Cold Fear (37 page)

The first thing she noticed was a light on, down at the beach house. She sure as heck hoped her mother wasn’t down there cleaning for any last-minute guests. That was the service industry for you, hard work, constant interruptions, and snarky members of the public thinking you were their slave. Izzy turned off the engine and listened to the hot metal ping as it cooled.

Her mother was pregnant with her fourth child—unfortunately her mom had miscarried the two she’d conceived after Izzy and, after all these years, this was a miracle baby. Now in her ninth month of pregnancy everything looked good, but no one was taking any chances. Izzy got out and dumped her purse on the front step, heading around the side of the house to see what was going on. She followed the path that linked the two properties, hidden behind a row of sage bushes that rustled softly in the breeze.

She smiled when she saw her father’s SUV parked down beneath the rental cottage. He’d been away on a sales trip, but must have come home early. She frowned when she heard raised voices. Her father saying something like “
it
isn’t what you think.
” And her mother was screaming at him. Words that didn’t make any sense.
Murderer. Evil. Monster.
Izzy’s heart banged in a nervous staccato.

What was going on? Her parents never argued. They were perfect together, but this was a humdinger. They didn’t know she was there. She was torn between giving them privacy and stopping them before someone said something unforgivable or her mother got upset and went into premature labor.

Izzy started to jog forward when an ear-shattering scream pierced the night, followed by an indescribable gurgling sound. She stopped dead for a moment and almost backed up in fear before realizing something terrible had happened to one of her parents.

Running, she rounded the corner and found her mother kneeling on the ground with her father’s head propped against her distended stomach, rocking him back and forth.

“Oh, Will. Will. I’m so sorry…” Tears streamed down her mother’s cheeks, glistening in the reflection of the porch light.

“Mom?” But her mother didn’t hear her.

What on Earth is going on?

Izzy watched in horror as a dark stain spread over her dad’s shirt. He wasn’t moving. He wasn’t breathing. A horrible chill started in her core and expanded outwards until it pushed against the inside of her skin, panic threatening to burst out.

“Mom!” It felt like her voice was coming from far away. “What happened? What’s wrong with Dad?” She wanted to run and call the ambulance but her feet wouldn’t move.

“Izzy?” Her mother blinked, coming out of her fugue state with a snap.

“What did you do, Mom?” Izzy asked.

Her mother looked at the man on the ground. Her husband. Izzy’s father. Then she blinked and started crying. “It was an accident. I didn’t mean to hurt him. I was scared…I thought he was going to kill me.”

Her dad wasn’t a violent man. This didn’t make any sense.

“I’m going to run up to the house and call 911, okay? You stay put and see if you can stop the bleeding.”

“You can’t do that. You mustn’t!” Her mother’s eyes grew huge, and she started rocking back and forth.

“He’s going to die if I don’t,” Izzy said sharply. But somehow she knew it was already too late. There was too much blood for her dad to still be alive. She was rooted to the spot in shock and horror. Her mother had just murdered her father. Tears filled her eyes, and she had to concentrate with all her might not to start screaming. If she did she might never stop.

“You don’t understand what he’s done.” Her mother pointed at the car beside her.

Slowly, Izzy walked around. The rear door of the SUV was raised and inside, a naked girl lay curled up on a sheet of plastic, partly hidden by a blanket. Izzy blinked. It was like she’d been thrown into the middle of a horror movie with no idea as to what her lines were. The girl’s hands and feet were bound with duct tape. Tape also covered her mouth. She was obviously dead.

Izzy’s legs started to shake. “I-I don’t understand, Mom.”

“He came home half an hour ago. I was asleep at the house, but I heard his car, and I saw him come down here to the beach house. He’d mentioned he was going to fix the pilot light on the gas boiler in case we got any last minute bookings. My back was sore so I thought I’d take a walk.” She sniffed, tears flowing down her cheeks and dripping onto Izzy’s father’s hair.

“I found him bending over that poor woman in the trunk.” Her mother’s breath rattled in her chest. Izzy felt the echo inside her own. “He tried to deny it, but how could he deny anything?” Her mom’s voice grew strident, but her eyes lost focus. “I accused him of being the serial killer the police are looking for on the mainland and he
laughed
at me! Then he lunged toward me.” She finally focused on Izzy again. “I stabbed him with this.” Her left hand groped in the sand before raising a long screwdriver. Crimson blood coated the shaft and handle.

