Presumed Guilty & Keeper of the Bride (21 page)

She turned and gazed up at the last flight of stairs.

“Go on,” said Annie.

Miranda began to climb.

Fourteen steps, each one a fleeting eternity. Fourteen lifetimes, passing, gone. Frantically she tried to visualize the roof, the layout, the avenues of escape. She’d been up there only once, when the news staff had gathered for a group photo. She recalled a flat stretch of asphalt, punctuated by three chimneys, a heating duct, a transformer shed. Four stories down—that would be the drop. Would it kill her? Or was it just high enough to leave her crippled on the sidewalk, a helpless mound of broken bones, to be dispatched with a few blows by Annie?

The door to the roof loomed just above. If she could just get through that door and barricade it, she might be able to buy time, to scream for help.

Only a few steps more.

She stumbled and fell forward, catching herself on the stairs.

“Get up,” said Annie.

“My ankle—”

“I said, get up!”

Miranda sat on the step and reached down to massage her foot. “I think I sprained it.”

Annie took a step closer. “Then crawl if you have to! But get up those stairs!”

Miranda, her back braced firmly against the step, her legs wound up tight, calmly kept rubbing her ankle. And all the time she thought,
Closer, Annie. Come closer….

Annie moved up another step. She was standing just below Miranda now, the gun frighteningly close. “I can’t wait. Your time’s run out.” She raised the gun to Miranda’s face.

That’s when Miranda raised her foot—in a vicious, straight-out kick that thudded right into Annie’s stomach. It sent Annie toppling backward down the stairs, to sprawl on the third-floor landing. But even as she fell she never released the gun. There was no opportunity to wrestle away the weapon. Annie was already rising to her knees, gun in hand. Her aim swept up toward her prey.

Miranda yanked open the rooftop door and dashed through just as Annie fired. She heard the bullet splinter the door, felt wood chips fly, sting her face. There was no latch, no way to bolt the door shut. So little time, so little time! Fourteen steps and Annie would be on the roof.

Miranda glanced wildly about her, could make out in the darkness the silhouette of chimneys, crates, other unidentifiable shapes.

Footsteps thudded up the stairs.

In panic Miranda took off into the shadows and slipped behind a transformer shed. She heard the door fly open, heard it bang shut again.

Then she heard Annie’s voice, calling through the darkness. “There’s nowhere to run, Miranda. Nowhere to go but straight down. Wherever you are, I’ll find you….”

Chase spotted it from a block away: Miranda’s old Dodge, parked in front of the
Herald
building. He pulled up behind it and climbed out. A glance through the window told him the car was unoccupied. Miranda—or whoever had driven it here—must be in the building.

He rattled the front door to the
Herald.
It was locked. Through the glass he saw a lamp burning on one of the desks. Someone had to be inside. He banged on the door and called, “Miranda?” There was no answer.

He rattled the door again, then started around to the back of the building. There had to be another way in, an unlocked window or a loading door. He had circled the corner and was moving down one of the alleys when he heard it. Gunfire.

It came from somewhere inside the building.

“Miranda?” he yelled.

He wasted no more time searching for unlocked entrances. He grabbed a trash can from the alley, carried it around to the front of the building and hurled it through the window. Glass shattered, flying like hail across the desks inside. He kicked in the last jagged fragments, scrambled over the sill and dropped onto a carpet littered with razorlike shards. At once he was running past the desks, moving straight for the back of the building. With every step he took he grew more terrified of what he might find. Images of Miranda raced through his head. He shoved through the first door and confronted the deserted print shop. Newspapers—the next issue—were bundled and stacked against the walls. No Miranda.

He turned, moved down the hall to the women’s lounge. Again, that surge of terror as he pushed through the door.

Again, no Miranda.

He turned and headed straight into the women’s rest room, pushing open stall doors. No one there.

Ditto for the men’s room.

Where the hell had that gunshot come from?

He ran back into the hall and started up the stairwell. Two more floors to search. Offices on the second floor, storage and news file rooms on the third. Somewhere up there he’d find her.

Just let me find you alive.

Miranda hugged the side of the transformer shed and listened for the sound of footsteps. Except for the hammering of her own heart she heard nothing, not even the softest crunch of shoes on asphalt.
Where is she? Which way is she moving?

