Page 49 of By the Time You Read This (Raisa Susanto #3)

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Raisa

Day Seven

Dawn was starting to break over the horizon, and on any other day, in any other circumstance, the view over the water would be literally breathtaking.

Right now, Raisa was just trying—and failing—to make all the puzzle pieces fit into place.

She’d stayed out of the way of the crime scene crew most of the morning. At some point, St. Ivany confirmed it had been Declan O’Brien who had eaten his own gun on the bow of a boat.

Raisa thought about his comfy, messy office, the rug and the plants.

And she wished she’d taken the threat to everyone in Gig Harbor more seriously.

She wouldn’t make that mistake again.

Over and over, throughout the morning, her eyes kept sliding back to the boat Essi had rented. Big Deck Energy.

What if Essi had only made it look like she’d left?

If she was still there, she might be able to tell Raisa who “the girl” was from the first chapter of her book.

She might also be willing to listen when Raisa told her she was in danger from Isabel’s protégé. It was worth checking, at the very least.

Raisa headed toward Essi’s boat, weaving her way through the chaos.

Something stopped her from calling out. Boats fell into the category of motor vehicles when it came to unlawful searches. If she had probable cause, she could board and check the cabin. But there was no reason to suspect anything, other than her vague feeling that Essi was in some danger.

That wouldn’t hold up in a court of law—in fact, it would probably get her laughed out of a judge’s chamber.

Then she heard the voices.

Not Essi’s. But she thought she recognized them.

These weren’t just the new renters.

As lightly as she could, she boarded the boat. It did sway beneath her feet, but for anyone inside, it probably felt like the natural ebb and flow of water.

She crept toward the cabin door, which was partially open, and her breath caught as she realized what she was seeing.

Delaney.

Holding a gun.

Go, her brain screamed. But the entrance to the cabin was awkward, and would put Raisa in a vulnerable position as she navigated the ladder.

She nudged the door open and then went in gun first.

By the time her feet hit the floor in the cabin, Delaney had shifted toward the middle of the boat.

And she had her gun pointed not at Raisa but at Gabriela Cruz, whose eyes were as big and wet and terrified as Raisa had ever seen them.

“Shit,” Raisa cursed beneath her breath. She had no one to blame for this situation but herself. And St. Ivany. This was why she’d never wanted to use Gabriela as bait in the first place—especially with how eager the girl had been to prove herself. “Delaney, drop the gun.”

Delaney stared at her for a long moment. It was dark in the cabin, dark enough that Raisa couldn’t read much of her expression. “What?”

“Drop. The gun,” Raisa said, her own locked on Delaney. She had a moment of déjà vu. A forest that had just as many shadows as this boat.

Gabriela pressed her lips together, but her chin quivered.

Stupid, stupid, stupid. Why had they decided to risk Gabriela’s safety? It had been arrogant beyond belief that they’d assumed they could protect her if Delaney got it in her head to kill the girl.

“No,” Delaney said.

“I’m not here as your sister,” Raisa said. “Drop the weapon, or I’ll shoot.”

Delaney’s eyes narrowed and she lashed out, grabbing Gabriela as she did. She pressed the barrel of the gun to Gabriela’s temple. “Raisa, you have to listen to me.”

“I really don’t,” Raisa said, though she couldn’t take the shot now, not with the chance of hitting Gabriela. “Delaney, what are you doing?”

“She’s the protégé,” Delaney said, her arm tightening around Gabriela.

“Apparently I was too good of an actor,” Gabriela said with a nervous laugh, seemingly trying to make light of her situation. But her knuckles had gone white where they’d curled into Delaney’s forearm.

“I know you think that,” Raisa said to Delaney. “We tried to make you think that.”

Delaney shook her head. “I’m not an idiot.”

“You didn’t know,” Gabriela interjected. “That I was miked on the beach, right? You didn’t know.”

Delaney’s jaw tightened. “No. But that doesn’t matter. I went there looking for you.”

“Because we wanted to draw you out,” Raisa said. The more they kept Delaney arguing, the better for them. Maybe St. Ivany would look around and wonder where Raisa had disappeared to. Maybe the boat would rock enough to throw off Delaney’s balance. Maybe Gabbi could get out of the hold and give Raisa a free shot. “Delaney, Gabriela was the bait. Not the killer.”

“She’s actually both,” Delaney said, sounding more rankled than Raisa had ever heard her. Usually, she was the calm one, the rational one. But she was frustrated. “And she admitted it.”

