In Too Deep (43 page)

“According to your deputy, Jay Adams is Elizabeth Adams’s sister.”

“No, ma’am. Miller is confused.”

“But he seems to know her.”

“Look, I don’t know who the hell you think you are. I’ve known the Adamses for a long time. Since before you was even born, I would suspect. I knew Lizzie’s Uncle Jerry and Aunt Dayne well. Hell, I even remember the names of their dogs. And I’m telling you that there ain’t no Jay Adams. Never was. You ask your friend Lizzie. She’ll tell you, she ain’t got no sister.”

“I see.”

The guy was lying through his teeth, but Patricia had a feeling she’d just got exactly what she’d come for. She now knew what Adams and Mac had been hiding. Her name was Jay.

*

Erin stared down at the letter in her hands with utter disbelief. It was a certified business letter informing her that she had been released from duty…indefinitely. She read it over and over, convinced that it was a mistake. That her mind was once again playing cruel tricks on her. But there it was. The words remained.

She let the letter fall from her lap onto the floor. A slight squeak escaped her mouth and she raised a trembling hand up to cover it. The department had let her go. They no longer wanted her. The letter said it was partly due to her medical condition, and partly because she had compromised an investigation.

She stared straight ahead as her eyes welled up with tears. The sobs tried to come but she choked them back, hating the way her throat burned and tensed, and at the hands of the department. The day she had been sworn into the department had been one of the happiest of her life. And now that was gone. She had been written off. She was no longer good enough to wear a badge.

It wasn’t right. There had to be something she could do. There had to be someone who would listen. Patricia. Yes, Patricia would understand. Wouldn’t she? She gazed at her phone and it stared back, dead and cold. She had left it off the hook on purpose, tired of the harassing phone calls.

Since the night of the fire, Mark and his colleagues had bombarded her with angry accusations. They thought she was after his money. They thought she wanted to have her cake and to eat it too. She was no longer the woman scorned, to be pitied but ignored. She was a lesbian. The fire wasn’t about revenge. She wanted to claim half the insurance. At least that was the theory.

A knock at her door startled her. She jumped up, angry, ready to scream at whoever it was. To tell them to fuck off and leave her alone. She yanked open the door and sucked in a big breath of air.

“Hi,” Liz said softly. “I tried to call but I kept getting a busy signal.”

Erin nearly choked at the sight of her. The warm, knowing look in her eyes, her gorgeous face, framed by the midnight hair. It was truly amazing how a human being could look so incredible standing there in jeans and a thin gray tank top.

“What’s wrong?” Liz asked.

“I…uh…” Erin tried to fight the burning betrayal she felt rising up in her chest. She tried to fight back the stinging words from Mark, from the press. But as she looked into the face of the woman she loved, she caved. All of it came erupting up out of her, exploding like a powerful volcano, leaving her insides hollow and crushed.

“Oh, baby, what is it?” Liz immediately embraced her, kicking the door shut behind them. She walked Erin over to the couch and sat her down, stroking her tear-streaked face. “Shh. It’s okay, tell me what’s wrong.”

Erin looked into her eyes. “It’s…it’s everything,” she sobbed out, sucking in quick jerky breaths of air. “It’s Mark, the press…”

Liz watched her, listening carefully. She knew that Mark had been bothering Erin. The man was furious and rightly so. He had nearly lost his life and his unborn child in the fire. But he was wrong about Erin. If he knew her at all, he would know that she could never do such a thing. As for the press, they were hungry vultures feeding off a scandalous story. She had made some calls to have it stopped, and she felt good knowing that she at least still had some pull in this city.

As she studied Erin’s drawn face, the far-off look in her eyes, she mentally chided herself for staying away from her so much the past few days. She shouldn’t have spent so much time at her house putting it back together again after the mess the cops made of it. Instead, she should’ve had Erin over. But she had been worried for her safety, knowing that for whatever reason someone was fucking with her, and she didn’t want her lover to get caught up in that. She’d thought Erin would be safer at her own place. At least for the time being.

