After Dark
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MOVE
SHE
MAKES
T H E FIFTH VICTIM
NOTHING BUT THE TRUTH
Johnny Mack slammed his fist in the
palm of his hand. "Why marry a man you'd refused to marry a dozen times
over just to keep Sharon from aborting her baby?"
Lane swiped the tears from her cheeks.
"He was your baby! All that I had left of you. I wouldn't allow anyone
to harm him! Not then and not now."
Johnny Mack remained silent. His
throat closed tightly. He'd known Lane had had a crush on him for years before
he'd left town, but he'd had no idea the depth of her feelings for him. She
was probably the only woman in his entire life who had ever loved him.
And loved him so unselfishly.
He wanted to reach out and take
her in his arms, but he could tell by her wary stance that she didn't want
him to touch her. She had loved him fifteen years ago, but how did she feel
about him now? How much had the passing of fifteen years, marriage to
Kent and a lifetime of lies changed Lane?
"I was very foolish back then,
wasn't I? I've grown up a lot since then. I've learned a great deal about
love. What it is and what it isn't." Lane's voice softened and trailed
off quietly. "I was so infatuated with you. Will is the only thing
that matters to me now. I would do anything to protect him."
"Even murder Kent?"
"Yes," she said.
"Even murder Kent."
Books by Beverly Barton:
EVERY MOVE SHE MAKES
WHAT SHE DOESN'T KNOW
THE FIFTH VICTIM
THE LAST TO DIE
AS GOOD AS DEAD
KILLING HER SOFTLY
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First Printing: December, 2000 10
9
Printed in the United States of
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To the important men in my life,
from whom I've learned what intriguing, complicated, infuriating,
incredible, fascinating and irresistible creatures the male of
our species can be. Dee Inman, Sr., Houston Montgomery,
Dee Inman, Jr., Billy Beaver,
Brant Beaver, Roger
Waldrep and Braden Waldrep.
And a special thank-you to my dear
friend, Wendy Corsi
Staub, for her support, encouragement
and understanding.
Barton
After
Dark
CONTENTS
Prologue
Your son needs you. Come home.
Johnny Mack Cahill read the note
again. The damned thing didn't make a bit of sense. He didn't have a son,
and his home had been here in the Houston area for the past fifteen years.
He turned the hand-printed message over, noting the college-ruled notebook
paper on which it had been written. Picking up the legal-size envelope
he had tossed on the sofa along with his other mail, he tried to read the
smeared postal service marking. All he could make out was "AL"
and "35."
Alabama? Who from Alabama would
be writing to him after all these years? Although he still sent Lillie
Mae money from time to time, she never wrote to him. And he hadn't left behind
anybody else who cared whether he lived or died. Or had he?
Who would be sending him such a
cryptic message?
Come home. Home to Alabama? Home to Noble's Crossing? Hell would freeze over first!
Holding the envelope up to the
light, Johnny Mack saw the shadow of something that hadn't fallen out along
with the mysterious, succinct letter. He tapped the envelope. Two objects
dropped to the open edge. He reached inside with the tips of his thumb
and forefinger, then pulled out a folded newspaper clipping and a school
photograph.
Shoving the remainder of his mail
to the left sofa cushion, he sat down and looked at the color photo. The
face of a handsome teenage boy stared up at him. A tight knot formed in
the pit of Johnny Mack's stomach. There was something familiar about
that young face, those sharp cheekbones, those dark eyes, that flirtatious
smile. Looking at the picture was like looking into a mirror and seeing
the reflection of the boy he had been twenty years ago.
Come home. Your son needs you. Quickly
scanning the article, Johnny Mack discovered that a fourteen-year-old
boy in Noble's Crossing, Alabama, had been suffering from amnesia since
the day of his father's brutal murder. His mother, Lane Noble Graham,
was considered the number one suspect, but as of yet had not been formally
charged.
Johnny Mack stared at the newspaper
photograph of the suspect. Lane. Dear God! Lane Noble. His gaze traveled
back and forth from the school photograph of the boy, who someone claimed
was his son, to the picture of Lane Noble, the boy's mother. Lane Noble
Graham. Hell, had Lane actually married Kent Graham? He'd thought she
was too smart to be taken in by that son of a bitch. Apparently not.
