The Murders at Astaire Castle (A Mac Faraday Mystery) (12 page)

David swallowed with guilt. “I don’t remember our planning two children and picking out their names.”

“I may have neglected to tell you about that part of our plans.” A slow grin crossed her lips.

“I fulfilled my part of the plan,” he noted. “I’m Spencer’s chief of police—just not the way I planned it to happen.”

“Like either of us had a clue about anything when we made those plans,” she said. “Neither of us had ever been out there, David. We had no idea of how the world worked. How can you save the world if you don’t know how it works? Who goes to fix an oven without figuring out how it works first?”

“I’ve never fixed an oven,” David said.

“I have,” she said. “Because I’ve learned how to take care of myself.” She laughed. “
You
taught me that—by sleeping with Katrina and dumping me—you forced me to grow up and for that I can thank you.”

Laughing, she grasped him by the arms. “David, before you dumped me, I couldn’t get my hair cut without getting at least five opinions—yours holding the most weight—and then taking votes. Overnight, I had to stand on my own two feet. If things had gone according to my plans, I never would have been strong enough to handle Riley’s disappearance and Mom’s death.”

“So you don’t hate me?” David held his breath.
Is this a trap? Is she drawing me into a false sense of security to shoot me? Is she armed?

“I did,” she confessed. “For the longest time, I hated your guts. I hated the very sight of you. But then, when I had my accident, and I was lying alone in bed all those months, I had a lot of time to think about my life and I saw how it all happened. By you betraying me the way you did, you forced me to grow up—it made me strong enough to survive and make me who I am today—a pretty cool chick if I must say so myself.”

He grinned at her. “You are pretty cool.”

Flashing him a grin, she placed her hands on her hips, wiggled her shoulders, and looked down at her bosom. “Even if I am flat-chested?”

David felt his cheeks turn red. She had a good memory. He joined in her laughter.

To his surprise, she took his hand and leaned in to whisper into his ear. “Thank you for ruining my life, David O’Callaghan.”

Her eyes met his. The electricity between them excited him. The old feelings he had for her were still there and they were as thrilling as they had been before.

When he moved in to bring his lips to hers, she jerked away to turn her attention to the dogs. “Molly, come! Time for bed.” Instantly, the white German Shepherd was at her side. Together, they went inside.

David whirled around to face her before she could close the door. “I hate the name Justin.”

“Then I guess you got lucky with Katrina in more ways than one.” She closed the door.

Gnarly touched his cold nose to David’s hand and uttered a whine.

“Looks like you got left out in the cold, too, Gnarly.”

“I need you to find someone,” Mac was telling Archie, who was reading a book on her side of the bed. With a pleading look, he laid his head on her shoulder and gazed up at her.

Enticed by the prospect of a job in his investigation, Archie quickly set the book aside. “Who?”

“Rafaela Diaz,” Mac said. “She was the Wagner’s housekeeper. She’d found the bodies. She was so freaked out that Pat O’Callaghan allowed her to go back to Brazil.”

“Now you want to find her,” Archie said. “Since this is an active case, isn’t that Bogie’s job?”

“Bogie’s looking,” Mac said, “but he doesn’t think there will be much luck. She’s from a small village in Brazil—according to the file, a primitive village where they are big into voodoo.”

“Which means they probably don’t have much in the way of paper trails.” She cocked an eyebrow in his direction.

“They had enough for her to make her way to America and Deep Creek Lake,” Mac said. “She was legal and had a passport at the time. After the murders, she went running back home.”

“What about Riley?” Archie asked. “Do you think he witnessed the murders?”

“That’s very up in the air,” Mac said. “I’ve had witnesses like him in the past.”

“You never told me you encountered wolf men before.” With a giggle, she looked down at him.

“I mean mentally ill,” Mac said, “never to the degree of Riley, but out there. I don’t hold out much hope that he can be any help to us, let alone prove that he didn’t kill them. I’m hoping Rafaela can help us catch the real killer.”

