A Deadly Reunion (26 page)

“Come on, come on,” I begged.

He groaned in reply.

As we moved painfully slowly, I kept
snapping my head around, waiting for Annabelle to burst out of
every room wielding a sparklingly clean knife as she did.

We reached the front door.

We made it out.

I headed across the opposite side of the
garden, ensuring the bulk of the house hid us from the woodpile at
the back.

“Come on, come on,” I repeated over and over
again as quietly as I could.

The roar of the fire was incredible, and the
heat was astounding.

Even from here, I could feel it sizzling
through the air.

Everything crackled, hissed, and spat.

But the screaming had stopped.

Annabelle had shouted ever since she’d heard
the fire, but now she was quiet.

I turned over my shoulder, surveying the
grounds and house.

God... I hadn’t... killed her, had
I?

Had one of the burning logs pinned her down?
Had one of the beams in the house fallen on her?

“I should go back,” I said aloud as I
realized I couldn’t just leave her there.

Denver, with whatever little strength he
had, grabbed my hand. “No,” he said firmly. “Wait for the
police.”

I turned back around.

I continued to help him forward.

We reached the rim of the woods.

They plunged away sharply, leading down to a
steep slope.

I started to help him down through the dense
firs and pine trees, but suddenly he tripped, fell from my arms,
and rolled a good eight feet before he managed to stop himself.

He looked back at me.

His bleary eyes drew wide. “Patti,” he
screamed.

I heard something click from behind me.

Sharp footsteps.

Then something was pressed hard into my
back.

“Stop,” someone said.

Annabelle.

“I will shoot your guts out all over these
woods, you understand?” she hissed.

I nodded.

My hands were still by my sides, near my
pockets.

I had all of three things in my pockets: a
phone, my keys, and the blue pin I’d picked up outside Denver’s
room.

“Put your hands up,” she hissed again.

As I brought my hand past my pocket, somehow
I managed to grab the pin.

“Stop fumbling, put them up now.” She
repositioned the gun until it was pointing into the back of my
head.

I was no expert, but it felt like a shotgun,
or at least something long and powerful.

“Leave her alone,” Denver tried.

“Shut up,” Annabelle snapped.

I held the pin in my hand, pressed against
my palm with my thumb as I spread my other fingers wide in
surrender.

“You had to get involved, didn’t you?”
Annabelle shoved the gun hard into my head. “You offered me a nice
distraction. While the cops thought I was going after you, they
turned their backs on the real target. The same with dear old
Nancy. But you coming here was a mistake.”

I didn’t say a word.

I waited.

Waited either for her to pull the trigger,
or to give me a chance to do something.

“You dumb bitch. You had to stick your nose
in. This wasn’t about you,” she croaked.

I didn’t want to say anything, but I had to.
I had to buy time. Standing there silently would likely award me a
bullet in the brain.

What I really needed was a chance.

“Why?” I stuttered.

Annabelle laughed. “You mean why did I do
it? Country boredom,” she laughed again.

It wasn’t a nice laugh. Neither was it a
happy one. It was short and puttering like a dying engine.

“Bullshit,” I said bravely.

Her laughing stopped. “Do you really want to
piss me off?”

“Just leave her alone,” Denver’s voice
shook.

“Stop being so darned chivalrous. I remember
you, Denver, and you ain’t chivalrous. You’re a goddamn bastard.
Like the rest of them.”

Like the rest of them.

I narrowed my eyes.

“You mean Hank and James, don’t you?” I
asked quietly.

She shoved the gun hard into the back of my
head. I blinked, wincing at the pain, but I didn’t move.

“You’re forgetting Frank Bishop. Though they
haven’t found that body yet.” She sounded momentarily triumphant,
but then she rammed the gun hard into my head again. “Are you going
to try and figure out why I did it, Patti Smith? Are you moving out
of self-help books into mysteries?”

I kept on holding onto that pin.

I’d get my chance.

I’d have too.

