“Be appreciative, Harold. I’ve got too much on my plate to be dealing with hysterical women.” Tate tipped his hat at Harold and got into his car.
Was he talking about her or Mrs. Thorne? Or both? Katie yelled, “Check out the old cemetery! The grave in the back!”
He pulled away without a backward glance.
“Now, what the devil are you talking about?” Harold said, moving in closer. The tic throbbed by his eye.
She glanced over to the shopping strip plaza that held the diner. No way was she throwing herself into that viper pit, especially not after her outburst at the fair. And no way was she showing Harold the grave. “I…I must have been mistaken.” She ran back through the cemetery feeling Harold’s gaze on her back the entire way.
By the time she pulled herself up the steps to her house, she could barely breathe for the exertion and smoke. It stung her eyes and burned her throat. She had to blink several times to clear the tears from her eyes.
She pushed her way into the house and ran through the broken living room to the bedroom. Adrenaline coursed through her, putting her on automatic pilot. She pulled one of Ben’s suitcases out of the closet and threw in the outfits Bertrice had given her along with a few other clothes. She tucked the pictures of her mother into a side pocket.
When she walked into the office, she had to stop for a moment. Drawers were open, papers were scattered everywhere. Similar to the destruction in the rest of the house, except this was more purposeful. Ben had been here and he’d cleared out his personal papers—along with her own, she soon realized.
She climbed back onto the counter and dumped out the change in the tin over the cupboards. All of their money was tied up in their household account and the veterinary hospital’s business account. All those
Cosmo
articles warning her to have her own money echoed in her mind. That Katie of the last few years had been afraid to bring up the possibility. Ben would have talked her out of it with the simple reasoning that he was the main provider. She’d never even asked that he add her name to the deed on the house. At least she had a few dollars.
She took one last look around the house. There was nothing here for her. There never had been. She tucked her suitcase just inside the door and ran through the woods to Silas’s house.
The sight of the empty driveway sent more chills down her body, despite the heat enveloping her body. Smoke drifted through the trees like ghosts. Everything was dark, and it was getting harder to breathe. Though she knew it was fruitless, she screamed Silas’s name anyway. She waited a few minutes, listening to the sounds around her. No birds chirped, not a breeze anywhere to ruffle a leaf. Everything waited in deadly anticipation. Fear welled inside her, for herself and for Silas. Where was he? Why hadn’t he come back for her?
The house stood alone and abandoned. It didn’t matter that Silas had put on the homey touches of the door and the rocking chair on the porch; he was leaving this behind. When they got through this—and they would get through it—he would do the same thing to her. He might set her up in a new life, but he’d back off once she was settled in. He’d take off to chase the shadows of the latest murderer…and leave her behind, too. Oh, he’d always be her protector, stealing into her heart whenever she was distressed. The distance between them kept her out of the shadows and him out of the light, but it didn’t keep her from loving him.
She turned and ran back through the woods to her house. Branches clawed at her and smoke burned down into her lungs. When her body wanted nothing more than to collapse, the image of fire sweeping through the woods kept her running.
Running where?
She’d never felt this alone and abandoned before, not even right after her mama died. There was nowhere to go, no one to trust or depend on. Something had happened to Silas. It was the only explanation. He was out there somewhere, maybe hurt. And she was here, trapped.
When she reached the porch, she had to drop to the steps and try to breathe. Her mama hadn’t given up, hadn’t given in to the world’s bleak circumstances. For the first time in a long time she drew strength from her mama’s memory. Something terrible had happened to her, either before or soon after Katie had been born. Ellie had forged on, even though she’d lived in fear of men. She’d back down from a fight, but she’d protected her daughter and given her a good life. Katie closed teary eyes and prayed, just like she and her mother used to.
I know I haven
’
t been the best person, especially lately. I want another chance to make my life right. Remember when I used to pray for the lost souls, for the girls who were hurt and scared. Right now I
’
m praying for myself. And I
’
m praying for Silas. He
’
s been lost for a long time, and now he
’
s really lost. Please bring him back to me. And get us both out of here.
She opened her eyes. Time to get moving. But they closed again as she added one more prayer.