She picked up her book and returned to the page she had been reading. “Well, without a road trip to Brazil, it’ll be a challenge finding her.”

He grinned back up at her. “And you love challenges.”

“That I do.”

Mac noticed a book in her hand. “What are you reading?”

“One of your mother’s books.”

“Have I read it?”

“Doubt it,” she said. “This is one of her later books. Mickey Forsythe and Diablo are working on a case of a murdered horror writer …”

“Sounds familiar.” Mac squinted to read some of words on the page she was reading.

“There’s a missing book that the writer is hiding from his crooked publisher so that he can’t get his hands on it until after their contract expires. You see once the contract expires then the writer can take it to another publisher. I just read where Diablo found it.”

“Diablo?” Mac buried his face into her neck and breathed in her scent. “The dog?”

“Yes,” she giggled. “Guess where he found it?”

Taking the book out of her hands, Mac did not answer. He tossed the book to the floor.

“Does that mean you don’t want to know where he found it?” Seeing the look in his eyes as he rolled over to pin her down onto the bed, she said, “I guess you aren’t interested in talking about great works of literature right now.”

With a wicked grin across his face, Mac shook his head.

“Oh, I love it when you get that twinkle in your eye.” She reached up to turn off the light.

Chapter Twelve

Something was wrong. Mac felt it as soon as he woke up. It was still dark outside, as it had been since the onset of autumn. That added an even more ominous tone to the start of the day when he woke up with the feeling that something wasn’t right.

Gnarly. … Gnarly isn’t jumping up and down on my chest.
Mac glanced over at the clock. 06:05 am.
Where is that dog?

The bedroom door was open. Mac threw the comforter aside and slipped into his lounging pants. After picking up his bathrobe, he knelt to peer under the bed where Gnarly made his den. He wasn’t there.

Gnarly would wake me up if something was going on … unless he couldn’t.

The thought crossed Mac’s mind that something had happened to Gnarly. He couldn’t remember hearing the shepherd come to bed. With a glance over at where Archie was curled up under the comforter, he recalled that he was too preoccupied to notice. Mac put on his robe and slipped the handgun he kept in the bed stand drawer into his pocket.

At the top of the stairs, he heard a soft voice drifting up from the kitchen below. As he made his way down the stairs, he recognized it to be singing. A soft smile came to his lips when he remembered how his adopted mother used to sing in the kitchen. Recognizing Chelsea’s voice and the scent of fresh brewed coffee, Mac relaxed and pressed the kitchen door open.

Fully dressed in a running suit complete with jacket and cap, Chelsea was sitting at the kitchen table with a German shepherd on either side. “Oh, did I wake you?” She tossed a couple of capsules into her mouth and washed them down with cranberry juice.

“Actually, Gnarly not waking me up is what woke me up.” Mac hurried over to the coffee maker to pour a cup of coffee. “Good morning. How did you sleep?”

“Great,” she replied in a cheerful tone. “I’m going to go running. Do you want to come?”

The thought of going running during the sunrise made Mac laugh. “Are you going with David?”

She laughed. “I didn’t think he’d be up this early.”

“Don’t be so sure.” Before Mac could explain, David was knocking on the kitchen door. Like Chelsea, he was dressed in a running suit.

Seeing David, Gnarly jumped to his feet and ran to the hook where his leash hung. Taking the end of the leash into his mouth, he yanked it down and trotted over to the door when Mac opened it.

“David takes Gnarly with him when he goes running in the morning,” Mac explained while inviting him in. “That’s why I thought the two of you were running together.” He told David, “Chelsea is going running, too.”

“Be serious.” David took the leash from Gnarly.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Chelsea asked.

With a smile, David knelt to clip the leash to Gnarly’s collar. “Back in school,” he told Mac, “Chelsea refused to do anything that would make her sweat.”

Her eyes narrowed to almost transparent slits. She stood up from the table. “School was a long time ago. I start every day with a run now.”

“How far?” David laughed. “Half a block?”