Raisa met Gabriela’s eyes, and she shook her head, almost imperceptibly.

“I came here looking for Essi, and Delaney followed me,” Gabriela said. “She started yelling about how I’m just like Isabel and I deserve to die.”

“Shut up,” Delaney snapped, shaking Gabriela. Raisa held her breath, and Gabriela winced but didn’t cry out. “You’re lying. You’re good at it, but not that good.”

Delaney met Raisa’s eyes. “I have it recorded.”

Raisa’s quick surprise was tempered by her history with Delaney. “Okay. Why don’t we listen to that after you’ve put down your weapon.”

Delaney simply pressed the barrel tighter against Gabriela’s head. “Don’t move.”

And with that, she released her grip on the girl.

Raisa’s finger twitched toward the trigger, but she didn’t touch it yet.

Delaney dipped a hand into her pocket, dug around for something. But she came up empty.

“What ...?” She took her eyes off Raisa long enough to look down at her palm. Again, Raisa ran a quick risk calculation, but it was still too dangerous now to do anything.

“What ...,” Delaney said again, this time less of a question. Then she huffed out a breath. “You stole it.”

“No, I didn’t,” Raisa replied, before realizing the accusation hadn’t been directed at her.

Delaney was staring at Gabriela. And in the next breath, Delaney shifted so that she had her weapon pressed against Gabriela’s forehead.

Gabriela was shaking. Her eyes darted, in a panic, to Raisa before returning to Delaney. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, ho, ho, little girl thinks she’s so clever,” Delaney purred, sounding so much like Isabel that Raisa nearly reeled back. Delaney drew a pattern on Gabriela’s forehead with the gun. “Little lying girl.”

Gabriela didn’t say anything, but she was staring at Delaney just like Raisa was.

Like they were watching Isabel’s ghost in action.

Raisa’s throat went dry, and she tried to swallow. Tried to regain control of her body.

“Little girl thinks she can fill some pretty big boots,” Delaney cooed. “But all she’s doing is playing dress-up in Mama’s clothing.”

“Delaney,” Raisa said, her voice coming out a croak. She had never realized that Delaney was so different from Isabel until seeing her now don Isabel’s persona.

Raisa had been struggling this entire time to picture Delaney killing Peter, killing Lindsey, killing Emily in such a gruesome manner. But she hadn’t been Delaney at the time.

She’d been Isabel.

Raisa should have realized it, when she’d seen how she was dressed for the bonfire, where they’d sent Gabriela in as helpless bait.

Delaney had looked different. She’d been dressed up as this—a huntress. A sociopath. A killer.

Isabel.

“I didn’t ... I don’t ...,” Gabriela muttered, seeming enthralled by the switch.

“Do you want to know how I punish little girls who lie?” Delaney asked. She caressed Gabriela’s face with the gun, running it over her cheekbone, along her chin.

“Are you going to put me in the hospital?” Gabriela said, her voice almost steady. “Like you did with Agent Kilkenny?”

Delaney pulled the gun back and smacked it across Gabriela’s face.

Gabriela cried out and crumpled to the floor, holding her cheek. Raisa took a step closer, but Delaney whirled on her. “No.”

Then she hauled Gabriela to her feet once more, taking control of the situation. Gabriela had given up trying to be brave, and was openly crying now.

“Gabriela put Kilkenny in the hospital,” Delaney said, sounding like herself once more. Maybe because she was talking to Raisa instead of the prey. “Not me.”

The anger that had been simmering in Raisa’s blood relit at that.

Broken bones, blood. A heart monitor that never varied because Kilkenny still hadn’t woken up.

“Delaney,” Raisa said, quietly this time. “Drop the gun.”

“I didn’t hit Kilkenny, you know I wouldn’t,” Delaney said, and then winced. Because they both knew Raisa would absolutely think Delaney could do that.

“We have a picture,” Raisa said, her anger morphing into rage. Maybe Delaney hadn’t been in control of herself, maybe she’d been channeling Isabel as she had a moment ago. But that didn’t absolve her of the guilt of doing it.

“Then it’s doctored,” Delaney said, her attention now fully locked on Raisa.

Raisa shook her head. There was literal blood on Delaney’s hands, from where Gabriela’s cheek had split open. And Delaney was proclaiming her innocence.

This, this was what their family was.

And Raisa wanted nothing more in that moment than to put a bullet into Delaney, thus becoming one of the rest of the Parkers.