Quickly Miranda glanced to either side of her. Her eyes had began to adjust to the darkness. She could make out, to the left, a jumble of crates. Right beside them were the handrails of a fire escape. A way off the roof! If she could just make it to that edge, without being seen.

Where was Annie?

She had to risk a look. She crouched down and slowly inched toward the corner. What she saw made her pull back at once in panic.

Annie was moving straight toward the transformer shed.

Miranda’s instinct told her to run, to attempt a final dash for freedom. Logic told her she’d never make it. Annie was already too close.

In desperation she scrabbled for a few bits of gravel near her feet. She flung it high overhead, aiming blindly for the opposite end of the roof. She heard it clatter somewhere off in the darkness.

For a few terrifying seconds she listened for sounds—any sounds. Nothing.

Again she edged around the corner of the transformer. Annie was following the sound, toward the opposite edge of the roof, stalking slowly toward one of the chimneys. A few steps farther. One more…

Now was her chance—her only one! Miranda ran.

Her footsteps sounded like drumbeats across the asphalt roof. Even before she reached the fire escape she heard the first gunshot, heard the whine of the bullet as it hurtled past. No time to think, only move! She scrambled for the fire escape, swung her leg over onto the first metal rung.

Another gunshot exploded.

The bullet’s impact was like a punch in the shoulder. Its force sent her toppling sideways, over the roof’s edge. She caught a dizzying view of the night sky, then felt herself falling, falling. Instinctively she reach up, clawed blindly for a handhold. As she tumbled over the edge of the fire escape landing, her left hand closed around cold steel—the railing. Even as her legs slipped away, dangling beneath her like dead weights, her grip held. She tried to reach up with the other arm but it wouldn’t seem to obey her commands. She could only raise it to shoulder height, and then her hand closed only weakly around the outside edge of the landing. For a second she clung there, her feet hanging uselessly. Then she managed to brace one foot against the brick face of the building.
Still alive, still here!
she thought.
If I can just pull myself over the rail—get back onto the landing…

The flicker of a shadow moving just above made her freeze. Slowly she lifted her gaze and stared into the gun barrel. Annie was standing at the roof’s edge, aiming directly at Miranda’s head.

“Now,” said Annie softly. “Let go of the fire escape.”

“No. No—”

“Just open your fingers. Lean back. A fast and easy way to die.”

“It won’t work. They’ll find out! They’ll know you did it!”

“Jump, Miranda.
Jump.
”

Miranda stared down at the ground. It was so far away, so very far.

Annie swung one leg over the roof’s edge, aimed her heel at Miranda’s hand gripping the rail and stamped down.

Miranda screamed. Still she held on.

Annie raised her heel, stamped again, then again, each blow crushing Miranda’s left hand.

The pain was unbearable. Miranda’s grip loosened. She lost her foothold, was left dangling free. Her left hand, throbbing in agony, could stand the abuse no longer. Her right hand, already weak and growing numb from the bullet wound, didn’t have the strength to hold her weight. She gazed up in despair as Annie raised her heel and prepared to stamp down one last time.

The blow never fell.

Instead, Annie’s body was jerked up and backward, like a puppet whose strings have been yanked all at once. She let out an unearthly screech of rage, of disbelief. And then there was a thud as her body, hurled aside, slammed onto the rooftop.

An instant later Chase appeared at the roof’s edge. He leaned over and grabbed her left wrist. “Take my other hand! Take it!” he yelled.

Bracing her feet against the brick wall, Miranda managed to raise her right arm. “I can’t…can’t reach you….”

“Come on, Miranda!” He leaned farther, his body stretching over the edge. “You have to do it! I need both your hands! Just reach up, that’s all! I’ll grab it, darling. Please!”

Darling.
That single word, one she’d never heard before on his lips, seemed to spark some new source of strength deep inside her. She took a breath and strained toward the heavens.
That’s as far as I can go,
she thought in despair.
No farther.

That’s when his hand closed around her wrist. At once she was held in a grip so tight she never feared, even for an instant, that she would fall. He dragged her up and up, over the roof’s edge.

Only then did her strength give out. She had no need of it now, not when Chase was here to lend her his. She tumbled into his arms.

No tree had ever felt so solid, so unbendable. Nothing, no one could hurt her in the fortress of those arms. He said, “My God, Miranda, I thought—”

Instantly he fell silent.