“Five miles.” She sauntered up to him. “And now nothing turns me on more than a good hard sweat.” She pushed through the kitchen door. “Come on, dogs. Let’s show him.”

Molly and Gnarly, with his leash trailing behind him, galloped out after her.

“I think you just got challenged,” Mac said.

Gnashing his teeth, David hurried out after her.

“Ah, young love,” Mac mused while pouring a second mug of coffee to take upstairs to Archie. “I prefer a different type of exercise on a chilly morning.”

“Want to race?” David caught up with Chelsea outside, where she was stretching in the circular driveway in front of the manor. Sitting with her legs spread out in front of her, she was lying practically flat out in between them. He didn’t recall her being so limber.

“Do you find it uncomfortable—my being here I mean?” she asked.

“No, do you?”

“To tell you the truth, I wouldn’t have taken Mac up on his offer if I had known you lived in the guest cottage. You’d think it would be awkward.”

“Like you said last night, what happened between us was a long time ago,” David said. “You’re not the same person you used to be, and neither am I.” He turned to prop his foot up on the top step of the porch and stretched out to touch his toes. He could feel her gaze on his back. “You even like to sweat now. That’s big.”

Her blonde eyebrows almost met in between her eyes. Her eyes narrowed to slits. “Why is Mac so nice? Why does he let you live here?”

David considered revealing their familial relationship as half-brothers, which would have revealed his father’s early relationship with Robin Spencer. Uncertain, he shrugged. “Mac used to be a homicide detective. He understands what it’s like. That’s something we share.” He swallowed. “Mac’s my best friend. We’ve got each other’s back.”

Her lips curled into a smirk. “I’m glad. I like both him and Archie. It’s good to have people who care about you.”

“Do you have friends like that in Annapolis?” David bent over to touch his toes.

“Kind of.”

David stood up. “What do you mean by ‘kind of?’” Watching her, he took a chance to ask, “What about Roger?”

Chelsea laughed. “He’s my boss and you scared the daylights out of him. I’ll be lucky if I have a job when I get back.”

“He shouldn’t scare so easily.”

“David,” she said, “you were packing a gun. Roger wasn’t.”

“I wasn’t going to shoot him,” David said.

“He didn’t know that,” she said.

He smirked. “I know.”

“You like that. You’ve always liked doing that.”

He turned to her. “Like what.”

She stepped up to him. “Intimidating people. Playing mind games with them. The only reason you want to race is to put me in my place by humiliating me like you always did before.” She poked him in the chest. “It’s not going to happen. I’m not the immature, insecure little girl who let you win because I was afraid I’d lose you.”

“You never let me win at anything.”

“Huh! Lot you know. Every chess match we used to have …”

“Never!”

“If I wasn’t such a wuss,” she chuckled, “I would have checked your mate at will every time.”

Molly had a look of pride as she sat at attention while watching her owner smirk at the male human who dared to challenge her.

“Like you could beat me in a race?” he asked. “Remember, I was an officer in the Marines.”

“Desk jockey.”

“No, special forces,” David countered with his hands on his hips. “And I’m still in the reserves.”

“I run three marathons a year just for fun.” She stepped up to lock her glare on his.

“I could beat you with one leg tied behind my back.”

“Wanna bet?”

“Bet,” he said.“Loser takes the winner out on a date—winner’s choice.” He pointed to the bridge in the distance. “We run to the bridge, cross the lake and come back. First one back here wins. That’s four miles.”

A slow grin crossed her face, starting at one corner of her lips and crossing over to the other side. One eyebrow cocked up to form an upside-down “V”. She spit into the palm of her hand and stuck it out. “Deal.”

David glanced down at the spit-covered hand. In a flash, he recalled when she was eight years old and he was ten. Chelsea demanded to be allowed in his and Riley’s boys’ club. In an effort to dissuade her, David offered a challenge. She had to eat a whole bowl of cold brussel sprouts. To seal the deal, David spit into his hand and offered it to her. That time, she closed her eyes and cringed before shaking it. Without hesitation, she ate the whole bowl and they were forced to accept her into their club.

