The Angel (33 page)

herself, hugging herself as if she was cold. “I’d hoped Victor’s death was an accident. If he was murdered—can you imagine what that’ll do to my life?”

Abigail stiffened and gave Yarborough a sideways glance, saw that Charlotte’s comment had hit a wrong note with him, too. Never mind cooperating with the police and, if her brother had been murdered, finding his killer—

making sure no one else got hurt.

But Charlotte Augustine didn’t seem to think there was anything off-putting about her remark. “Detective Browning, I know you have to explore all the possibilities, but I don’t see how these photographs of the detective’s daughters or the attack on Liam have anything to do with me or my husband. What if Liam’s the one responsible for the bulletin board, and this detective found out and attacked him?”

“That didn’t happen,” Yarborough said.

Charlotte went ashen. “I’m sorry, I…” Fresh tears welled. “I want to help if I can. Go ahead. Please. Ask me any questions you want to.”

“Keira Sullivan,” Abigail said. “Do you know her?”

A flicker of recognition.

Yarborough took a half step forward. “The truth, Mrs. Augustine.”

She tightened her hug on herself and looked toward the house as the door opened and paramedics carried out Liam Butler on a stretcher. “Oh, Liam,” she whispered.

“Charlotte,” Abigail said, “how do you know Keira Sullivan?”

“I don’t. We—we’ve never met. I just know her name. Her work. Victor showed me one of her illustrated books the day he drowned. That afternoon. I didn’t tell you. He came out to the house…” She bit on her lower lip. “It was the last time I saw him.”

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Abigail could see that Charlotte wasn’t finished and didn’t interrupt her pause.

“I only remember because I liked the illustrations. They’re so original—so cheerful. I was surprised Victor liked them, considering his obsession with the devil and evil.”

“Why did your brother show you Keira’s book?”

Abigail asked.

“I don’t know!”

But that wasn’t the truth, and Yarborough, clearly losing patience, shook his head. Instead of pouncing on Charlotte for her obvious dissembling, he spoke quietly to her. “You have a lot bottled up inside you, Mrs. Augustine. You just lost your brother. It’s tough. We know that.” His tone was reassuring, friendly. “It’d do you good to finally let it all out. Tell us everything. Let us decide what helps and what doesn’t. Don’t censor yourself.”

She dropped her arms to her sides. “It has been hard. So hard. I wish now I’d pushed Victor to give me more in

formation, but I didn’t. And now it’s too late.”

“There was an event on Beacon Hill the night he drowned,” Abigail said. “A benefit for a folklore confer

ence. Keira Sullivan was there. So was one of the girls whose pictures are on the bulletin board. Did Victor—”

“He wasn’t invited. Jay and I weren’t, either.”

“Charlotte—”

“I don’t know why Victor showed me that damn book! He was
spying
on me, Detective Browning. He was trying to help, but still.” She suddenly kicked the top off a dandelion, sending little white seeds floating into the air. “He didn’t like Jay.”

Her tone had changed, and Abigail resisted the tempta

tion to jump in with another question.Yarborough remained impassive at her side.

Charlotte squashed what was left of her dandelion with 306

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her toe. “I want this all to go away. But it won’t, will it?”

She raised her gaze to Abigail. “Liam didn’t know why Victor was having him spy on Jay and me. Victor didn’t tell him. There was no need to tell me—I saw for myself what was going on with Jay. I just didn’t want to admit it.”

“But Victor did tell you,” Abigail said. Charlotte nodded. She wasn’t shaking now. “He said there were times when he’d look at Jay and think he was looking into the eyes of the devil. I wanted to believe it was an exaggeration. I didn’t want to believe Jay was that bad.”

“He is, though,” Yarborough said. “Isn’t he?”

“I think so,” Charlotte said, hugging herself again. Out on the street, Abigail saw Bob O’Reilly pull up to the curb, jump out of his car and show his badge to a Cam

bridge police officer, who didn’t stop him. Abigail didn’t contain herself. “Bob—your daughters—”

“They’re safe. They’re with Scoop, Owen and the Lex

ington police.” But he didn’t look even marginally relieved as he narrowed his eyes on Charlotte Augustine. “Jeanette and Billie Murphy.”

