Page 63 of Mean Streak

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Y ou could have saved me a lot of trouble and died the first time,” Alice said.

“Acute subdural hematoma. I was certain I’d struck you hard enough to cause a slow but persistent bleed, which out here,” she said, spreading her arms wide, “would have been deadly. But not to you. Not to the Golden Girl. Haven’t you ever, just once in your charmed life, had a streak of rotten luck? ”

Emory’s brain, not even a week away from the first injury, was feeling the effects of the car crash and now a second blow to her head. She tried to stand, but her legs were too rubbery to support her, so she came off all fours and sat.

She tried to focus on what Alice was saying, but the words made no sense. Her image was wavering, as though Emory were looking at her underwater. The fluidity was making her nauseated.

“What are you saying? What is that in your hand?”

“This?” Alice raised the pistol. “It’s known in every ER in the country as a Saturday night special. Your basic thirty-eight-caliber revolver.”

Emory was beginning to grasp what was happening. “What are you doing with it?”

“I’m about to kill you, and this time I’ll make sure you’re dead.”

Emory’s stomach pitched. Nausea surged into the back of her throat. She was only barely able to swallow it. “Why?”

“It would take forever to enumerate all the reasons, Emory, and it’s cold out here.

To summarize, Jeff was a louse, but he was my louse.

At least he was until I made the mistake of introducing him to you.

You were a much greener pasture. Pretty.

Rich. Coveted virtues to him. But he didn’t love you, you know. He never did.”

“I realize that now.”

“However, he reveled in the affluence and status you lent him. So much so that he would never have left you, no matter how rocky the marriage became. He would always have held on.”

“So you had to get rid of me.”

“You had obligingly shown me the map with the trail you planned to run on Saturday morning. You went over it with me in great detail.”

“But you were with Jeff.”

“Who never could smoke weed without passing out afterward. I plied him with two scotches, two bottles of red wine, and a high-quality joint to ensure that he wouldn’t awaken until late the following morning.

“I made the long drive, parked at your turnaround spot, which you’d also pointed out to me, walked along the trail until I found a good hiding place, waited until you ran past, then came up behind you with the rock I’d found on the path.”

She smiled sourly. “In hindsight, I should have stayed a wee bit longer to make sure you were dead or soon would be. I was afraid to touch you for fear of leaving trace evidence. I didn’t touch the broken sunglasses that caused such high anxiety.

“Anyhow, I rushed back to my car, which was still the only one there. I met no one on the road coming down the mountain. I made it back to Atlanta in record time and had brunch in bed with Jeff, who was none the wiser. It was just as I outlined it to you this morning, except I was the one who sneaked out, not Jeff.”

“You wanted me dead so you could have him.”

She laughed. “Emory, you’re thinking far too simplistically.

I wanted you dead so Jeff would be blamed for it.

Being convicted of your murder would cost him his life, one way or another.

Two birds, one stone. You see?” She flashed a smile that was overly bright and cheery, a madwoman’s grin of self-congratulation.

Emory concentrated hard on gathering puzzle pieces until they formed a complete picture. “Did you leave the trinket off his ski jacket there?”

“It was found? I wondered. I couldn’t ask.”

Emory didn’t tell her who had found it.

“Everything was going according to plan,” Alice continued. “Jeff quickly came under suspicion. He pretended to be distraught over your disappearance, but very quickly he grew fond of the prospect of being a wealthy widower, which, of course, was to my benefit.

“But I couldn’t figure out why no one could find your body.

How hard could it be? I guessed that you’d regained consciousness and staggered off the path and into the wilderness.

After three days, I began to relax, believing that if you hadn’t died of the head trauma, surely you had succumbed to hypothermia.

“Then you turned up alive. Saved by Daniel Boone. Unbelievable,” she said, shaking her head at the wonder of it.

“Who would have guessed that your splendor extended to rising from the dead?

And that was only the first of several jolts.

Your cabin-dweller was a fugitive being hunted by the FBI.

You and he were in a feud with incestuous hillbillies.