And tell Mama I love her and I always will. Tell her I
’
m sorry for being mad at her all these years.
The smoke was getting thicker. She coughed long and hard as she pulled herself to her feet and went inside. Hot pain seared her chest. She tried once more to call Silas’s beeper. As she started to hang up the phone, someone grabbed her arm.
For a second, she felt relief—Silas was here, lurking inside the house as he’d done before. But it was Gary’s face she took in when she turned around.
“I’m glad I stopped by here,” he said. “Come on, we’ve got to get you out of here. If the winds shift, this place is toast.”
“Let me go!” She jerked away from him, though she couldn’t loose herself from his grip. “I don’t want your help.”
Frustration laced his features. “I understand why you don’t trust me. I don’t want to hurt you. I never wanted to hurt you or scare you. I’ve been going about this the wrong way, but it’s the only way I know how.” His hands tightened around her wrist. “I’m not sure if Ben’s coming back. Last time I saw him he was giving Bertrice a ride home after her car broke down. I’m not sure you should trust him anyway.”
Something in her expression prompted him to go on. “Ben’s playing games with you, Katie. Do you know why the folks in town don’t like you? First of all, you’re a snob. You never come into town much, you don’t socialize. People don’t think you deserve the doc, who’s painted himself as a saint. You won’t give him a baby, even though he wants one. You think the town fair is silly, which is why Ben had to force you to volunteer. And you have separate bedrooms now because you’re in love with Silas.”
She was shaking her head all through his speech. “That’s not true. Well, except for the last part. Why would they think those things? How did they know about the separate bedrooms?”
Gary let go of her arm and took a step back. “Because that’s what Ben’s been telling them. He’s been playing everyone against you.”
She was shaking her head in disbelief even as the pieces fell together. Maybel’s snide comment about giving him babies, the hostility she’d encountered lately, and their refusal of her help despite the poster begging for help still being in the window. Knowing the cross came from Silas. She didn’t want to believe Gary. He was the enemy.
He glanced at his watch. “Katie, there’s more. He’s the one who wrecked this place. Having gone on a destructive rage before, I recognized the senselessness of the vandalism. Let me get you out of here.”
She could barely get her mind around what he’d just told her, even though it rang with truth. “I have to wait for Silas.”
“If the wind changes direction, or increases, that fire’s going to sweep through here like the Tasmanian devil. You can’t outrun it.”
She moved farther away from him.
“Katie, trust me.” Desperation intensified his features.
If he was the killer… “I can’t.”
“Yes, you can. I could never hurt you.” He moved closer. “I came back to Flatlands for you. Because I needed to connect with you.” She backed up to the wall. “Because you’re my sister. My half-sister.”
All the breath had left her lungs, and all she could do was stare dumbly at him. He gave her those few minutes to absorb his words. Her first instinct was to deny them just as she’d denied his words about Ben. Instead, she looked at him for the first time. Brown hair like hers. Brown, almond-shaped eyes like hers, wide-set like hers. In those eyes the desperate need for her to believe. In those eyes, the truth.
“My father”—Gary looked away for a moment before continuing—“raped your mother. I saw it happen.”
“No,” she said, though once again the pieces clicked together: her mother’s fear of men, her father’s obscurity, and those warnings about staying away from Sam Savino. It also explained the eerie way he looked at her whenever she did run into him.
“I was just a little kid. I didn’t even realize what I was seeing. Your mom used to clean for us. My mother always went to a friend’s house to play bridge while your mom was cleaning. I usually had to go with her, but I wasn’t feeling well so she let me stay in bed. I guess my father didn’t know I was in the house. He came home for lunch and started talking to Ellie. I don’t remember what he said. I was at the top of the stairs about to come down for a drink when I heard her crying. I thought he was just pushing her around, like he pushed everyone around. I figured that’s the way it was. But he did other things, and I watched, too scared to come downstairs and too frozen to leave. I knew it was wrong, what he was doing. I couldn’t believe he was doing it, so I buried it in my subconscious.”
She could see the pain in his eyes as he remembered details she didn’t want to hear.