She gasped as if he’d stuck her with a needle and she lunged for the street, but Abigail and Yarborough both grabbed her before she could get a half step. Charlotte calmed down, and they let her wriggle free. Bob hadn’t moved. “You acted on behalf of the Murphys and bought one of my niece’s paintings at the auction the night your brother drowned.”

“I told Detective Browning already that my husband and I weren’t there.”

“You phoned in the bid. I just talked to the Irish profes

sor who’s heading up the conference—”

“He’s wrong.”

“The Murphys are your clients. They’re into their Irish

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heritage.” Bob was steady, focused. “They’d love to get their hands on an Irish Celtic stone angel like the one in Patsy McCarthy’s story.”

Charlotte turned to Yarborough, as if he could help her, but he just stepped back from her. She started shaking again.

“Please—the Murphys aren’t involved in any of this. I didn’t tell you about the painting because I knew you’d jump to the wrong conclusion.”

Bob remained icy. “You picked up the painting this morning.”

“No—”

“Charlotte,” Abigail said without sympathy, “no more lies and half truths.”

She stared down at the ground. Some of the fight seemed to go out of her. “I delivered the painting to Billie Murphy’s office in Boston. He wasn’t there. I left it with his receptionist.”

“Whose idea was it to bid on it?” Bob asked. Charlotte clamped her mouth shut and refused to answer. Even Yarborough gave a little hiss—no more playing the nice, patient police officer—but Bob remained calm to the point of scary. He rocked back on his heels. “Mrs. Augus

tine,” he said, “you’re going to tell us what you know.”

Abigail glanced at the paramedics sliding the stretcher into the back of an ambulance. Liam Butler was fighting for his life, and this woman was playing games. “You need to stop thinking about how this situation is going to affect your business and your social life.”

“The Murphys are new clients,” Charlotte said weakly.

“They’re from working-class South Boston, but they have a spectacular home now on the waterfront. They’re won

derful people. They have exquisite taste—”

Bob cut her off. “I grew up with them. I know who the 308

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hell they are. They looked after a woman who was just found knifed to death in her own house. The Murphys were good to her. They own the land in New Hampshire where my sister built a cabin. How did you meet them, Mrs. Augustine?”

“My husband. Jay—I don’t know how he met them.”

“He insinuated himself into the Murphys’ lives, Patsy McCarthy’s life—
my
life.” Bob’s tone hardened even more. “Where is Jay now?”

“I told Detective Browning—he’s traveling.”

“He’s not traveling.”

“No,” Charlotte mumbled. “Please.”

“My sister’s name is Eileen Sullivan. She’s a religious ascetic. She—”

Charlotte was sobbing quietly now. “I know. I don’t know her, but we— Jay and I have been out to the Murphys’ house in New Hampshire.”

Bob didn’t say a word, but Abigail could feel her own knees going unsteady under her. Jay Augustine knew how to get to Eileen Sullivan’s cabin. She was there. Keira was on her way.

“Bob…”

He turned and walked back out to the street. Yarborough nodded to Abigail. “Go. I’ll see to Mrs. Augustine and fill in the Cambridge guys.”

“Tom—”

“It’s Bob’s family, Abigail. Go.”

She tried to smile. “I might have to revise my opinion of you.”

He ignored her, and she ran to join Bob. She didn’t know what she could do to help, but he didn’t have to be alone.

Near Mount Monadnock

Southern New Hampshire

1:45 p.m., EDT

June 24

Keira sank onto her knees on the bank of the stream in front of her mother, whose moan of pain had been the sound she’d heard. Her mother sat with her knees tucked under her chin in the shade of a white pine, her hands and feet bound tightly with blood-soaked rope.

She was bleeding from a dozen slashes on her arms and shoulders. Superficial wounds, Keira thought. Designed to elicit pain and a lot of blood, not to kill. Not yet, at least.

“I can feel the Irish wind on my face,” her mother whis

pered, her lips cracked and bloodied from where she’d bit down during her torture. “Oh, I can see the green—such a green. Deirdre won’t fly. She would love to see her mother’s birth place and meet her Irish relatives, but she’s too afraid to get on a plane.”

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“Mum…it’s Keira.” She had to fight to keep herself from sobbing. “You’re in New England. Be with me now, okay?”