“But that’s not the worst of it,” Erin hiccupped. Bending down, she retrieved a letter, which she plopped in Liz’s lap.

Liz read it carefully, the heat rising to her cheeks as she finished. “They can’t do this,” she said. “They have no right. We’ll sue!”

Erin collapsed against her. “I don’t know what I’m going to do,” she said meekly.

“Don’t you worry. We’ll handle it.” She cupped Erin’s face, wanting so badly to make everything all right. To take her away from all that plagued her. Some day very soon she would, but right now she needed to take care of her immediate needs. “You hungry?” she asked.

“No, I can’t eat.”

“You sure? I can go get us something. Feed you in bed, just like I did the other night.”

Erin gave her a tired, quick smile and rose up off the couch. “I’m sorry, I just don’t feel like eating.” She held out her hand. “Come lie down with me?”

Liz took the warm hand and walked with her into the bedroom. They lay down side by side in their clothes on top of the bed. Liz reached down and pulled up a light blanket to cover her defeated lover. In no time at all, they fell fast asleep, snuggled comfortably into one another.

*

Erin awoke in her lover’s embrace. Darkness was all around, blanketing her surroundings. She eased herself up, careful not to wake Liz, able to tell that she was asleep by her breathing. She rubbed at her eyes and focused on her bedside clock. It was after eleven.

She yawned and climbed down off of the bed to head into the kitchen. Sleepiness had given way to thirst and she padded to the fridge. After fetching a chilled bottle of water, she turned and shut the fridge, but not before its light spilled out into the living room. Blue eyes stared at her from a shadowed face, and she yelped and dropped the bottle.

“Gosh, honey, you scared me,” she said, grabbing her chest and feeling the fool. “I thought you were still asleep.” She bent down and picked up her water. Standing back up, she watched the figure and waited for a response. When it didn’t come, fear shot through her and she nearly dropped the bottle again. “Liz?”

The figure stepped closer and Erin at once knew it wasn’t her lover. The woman stood shorter than Liz and she could smell her. She smelled foul.

The silent woman raised an arm at her and Erin stood completely frozen to the ground.

“What’s going on?” Liz asked as she flipped on the kitchen light. She walked toward Erin and then stopped, noticing her unwavering stare. She turned her head as she approached, blinking her eyes in the bright light.

“Hello, Lizzie,” Jay said as her arm remained still, pointing a handgun right at Erin.

“Jay,” Liz breathed out in shock. “What are you doing! Put the gun down!” She went toward her sister, but Jay swung the gun around at her.

“Don’t do it, Lizzie! Or I’ll shoot you dead where you stand.” When Liz stopped her advance, Jay continued, “You don’t seem happy to see me, sister. Y’all really should lock the door if you don’t want company so late.”

Liz stood still, her mind spinning. She cringed as she realized she hadn’t locked the door behind them earlier, too worried about Erin at the time. She stared at her sister with wide eyes, trying to think of a way to reason with her own flesh and blood.

“Why, Jay?” she asked, truly hurt and stricken by her sister’s actions. She had to try to get her to talk, to stall her before she did anything rash.

“She’s bad for you,” Jay said, wiping her nose with her free hand. She wore the same filthy overalls Liz had seen her in more than two months before. She hadn’t bathed recently; Liz could smell her stench. “That fire was set so she would have to go to jail.”

“Jesus, Jay.” She couldn’t believe her own sister was doing such things. “What you did was wrong. You know that, right?”

“It was done for you.”

“For me? You almost killed two innocent people! One of them almost nine months pregnant. Not to mention the fact that the cops found evidence pointing to me as the culprit.”

“You?” Jay asked, her voice a higher pitch with obvious surprise. “No, it was supposed to look like she did it.”

Jay glared at Erin once gain.

“Then why did you put the gasoline and the boots in my truck?”

Jay shook her head and started to speak, but she couldn’t. Instead she waved the gun harder at Erin.

