Someone's Watching (32 page)

Jeremy swerved back in front of the northbound car. The black car made it in behind them, just as the southbound car zipped by.

“Jeremy, you can’t outrun him in this car.”

“What choice do I have?”

“Pull over. Stop.”

“He won’t let me. He’ll run us off the road.”

Jeremy was gaining on another car in the northbound lane. Trees, water, trees, water—everything rushed by in a blur.

Jeremy accelerated and pulled into the southbound lane to pass, the black car pinned to his tail. There were several cars in the northbound lane, driving so close together it was impossible to get back
in between them. The old Honda was shaking. It didn’t have the power for this.

Another southbound car was approaching. Closer, closer. The lights brighter, brighter.

No opening between the cars in the northbound lane. Water and mangroves to the left. Crashing into the mangroves at this speed would likely kill them. Their only chance was to get in front of the first northbound car before they collided with the southbound car.

“Floor it,” Robbie screamed.

Jeremy was pressed forward against the steering wheel. The lights from the southbound car were blinding. Robbie felt the car swerve. She squeezed her eyes shut, grabbed the edge of her seat, and waited.

Behind her came the sound of screeching, then a crash. Then just the whirr of their car’s wheels against pavement.

Jeremy was slowing down.

Robbie opened her eyes and turned around. She could see a pile up of cars, but couldn’t tell how bad the accident was.

The black car was no longer on their tail.

The headlights from a southbound car brightened Jeremy’s face. It was wet with sweat.

In the distance, Robbie heard the sound of a siren. It got louder and louder, then went past them on their left.

She slumped back against her seat.

The siren got softer and softer.

Robbie watched Jeremy’s grandfather as he paced between the club chair and the draped window, hands clasped behind his back. The floorboards creaked as he went back and forth, back and forth. Otherwise the room was quiet, except for the ticking of the old clock above the piano. It was a little after eleven p.m.

Robbie and Jeremy sat beside each other on the sofa, their knees touching. Every once in a while Mr. Weiss would glance down the hallway. Then he’d shake his head and return to his pacing.

Elise and Kate were busy with something in the back of the house and still hadn’t come out, even though Robbie and Jeremy had arrived almost a half hour earlier.

Robbie’s wet sneakers were on the front porch and her feet were wrapped in a towel. Mr. Weiss had made them hot tea with honey, which Robbie and Jeremy drank while they filled him in on what had happened over the last day and a half. They realized with all that was going on, they could no longer keep Jeremy’s grandfather in the dark.

Mr. Weiss stopped pacing and pushed his glasses up on his nose. “You must call Detective Lieber.”

Jeremy shook his head. The bruise around his eye had turned black-and-blue. “She’ll arrest me. She’ll have no other choice.”

“But someone tried to kill you on the highway. If you tell her what happened, she can be looking for that person.”

“We can’t prove the black car was trying to run us off the road,” Robbie said. She took another sip of hot tea, but nothing helped. She was chilled through and through. “It will look as though we were running from the scene of the crime and caused the accident.”

“This is terrible,” Mr. Weiss said. “I don’t see a way out.”

“We have to figure out who else Mike was blackmailing,” Robbie said. “Until we do, and stop him, Kate’s at risk.”

“Wait,” Jeremy said, getting up from the sofa. “Maybe he’s no longer a threat.”

“Who?” his grandfather said, but Jeremy was already out of the room.

“The guy who was trying to run us off the road,” Robbie said, remembering the screech and pileup of cars behind them. “The murderer may have died or been seriously injured in the crash.”

Jeremy returned with a laptop and sat back down on the sofa next to Robbie. He logged on, the tapping of his fingers on the keyboard competing with the ticking clock.

“Okay. Good,” Jeremy said. “Here’s a report of the accident.”

Robbie leaned closer, trying to read.

“Five-car accident just north of Key Largo on Highway 1 at approximately ten p.m.,” Jeremy read aloud. He paused and let out a slow breath. “No fatalities and no one seriously injured.”

“So he’s still out there,” Robbie said. “And we have no idea who he is.”

A door opened at the other end of the house, followed by the sound of voices, then footsteps and the click of dog claws against the wood floor.