“But,” she said, smiling again, “I saw a way to turn this mess to my advantage. Worse than anything, Jeff hated being seen as a fool, and your escapades were making him out to be a colossal one. He was rapidly unraveling. All I had to do was keep pulling on the thread.

“Last night he tried to convince me that you had become mentally unbalanced. So, as a friend to both of you, I drove up here this morning to lend support. He outlined his ridiculous plot with that pair of brothers. I pretended to be dismayed, when actually I was delighted. Without any help from me, he was digging himself in deeper. Which I would have been happy to sit back and watch him do. But,” she sighed, “at the last minute, he forced my hand.”

Emory’s blood turned cold. “You’re referring to him in the past tense.”

Lost in her own thoughts, Alice continued, speaking in a rueful murmur. “Incomprehensibly, he was going to chase up here and reclaim you. Even after suffering the humiliation heaped on by you, he still chose you over me.”

“My God, Alice, what have you done? You’ll never get away with it, not any of it.”

“Oh, getting away with it has ceased to matter. My goal was to have the two of you dead, and I’m halfway there.” She aimed the pistol down at Emory. “Any final words?”

“Alice, please.”

“No? Okay then.”

The shot rang out, and Alice crumpled to the ground, her right leg giving out from under her.

Hayes emerged from the fog-blanketed trees like a specter, his gun hand extended at arm’s length. “Drop the weapon or you die.”

Emory cried out, “No, no!” But her fear was more for him than Alice.

The bullet had entered the back of Alice’s leg and exited the front just above her knee. Her teeth chattered with pain, but she kept her grip on the pistol, which was aimed at Hayes, who made a huge target.

Emory thought her heart would burst from her chest. “Alice, please, listen to me, listen to him. Toss the pistol away. Don’t make him kill you. Please don’t.”

Alice didn’t seem to hear. She was focused on Hayes. “Emory’s super stud.”

“Drop the pistol.”

“If you’d wanted me dead,” she taunted, “you would have made the first shot count.”

“I don’t want you dead. But I will fucking kill you if I have to.”

“Don’t make him, Alice, please, please,” Emory sobbed. “I beg you. Don’t make him do it. Put the gun down. It’s over.”

“Over for you.” She whipped the pistol toward Emory.

The gunshot wasn’t as loud as it might have been on a clear day when the air was crisp. The fog muffled some of the sound.

But Alice was just as dead.

Hayes was beside Emory in an instant, bending down to lift her up and hug her against him. His hands closed around her head as he searched her face. “Are you all right?”

She was weeping. “I didn’t want you to have to. I didn’t want you to—”

“Shh. Shh. I didn’t.”

He indicated that she look behind her. Sergeant Detective Grange was standing with one hand braced against a tree, bent at the waist, retching violently. Knight stood beside him, his beefy hand on his partner’s shoulder.

***

Hayes’s cabin became headquarters for all the law enforcement personnel and emergency responders who arrived on the scene within minutes.

He had carried Emory in his arms the remaining distance and deposited her in one of the olive-green chairs at the dining table. He brought a quilt from the bed and draped it around her. “That’ll help until the ambulance gets here. They’ll have a Mylar blanket.”

“I only want you.” Emory grasped his hand.

He knelt beside her and threaded his fingers through her hair. “What the hell were you doing on that road on foot?”

“Running to warn you.”

He dragged his thumb across her lower lip. “Don’t do it again,” he said huskily.

“Don’t ever make yourself so large a target.”

“Not much I can do about that, Doc.”

They were still staring into each other’s eyes when Jack Connell approached. “Hanging in there?”

Tremulous and tearful, Emory said, “We’re alive.”

“No small miracle,” Connell said. “Knight, Grange, and I came upon your crashed car. My crashed car.”

“I’m sorry about that.”

He made a motion of dismissal. “You weren’t injured in the crash?”

“Nothing serious. But Alice…” Speaking the name caused her voice to crack. “She struck me. Maybe with the butt of the pistol. I’ll need another brain scan.”