No. It came in Kilkenny’s voice.

She shouldn’t want that.

That would make her just as much of a monster as her sisters.

She hated herself for the impulse, she hated it. She wanted to tear at her own skin and bones; she wanted to trade places with Kilkenny because she was ...

She was . . .

She was . . .

Broken.

Raisa nearly gasped, and she would have, had Delaney and Gabriela not been watching her so closely.

I wanted to make them the same as me.

Broken.

Lana and Larissa aren’t broken.

But wouldn’t it be more fun if they were?

“Oh my god,” Raisa said. “Did you write Isabel letters?”

“No,” Gabriela answered.

“Not you,” Raisa snapped, keeping her eyes on Delaney. “Did you write Isabel letters?”

“No,” Delaney said, seeming hesitant for the first time since Raisa had entered the cabin.

“Did you write reviews on a hiking trails app?” Raisa asked, knowing she must sound unhinged at the moment.

Delaney confirmed that when she frowned. “No. What are you talking about?”

“Oh my god,” Raisa said, her knees nearly giving out. “She never wanted me to solve who killed her.”

Her eyes slid to the gun she now pointed at her own sister.

“Did you hit Kilkenny?” Raisa asked, jerking the weapon. “Answer me.”

“I was in Seattle,” Delaney said. “I got the alert on my phone.”

Raisa closed her eyes briefly. Delaney could have driven to Gig Harbor and then gone back to the city. But it had never made sense that Delaney would want to harm the one person who believed in her.

“Someone must have used a fake ID to rent a car in your name,” Raisa said. “It was all to push me into being so angry at you I would look for any reason to pull the trigger. Because Isabel doesn’t understand that wouldn’t have been enough to make me do it.”

“Was it Essi?” Gabriela offered.

Raisa tried to remember the still shot of the video, but her brain had told her it was Isabel and then the paperwork had told her it was Delaney and she hadn’t questioned it. So she no longer trusted her judgment there.

“Maybe,” Raisa said, and Delaney made a sound.

“No, don’t you see,” Delaney said, shaking Gabriela. “It’s Gabbi. It’s always been her.”

“No.” Raisa shook her head. “We made you think that. And ... And Isabel. She constructed all this. It’s her chessboard. We’re all playing her game.”

“You think Peter Stamkos and that man who shot himself last night both simply killed themselves?” Delaney asked. “Lindsey was in an accident, and Emily Logan ...?”

“Her boyfriend killed her,” Raisa said, on a humorless laugh. “Of course, it’s always the boyfriend.”

This wasn’t about anyone else. This had been about Raisa and Delaney this whole time.

“That would be nice and all, except Gabbi killed them all,” Delaney said, completely back to being the Delaney Raisa knew so well.

“We were the ones who put Gabriela onto your radar,” Raisa reasoned. “You think she did it because we made you think she might have.”

“No,” Delaney said slowly. “I think she did it because she did it.”

Raisa shook her head. “Look, we’ll get this figured out, okay? Just let Gabriela go, and we’ll all go into the police station—”

“And I’ll be arrested,” Delaney said. “Because you think I’ve been holding an innocent civilian against her will.”

“And threatening her with murder,” Gabriela added. “Not to put too fine a point on it, but that is what you’re doing.”

Raisa shot Gabriela a look, and she shrugged as much as she could, unabashed.

“If you had evidence she’d killed Emily, why wouldn’t you just go to the police with it?” Raisa asked. Her gun was now pointed at the floor, an unconscious acknowledgment of trust.

“Because you know she’s too good for that,” Delaney said. “Isabel was teaching her how to clean up her footprints. You ever wonder how that crime scene was so clean? It’s because she had one of the longest professional serial killers instructing her what to do.”

“But she never visited Isabel,” Raisa said, thinking about the visitor logs. Isabel had three visitors besides Raisa herself. The documentarian, Delaney, and Roan Carmichael.

Gabriela went rigid in Delaney’s arms.

“What? Yes, she did,” Delaney said.

“No ...,” Raisa said, but trailed off, her mouth going dry.

Her eyes slid to Gabriela, who was now looking at the floor.

Raisa widened her stance as if to regain her balance, yet the boat hadn’t moved at all. It was the reality of the case that had shifted.

Of course Gabriela had visited Isabel. The girl had told them that very first visit that she had gone to talk to her.