A pistol hammer clicked back.

They both spun around to see Annie standing a few feet away. She wobbled on unsteady legs. With both hands she clutched the gun.

“It’s too late, Annie,” said Chase. “The police know. They have your final letter. They know you killed Richard. Even now they’re looking for you. It’s over.”

Annie slowly lowered the gun. “I know,” she whispered. She took a deep breath and looked up at the sky. “I loved you,” she said to the heavens. “Damn you, Richard.
I loved you!
” she screamed.

Then she raised the gun, put the barrel in her mouth and calmly pulled the trigger.

Fifteen

T
his time the ministrations of cranky Dr. Steiner were insufficient. Only a hospital—and a surgeon—would do. An emergency ferry run was ordered and Miranda was loaded aboard the
Jenny B
with Dr. Steiner in attendance. The hospital in Bass Harbor was alerted to an incoming patient: gunshot wound to the right shoulder, patient conscious and oriented, blood pressure stable, bleeding under control. The
Jenny B
pulled away from the dock with two passengers, a crew of three and a corpse.

Chase wasn’t aboard.

He was at that moment fidgeting in a chair in Lorne Tibbetts’s back office, answering a thousand and one questions. A command performance. A woman, after all, was dead; an investigation was called for; and as Lorne so succinctly put it, the choice was between talk or jail. All the time Chase sat there, he was wondering about the
Jenny B.
Had it reached Bass Harbor yet? Was Miranda stable?

Would Lorne ever finish with the damn questions?

It was two in the morning when Chase finally walked out of the police station. The night was warm, warm for Maine, anyway, but he felt chilled as he walked to his car. No more ferries to Bass Harbor tonight. He was stranded on the island until morning. At least he knew that Miranda was out of danger. A phone call to the hospital had told him she was resting comfortably, and was expected to recover.

Now he wondered where to go, where to sleep.

Not Chestnut Street. He could never sleep under Evelyn’s roof again, not after the damage he’d done to the DeBolt family. No, tonight he felt rootless, cut off from the DeBolts, from the Tremains, from the legacy of his rich and haughty past. He felt born anew. Cleansed.

He got in the car and drove to Rose Hill.

The cottage felt cold, devoid of life or spirit, as if any joy that had ever existed within had long since fled. Only the bedroom held any warmth. This was where he and Miranda had made love. Here the memory of that night, that one night, still lingered.

He lay on the bed and tried to conjure up the memory of her scent, her softness, but it was like trying to catch your own reflection in water. Every time you reach out to hold it, it slips from your grasp.

The way Miranda had slipped from his grasp.

She’s not one of us,
Evelyn had once said.
She’s not our kind of people.

Chase thought of Noah, of Richard, of Evelyn. Of his own father. And he thought,
Evelyn’s right. Miranda’s not our kind of people.

She’s far better.

“Happy endings,” said Miss St. John, “are not automatic. Sometimes one has to work for them.”

Chase took the advice, and the cup of coffee she handed him, in silence. The advice was something he already knew. Hadn’t experience taught him that happy endings were what you found in fairy tales, not real life? Hadn’t his own marriage proved the point?

But this time it will be different. I’ll make it different. If only I could be certain I’m the one she wants.

He sipped his cup of coffee and absentmindedly scratched Ozzie’s wild black mop of hair. He didn’t know why he was petting the beast, except that Ozzie seemed so damn appreciative. A glance at his watch told Chase he had plenty of time to catch the twelve-o’clock ferry to Bass Harbor. To Miranda.

All night he’d lain sleepless in bed, wondering about their chances, their future. The specter of his brother couldn’t be so easily dispelled. Just a few short weeks ago Richard had been the man she loved, or thought she loved. Richard had taken her innocence, used her, nearly destroyed her.
And now here I am, another Tremain. After what Richard did to her, why should she trust me?

Events, emotions had moved at lightning speed these past few days. A week ago he had called her a murderess. Only hours ago he had come to accept her innocence as gospel truth. She had every right to resent him, to never forgive him for the things he’d once said to her. So many cruel and terrible words had passed between them. Could love, real love, grow from such poisoned beginnings?

He wanted to believe it could. He had to believe it could.

But those doubts kept tormenting him.

