“You sound very offhand about that, Jean.”
“You get used to things by the time you’re my age, Marissa. I shouldn’t have to tell you that, but I’ve never thought you were quite as smart as you should be. Maybe you’ll understand if you show me the courtesy of letting me continue.”
“Please, go ahead,” Marissa said flatly.
“When your mama got in the family way again, she was so happy. So was your…Bernard. Your mama asked Mitch and me to be your godparents. We don’t have fancy things like that in the church where I go to like I still believe in God, but Mitch wanted to so much, I agreed. I remember holding you and pretending you were my second baby. I told Annemarie that.”
Eric shifted again and mumbled, “’Rissa. I…I need help.”
“Oh, please, Jean,” Marissa cried. “Let me call the paramedics.”
“The paramedics!” Jean laughed. “And while they’re working on him, we’ll just go on with our chat? Maybe I hit the femur, but I don’t think so. He’s just weak from blood loss.”
“People can
die
from blood loss!” Marissa shouted.
“Lower your voice, young lady. This is
my
house and we will do what
I
say. Eric is fine. The Eric Montgomerys of the world are
always
fine.” Marissa swallowed her anguish as Jean drew a deep breath and went on calmly. “So, Annemarie kept telling me I’d have another baby and she even loaned me your christening gown for luck, she said. She never meant for me to keep it, but I couldn’t bear to give it back because you looked so much like my Betsy.”
“My dress…”
“Yes, your dress. And your mother never asked me to give it back. I guess she was too polite. Everybody was so nice to me after I nearly died when Betsy did. Even my prince of a husband never said a bad word about me not fastening the chain and losing Betsy like I did. He never acted like he blamed me. That helped.
Then.
I know better
now.
“After a few years, Mitch started bringing the Archer boys around. They were nice, polite boys and Dillon was cute and such a charmer. I should have recognized that kind of charm. Mitch said he felt sorry for them because their father, Isaac, was so hard on them and their mother, Belle, didn’t stand up to him. Do you know her name wasn’t really Belle? She just called herself that. Her real name was Jezebel. Think about it.”
Jean fell silent, going off into her private world again. Marissa listened to the wail of the wind around the house, through the trees and the snow spitting against the windows. The night was worse than the night of her wreck, she thought. At least last week she’d been active, her mind alive with thoughts of how to save herself. Tonight, she knew at least one person was going to die—probably more.
“Jezebel was Dillon’s mother,” Jean said. Marissa looked at the woman’s worn, bleak face. “Mitchell Farrell is his father. Oh yes. All those nights he was working late and I was sitting here by myself, being understanding and wishing for a baby, he was with that whore. Isaac never came home until about eleven o’clock. Mitch had plenty of time with his girlfriend before he came home to me, and that girlfriend gave him a son.”
Marissa sat in stunned silence for a moment, then asked, “Mitch?”
Nothing. Then Jean jabbed at Mitch’s leg with her elbow. He moaned, then said weakly, “Yes, Marissa. It’s true.”
“Oh.” Marissa could not think of one other word. “Oh.”
“Yes.
Oh,
” Jean mimicked. “And he dared to bring that boy here! To have him stay for supper! To show him his woodworking! And I was glad he seemed to enjoy the boys, especially Dillon. I was glad that kid could take away some of Mitch’s pain over losing his only child. Only Mitch hadn’t lost his only child!”
“M-Mitch, did you tell her this about Dillon?” Marissa jumped at the sound of Eric’s voice coming from the floor. He sounded weak, his voice slow and almost sleepy.
“Yes, he told me,” Jean snapped. “Almost two weeks ago. Give him just the right amount of morphine and he’ll tell you anything you want to know. Hell, he’ll tell you things you
didn’t
want to know. When I heard about Dillon being his son, I sat up all night, just trying to take it in. I thought he’d just gone crazy on the drugs. I asked him over and over and his story never changed, though. Then I went over everything about those old days, and I knew it was true.”
All Marissa could think about was the blood Eric was losing with each minute Jean talked. If only someone would come to the door, she thought. If only she had a weapon, no matter how crude, she could at least disable Jean and, she hoped, get one of the guns away from her. Instead, all she could do was talk.