I had to keep talking. Distracting her. It
was my only hope. If I were lucky, the police would arrive. I’d
warned them that my car was waiting by the driveway. They just had
to hurry.

“Do you want me to figure out why you did
it?” I stalled for time.

This elicited another laugh. “You think
you’re that good? Patti, sweetie, I’ve read some of your books, and
you’re a goddamn idiot.”

I was used to receiving criticism, but not
at the end of a shotgun.

I let it slide.

“They hurt you, right? James and Hank and
Frank and Denver – they hurt you in some way, and you’re getting
revenge. They broke your heart. Now you’re breaking theirs,
literally.”

“Don’t you try this police psychology
bullshit on me. You couldn’t possibly understand what it’s like to
have your feelings toyed with, to try your hardest to be nice and
decent only to repeatedly hear you aren’t worth it. The bitches
like Nancy get to live happily ever after, while I keep people
together and get nothing for my troubles. Do you know how many
times I helped James with his homework? Do you know what happened
when I asked him out to the dance? Guess. It was the same with Hank
and the others. God, I tried my hardest to be nice to them, to look
out for them, to do what was right and decent,” Annabelle’s voice
became tense and tight. Then she took a step back and swiveled her
gun over to Denver. “Do you know what it’s like to live right but
be rewarded with nothing but contempt? Fuck you for ignoring me,
Denver, you were never worth it anyway.”

I had to distract her.

In a split second I saw the look in her eyes
and I knew she was going to pull the trigger.

“Actions have consequences, Denver Scott.
You should have been nicer to me in high school,” Annabelle leveled
the gun.

“Isn’t it all in the past?” I shouted. “I
might write bullshit advice on romance, but I feel obliged to point
out one thing. Get over it. High school was a long time ago.”

She turned her gun back on me.

That’s when I acted.

That’s when I turned around.

That’s when I brought the pin out, twisted
to the side, and stuck it hard into the back of her hand.

She let off a blast of the shotgun, but it
missed me, it missed Denver, and it lodged into a tree a couple of
feet away.

Bark spewed out as Annabelle screamed in
pain and dropped the gun.

I fell to the ground.

I tried to grab the gun.

She clutched at my neck.

I elbowed her hard, but she was stronger
than me.

She was also completely unhinged.

Gasping as her fingernails dragged across my
flesh, she managed to grab the gun.

I heard Denver try to move, but he couldn’t
pull himself forward.

I had nothing.

Apart from the pin.

I turned on her again and somehow managed to
jam it back into her hand.

She dropped the gun.

I grabbed it.

Somehow.

I pitched backwards and rolled several feet
down the hill until my back slammed up against the very same tree
that had been shot.

I heard her dash forward.

I raised the gun.

Sirens started to blare in the distance.

I could hear tires crunching up the
driveway.

It distracted her.

I’d never used a gun before.

Then again, before I’d come back to Wetlake,
I’d never had a fling with a man like Denver either or tracked down
a serial killer in the woods.

I shot the ground by Annabelle’s feet.

She jumped back.

Pushing into the tree behind me, I managed
to stand, holding the gun and pointing it right at her.

She stared at me. I mean her eyes locked
onto mine.

It was one of those moments impossible to
forget. When the doors to someone’s soul dropped wide open and you
managed to see what was inside.

Desperation.

Twisted desperation.

And soul-crushing loneliness.

Annabelle was a broken woman.

....

I heard cars screeching to a halt, I heard
people race our way, I heard guns cocking, and I heard people
scream as they told me to lower my weapon.

“It’s not her; it’s Annabelle,” Denver
managed, still trying to push himself up, yet falling flat on his
face repeatedly.

I put the gun down.

Then I glanced over at him.

With his face pressed into the leaves and
dirt, he stared back at me.

Again I enjoyed a rare moment of staring
right into someone’s soul.

This time I didn’t see something that was
broken.

I’d been wrong about Denver.