Her mother’s eyes flickered, and she tried to sit up straighter. “Keira, please tell me you understand. I didn’t tell you about Deirdre because I couldn’t. She was—she was the best of us, and she was taken from us…”

“I know, Mum. I understand.”

A few feet from them, the stone angel stood among the ferns at the edge of the stream, as beautiful as the night of the summer solstice when Keira had spotted it on the hearth of the collapsing ruin.

“Run, Keira.” Her mother groaned in pain. “Leave me.
Please
.”

“Don’t talk. Save your strength.”

“We can’t let him kill again.”

He was there, Keira realized. In the trees, just as he’d been in Ireland. Lurking, enjoying the fear and suffering he was causing.

Jay Augustine.

Using the edge of the splitter, she managed to whack through the rope on her mother’s ankles. The rope on her wrists, yanked tight and soaked with blood, would be im

possible to cut with any precision—she’d need a sharp knife.

“Can you walk?” she asked her mother.

“Yes…but, Keira, take the splitter. Run as fast as you can. Let him amuse himself with me—I’ll buy you as much time as I can.”

“I’m not leaving you.”

Keira rose, slipping in the mud as she hung on to the splitter and, with her free hand, helped her mother up.
Distract and disrupt.
It was one commandment she re

membered from her police academy days for just such a situation. She didn’t have to take on Jay Augustine. She

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simply had to distract him and disrupt his plans, get her and her mother away from him if she could.

“He’s evil, Keira,” her mother said. “He’s not insane. He’s chosen this path.”

“I know, Mum.”

Her mother was reasonably steady on her feet despite the blood, her bound wrists. “He doesn’t believe in angels or saints—or fairies and magic. Or the devil himself. He just wants to commit violence and play his games. Feel his own power.”

“What does he have for weapons?”

“Knives. Two that I saw. And fear. He uses fear as a weapon.”

At least if he didn’t have a gun, Keira thought, he couldn’t just shoot them from the bushes. She had no doubt he was watching, taking pleasure in her reaction to her mother’s condition—plotting his next move. If the splitter deterred him, it wouldn’t be for long. He’d think of some way around it.

Her mother faltered, shivering not with cold, Keira realized, but with the agony of her wounds—with her own fear. “He killed Patsy. He told me. She told him that story of hers. He manipulated her, too. It’s not your fault. It’s not her fault. Oh, Keira.”

Keira focused on taking the next step, paying attention to any movement, any sound in the nearby trees and under

growth. “Let’s just keep moving.”

Her mother sobbed, then nodded, as if summoning her resolve.

A crunching sound came from the hill above them.

“Keira, Keira.” A man’s voice, chiding her as if she were a recalcitrant child. “Don’t you see? Your mother wants to suffer for the sins of her past. She needs to suffer.”

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Keira maintained her hold on the splitter. The man stepped out from the cover of several small hemlocks. He was middle-aged, trim, dressed neatly in slacks and a button-down shirt and lightweight jacket. But she saw spots of blood on his slacks, his knuckles, one cheek, and his eyes shone with an excitement that struck her as sexual, physical.

Keira pushed back her own fear. “Jay Augustine, right?”

He seemed momentarily surprised, then gave her a mock bow. “I did anticipate that my identity would be dis

covered. Part of the fun, in fact.” But before Keira or her mother could speak, he continued. “While your saintly mother was cavorting in Ireland, indulging in fairies and magic and sins of the flesh, her best friend was being tortured and raped. She never told you, did she, Keira?”

“Why would she tell me? Any mother would want to protect her child—”

“I’m offering your mother redemption. I left her alive deliberately so she can watch me brutalize you, just as Deirdre’s killer did her. You, the daughter conceived in sin—your mother can suffer the worst pain she’s ever known, and thus be free.”

Keep him talking,
Keira thought. “You don’t care about redemption—”

“I offered Patsy redemption. She set her daughter’s killer on fire.”

Keira’s mother shook her head. “No. Not Patsy. She didn’t kill Stuart. I’d have if I’d known where to find him, but Patsy didn’t kill him.”

“She wanted to—she let it happen. She always knew she’d have to pay for what she did. When I came for her, she knew her moment had come. I could see it in her eyes.”