“Ambulance should be here in a couple more minutes.” He shuffled his feet and divided an uneasy look between her and Hayes.

Hayes, getting the message, mumbled that he’d see if there was anything he could do outside and left through the open door.

She was reluctant to let him go but didn’t call him back, intuiting what Jack Connell was about to say.

“Emory, your husband is dead.”

She nodded. “She alluded to it. How?”

“Gunshot. Probably with the same pistol she was going to use on you.”

“Was it Jeff’s pistol?”

“No. One registered to him was found in an inside pocket of his jacket.”

“So she wasn’t lying about that. She told me he had a pistol.”

“He didn’t get to implement his plan, whatever it was, and I guess we’ll never know. He was killed inside the suite. Somehow Alice Butler got out without the deputy seeing her. Maybe the same way you and Hayes split the other night through the adjoining suite.”

He explained that after discovering Jeff’s body, he, Knight, and Grange had left the deputy there to guard the crime scene. “We were afraid for your safety and went looking for you at the motel. When I saw that my car was gone, we figured there was only one place you’d go.”

“My phone must have died before you got that part of the message. I told you I was on my way up here to warn Hayes.” She was watching him through the open doorway. His back was to her. He was talking to Buddy Grange and Sam Knight. “Alice knew.”

“She got here quick. She must’ve come upon the wrecked car and realized you’d set out on foot. She continued driving till she spotted you on the road, then—”

“Came up behind me, like before.”

“Before?”

She related Alice’s confession.

“So it wasn’t Jeff after all,” Jack said.

“Not directly. They both deceived me, and Alice told me he wasn’t all that bereaved when he thought I was dead. I believe that.”

“Hate to say it, but so do I.”

Hayes came through the door and rejoined them. “Ambulance driver is turning around so he can back in.”

Connell said to Emory, “I’ll pass along to Knight and Grange that Alice confessed.” He left them to go outside.

Hayes sat down on his haunches in front of her and took her cold hands between his. “Knight told me about Jeff. You okay?”

“It’ll take some time.”

“You have time.”

Absently she nodded. After a moment, she asked, “What happened at the Floyds’ house?”

“Norman and Will were on the lookout for me in front. Forgot to cover their back. They’re mean, but not too astute.”

“Lisa and Pauline?”

“Safe. I got there before the brothers carried out their wretched threat, which was probably an empty one. They wanted me, not Lisa.”

“Are they in custody?”

“They probably are by now. The mountain is crawling with cops of all varieties. I left Norman and Will easy to find, chained to the tree where they used to keep the dog.”

“Poetic justice.”

“I thought so.”

She touched the fresh bruises on his face.

He gave her a wry smile. “They didn’t go for the idea at first.”

Wanting to smile, needing to weep, she leaned forward and nestled her head against his neck. He wrapped his arms around her and held her close. She could feel his lips moving against her hair, but she didn’t catch the whispered words.

They stayed that way until two EMTs wheeled in a gurney.

Hayes tilted her head up and kissed her mouth, warmly and sweetly.

Then he stepped away and gave her over to the care of the EMTs, who insisted on strapping her to a board because of the head injury.

As they wheeled her through the doorway and out into the yard, she caught sight of Sergeant Grange.

She called his name, and he turned. He looked ashen, his shrewd eyes not as bright as usual.

She mouthed to him, Thank you . He acknowledged her gratitude with a quick nod, then cast his eyes down at the ground.

Looking for Hayes, she tried to move her head from side to side, but because of the constraint across her forehead, she couldn’t.

When she didn’t see him, she struggled to raise her head, also to no avail.

With mounting anxiety, she searched the yard as thoroughly as her peripheral vision would allow.

Finally she spotted Jack Connell. He was watching her, and in an instant she knew the cause of his bleak expression.

She ceased the struggle to raise her head. She wouldn’t find who she had been looking for. The tears that leaked from the corners of her eyes were also futile. That he had vanished should come as no surprise. He had told her he would, and he always did as he said.