He wasn’t warped.

I’d never seen warped and broken before
today.

He was just complicated.

So was I.

I was also quickly revising my golden
rule.

You could have a successful relationship
with a complex guy, as long as he was Denver Scott.

What happened next happened quickly.
Annabelle was handcuffed and loaded into the back of a squad car,
while Denver was taken to hospital, his brother riding in the
ambulance with him the whole way.

As for me, I was questioned, extensively,
and eventually found myself all the way back where everything had
started.

The Lake Motel.

In the same damn room.

Staring at the same damn walls.

Waiting for the same damn man.

Two days after the incident, I woke up from
a brief nap to insistent knocking on the door. I knew who it was
before I opened it.

He stood there.

His arm was in a sling and there were
dressings over the back of his head and left cheek.

He certainly looked worse for wear.

He also looked intently my way.

Silently.

His lips were firmly closed and he didn’t
even make the slightest of sounds.

“Are you determined to never let me sleep?”
I leaned against the open door, unable to conceal my massive
grin.

His previously blank expression became
slightly pink.

“You always knock on my door while I’m
sleeping,” I clarified through a curling smile.

“You snore,” he pointed out immediately, “I
was waking you up before you ruptured someone’s eardrums.”

“And I see getting attacked by a psychotic
ex-classmate hasn’t changed your charming sense of humor.”

“Are you going to stand there berating me or
are you going to invite me in?”

I paused, controlling the natural smile
threatening to turn my cheeks hard into my eyes. “I don’t know, am
I?”

“I’d rather not have this conversation
outside.”

“Conversation? Is that what we’re doing
here?”

I could see he was trying but failing to
control his own grin. “I need to say thank you. And maybe I need to
apologize.”

I straightened up visibly. “Now this I’ve
got to hear.”

“Though you contravened a direct order by a
police officer and by my own brother not to go after me—”

“I saved your life,” I finished.

His eyes blazed. “You burnt down a woman’s
house and could have started a forest fire.”

“Yet I stopped a serial killer.” I crossed
my arms, starting to get defensive.

Apparently we were done playing.

“And stopped a serial killer,” he conceded,
his voice unusually soft.

He nodded into the room, and I took a step
back, watching him as he walked in and closed the door behind
him.

He paused in silence for a moment. “Thorne
told me you were still here,” he managed in a gentler voice. “I
thought you would have gone back to D.C. in your electric blue
pickup truck by now.”

I swallowed. “I think I might sell the car
back to the dealership, actually. I can’t really drive it,” I
admitted through a polite cough.

“I think you’re going to make a considerable
loss,” Denver laughed.

I joined in.

It broke the tension between us.

Then we both petered out as we looked at
each other.

“You know, we both live in D.C.,” I pointed
out suddenly.

His eyebrow flicked up, but apart from that,
I couldn’t read his expression. “You don’t say? Are you pointing
this out for a reason?”

“Yeah, I thought you could give me a lift
home,” I smiled.

“Pretty presumptuous of you. I’m a very busy
guy.”

“Really, what are you doing this afternoon?”
My eyes sparkled.

So did his. “I’ll have to see what offers
come up.”

“You want me to say it, don’t you?” I
realized with a kick of nerves.

He nodded.

“Fine, Denver Scott, stay with me. Come back
to D.C. with me. Meet my dogs.”

“Is that like taking a guy home to your
parents for the first time?” he chuckled.

“Better. My dogs won’t make you eat pot
roast. But you can meet my parents if you want to.”

“Patti,” he took a step forward, and though
he favored his injured arm, that didn’t stop him from using his
good hand to trail his fingers lightly down the side of my face,
“this sounds kind of serious, but you haven’t even asked me out on
a date. How will you know if you like me if we don’t go out on a
date?”

I snorted as I hooked my arm gently around
his back.

He leaned into me and kissed my head.

“Fine, Denver Scott, would you like to go
share a shitty motel sandwich with me out on the grass?”