Presumed Guilty & Keeper of the Bride (19 page)

They stared at each other, caught in a binding fascination for each other’s transgressions, each other’s pain.
Killer and victim,
thought Miranda.
That’s what I see in her eyes. Is that what you see in mine?

The telephone rang, shattering the silence.

The sound seemed to rattle Jill. At once she turned and reached for the door. There she stopped. “You think you’re the exception, Miranda. You think you’re untouchable. Just wait. In a few years, when you’re my age, you’ll know just how vulnerable you are. We all are.”

She walked out, closing the door behind her.

At once Miranda slid the bolt home.

The phone had stopped ringing. Miranda stared at it, wondering if it had been Chase, praying that he would call again.

The phone remained silent.

She began to pace the living room, hoping Chase, Annie,
anyone
would call. Starved for the sound of a human voice, she turned on the TV. Mindless entertainment, that’s what she needed. For a half hour she sat on the couch among Annie’s discarded socks and sweatshirts, flicking nervously between channels. Opera. Basketball. Game show. Opera again. In frustration she flicked it back to basketball.

Something clattered in the next room.

Startled, she left the couch and went into the kitchen. There she found herself staring down at a plastic saucer rolling around and around on its side across the linoleum floor. It collapsed, shuddered and fell still. Had it tumbled off the drainboard? She looked up at the sink and noticed, for the first time, that the window was wide open.

That’s not the way I left it.

Slowly she backed away. The gun—Annie’s gun. She had to get it.

In panic she turned to make a dash for the living room—

And found her head brutally trapped, her mouth covered by a wad of cloth. She flailed blindly against her captor, against the fumes burning her nose, her throat, but found her arms wouldn’t work right. Her legs seemed to slide away from her, dissolving into some bottomless hole. She felt herself falling, caught a glimpse of the light as it receded into an impossibly high place. She tried to reach out for it but found her arms had gone numb.

The light wavered, shrank.

And then it winked out, leaving only the darkness.

Phillip was banging away at the piano. Rachmaninoff, Chase thought wearily. Couldn’t the boy choose something a little more sedate? Mozart, for instance, or Haydn. Anything but this Russian thunder.

Chase headed out to the veranda, hoping to escape the racket, but the sound of the piano seemed to pound right through the walls. Resignedly he stood at the railing and stared toward the harbor. Already sunset. The sea had turned to red flame.

He wondered what Miranda was doing.

Wondered if he’d ever stop wondering.

This morning, when they’d driven off in their separate cars, their separate ways, he’d known their relationship had gone as far as it could. To go any further would require a level of trust he wasn’t ready to give her. Their amateur detective work had come to a dead end; for now they had no reason to see each other. It was time to let the pros take over. The police, at least, would be objective. They wouldn’t be swayed by emotions or hormones.

They
still believed Miranda was guilty.

“Uncle Chase?” Cassie pushed through the screen door and came out to join him. “You can’t stand the music, either, I see.”

He smiled. “Don’t tell your brother.”

“It’s not that he’s a bad musician. He’s just…loud.” She leaned against one of the posts and looked up at the sky, at the first stars winking in the gathering darkness. “Think you could do me a favor?” she asked.

“What’s that?”

“When Mom gets home, will you talk to her? About the
Herald.
”

“What about it?”

“Well, with all that’s come up—about Jill Vickery, I mean—it’s beginning to look like we’ll need a strong hand on the helm. We all know Dad groomed Phillip to be the designated heir. And he’s a bright kid—I’m not putting him down or anything. But the fact is, Phillip’s just not that interested.”

“He hasn’t said much about it, one way or the other.”

“Oh, he won’t say anything. He’ll never admit the truth. That he’s not crazy about the job.” She paused, then said with steel in her voice, “But I am.”

Chase frowned at his niece. Not yet twenty, and she had the look of a woman who knew exactly what she wanted in life. “You think you have what it takes?”

“It’s in my blood! I’ve been involved from the time I could put pen to paper. Or fingers to keyboard. I know how that office works. I can write, edit, lay out ads, drive the damn delivery truck. I can
run
that paper. Phillip can’t.”

Chase remembered Cassie’s term papers, the ones he’d glanced through at the cottage. They weren’t just the chewing up and spitting out of textbook facts, but thoughtful, critical analyses.

“I think you’d do a terrific job,” he said. “I’ll talk to your mother.”