“I know learning that Mitch had an affair must have hurt so deeply,” Marissa said. “But it was a long time ago. Does it really matter
now
when Mitch is—”
“Dying?” Jean looked frighteningly furious. “Yes, it matters, because he didn’t just have a fling with one of the town sluts that produced a kid—he didn’t
do
anything for that kid except drag him out here once in a while! He knew Isaac was hard on Dillon—Isaac was no fool. He knew Dillon wasn’t his. But Mitch couldn’t have his reputation ruined by having people find out about him and Belle. No, not Mitch Farrell.
“Belle died when Dillon was nine, and she told him then who his real daddy was. I remember a day before she died when the boys were here and Dillon asked Mitch if he’d be his daddy and protect him from Isaac. Mitch said he was real sorry, but he couldn’t do that. He said, ‘Isaac
is
your father, you know.’ I didn’t suspect Mitch then, but I could tell Dillon didn’t believe Isaac was his father. Children sense the truth and it was true, wasn’t it, Mitch?
Wasn’t
it?”
“Yes,” Mitch croaked. “Yes, he was my boy.”
Marissa’s cell phone went off and she almost screamed. She still wore her jacket and she reached in the pocket and pulled out the phone, but before she could even look at the caller ID Jean shouted, “Shut it off!” It rang again before Marissa could turn it off. Please let that have been Catherine, she thought. Catherine, the worrier, might think something was wrong. But no matter how worried Catherine was, she could never guess what was wrong. Never.
“That’s enough, Jean,” Mitch said hopelessly. “Just kill me.”
Jean didn’t even look at Mitch. “You have to keep in mind that all these years I still thought I had the most wonderful husband in the world. I didn’t know about Belle. I didn’t know about…another one. And I was so thankful that Mitch didn’t seem to blame me for Betsy, even though I blamed myself.
“But every night, I’ve taken Mitch to the point on the morphine where he talks and talks. He tells me everything because he gets this notion I’m God and I can forgive him before he dies. He’s sorry for most of it, but even if there was a God, he wouldn’t forgive Mitch. God will never forgive him for Dillon. You see, Dillon had been treated bad all his life. Then he found out the truth and he thought he was saved—his real daddy would take him and be good to him. But his real daddy wasn’t one bit interested in taking him—just protecting himself and his own good name. I don’t know if Dillon was born different or old Isaac made him different by beating him or if later Dillon’s hatred for Mitch killed his conscience, but when he was about twelve or thirteen he started striking back. That’s what Mitch said: ‘He started striking back.’
“Dillon was smart and clever and sneaky, just like Mitch. The first thing he did that we know about is kill Buddy Pruitt’s grandpa.”
“No,” Eric said in a thin voice. “Accident.”
“Dillon told Buddy how to make it
look
like an accident. He pretended to be Buddy’s friend, pretended to be helping him by getting that terror of an old man out of the way, but all he really wanted to do was make Buddy his slave.” Jean paused. “Marissa doesn’t believe me. I can tell by the look in her eyes.
You
tell her about Buddy, Mitch.”
“It’s true,” Mitch managed miserably. “Dillon boasted to me. He got into a sort of…pattern. I wouldn’t claim him, so he’d torture me.” Mitch began that gurgling cough that sent chills down Marissa’s spine. Please let him choke and die, she thought. But if he dies, then what?
“Buddy was scared silly of Dillon after that because Dillon could expose him as an accomplice to Old Man Pruitt’s death,” Jean explained. “So Buddy became Dillon’s little lapdog. Did whatever Dillon told him to. Pathetic!”
Another cell phone went off. Jean cursed impressively and grabbed Eric’s cell phone, which she’d kept near her along with his walkie-talkie. She turned it off and glared at Eric and Marissa. “You two are certainly the popular ones.”
“People know where we are!” Marissa could have bitten off her tongue, particularly when Jean gave her that weird smile.
“Well maybe I should kill you before they come,” she said in a soft, vicious voice.
I’m sorry, Eric, Marissa thought. I’m a fool and I’m so, so sorry.
“Let’s see, I believe Tonya Ward came next. You remember that scandal when Edgar Blume literally got caught with his pants down when his wife and boy came back to town? Edgar was stone-cold dead and looked like he’d been having one hell of a party. He hadn’t, although he was no pillar of virtue. It seems Tonya got tangled up with him and Dillon helped her out. He ended up killing Blume and”—Jean snapped her fingers—“just like that Dillon had someone else in his debt.”
