After Dark (41 page)

    "That day, the day Kent died,
I'd left her in the garden to go into the kitchen and ask Mrs. Russell to
prepare us some iced tea, but when I returned Mary Martha had disappeared.
At first, I was frightened when I couldn't find her, but then as I neared
the row of shrubs that separate our property from the Nobles', I heard
her talking to Kent. I walked through the wooden arbor in the middle of
the hedge, and that's when I saw-" Edith sucked in a deep breath.''Kent
was on his knees, obviously drunk, and Mary Martha had Will's baseball
bat in her hands. She was striking him with it, and before I could reach
her, she hit him in the head repeatedly."

    Edith gulped down tears. "She
kept saying, 'You made me kill my baby. You made me kill my baby.' "

    "And Will saw what happened,
too," Lane said. "He just doesn't remember it all. Not yet.
That's why he… You weren't asking him what he'd done; you were asking Mary
Martha. She's the one he heard crying." Lane shook her head sadly as
the truth became crystal clear. "Why did you put us all through this
nightmare when you could have admitted the truth? Mary Martha wasn't
responsible for what she did. She wouldn't have gone to prison."

    "She would have spent the
rest of her life in a mental institution," Edith said. "I couldn't
allow that to happen."

    Johnny Mack rose to his feet and
faced Lane. "Call T. C. Now. I'll stay with Miss Edith. And while
you're at it, call James. She's going to need a lawyer."

    "Right. I'll check on Mrs. Russell
and see if I can get her to go downstairs. T. C. must have been delayed
by something. He should have gotten here by now." When Lane found
the housekeeper just where she bad left her, she asked her if she wanted
to go downstairs, to her own room, but the woman refused to budge.

    '’I should go back in there and
see to Miss Edith. That poor woman." Mrs. Russell sobbed quietly.
Miss Mary Martha dead. Sweet, pitiful child."

    "Yes, Miss Mary Martha is dead."

    "I suppose she's better off,
but it's such a shock. When I first saw her, I thought she was just sleeping,
but then Miss Edith told me she was dead… I shouldn't have screamed, but I
couldn't help it. I was so shocked."

    "It's all right." Lane
patted Mrs. Russell on the back. "I'm sure Johnny Mack could use some
help seeing to Miss Edith. He's going to stay with her while I make some
phone calls."

    Lane helped the housekeeper to
her feet, then gave her a pat on the back before she went in search of a
telephone in one of the bedrooms. Just as she started to enter the nearest
room, she heard something downstairs. Footsteps on the marble floor
in the foyer? Maybe T. C. had finally arrived.

    Lane flew down the stairs, but came
to an abrupt halt when she saw Buddy Lawler waiting for her at the bottom.
He's the chief of police, she reminded herself. Even if he doesn't want
to arrest Miss Edith, he'll have no choice. And once he learns that she
has killed Mary Martha-Buddy will go crazy when he finds out that the girl
he's loved since they were kids has been murdered by her own mother.

    "What are you doing here?"
Buddy asked.

    Lane took several tentative
steps farther down the stairs. "I could ask you the same question."

    "T. C. told me about your telephone
call," he said. "I told him that I'd handle the situation."

    "Then, T. C. isn't coming?"

    "Whatever police business
there is here, I'll be the one to handle it."

    "All right." A peculiar
uneasiness settled in Lane’s stomach. "But I'd think it would be
easier if you let T. C. arrest Miss Edith." Why was Buddy so pale? Why
was he sweating profusely when the temperature was only in the low eighties
today? And why were his hands trembling? Lane stopped at the foot of the
stairs, instinct warning her that she couldn't trust Buddy, that even if
he was a policeman, his first loyalty was and always had been to the Graham
family and not to upholding the law.

    "Get Miss Edith a glass of water,"
Johnny Mack instructed the housekeeper.

    Mrs. Russell nodded, hurried into
the adjoining bathroom and returned with a glass, which she handed to
her employer. Then she glanced at Johnny Mack. "I can't believe that
Miss Mary Martha's really dead. But she is, isn't she?"

    "Yes," he replied.