“Thanks, Uncle Chase. I’ll remember to mention your name when I get my Pulitzer.” Grinning, she turned to go back into the house.

“Cassie?”

“Yes?”

“What do you think of Jill Vickery?”

Cassie frowned at the change of subject. “You mean as a managing editor? She was okay. Considering what she got paid, we were lucky to keep her.”

“I mean, on a personal level.”

“Well, that’s hard to say. You never really get to know Jill. She’s like a closed book. I never had any idea about that stuff in San Diego.”

“Do you think she had an affair with your father?”

Cassie shrugged. “Didn’t they all?”

“Do you think she was hurt by it?”

Cassie thought this over for a moment. “I think, if she was, she got over it. Jill’s a tough cookie. That’s the way I’d like to be.” She turned and went into the house.

Phillip was still playing Rachmaninoff.

Chase stood and watched the last glow of sunset fade from the sea. He thought about Jill Vickery, about Miranda, about all the women Richard had hurt, including his own wife, Evelyn.

We’re lousy, we Tremain men,
he thought.
We use women, then we hurt them.

Am I any different?

In frustration he slapped the porch railing.
Yes, I am. I would be. If only I could trust her.

Phillip’s pounding on the piano had become unbearable.

Chase left the porch, walked down the steps and headed for his car.

He would talk to her one last time. He would look her in the eye and ask her if she was guilty. Tonight he would get his answer. Tonight he would decide, once and for all, if Miranda Wood was telling the truth.

No one answered Annie’s front door.

The lights were on inside, and Chase could hear the TV. He rang the bell, knocked, called out Miranda’s name. Still there was no answer. At last he tried the knob and found the door was unlocked. He poked his head inside.

“Miranda? Annie?”

The living room was deserted. A basketball game, unwatched, was playing out its last minute on the TV. A pair of Annie’s socks lay draped over the back of the sofa. Everything seemed perfectly normal, yet not quite right. He stood there for a moment, as though expecting the former occupants of the room to magically reappear and confront him.

The basketball game went into its fifteen-second countdown. A last-ditch throw, across the court. Basket. The crowd cheered.

Chase crossed the room, into the kitchen, and halted.

Here things were definitely not right. A chair lay toppled on its side. On the floor a saucer lay upside down. Though the kitchen window was wide open, an odor hung in the room, something vaguely sharp, medicinal.

Quickly he searched the rest of the house. He found neither Miranda nor Annie.

With growing panic he hurried outside and glanced up and down the street. Except for the far-off barking of a dog, the evening was still.

No, not quite. Was that the sound of a car engine running? If seemed muffled or distant. He circled around the house and saw a small detached garage in back. The door was shut. The sound of the car engine, though still muffled, seemed closer.

He started toward the garage. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he sighted a flicker of movement. He turned just in time to spy a shadow slipping away, blending into the darkness.

This time, you bastard,
Chase thought,
you don’t get away from me.

Chase sprinted off in pursuit.

He heard his quarry dodge left, toward a thick hedge of bushes. Chase, too, veered left, scrambled over a low stone wall and broke into a sprint.

The fleeing shadow burst through the hedge and made a sharp right, into a neighboring yard littered with garden tools. Chase, intent on capture, didn’t notice his quarry had swept up a rake. It came flying at him through the darkness.

Chase ducked. Tines first, it flew over his head, then clattered into a wheelbarrow behind him. Chase leaped back to his feet.

His quarry grabbed a pickax, flung it.

Again Chase dodged. He heard the whoosh of air as the lethal weapon looped past. By the time he’d recovered his balance the figure was off and running again, toward a stand of trees.

He’ll be lost in the shadows!
thought Chase. He mustered a final burst of speed, drew within reach. His quarry was tired. He could hear the other man’s ragged breaths. Chase launched himself forward, grabbed a handful of shirt and held on.

His quarry, instead of trying to pull free, spun around and charged like a bull.

Chase was flung backward, into a tree. The shock lasted only an instant. Rage, not pain, was his first response. Shoving away from the tree, he flung himself at his attacker. Both men fell off balance, went skidding across the wet leaves. The attacker punched, and the blow caught Chase in the belly. With a new strength born of fury, Chase slammed his fist blindly at the squirming shadow. The man groaned, tried to lash out. Chase hit him again. And again.

The man went limp.