Elise came into the living room first like a mischievous elf. The old jeans and T-shirt she’d changed into were splattered with something black and her dark ponytail swung behind her.

“Okay, everyone. I’d like to present the real Kate Brooks.” Elise stood aside and made a flourish with her hands.

The frightened, nervous girl with platinum blonde hair and slate gray eyes was gone. The young woman who stepped into the room had shiny black hair, blue eyes, and a heart-shaped face. Her lips tugged up at the corners, accentuating her dimples.

Robbie’s throat constricted.

Kate was still wearing Robbie’s old jeans and T-shirt, but like Elise’s, they were splattered with hair dye. She looked at Robbie and her mouth drooped. “Is something wrong?”

“Oh, Kate,” Robbie said finally. She crossed the room and hugged her sister. For the first time in her life, Robbie was responsible for another human being. And the idea was humbling.

“My lips are still fat from the collagen injections they gave me,” Kate said, “but they’ll probably go back to normal over time.”

Collagen injections. And again Robbie was reminded of what Kate had suffered for almost two weeks.
Dad
, Robbie almost said.
We need to call Dad and tell him you’re all right
.

She thought about the last meeting with her father at South Pointe Park, about the accusations they threw at each other. And then, a few hours ago, Kate’s reluctance to have Robbie call him.

“You definitely look like sisters,” Elise said. “Almost like older and younger versions of identical twins.” She glanced from her brother to her grandfather. A crease appeared between Elise’s brows. “What’s wrong? Something else happened?”

“There are some complications,” Jeremy said.

Later
, Robbie thought.
She’d call their dad later
.

“The people who kidnapped Kate were running a blackmailing ring,” Jeremy said.

“I know,” Elise said. “Kate explained everything. We figured you went down to the house where she was kidnapped to look for the videos. Did you find any?”

“A few.”

“But we also found a couple of dead bodies,” Jeremy said. “And unfortunately, the police will think we killed them.”

“Oh no, Jeremy.” The smattering of freckles on the bridge of Elise’s nose became more pronounced as her face grew paler. “Not again. Please, not again.”

Jeremy’s grandfather looked away.

The ticking clock was the only sound.
Not again
.

“We want Kate to see the DVDs,” Robbie said. “To see what she remembers.”

Kate sat down on the corner of the sofa. She slipped off the sneakers, brought her knees up to her chest, then rested her head on her knees, making herself into a tight ball.

Elise glanced over at Kate, then back to Robbie. “Does she really have to watch them?”

“One of them may have the murderer on it,” Jeremy said.

“It’s okay.” Kate’s voice was muffled by her knees.

Robbie rummaged through her satchel and took out the DVDs. She’d only found five with the strange numbered labels on them.

Elise brought them over to the DVD player. “You’re sure the killer’s on one of these?”

“No,” Robbie said. “These were the only ones we found, but there could be others.”

Elise popped one into the DVD player, then sat on the floor next to Geezer. She brought the end of her ponytail around to her mouth.

Mr. Weiss glanced at Kate still huddled on the sofa, then left the room.

Background music came on, a pulsing South Beach beat, and the sound of a woman’s laughter. But the screen was white. Robbie realized it was a white sofa. And then something caramel-colored appeared. A back. A woman’s back. Then wild copper hair. The laugh again. The woman moved out of the way. The man was visible now.
A bald, older man with a double paunch, powerful calf muscles, and hairless limbs. He was completely naked, a glass in one hand, his eyes out of focus. The woman climbed onto his semi-flaccid penis.

“That’s right, baby,” she said. “Give it to me nice and slow.”

Robbie had sat down beside Kate. Kate glanced up at the screen, then put her head back down.

“I know him,” Jeremy said from his seat on the club chair.

“You know him?” Robbie asked.

“I mean I recognize him. He’s the CEO of some big corporation. He was one of the speakers at a motivational forum they had at the Convention Center a few weeks ago.” Jeremy’s eyes were fixed on the caramel-colored back bouncing up and down.

“Oooooo, baby. That’s sooooo good, baby.”

The man grunted.

Robbie turned away. Kate brought her hands up to her eyes.

“You can stop it now, Elise,” Robbie said.

She heard the click of the DVD player.