Come home. Your son needs you.
Whoever had sent him the message
had made one crucial error-they assumed he and Lane had been lovers.
They were wrong. Lane had been the one Magnolia Avenue debutante he'd
never fucked. But she'd been the one he had wanted most.
Chapter 1
A loud clap of thunder momentarily
drowned out the minister's words. Lillie Mae glanced at Miss Lane, standing
so proudly at young Will's side, and noticed the way the boy held the huge,
black umbrella over his mother's head. Protective. Caring. At fourteen,
he was all long legs and arms. And piercing black eyes, so much like his father's.
"Ashes to ashes. Dust to
dust." Reverend Colby ignored nature's comment on this event as he
continued to spiel off the inane words that held little true comfort for
anyone who had genuinely cared for the deceased.
A jagged bolt of lightning
struck the earth nearby. Several ladies gasped loudly. Her body trembling,
her face pale, Mary Martha Graham cried out and moved toward the open
grave as if she intended to throw herself onto the coffin again.
Lord Almighty. Lillie Mae groaned
silently. That was all this day needed-for crazy Mary Martha to put on another
show for the townsfolk. Hadn't they all endured enough having to listen
to her hysterical tirade at the funeral, without having to witness more
of her insane grief?
"Oh, Kent, I loved you."
Mary Martha hovered over the steel gray casket. "You know I did. Please,
brother, please come back. Don't leave me."
James Ware stepped forward and
slipped his arm around his stepdaughter's waist, then drew her backward
to once again stand between her mother and him. She turned quickly and
buried her face against his chest, weeping uncontrollably.
Lillie Mae noticed the look of
pity on Miss Lane's j face and knew how much she longed to comfort her former
sister-in-law. But due to the circumstances, it wouldn't be proper for
the suspected murderess to offer a loving embrace to the deceased's
grieving sister. Poor Miss Lane. It just wasn't fair that she might be arrested,
her a good woman who had never done an unkind thing in her life.
The downpour continued, growing
heavier as the graveside service progressed. A tepid, humid wind
blew the rain beneath the dark burgundy tent under which the family had
congregated. Lillie Mae stood with Miss Lane and Will, just outside
the protective covering. When Will had been asked to join the Graham
family, he had declined and instead stayed loyally at his mother's side.
Lillie Mae knew that people would
say it was a bad day for a funeral. Some might even imply that the heavens
were weeping for Kent Graham. Not likely. She considered the nasty weather
a statement on Kent's life-dark, dreary, cold and destructive. That
sorry SOB didn't deserve to be put to rest on a bright, sunny day. Indeed,
if the day and the service had been an honest tribute to Kent, the devil
would have popped up from hell, bringing fire and brimstone with him to
singe the hallowed ground. Then Old Scratch would have personally escorted
Kent's twisted soul straight to Hades.
When the service ended and the
gathering dispersed, Mary Martha's shrill scream stopped the crowd's quiet
departure. Lillie Mae glanced over her shoulder in time to see James Ware
and Police Chief Buddy Lawler physically restrain Kent's little sister.
She struggled with them like a madwoman, her wide-eyed gaze darting in
every direction.
Edith Graham Ware tilted her regal
head, every strand of her perfectly coiffured red hair untouched by
the moisture in the air. She glanced casually at her overwrought daughter,
then stabbed Lane with her sharp glare. The accusatory look in her green
eyes issued her former daughter-in-law a warning. Lillie Mae didn't
think many folks noticed that look. They were too busy watching Mary Martha
being dragged, kicking and screaming, from the graveside. A shudder of
foreboding racked Lillie Mae's bone-thin body. She knew the power the
grande dame of Noble's Crossing had-enough to counteract any power Lane's
family name possessed.
Lane reached out, slid her arm
through Lillie Mae's and gazed pleadingly into her eyes. Miss Lane was cautioning
her, once again, that no matter what happened, no matter how difficult
things became, nothing mattered except protecting Will.
"Let's go home," Lane said,
then turned to her son. "Do you want to say goodbye to your grandmother
before we leave?"