Chase rolled away from the body. For a moment he sat there, catching his breath, wincing at the pain in his knuckles. The other man was still alive—he could hear him breathing. Chase grabbed the inert figure by the legs and dragged him across the leaf-strewn lawn, toward a faint pool of light from a distant porch lamp. There he knelt to see who his prisoner was. In disbelief he stared at the face, now revealed.

It was Noah DeBolt. Evelyn’s father.

Thirteen

T
he steady growl of an engine slowly penetrated Chase’s numbed awareness. The car in the garage…the closed door…

That’s when the realization hit him. He lurched to his feet.

Miranda.

He sprinted across the yard to the garage. A cloud of fumes assailed him as he pushed through the door. Miranda’s car was parked inside, its engine still running. In panic, he flung open the car door.

Miranda lay sprawled across the front seat.

He switched off the ignition. Coughing, choking, he dragged her roughly out of the car, out of the garage. It terrified him how lifeless she felt in his arms. He carried her to the lawn and laid her down on the grass.

“Miranda!” he yelled. He shook her hard, so hard her whole body shuddered. “Wake up,” he pleaded. “Damn you, Miranda. Don’t you give up on me. Wake up!”

Still she didn’t move.

In panic he slapped her face. The brutality of that blow, the sting of her flesh against his, shocked him. He laid his ear to her breast. Her heart was beating. And there it was—a breath!

She groaned, moved her head.

“Yes!” he shouted. “Come on. Come on.” She sank back into unconsciousness. He didn’t want to do it, but he had no choice. He slapped her again.

This time she moved her hand, a reflexive gesture to ward off the savage blows. “No,” she moaned.

“Miranda, it’s me! Wake up.” He brushed back her hair, gently took her face in his hands and kissed her forehead, her temples. “Please, Miranda,” he whispered. “Look at me.”

Slowly she opened her eyes. They were dazed and full of confusion. At once she lashed out blindly, as though still fighting for her life.

“No, it’s me!” he cried. He held her, hugged her tightly against him. Her frantic thrashing grew weaker. He felt the panic melt from her body until she lay quietly in his arms.

“It’s all over,” he whispered. “All over.”

She pulled away and stared up at him with a look of bewilderment. “Who…”

“It was Noah.”

“Evelyn’s
father?
”

Chase nodded. “He’s the one who’s been trying to kill you.”

“You have no right to hold me, Lorne. You understand?
No right.
” Noah, his face bruised an ugly purple, stared at his accusers. Through the closed door came the sounds of the police station: the clack of a typewriter, the ringing phone, the voices of patrolmen headed out for night duty. But here, in the back room, there was dead silence.

Quietly Lorne said, “You’re not in any position to pull rank, Noah. So talk to us.”

“I don’t have to say a thing,” said Noah. “Not until Les Hardee gets here.”

Lorne sighed. “Legally speaking, yeah, you’re right. But it would sure make things easy if you’d just tell us why you tried to kill her.”

“I didn’t. I went to her house to talk to her. I heard the car running in the garage. I thought maybe she was trying to kill herself. I started to go in, to check on it. Then Chase showed up. I guess I panicked. That’s why I ran.”

“That’s all you were doing there? Just paying Ms. Wood a visit?”

Noah gave him an icy nod.

“In a getup like that?” Lorne nodded at Noah’s black shirt and trousers.

“What I wear happens to be my concern.”

“Chase says differently. He says you dragged her in the garage, left her there and started the car.”

Noah snorted. “Chase has a little trouble being objective. Especially where Miranda Wood is concerned. Besides,
he
attacked
me.
Who the hell’s got the bruises, anyway? Look at my face. Look at it!”

“Seems to me you both got some pretty good bruises,” said Lorne.

“Self-defense,” claimed Noah. “I had to fight back.”

“Chase thinks you’re the one who’s been going after her. That you set fire to her house. Drove at her with a stolen car. And what about tonight? Was that supposed to be a convenient little suicide?”

“She’s got him all twisted around. Got him taking her side. The side of a murderer—”

“Who’s the guilty party here, Noah?”

Noah, sensing he’d said too much already, said abruptly, “I’m not going to talk till Les gets here.”

In frustration Lorne crumpled his paper coffee cup in his fist. “Okay,” he said, dropping into a chair. “We can wait. As long as it takes, Noah. As long as it takes.”