“What a perfect setup for Mike.” Jeremy leaned back against the club chair. “With his public relations business, he’d know who was in town and who to target. Whose career would be ruined if the video got out.”

“So the CEO may be the killer?” Elise took her ponytail out of her mouth and twirled it around her fingers.

“It’s possible,” Jeremy said. “But he was in town weeks ago. I think the blackmail victim would have reacted quickly to shut down the blackmailers. That’s why we should look for videos that Kate was in.”

Kate raised her head from her knees.

“We believe the blackmail victim is targeting everyone who knows about him,” Robbie said. “Trying to eliminate the video and anyone who might out it.”

“So Kate’s a target?” Elise asked.

“Kate was a target,” Robbie said. “But the victim would be looking for a blonde, gray-eyed girl named Angel, not Kate. Kate’s off the killer’s radar.”

“So we don’t have to worry about the killer going after anyone in this room, right?” Elise asked.

Jeremy looked at Robbie. She knew he was thinking about Robbie’s apartment.

“I don’t know that anyone actually broke into my apartment,” she said to him. “My neighbor saw someone outside and the cat was out, but nothing inside was touched. I think I let my imagination go when we thought Mike was involved. But Mike’s dead, and a blackmail victim has no reason to connect me with the videos.”

Jeremy nodded. “We’re all off the killer’s radar, Elise.”

“But we still need to find who’s behind the murders,” Robbie said. “Because right now, the police think Jeremy is.”

Jeremy got up and started walking back and forth between the club chair and the windows, where his grandfather had paced earlier. “Put in the next one.”

Elise popped the DVD out and put another in.

The next video played. More of the same. This one featured Tyra and another girl, but not Kate.

They hit pay dirt on the third one.

Jeremy leaned closer to the TV. “The congressman. So we were right that he was a blackmail victim.”

The bushy eyebrows and jowly face of Richard Griswold loomed in front of the camera. He was grotesquely shaped with a tank-like torso resting on skinny hairy legs. In the background, on a white sofa, sat Kate, Angel as she was known at the time. She was dressed like a little girl with pigtails and kneesocks.

Kate tightened back into a ball and turned her head away.

“No reason to watch this.” Elise popped the DVD out. “He’s already dead.”

She tried the fourth and fifth DVDs, but Kate wasn’t in either and the victims weren’t familiar to any of them.

“That’s it.” Elise turned off the TV and leaned against the ottoman. “Does this mean you’re out of leads?”

“Maybe.”

“But then the police will still think you’re involved,” Elise said.

Jeremy massaged the back of his neck. Like Robbie, he had scratches on his arms from the hedges around Mike’s house. “Could someone related to the congressman be getting even for his death?”

“That seems like a stretch,” Robbie said. “His whole family’s up north. I don’t see how they could have put such a bloodbath together from a distance.”

“Kate,” Jeremy asked, “do you know how many videos you were in?”

She lifted her head, shook it, then rested it back on her knees.

No one spoke.

“Maybe there’s something in the paper,” Elise said, finally.

“What do you mean?” Jeremy asked.

“Well, if it’s someone like the congressman or the CEO, then he’s probably in the news. Maybe Kate would recognize the man if she saw his picture.”

“Kate?” Jeremy asked.

She didn’t lift her head.

“Kate, can you help us here?”

She sat up slowly, releasing her knees.

“Okay, good,” Jeremy said. “We know the congressman was with you Friday; what about Saturday night? Did anyone come back with you then?”

Kate shook her head.

“Sunday?” Jeremy asked.

Kate nodded, almost imperceptibly. Was she afraid of something that happened Sunday?

“Good. What do you remember about him?”

She looked down at her bare feet.

“Kate?” Robbie said. “I know it’s hard for you to do this. But he may be the killer.”

Kate shook her head. “He isn’t. He was a nice guy. He wanted to help me.”

“He may have been a nice guy whose career was about to be ruined,” Jeremy said. “Maybe the video pushed him over the edge.”

Mr. Weiss came into the room carrying a stack of newspapers. So he’d been listening in, after all.

“Do you want to look through these, dear?”

Everyone waited for Kate to answer. What was bothering her? Finally, she held out her hands.