She surprised him then.
Why wouldn’t I expect her to surprise me again? Chelsea Adams is a woman full of surprises.
“Deal.” David grasped her hand.

After they shook, David and Chelsea picked up each of their dog’s leash.

“You should tie your shoe before we start.” She pointed to his feet. “Hate for you to trip.”

David knelt down to check his laces, at which time she shoved him over onto his side in the grass before sprinting off with Molly by her side.

Equally incensed by the dirty trick, Gnarly strained against his leash so hard that he threatened to drag David on his stomach until he got up to his feet to catch up with her.

In the time it took for David and Gnarly to run through the stone pillars marking the entrance to Spencer Manor, Chelsea and Molly were a third of the way down the Point. David and Gnarly sprinted down the road. With all of the residents being well-to-do millionaires who didn’t have to leave their homes to work in the morning, the road was deserted.

In the fall, after the colorful foliage had fallen and before the ski season started in late November, Spencer was practically a ghost town except for the few year-round residents who, like Mac, were retired, or were worker-bees like David.

It was for this reason that David, after falling into step with Chelsea when they turned right onto Lakeshore Road, noticed a silver sedan coming up behind them.

Both runners moved over off the road to allow the car to pass them. When it didn’t, David’s instincts told him that this was not good. He slowed his pace to allow Chelsea to sprint on ahead while waiting for the car to move on. When the car slowed down almost to a halt, David whirled around while pulling his gun out of his pocket. The pause he took to ascertain the danger behind the wheel gave the driver ample time to surge forward while firing at him.

“Gun!” he shouted a warning to Chelsea.

While two shots were fired through the passenger window at him, David fired off three shots at the moving car. One bullet took out the front windshield, the second took out the rear passenger window. The last took out the rear window when the car surged on past. While the car sped away, David stepped out into the road and fired two more shots while running up to where Chelsea was lying in the ditch on top of Molly.

Gnarly’s barks could be heard to the end of Spencer Point. Undeterred by his leash flapping behind him, he charged after the vehicle with every intention of catching it.

“Are you okay?” David helped her to her feet. He could feel her hands shaking.

“What was that about?”

“I don’t know.” David knelt down next to Molly who was pawing at Chelsea. “What about Molly? Did she get hit?” Noticing that his own fingers were trembling, he rubbed his hands on his pants.

“No.” She hugged the dog. “We dove for the ditch before the car got up here.”

David noticed red blotches in Molly’s white fur. “Are you sure?” He ran his fingers through her fur in search of the source of the bleeding. More blood appeared. “I see blood.”

Noticing the drops of blood, Chelsea searched her dog for a wound, but Molly, who was licking her face, wasn’t acting hurt in any way.

His legs feeling numb, David knelt down. “Where’s the blood coming from?” He saw that his hands were covered with blood.

“David! It’s you! You’ve been shot!”

Her voice sounded like she was in a tunnel calling to him. Grabbing her by the arm, he fought to stay upright, but was losing the battle.

“Oh, David!” she sobbed while holding onto him. “Stay with me. Don’t die.”

“Call … emergency.” David sucked in as much breath as he could, which made the pain ripping through his side more intense.

“David, no!” Chelsea yelled. “No! Not now! Not after … I love you. I’ve always loved you. I thought I hated you but when you called the other night all of those old feelings came rushing back. Even with Riley in the mental ward, you were all I could think about. That was why I had to see you, David. I love you but I’m scared and—”

“Chelsea!” David gasped out in a sharp tone.

Clutching both of his hands, slimy with blood, into hers, she swallowed. “Yes, David?”

Grimacing, David gazed into her light blue eyes that were filled with tears. “Now’s not a good time to discuss it. If I live, we’ll talk later. If I die, it won’t matter.”

His last vision before he lost consciousness was Chelsea pleading for him to stay with her.