“It’s not going to stick,” said Miranda. “I know it won’t.”

They sat huddled together on a bench in the intake area. Ellis Snipe had brought them coffee and cookies. Perhaps it was his way of personally atoning for the ordeal the police had put them through. So many questions, so many reports to be filed. And then, halfway through the interrogation, Dr. Steiner had shown up, called in by Lorne to check on her condition. In the guise of a medical exam, he had practically assaulted her with his stethoscope.
Breathe deep, damn it! Gotta check your lungs. You think I like making all these house calls? This keeps up, you two will have to put me on retainer!

The questions, the demands, had left her exhausted. It was all she could manage, to sit propped up against Chase’s shoulder. Waiting—for what? For Noah to confess? For the police to tell her the nightmare was over?

She knew better than that.

“He’ll get out of it,” she said. “He’ll find a way.”

“This time he won’t,” said Chase.

“But I never saw his face. I can barely remember what happened. What can they charge him with? Trespassing?” Miranda shook her head. “This is Noah DeBolt we’re talking about. In this town, a DeBolt can get away with murder.”

“Not Richard’s murder.”

She stared at him. “You think he killed Richard? His own son-in-law?”

“It’s starting to fall together, Miranda. Remember what that lawyer FitzHugh told us? The real reason Richard gave Rose Hill to you? It was to keep the land out of Evelyn’s control.”

“I don’t see what you’re getting at.”

“Who’s the one person in the world Evelyn listens to? Trusts? Her
father.
Noah could have talked her into selling the land.”

“You think this is all for control of Rose Hill? That’s not much of a motive for murder.”

“But the threat of bankruptcy is. If his investment collapsed, Noah would be left holding acres of land he could never develop. Worthless land.”

“The north shore? Then you think Noah was the money behind Stone Coast Trust.”

“Which makes Tony Graffam nothing but a front man. A patsy, really. My guess is, Richard found out. He had those financial records from Stone Coast, remember? The account numbers, the tax returns. I think he matched one of those accounts to Noah.”

“Richard could have ruined him right then and there,” she pointed out. “All he had to do was run the story in the
Herald.
But he canceled it.”

“It’s the way their relationship worked, Richard and Noah. They were always out to cut each other down. But not in public,
never
in public. It was a private rivalry, just between them. That’s why Richard didn’t print the article. It would’ve exposed his own father-in-law. And brought the family’s dirty linen out into the public eye.”

Miranda shook her head. “We’ll never prove it. Not after Noah’s lawyer gets through with the smoke and mirrors. You’ve been away from this island too long, Chase. You’ve forgotten how it is. The DeBolts, they’re the equivalent of gods in this town.”

“Not any longer.”

“Then there’s the matter of evidence. How do you prove he killed Richard?” She sighed, an admission of defeat. “No,
I’m
the convenient suspect. The one they’ll convict.” She sat back wearily. “The one they’ll put away.”

“That won’t happen, Miranda. I won’t let it happen.”

Their gazes met. For the first time she saw what she’d been longing to see in his eyes. Trust. “Then you think I’m telling the truth.”

“I know you’re telling the truth.” He touched her face. As his hand stroked down the curve of her cheek she closed her eyes and felt herself melting, flowing like warm liquid against him. “I think I’ve known it all along. But I was afraid to admit it. Afraid to consider the other possibilities….”

“It wasn’t me, Chase. It wasn’t.” She slid into his arms and there she found warmth and courage, all the courage she’d somehow lost in these past soul-battering days.
Believe me,
she thought.
Never stop believing me.

They were still locked in that embrace when Evelyn Tremain walked in the station door.

Miranda felt Chase stiffen against her, heard his sharp intake of breath. Slowly she raised her head and turned to see Evelyn and the DeBolt family attorney, Les Hardee, standing a few feet away.

“So it’s come to this, has it?” Evelyn said quietly.

Chase said nothing.

“Where is my father?” said Evelyn.

“In the room down the hall,” said Chase. “He’s talking to Lorne.”

“Without me?” cut in the attorney. He headed swiftly down the hall, muttering, “A clear violation of rights….”

Evelyn hadn’t moved. She was still staring at them. “What sort of lies are you spreading about my father, Chase?”

Slowly Chase stood to face her. “Only the truth, Evelyn. It may be hard to take, but you’ll have to accept it.”