Izzy’s thoughts crackled inside her head like there was interference in the atmosphere and she couldn’t understand the conversation. But she could. She knew exactly what had happened. Her mother had murdered her father with a screwdriver because she thought her father was a serial killer. She looked back at the pale glimmering corpse of the woman in the trunk. A thick silver chain encircled her wrist. A medical alert bracelet.

Gore rose up inside Izzy’s throat, burning the soft tissue of her gullet. Every nightmare she’d ever had paled next to this new grim reality. She went over and felt for the pulse in her father’s neck. Searched frantically for a few long seconds before recognizing the vacant eyes for what they really were. Dead.

A wave of absolute dread hit her. “We need to call the cops, Mom.”

“No.” Her mother climbed awkwardly to her feet, holding her baby bump with her right hand. “No.”

“Mom, we have to tell the cops.” Revulsion and grief raced through her as she looked at her beloved father. “They’ll know you did this in self-defense. It was an accident.”

“No. They’ll take away my baby!” Her mother backed up a step, shaking her head. “Do you know what will happen when they find out your father was a killer? Do you think they’ll believe we didn’t know about it? We’ll be pariahs, shunned.” She rubbed the hand holding the screwdriver over her belly in a way that disturbed Izzy.

“How could I not know I was married to a monster?
Oh, God
, I
loved
a monster. A monster who slept in my bed every night and fathered my children.”

Izzy’s father was a murderer…she couldn’t believe it. There had to be some mistake but the girl in the trunk said otherwise.

“We
have
to tell the cops, Mom,” Izzy insisted. She pointed to the bodies. “What else are we going to do? Bury them in the sand dunes?” She was being sarcastic, but her mother started nodding.

“Yes. That’s exactly what we’re going to do.”

“Err, no. That’s nuts.” Izzy flinched when her mother grabbed her arm, short fingernails digging into her flesh. She waved the bloody screwdriver. “Do you know what he did to those girls? Look at her.” Her mom spun her around and pointed at the bound naked girl. “He kidnapped her. Raped her. And then he killed her. Do you think she’s the only one? Do you know what will happen to us? I’ll be arrested and questioned. I’ll probably lose this baby or she’ll be born in prison. You’ll have to take care of her. Is that what you want?”

Izzy scrubbed her shaking hands over her face. She didn’t want any of this. Her mother was verging on hysteria and no wonder. The community of Rosetown was close-knit and superstitious. Gossip and speculation about everyone’s private business was a way of life here, but they’d deal with it.

“We still have to go to the cops, Mom. They’ll know what to do.”

Her mother backed up, cradling her stomach. “If you do that, Izzy, if you tell anyone, I’ll kill myself.” The screwdriver rose to hover near the tender skin of her neck. “I can’t live with the idea that your father…that he lied to me and I was foolish enough to believe him.” Her eyes bulged.

“You’re not thinking straight, Mom.”

Her mother placed the screwdriver against her throat. “I’m not kidding, Izzy. I can’t live with the idea other people will find out what he did. What I did.” Her eyes flashed to the dead man on the ground.

Izzy’s hands clenched and unclenched. She couldn’t believe this was happening. She’d gone from being a normal teen sneaking out to a party to being on the verge of losing everyone she loved, and she hadn’t even gotten over losing Shane yet. Her mother was clinging to the narrowest edge of sanity. She was all Izzy had left, and she carried an innocent baby inside her who needed protecting.

Her mother’s hand tightened on the handle of the screwdriver.

“Stop,” said Izzy, swallowing down hard. “We’ll do it your way. I’ll move the car a bit so we don’t have to carry him—” Her voice stumbled over the distant pronoun. “
Him,
” not dad or daddy. “
Him
” said with an inflection of hatred, of abhorrence. “We don’t want to drag him so far. Don’t strain yourself,” she warned, thinking of the baby.

Izzy hauled her father sideways and then pushed him up on top of the dead girl.