“No…no, it was her. It was supposed to look like it was her. She’s bad for you. She’s bad!” she screamed.

“No, Jay.” Liz said, doing her best to sound calm. “She’s good for me. I love her.”

Jay shook her head violently and then grabbed at it, clutching her hair. “No. No, you don’t mean that!”

“And I love her too,” Erin said, stepping up to stand by Liz’s side.

“No…no…” Jay pulled on her hair and took wild, unsteady steps, first toward them and then back, pointing the gun at them as if it were an accusatory finger.

“I mean it, Jay. I love her. You wouldn’t hurt someone I love, would you?” Liz could tell her words were getting to the disturbed woman. Almost as if they were penetrating her shell, forcing her to see reality. She watched her sister, holding her breath, feeling Erin’s hand slip into her own. They stood still, watching and waiting, a united front against anything and everything that threatened their relationship. Just as they had done days earlier when the police had come calling after the fire. Just as they would do for all eternity.

“I would.” A voice sounded from behind Jay. Liz stood staring, completely stunned as Kristen Reece stepped in from the darkness of the hallway.

“Kris,” Liz breathed, gaping at both women in complete shock. Jay filthy and mentally unstable, Kristen looking very healthy and well kept. “You mean…”

“That’s right, it’s been me all along.”

“You? I was going to say…you’re alive.” Words weren’t coming easy to her. The situation before her was overwhelming, and she desperately tried to make sense of it all.

“Alive and well. I look good for someone who was burned beyond recognition in a car crash, don’t I?” She looked down at herself and straightened her shirt.

“If it wasn’t you, then who?” Erin asked softly as she thought of the remains found at the site of the wreckage. The remains that never had been proven to be those of Kristen Reece.

“No one anyone will miss, rest assured. And all it took was a little dental work on my part.”

“I can’t believe this.” Liz rubbed her forehead with her free hand. Words from the past rang in her ears. Kristen telling her that she wanted out. That she would make everything okay and then disappear. And now it all made sense to her.

“Miss me? I missed you, darling.” Kristen laughed, staring at Liz.

“But why?” Liz shook her head. She couldn’t understand why Kristen would do it. All along she had thought that Jay had been responsible for the killings, that Kristen knew about her suspicions and that she was trying to help her stop Jay.

“Why? Why? I did it all for you, sweetie. Like some pathetic, lame-ass fool who thought if I did, that you would love me. But no…you only wanted to fuck me. And boy did you do that well.” She paused, eyeing Erin, sizing her up. “But that was okay, because I had all but convinced myself that you couldn’t love.” She looked back to Liz. “That maybe you just weren’t capable. But then this little bitch came along and proved my theory wrong. And now, I’m so fucking fed up with you and your new bitch that I’m ready to kill you both. Her first, of course, so you have to watch her die.”

“No, Jay. You can’t. We talked about this, remember?” Liz looked past Kristen to her sister, pleading with her.

“Oh you’re right. She can’t. She’s weak. Crazy and weak. But she has been good for most things. She’s been a great getaway driver, and a wonderful silent witness. She and Tracy were the perfect little helpers. Both of them were so enthralled with you that they were willing to do anything once I convinced them they were helping you.”

“Jay, don’t listen to her. Why did you ever listen to her?”

“She told me those people were bad.” Jay responded in a childlike voice, looking back and forth between Kristen and her sister. “That they were hurting you.”

Kristen laughed wickedly and walked over to stand next to Jay. “You see? My perfect little puppet. She’ll do anything I ask and all for you, little sis.” She stroked Jay’s face, looking back to Liz.

“Jay, did you kill those men?” she asked, needing to know.

“They were bad.” Jay answered, sounding a little less convinced. “Kris said they were bad and she drugged them up and I drove.”

“Did you kill them?” she asked again.

“I—”

“I told you she’s weak,” Kristen interrupted. “She couldn’t even stand to look at them after I shot them. And she nearly threw up when I stabbed them.”