“The
truth?
” Evelyn let out a disbelieving laugh. “An officer calls me, tells me my father’s been arrested for assault. Assault?
Noah DeBolt?
Who’s lying, Chase? My father? You?” She looked at Miranda. “Or someone else?”

“Lorne will explain the charges. You’d better talk to him.”

“Because you won’t? Is that it? Oh, Chase.” She shook her head. “You’ve turned your back on your own family. We love you. And look how you hurt us.” She turned, faced the corridor. Softly she said, “I just hope Lorne has the good sense to know the truth when he hears it.” Taking a deep breath, she started down the hall.

“Wait here,” Chase said to Miranda.

“What are you going to do?”

He didn’t answer. He just kept walking away, in pursuit of Evelyn.

Stunned, Miranda watched him vanish around the corner. She heard a door open, then close behind him, shutting her out. She wondered what was going on in that room, what words were being exchanged, what deals forged. She had no doubt there
would
be deals, declarations of Noah’s innocence. His attorney would do his best to twist the story around, make it seem like some crazy misunderstanding. Somehow they’d manage to make Miranda look like the guilty party.

Please, Chase,
she thought.
Don’t let them sway you. Don’t start doubting me again.

She stared down the hall and waited.

And she feared the worst.

“The charges are preposterous,” said Evelyn. “My father’s never broken a law in his life. Why, if he gets too much change back from a clerk, he’ll go across town to return it. How can you accuse him of assault, much less attempted murder?”

“Mr. Tremain here has the bruises to prove it,” said Lorne.

“So does my client!” cut in Les Hardee. “All that proves is, they traded blows in the dark. A case of mistaken identity. Two men blindly duking it out. At the very worst, you can accuse my client of idiotic behavior.”

“Thanks a lot, Les,” grunted Noah.

“The point is,” said Hardee, “you can’t hold him. The damage—” he glanced at Chase’s bruised face, then at Noah’s face, even more bruised “—appears to be mutual. And as for that nonsense about trying to kill Miranda Wood, well, where’s your evidence? She was facing a jail term. Of course she was depressed. Of course she’d consider suicide.”

“What about the fire?” pointed out Chase. “The car that almost ran her down? I was there, I saw it.
Someone
’s trying to kill her.”

“Not Mr. DeBolt.”

“Does he have alibis?”

“Do
you
have evidence?” Hardee shot back. He turned to Lorne. “Look, let’s call a halt to this farce. I’ll take the responsibility. Release Mr. DeBolt.”

Lorne sighed. “I can’t.”

Evelyn and Hardee stared at the diminutive chief of police.

“I’m afraid there
is
evidence,” said Lorne, almost apologetically. “Ellis found a bottle of chloroform behind the garage. That kind of argues against suicide, doesn’t it?”

“Nothing to do with me,” said Noah.

“Then here’s some more evidence,” cut in Chase. It was time to gamble, time to shoot the wad. He was going to make a guess here; he only hoped it was the right one. “You know that money from the Bank of Boston? That hundred thousand dollars used to bail out Miranda Wood? Well, I had a banker friend of mine slip into the computer. Match that money transfer to an account.”

“What?” Lorne turned to Chase in surprise. “You know who paid the bail?”

“Yes.”
Here goes,
thought Chase. “Noah DeBolt.”

It was Evelyn who reacted first, with a rage that transformed her face into an ugly mask. The look was directed at her father. “You did
what?
”

Noah said nothing. His silence was all Chase needed to back up his hunch. Right on target.

“It can be officially confirmed,” said Chase. “Yes, it was your father who paid the bail.”

Evelyn was still staring at Noah. “You let her out?”

Noah’s head drooped. In an instant he’d been transformed into a very old, very tired-looking man. “I did it for you,” he whispered.

“For me? For
me?
” Evelyn laughed. “What other favors have you done for me, Daddy?”

“It was for you. Everything was for you—”

“You crazy old man,” muttered Evelyn. “You must be going senile.”

“No.”
Noah’s head shot up. “I would’ve done anything, don’t you see? I was protecting you! My little girl—”

“Protecting me from what?”

“From yourself. From what you did….”

Evelyn turned away in disgust. “I don’t know what the hell he’s raving about.”

“Don’t turn your back on me, young lady!”

“You can see he needs a doctor, Lorne. Try a psychiatrist.”

“This is the thanks I get!” Noah roared. “For keeping you out of
prison?
”