“That was inside me when I saw you with that stray kitten. I didn’t understand why I associated strays with you, or why it made me so angry. I didn’t understand until years later—until I had to take a rage management course. It came back to me then.” He lowered his head. “I’m sorry for the pain I caused you. Maybe for the pain I’m causing you right now. But I need to reconnect with my family again. My father’s still a bastard, and my mother’s a dishrag. That leaves you as my only real family.”
He jerked her against him so fast, she didn’t have time to respond. “Katie, forgive me for what I did all those years ago,” he whispered. “Be my family.”
Family. The word left her feeling warm and mushy inside, though she was still disoriented at being held so tenderly by Gary. Could she trust him? She’d trusted Ben all these years, and he’d been sabotaging her. She sorted through the facts she could get her mind around. The way Ben had played intermediary between her and the Emersons. He’d told her they were only using her, that they didn’t really want her in their family. What had he told them? And Bertrice! Maybe he’d been listening when she’d told Katie about the belly ring.
Gary finally stepped back. “I know I’ve dumped a lot on you. I’ve been trying to tell you this for weeks now.”
Before Katie even had time to respond, a metal pipe swung from around the corner and knocked Gary to the floor. He groaned, and his arm twitched once, but he was out. Ben stepped around the corner. She’d seen that cold look on his face before, and it scared her no less now than it had then.
“Did he hurt you?” he asked, not even looking down at Gary. His gray eyes were locked on her.
“My God, what have you done?” She dropped down to check Gary’s pulse. It was there, though a tenuous pulse of life. The cut on his head was welling up, and blood seeped out to stain his hair.
Ben pulled her to her feet. “I thought you were afraid of him. Now you’re acting as if he’s your best friend. Or even your brother.”
How much had he heard? Enough apparently. “He was going to get me out of here. I thought you’d left.”
His eyes glinted like a sharp-edged knife, but it was his soft voice that sent a shiver of dread down her spine. Why hadn’t she seen this cold, unemotional core before? Only when he’d poisoned The Boss, and before that, just glimpses. “I wouldn’t be much of a hero if I left my wife to be ravaged by a fire, now would I?”
He smelled like smoke and sweat, and his hair and clothing were disheveled. Blood was splattered on his forearms. He followed her gaze. “Gary’s blood.” He held out his other hand to her. “Let’s go, before the fire moves in.”
She could only stare at that hand, also stained with blood. “That’s not Gary’s blood.” Dread and fear coiled inside her. “Whose blood is it?”
He turned his hand as though admiring the pattern. “Silas’s. Katie, he’s a killer, just like I’ve been telling you. I caught him red-handed. He’d been keeping a woman hostage at an old barn on the south end of his property. She was handcuffed to a bed, arms and legs spread. Naked. Silas had the knife in his hands when I walked in on him.” Ben’s eyes were glassy as he put himself back in the scene. Agony and regret strained his voice when he said, “ I tried to stop him, but he shoved me away. Before I could get to my feet, he’d sliced her from the butterfly tattoo on her shoulder down to her pelvis. I attacked him, we fought. He tried to kill me, too, but I won. You’re safe now, Katie. No one will hurt you now.” He focused in on her at last. “You believe that, don’t you?”
No, no, no
! Her brain was overloaded with information.
The tattoo. Bertrice had told her that Geraldine had a tattoo on her shoulder.
Her blood was rapidly crystallizing into ice.
Ben had seen the tattoo.
“We need to get out of here, Katie.”
“I’d better pack some things first.” She held herself together and walked to their bedroom. The gun was still in the nightstand. She tried to keep her voice modulated and her pace easy. He followed her, but she blocked his view of the nightstand drawer when she pulled out the gun and tucked it into a canvas bag.
“Katie, you don’t seem very upset about Silas being a killer?”
She felt stiff and shaky, but she turned to Ben with a calm expression. “Is he dead?”
“That’s all you care about, isn’t it, that Silas is okay. What about me? What about Geraldine? You are one selfish girl, aren’t you? Always have been. You took and took and took from me, and never gave me what I wanted most: your love. Yet, you always wanted more than I could give you. Is that what you liked about Silas? Did he give you what
you
wanted most?”