    Mrs. Russell clasped her hands together
and shook her head sadly. "She was fine earlier today. But this afternoon
when I brought her a nice bowl of ice cream, she was…" Mrs. Russell
nodded to the bowl which lay in the middle of the floor, its melted chocolate
contents staining the area rug. "She enjoyed a little treat in the afternoons."
The housekeeper continued shaking her head. "I panicked when
Miss Edith told me that Miss Mary Martha was dead. I didn't mean to scream.
I just don't understand what happened. How did she the?"

    "She was smothered,"
Edith said quite calmly, then lifted a satin pillow from the floor.
"With this."

    ‘’Oh, Lord have mercy!" Mrs.
Russell said.

    "Why did you do it?"
Johnny Mack asked. "How could you have killed her?"

    '’I… You think I smothered Mary
Martha?" Edith gazed at him, an expression of surprised disbelief
on her face. "I didn't kill my daughter. He did."

    "Who did?" Johnny Mack asked,
fear clawing at his throat.

    "Buddy did. He said that he
killed her because he loved her. He did it to protect her, to keep her
from spending the rest of her life locked up in a mental hospital."

    "Buddy did this?"

    "Yes, he did it because he loves
her so dearly. Everything he's done, he's done to protect her, just as I
have. He killed Jackie when she overheard a conversation between
Buddy and me and she tried to blackmail us. And he shot you. And he tried
to kill Will."

    "And you knew what he was doing
and didn't do a thing to stop him."

    "By the time I realized just
what lengths he'd go to in order to keep the truth from coming to light, it
was too late for me to do anything. Buddy and I were in this together. I
couldn't turn him in without revealing that Mary Martha had killed
Kent.

    "I had no idea that he'd actually…
that he would take her pillow and smother her. I followed him upstairs
and found him doing it. I tried to stop him, tried to pull the pillow off
her face, but-" Edith broke down and flung herself across her daughter's
lifeless body.

    "Stay here with Miss
Edith," Johnny Mack told a stunned Mrs. Russell.

    The police had to be alerted that
their chief was a murderer. Buddy Lawler was a dangerous man, one whose
actions were unpredictable. Lane was alone downstairs. Lillie
Mae and Will were alone next door. And no local policeman would question
the chief if he showed up at either house. Johnny Mack's guts tightened,
and he sensed danger close by. He had to get to Lane. Now.

    When he reached the landing, he
heard voices.

    Lane was talking to someone. A
man. He stopped at the head of the stairs and looked down into the foyer.
Buddy Lawler glanced up at him, and their gazes locked for a split second.

    "Johnny Mack is upstairs
with Miss Edith." Lane lifted her foot and eased backward, up one
step. "Let me tell him that you're here."

    Buddy rushed Lane before Johnny
Mack could reach her. He clamped his hand over her mouth, twisted her arm
behind her back and dragged her off the stairs and into the foyer.

    "Don't hurt her!" Gut-wrenching
fear dampened Johnny Mack's face with perspiration as he ran down me
stairs.

    "You stop right where you are,
Cahill," Buddy warned.

    Johnny Mack froze to the spot, halfway
down the stairs, halfway to Lane. "Let her go. You don't want to add
another murder to the list, do you? Lane's never done a thing to
you."

    Buddy unsnapped his holster.
Johnny Mack realized he could never make it to Lane in time. He was too
far away. He watched helplessly as Buddy withdrew his Magnum and aimed
the weapon at Lane's head.

    Buddy eased his hand away from Lane's
mouth and down to her throat. "Tell your lover goodbye."

    "Buddy, please, you don't want
to hurt me." Lane spoke to her abductor, but her gaze settled on
Johnny Mack's face.

    "You're right, I don't want to
hurt you," Buddy said. "But I didn't want to hurt Mary Martha either.
I had no choice. I did what I had to do. She was too sweet, too fragile to
endure years in a mental hospital. I knew she'd rather be dead than to
go through that."

    "You killed Mary Martha?"
Lane gasped.