When Miss St. John had come knocking at the cottage door at ten o’clock with an offer of coffee and a morning chat, he’d almost welcomed the intrusion, though he suspected her invitation was inspired by more than neighborly kindness. Word of the night’s goings-on must already be buzzing about town. Miss St. John, with her mile-long antennae, had no doubt picked up the signals and was probably curious as hell.

Now that she’d been brought up to date, she was going to offer an opinion, whether he wanted to hear it or not.

“Miranda’s a lovely woman, Chase,” she said. “A very kind woman.”

“I know,” was all he could answer.

“But you have doubts.”

He sighed, a breath that seemed weighted with pain and uncertainty. “After all that’s happened…”

“People are entitled to make mistakes, Chase. Miranda made one with your brother. It wasn’t a terrible sort of mistake. It had nothing to do with cruelty or bad intentions. It had only to do with love. With misjudgment. The mistake was real. But the emotions were the right ones.”

“But you don’t understand,” he said, looking up at her. “My doubts have nothing to do with her. It’s
me,
whether she can forgive me. For being a Tremain. For being this symbol of everything, everyone who’s ever hurt her.”

“I think Miranda’s the one who’s searching for forgiveness.”

He shook his head. “What should I forgive
her
for?”

“You have to answer that.”

He sat in silence for a moment, rubbing the ugly head of that ugly dog.
What do I forgive you for? For showing me the real meaning of innocence. For making me question every stuffy notion I was brought up to believe in. For making me realize I’ve been an idiot.

For making me fall in love with you.

With sudden determination he put down his coffee cup and rose to his feet. “I’d better get going,” he said. “I’ve got a ferry to catch.”

“And then what happens?” asked Miss St. John, walking him to the door.

Smiling, he took her hand—the hand of a very wise woman. “Miss St. John,” he said, “when I find out, you’ll be the first to know.”

She waved as he headed out to his car. “I’ll count on it!” she yelled.

Chase drove like a crazy man to the ferry landing. He arrived an hour early, only to find a long line of cars already waiting to board. Rather than risk missing the sail, he decided to leave his car and board as a foot passenger.

Two hours later he walked off onto the dock in Bass Harbor. No taxis here; he had to hitch a ride to the hospital. By the time he strode up to the patient information desk, it was already two-thirty.

“Miranda Wood,” said the volunteer, setting down the phone receiver, “was discharged an hour ago.”

“What?”

“That’s what the floor nurse said. The patient left with Dr. Steiner.”

Chase felt ready to punch the desk in frustration. “Where did they go?” he snapped.

“I wouldn’t know, sir. You could ask upstairs, at the nurses’ station, second floor.”

Chase was about to head for the stairwell when he suddenly glanced up at the wall clock. “Miss—what time does the ferry return to Shepherd’s Island?” he asked.

“I think the last one leaves at three o’clock.”

Twenty minutes.

He hurried outside and glanced up and down the street for a taxi, a bus, anything on wheels that might take him to the landing. They
had
to be at the landing. Where else would she and Dr. Steiner go, except back to the island?

It was the last ferry of the day and he’d never catch it in time.

Happy endings are not automatic. Sometimes one has to work for them.

Okay, damn it,
he thought.
I’m ready to work. I’m ready to do anything it takes to make this turn out right.

He took off at a sprint down the street. It was two miles to the ferry landing.

He ran every step of the way.

The deckhand yelled, “All aboard!” and the engines of the
Jenny B
growled to life.

Standing at the rail, Miranda stared out over the gray-green expanse of Penobscot Bay. So many islands in the distance, so many places in the world to run to. Soon she’d be on her way, leaving memories, good and bad, behind her. There was just this one last journey to Shepherd’s Island, to tie up all those loose ends, and then she could turn her back on this place forever. It was a departure she’d planned weeks ago, before Richard’s murder, before the horrors of her arrest.

Before Chase.

“I still say it was an idiotic idea, young lady,” said Dr. Steiner, hunched irritably on a bench beside her. “Checking out just like that. What if you start to bleed again? What if you get an infection? I can’t handle those complications! I tell you, I’m getting too old for this business. Too old!”

“I’ll be just fine, Doc,” she said, her gaze focused on the bay. “Really,” she said softly, “I’ll be just fine….”

Dr. Steiner began to mutter to himself, a grumpy monologue about disobedient patients and how hard it was to be a doctor these days. Miranda scarcely listened. She had too many other things on her mind.