"I don't have anything to
say to Grandmother as long as she keeps treating you this way."
Lillie Mae didn't think she had ever
been prouder of Will than she had been today. A boy on the verge of young
manhood, he was still part child, and yet his loving, caring attitude toward
Miss Lane said a lot about the man he would one day become, the fine and
honorable man his mother had raised him to be.
She closed her umbrella and slid
into the backseat of Lane's white Mercedes. When they got home, she'd
fix a pot of coffee for them and prepare a light lunch. Miss Lane hadn't
eaten enough to keep a bird alive since Kent's death. And no wonder, considering
how quickly she had become the number one murder suspect. And even Will's
normally voracious appetite had lessened in the five days since life
as they knew it had ceased to exist. The more she tried to blot out the memories
of that horrible day, the more vivid they became-like a recurring nightmare
over which she had no control.
They drove in silence, away from
Oakwood Cemetery, down through Baptist Bottoms, past the old trailer
park, over the Chickasaw Bridge and straight onto Sixth Street. Lillie
Mae's gaze lingered on the rusted gates hanging open to where the trailer
park had once existed. She had lived there in a small two-bedroom trailer
for years, with her only child, Sharon. Every morning at five-thirty, she
had driven her old Rambler from Myer's Trailer Park on the west side of
the Chickasaw River all the way across town to Magnolia Avenue, to the
Nobles' estate. And every evening at seven-thirty, she had driven home,
back across the river that divided the town into the haves and have
nots.
She and Sharon had belonged to
the have nots, and to this day she blamed herself for the savage, raging
hunger that had been inside Sharon-the need to escape from poverty any
way she could.
Johnny Mack Cahill had been the
most notorious of the have nots. Local society
hadn't just scorned the boy; they had hated him. He had shown no respect for
their snobbish hierarchy, and he had thumbed his nose at them time and
again. But when he'd entered their world, bedded their women and laughed
in their faces, they had punished him severely.
He had sworn he would never return
to Noble's Crossing, but Lillie Mae prayed that her unsigned note would
bring him home again. If he did come back, all hell was bound to break loose
since quite a few folks thought he was dead. But if ever Will needed his
real father, he needed him now. And if it was ever the time for Johnny Mack
to repay Miss Lane for having saved his life, now was that time.
Lane stood in the doorway of
Will's room. Light from the hallway cast soft shadows over the bed and the
long, slender form of her sleeping child. And despite the fact that he already
stood six feet tall, John William Graham was still a child. A child approaching
manhood-racing toward adulthood, bursting with the energy of raging
male hormones.
He was in so many ways his father's
son. Far too handsome for his own good. Black hair and eyes. Tall and lean.
And possessing a killer smile that was already drawing the attention
of all the teenage girls in Noble's Crossing. But Will was also her son,
and she had raised him with the love, security and wealth his own father had
never known. She had instilled in her precious Will a sense of honor
and dignity and respect for others that Johnny Mack had lacked.
In her heart and mind, she never
had been able to separate the father from the son, and now that Will was
a young carbon copy of Johnny Mack, she realized how foolish she had been
to think she could keep his parentage a secret forever. If Kent hadn't
been tall and dark, too, someone would have figured out the truth long
ago. Maybe, just maybe, they would have all been better off if that had
happened.
But hindsight was twenty-twenty.
If she had it to do over again, would she lie to Kent and allow him to believe
that Will was his child? Even though Kent had been her boyfriend of sorts
since they were little more than children, she had never been in love
with him. Sometimes, she wasn't sure she'd ever even liked him. Their parents
had been friends-social equals-and distantly related. Both families
had delighted in the thought that someday the Grahams' only son and the
Nobles' only daughter would unite the two oldest and wealthiest families
in the county.
And despite his declarations
to the contrary, she doubted that Kent had ever really loved her. Oh, he
had wanted her, pursued her and scared away most of the other young men
who had shown an interest in her. He had wanted to marry her, to possess
her, to rule her, but he had never loved her. And when he'd realized that
even as his wife, she would never truly belong to him, his desire for her
had turned slowly to hatred.