“Mitch, you said Dillon
bragged
to you as a form of torture. What makes you so sure Dillon was telling the truth?” Marissa asked.
“Knew too many details,” Mitch croaked. “I headed investigations. It was always just like Dillon said it was. And sometimes, he’d take a little something to prove what he’d done. He told me to hide the stuff for him and I did. Had me under his finger, too, ’cause he knew I was ashamed of myself for not claiming him. I’d protect him from prosecution, though.”
“For yourself, not out of love for him.” Jean lifted her head and rubbed the muzzle of the gun under her chin, slowly, absently. Let it go off, Marissa thought furiously. Let the gun blow off her head.
“Oh yes, there’s one more thing Eric will particularly enjoy,” Jean continued in a disturbingly casual, chatty tone. “Maybe you recall when Melody Simmons got drunk out of her mind, went tearing away from the Lonesome Me Tavern, and ran over that little eight-year-old boy. Well, it seems she’d gotten mad at her date, Will Addison, and took off without him. Everyone thought he’d just walked home and she’d kept on driving. She didn’t. She got sick and pulled to the side of the road. Will was walking when he came upon the car. Melody was so drunk, for once Sir Will decided to act like a gentleman and take her home. They were having a fight, and
Will
hit that child with the car!
“Melody passed out and Dillon happened along,” Jean continued as if relishing the story. “I don’t remember all the logistics, but Dillon made it look like Melody had hit the boy. Dillon told Mitch that the boy wasn’t dead after Will hit him, so Dillon ran over him again just to make sure! Then Dillon took Will home and added another lackey to his collection. Melody, barely eighteen, was prosecuted as an adult and went to prison.”
Although Marissa had been cringing throughout Jean’s telling of the story, she’d tried to keep her face as calm as Jean’s. “You said Eric would particularly enjoy that. Why?”
“Because later Gretchen dated Will. Then for some reason, she gave him the heave-ho and began seeing Dillon. People knew Will wasn’t happy about losing her, particularly to Dillon. I think he pursued her in a way. After your little party at Gray’s Island, Dillon told Mitch he should never have ‘helped’ Will because Will was a drunk and drunks talk. Somebody saw Will with Gretchen the afternoon before she died. Dillon said that night he got her drunk—she wasn’t used to alcohol—and she started talking about knowing secrets and asking people if you ever
really
know someone else. He told Mitch after she’d say that, she’d look at him.
“Dillon was sure Will had told her about running over the little boy. Dillon said he had to do something to protect himself, and so he pushed her off that railing in the church. Did you hear that, Eric? Dillon
killed
your sister! He even took her ring and gave it to Mitch to hide for him.
“Tonya, another person who
owed
Dillon, said he’d tried to grab Gretchen and drag her off the rail and down to the balcony. Dillon said you’d seen exactly what happened and you told the police, Marissa. Dillon didn’t know what to do about you. He was between a real rock and a hard place when it came to you.”
“Why?” Marissa asked coldly.
Jean paused and then slowly smiled. “Because, honey, you are Dillon’s sister.”
2
Marissa felt turned to ice as Jean looked at her with a mixture of amusement and hatred. Finally, she asked, “What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about what Dillon was talking about—the fact that Mitch is your father, too.”
Marissa shook her head, harder and harder and harder.
“Your head is going to fly right off your neck if you don’t stop that,” Jean said in amused warning. “Isn’t it clear once you think about it? Mitch was what they now call a player. He wasn’t working the night Betsy drowned—he was paying one of his last visits to Belle and his little boy because he had something else new and more exciting in his life. He left me alone for
them
on that horrible night—” Jean groaned in pain, then pulled herself together.
“Your parents were nice to us, Marissa. Your mother just couldn’t have been
sweeter.
I always knew Mitch thought Annemarie was beautiful, but I was a trusting fool. When he got tired of Belle, Mitch left her in Isaac’s loving hands and went straight to your mother. I’m sure she thought he was as handsome as I did. I could tell it. And he could smooth-talk a woman into doing whatever he wanted. Mitch always had that effect on women and Annemarie Gray was no different.” Jean paused. “She must have gotten pregnant with you almost right away, Marissa.”