A quiet exit, some time alone—yes, all in all, it was better this way. Seeing Chase again would be too confusing. What she needed was escape, a chance to analyze what she really felt for him. Love? She thought so. Yes, she was
sure
of it. But she’d been wrong before, terribly wrong.
I don’t want to make the same mistake, suffer the same consequences.

And yet…

She gripped the railing and gazed off moodily at the islands. The wind had come up and it whistled across the water, blew its cold salt breath against her face.

I do love him,
she thought.
I know I do.

But it’s not enough to make a future.
Too much stood in the way. The ghost of Richard. The shadow of mistrust. And always, always, those metaphorical train tracks on whose wrong side she’d grown up. It shouldn’t make a difference, but then, she was merely Miranda Wood. Perhaps, to a Tremain, it made
all
the difference.

“Bow line’s free!” called the deckhand.

The engines of the
Jenny B
throttled up. Slowly she pivoted to starboard, to face the far-off green hillock that was Shepherd’s Island. The deckhand strode the length of the boat and released the stern line. Just as it slipped free there came a shout from the dock.

“Wait! Hold the boat!”

“We’re full up!” yelled the deckhand. “Catch the next one.”

“I said
hold up!
”

“Too late!” barked the deckhand. Already the
Jenny B
was pulling away from the dock.

It was the deckhand’s sharp and sudden oath that made Miranda turn to look. She saw, far astern, a figure racing toward the end of the pier. He took a flying leap across the growing gap of water and landed with only inches to spare on the deck of the
Jenny B.

“Son of a gun,” marveled the deckhand. “Are you nuts?”

Chase scrambled to his feet. “Have to talk to someone—one of your passengers—”

“Man, you must want to talk
real
bad.”

Chase took a calming breath and glanced around the deck. His gaze stopped at Miranda. “Yeah,” he said softly.

“Real bad.”

Miranda, caught standing against the rail, could only stare in astonishment as Chase walked toward her. The other passengers were all watching, waiting to see what would happen next.

“Young man,” snapped Dr. Steiner. “If you sprained your ankle, don’t expect me to fix it. You two and all your damn fool stunts.”

“My ankle’s fine,” said Chase, his gaze never leaving Miranda. “I just want to talk to your patient. If it’s all right with her.”

Miranda gave a laugh of disbelief. “After a leap like that, how could I refuse?”

“Let’s go up front.” Chase reached for her hand. “For this, I don’t need an audience.”

They walked to the bow and stood by the rail. Here the salt wind flew at them unremittingly, whipping at their clothes, their hair. Above, gulls swooped and circled, airborne companions of the plodding
Jenny B.

Chase said, “They told me you checked out early. You should have stayed in the hospital.”

Miranda hugged herself against the wind and stared down at the water. “I couldn’t lie in that bed another day. Not with so many things hanging over me.”

“But it’s over, Miranda.”

“Not yet. There’s still that business with the police. And I have to settle with my lawyer.”

“That can wait.”

“But I can’t.” She raised her head and faced the wind. “I want to leave this place. As soon as I can. Any way I can.”

“Where are you going?”

“I don’t know. I’ve thought about heading west. Jill Vickery walked away from her past. Maybe I can, too.”

There was a long silence. “Then you’re not staying on the island,” he said.

“No. There’s nothing here for me now. I’ll be getting the insurance money from the house. It will be enough to get me out of here. To go some place where they don’t know me, or Richard, or anything that happened.”

The water broke before the bow of the
Jenny B
and the spray flew up, misting their faces.

“It’s not an easy thing,” she said, “living in a town where they’ll always wonder about you. I understand now why Jill Vickery left San Diego. She wanted to wash away the guilt. She wanted to get back her innocence. That’s what I want back, Chase. My innocence.”

“You never lost it.”

“Yes, I did. That’s what you thought. What you’ll always think of me.”

“I know better now. I have no more questions, Miranda. No more doubts.”

She shook her head. Sadly she turned away. “It’s not as easy as that, to bury the past.”

“Okay, so it’s not.” He pulled her around to face him. “It’s never easy, Miranda. Love. Life. You know, just this morning, Miss St. John said a very wise thing to me. She said happy endings aren’t automatic. You have to work for them.” He reached up and framed her face in his hands.