    Trembling from head to toe, Buddy
tightened his hold on Lane and dragged her backward, toward the partially
open front door. Johnny Mack waited until Buddy had taken Lane outside
before he ran the rest of the way down the stairs. He had to find a way to
stop Buddy. The man wasn't thinking straight; he was acting irrationally.
There was no telling what he would do next. Where the hell was T. C? He should
have been here by now. A blood-chilling thought crossed Johnny Mack's
mind-what if T. C. had told Buddy about Lane's call and that was why he had
shown up? What if T. C. wasn't on his way to the Graham house?

    If only he had a weapon of some
sort, a way to stop Buddy. If he rushed Buddy, the man was liable to kill Lane.

    "Here, take this."

    Johnny Mack whirled around at the
sound of the familiar female voice. Miss Ethth stood a few feet away,
a rifle in her hand. She held it out to him.

    "It's one of your daddy's rifles,"
she said. "I went up to the attic and got it and loaded it for you. Take
it and do what you have to do to save Lane. There's been too much killing.
It's got to stop. For Will's sake."

    His mind jumbled with confusing
thoughts and mixed emotions. He grabbed the rifle and ran. Outside, in
the driveway, Buddy tried to force Lane into his car, but she struggled
with him. Where the hell did Buddy think he was going? Had the man completely
lost his mind?

    Johnny Mack knew that he had one
chance. One shot to save Lane. If he missed, Buddy would kill her. And if
that happened, nothing else mattered. In that one split second he understood
how Miss Edith must feel. With both of her children dead, what did she have
to live for?

    He had handled a gun all his life.
Wiley Peters had taken him hunting every year during deer season. And Judge
Brown, who had been an avid hunter, had trained him to be a sportsman.
But this was the first time someone's life depended upon his marksmanship-
Johnny Mack prepared quickly. No time for anything except action. Getting
his quarry in his sights, he drew in and held a deep breath, then aimed and
fired.

    Lane had been opposed to Will visiting
Miss Edith at the jail, but her son had insisted that he wanted to see his
grandmother. She supposed Will would always think of Kent's mother that
way. Even knowing the part she had played in the recent events that had resulted
in death and tragedy for so many, Will's kind heart urged him to comfort a
woman whom he had once loved so dearly. Perhaps in her own way, Miss Edith
still loved Will, too.

    Johnny Mack waited with Lane, he a
tower of strength in comparison to her being little more than a bundle
of nerves. In the past twenty-four hours since Miss Edith had confessed
to helping cover up the truth concerning Kent's murder and the subsequent
actions Buddy Lawler had taken to shield Mary Martha, James Ware had,
despite Edith's icy cold attitude, stood staunchly at her side. He had
hired his wife a high-priced lawyer out of Atlanta, made funeral arrangements
for his stepdaughter and found time to plead with Johnny Mack and Lane
not to turn him in to the police.

    "Give me a chance to return
the money I stole from Edith," James had said. "All I want, all
I've ever wanted was to be with Arlene. We can find a way to make it just
fine without Edith's money."

    But even now, Miss Edith kept the deepest,
darkest family secret The sordid little tale of incest and a child conceived
in that sinful act. Neither she nor Johnny Mack saw any need to reveal
that truth, not when it could serve no purpose.

    Lane would never forget how close
she had come to dying, how easily Buddy Lawler could have pulled the trigger.
She owed her life to Johnny Mack. He had killed a man to protect her. And in
an odd way, she had Miss Edith to thank. After all, her former mother-in-law
had provided Johnny Mack with the weapon.

    T. C. Bedlow walked alongside
Will, bringing him out from the holding cells in the back of the building
into the heart of the police station. The apologetic sergeant had bowed
and scraped and said I'm sorry a dozen times over, and they had assured
him that they didn't hold him responsible. After all, he'd had no way of
knowing that Buddy had snapped and become a danger to those around him.
No one had even suspected.

    "I'm ready to leave
now," Will said as he approached his parents.

    "How did it go with Miss
Edith?" Lane asked.

    "Okay, I guess." Will
shrugged. "She's got herself a lawyer coming in from Atlanta. A guy
named Steve Whitaker. He's supposed to be every bit as good as Quinn
Cortez."