken as much responsibility as he was capable of. “There’s one more thing you can do for me.”
“If I can.”
“I want you to take me to the sheriff’s office. I’m going to tell them what you told me. I will not let Christian stay in jail for one more night.”
“Save your breath. They aren’t going to listen to you. Besides, it’s obvious Peter’s death was a suicide. Christian’s not going to be charged—”
“Are you going to take me, or am I going to walk? Because I will, if I have to. I’ll walk down that driveway and find my way to the main road, until somebody takes pity on me or runs me over.”
“I’ll take you.”
“I’ll get my coat.”
“Julia?”
“What?”
“I wish things had been different.”
She knew it was as close to an apology as he could come. “So do I. In a million different ways.”
“I did love you.”
“Bard, if that was love, I never want any part of it again. I hope you don’t, either.”
Christian remembered the first time he had sat in this particular nine-by-twelve room at the sheriff’s office. He had been shuddering violently, plagued by the vision of Fidelity’s torn and bleeding body. He had wanted nothing more than to go back in time, to wake up again that morning and personally reshuffle the hand fate had dealt her. He had been too innocent, too convinced the world worked the way it was supposed to, to realize what danger he was in himself.
He realized it now.
The door opened, and the two deputies who had been questioning him arrived and pulled up chairs at the table again. They had come and gone, come and gone, for hours, and unfortunately today was Pinky’s day off so there had been no respite. It was night by now, and he hadn’t eaten anything except a vending machine candy bar since just after dawn. Someone from the club had left clothes for him, and he’d been allowed to change into jeans, a shirt and a sweater. He was grateful but not fooled. It was bad for Mosby’s reputation to have their fully attired huntsman sitting in an interrogation room.
“I’m ready to sign a statement,” Christian said. “I’ve told you what happened.”
“Your lawyer’s on the way. We’re under instructions not to question you or let you say another thing.”
“Mel Powers?”
“He’s the one you called, isn’t he?”
No one had been at the office or Mel’s home. He had left a message, but he hadn’t expected to reach Mel before tomorrow. “How long is that going to take?”