But Raisa had lost track of that detail in the aftermath of the attempt on Kilkenny’s life. If that hadn’t happened, they would have gone to check the visitor logs that very morning. They would have seen Gabriela hadn’t been listed.

They would have known she had either lied to them or used a fake name to get in.

Maybe ... maybe that was why Gabriela had taken a run at them in the first place. She had guessed they would check the logs, and she’d realized she’d misplayed her hand.

She wasn’t perfect—she wasn’t Isabel. She’d had to clean up her mess, and to do so, she’d nearly killed Kilkenny.

The worst part was that it had worked.

Stupid, Raisa chastised herself, even as she brought her gun back up. This time she pointed it at Gabriela. “You used Roan Carmichael’s name as cover for visiting Isabel.”

Gabriela looked like she was caught between two impulses. But given another heartbeat, she broke into a smug grin. “I can’t believe Isabel thought either of you was interesting enough to fuck with. But people are always weird about family.”

Raisa pulled her phone out of her pocket with her free hand, while keeping her gun trained on Gabriela. Taking the shot would endanger Delaney, but the threat of it might keep Gabriela from getting too clever.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Gabriela said. “I’m guessing you’re calling in the cavalry?”

Raisa knew she should just stop listening to her. But she hesitated.

“You know, aiming for Kilkenny with that SUV served two purposes,” Gabriela said, like she didn’t have two guns aimed at her head by grown women who outnumbered her. “One, obviously, was to try to make you take out your own sister. How glorious would that have been? Especially when you later found out she wasn’t guilty.”

Gabriela did a chef’s kiss gesture. “I just loved Isabel’s big brain. It was my favorite thing about her.”

“My favorite thing is that she’s dead,” Raisa said flatly. “I guess I should thank you for that.”

Storm clouds blew in and out of Gabriela’s expression. “Anyway, the second purpose it served—along with the reason that I was glad I didn’t actually kill him—was it gave me leverage.”

“You can’t just blindly threaten Kilkenny,” Raisa said.

“Is that what I said I was doing?” Gabriela asked. “Have you learned nothing from dealing with Isabel? We don’t do anything blindly.”

Raisa’s stomach lurched, and it had nothing to do with the boat swaying beneath her feet.

Delaney’s gaze slid over her shoulder like she was wondering how fast they could get out of the cabin and to the hospital.

“You know that nurse you like so much?” Gabriela asked. “The young man working the desk? That’s Emily Logan’s boyfriend, and he found her as annoying as I did. If he doesn’t hear from me in the next—” She searched out a clock. “Three minutes, he’s going to go ahead and make sure Kilkenny never wakes up from the little nap he’s been taking.”

“Call him,” Delaney said, jamming the gun into Gabriela’s temple.

But Gabriela’s expression didn’t change, and all Raisa could think about was what Kilkenny would say here.

Gabriela was erratic. With Declan O’Brien’s death, her killing spree was heating up. That usually ended with a flame out to match just how devastating the inferno had been.

A gun to Gabriela’s head was not going to save Kilkenny.

Raisa did every quick calculation she could, trying to come up with the best scenario possible.

And then Delaney threw both herself and Gabriela sideways.

The two grappled on the ground for a minute before Gabriela emerged, breathing heavily.

“Psycho bitch.”

Delaney sat on the ground, her gun lost somewhere behind her because of the scuffle. “Let her go, Raisa.”

“What?” Raisa asked. Delaney wasn’t exactly in the position to give her orders.

“She’s not worth Kilkenny’s life,” Delaney said, meeting Raisa’s eyes.

They hadn’t worked together more than a few days two years ago, yet for some reason, Raisa was able to read her blank expression.

Because Delaney was hers .

Family, whether Raisa loved that fact or not.

She hesitated a second longer for show, then stepped aside.

Gabriela glanced between them and then dashed toward the stairs.

They listened to the slap of her shoes against the deck and then the pier.

“You have a plan?” Raisa asked, reholstering.

Delaney grinned as she held up a slim, old-school recorder, the kind of tool journalists in the early aughts had used before smartphones.

“She’s not the only one with sticky fingers,” Delaney said. “I dropped that AirTag you put on me in her pocket. As long as you have the tracker, we’ll be able to find her.”

Raisa was already halfway up the steps, already dialing St. Ivany.

“Hey,” Delaney called, not following. Raisa paused, looked back. “Thanks for not killing me.”

Raisa laughed. “Hey. Thanks for not making me.”