“We’ll need to get rid of this car after we get rid of the body,” her mother told her.

God. Izzy wanted to vomit as her father’s blood soaked into her t-shirt. She couldn’t believe she was doing this. Izzy eyed her mother’s bloodstained nightgown. “I’ll go get us a change of clothes from the house, and some rubber boots. You get a shovel from the shed. I’ll fetch your coat. You follow me in the van and we’ll go out to Parson’s Point.” They were about to slap a protection order on the dunes, which meant the chances of the bodies being discovered would be reduced. She needed to get her mom through the next couple of weeks. Keep her healthy enough to have her baby. Then she’d persuade her to go to the cops and tell the truth.

Izzy ran into the main house. She knew nothing would ever be the same again. Hopefully God could forgive her for what she was about to do, because she sure as hell would never be able to forgive herself.

*     *     *

F
RAZER CAREFULLY BROUGHT
Isadora back into the present, trying to figure out how this affected things. The case. Not them. There was no them. Had he really considered a relationship? Stick to sex—apparently, it really was the only non-job related thing he was good at.

She blinked awake, quickly going from seventeen-year-old girl in a panic, to mature woman with years of life experience. Her green eyes went to him as she shifted herself carefully into a sitting position. Even though she looked awkward and uncomfortable, he didn’t offer to help.

“I should have told you this as soon as they found Helena.” Her voice was croaky.

“Yes.”

She flinched.

What the hell did she expect?

“Will you promise me one thing?”

Seriously
? She was asking for promises?

“Talk to Kit for me. Explain it isn’t her fault.”

Frazer hardened his heart. Had she seduced him on purpose? Had she been snooping to see what they discovered? “You should have told the police years ago.”

She nodded. “I know. I ran away instead.” She looked remarkably composed now. As if unburdening herself had lifted her guilt. Well, lucky fucking her.

“You left a mentally unstable killer in charge of an infant?”

Isadora’s mouth tightened. “My mother wasn’t unstable, she was overwrought that night. I watched her with Kit after she was born, and she was a great mom. I would never have gone away if I thought she’d hurt a baby.”

He raised a skeptical brow. “How did you explain your father’s absence?”

“She told people Dad left her. After a year or so she told them she’d heard he died.”

“People accepted it?”

“She was the local here. Yes,” she rubbed her arms, “people accepted it.”

“Did Ted know?”

He stared at her and realized that although she looked calm on the outside she was actually trembling. She hid her feelings well. So did he.

She shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

Someone knew. His eyes narrowed.

“Are you going to arrest me?” she asked in a very small voice.

“I don’t know yet. I need you to keep this information to yourself for now—”

“But Ferris Denker might be innocent.”

“He was never innocent!” Frazer lost it then. This was one of the things Denker had kept up his sleeve, and he wasn’t about to let him use it to save his sorry ass. “You know when they caught him, Denker? He had a woman in his trunk?”

She nodded, probably remembering the woman in her father’s trunk—Beverley Sandal.

“Was the woman in your father’s car mutilated in any way?”

Her eyes flashed in surprise. “What? No.”

“Then you’re right, Ferris Denker probably didn’t kill Beverley Sandal.” He drew in a long breath to steady himself. “When the highway patrol pulled Ferris Denker over with a broken taillight they noticed he had blood on his jacket. That’s because Denker’s sexual proclivities included cutting off women’s breasts. The woman in the trunk? He cut off her breasts while she was still alive.”

Isadora’s throat worked convulsively, but he was done with hiding the exact shape of Ferris Denker’s monster.

“He had one breast in each of his jacket pockets, placed in freezer bags. When the officers searched his house they found a freezer full. When he confessed, he told detectives he liked to suck on women’s tits. He’d take his victims’ breasts out of the freezer, and he’d suck on the nipples while he jacked off to the memories of torturing them. He. Was. Never. Innocent!” His voice shook the room and he realized he was shouting and Isadora was crying with Barney pressed against her.

Christ. He dragged his hands over his face and drew in another breath because what he was about to say would probably hurt her even more. “But I think your father may have been innocent.”

Her chin came up. “What?”

“In case you hadn’t noticed, there’s another serial killer operating right here on the Outer Banks.”