Mackenzie Legacy, The (19 page)

Once they were a safe distance away from the scene of the crime they compared notes, and suddenly everything that had happened started to make sense.

“I’m so sorry!” Caledonia was stricken. “We never imagined it would happen like this.”

Layla finally found her voice, gulping, “I’m glad you did it, and I’m glad they’re dead. I hope Max burns in hell.”

Caledonia hugged her again. “Hoisted on his own petard.”

“His own what?” Calvin said.

“Poetic justice,” Michael said. “He had it coming.”

They went straight to the hotel room, and Caledonia took Layla aside to help her get changed and washed up. Michael and Calvin explained everything to Jarod and his father, and they decided to leave town right away, splitting up to meet back at their house.

“I’m so sorry,” Jim told Caledonia when she embraced him goodbye. “I never expected it to go that far.”

“But it worked,” Cali said, finding it difficult to mourn Max. “We’re all free of him, and we have you to thank for everything.”

Calvin held out his hand for a shake but his father hugged him instead, and Caledonia watched as his heart softened a tiny bit. They loaded up their things in the truck and drove away with the twins, making their plans as they headed out of Los Angeles.

“We’re going to need to find a place to rent,” Michael said, always pragmatic. “And I’m going to need internet access as soon as possible.”

Caledonia turned to Layla, “I’m afraid that we used all of your money to set up Max.”

“I’m glad,” she said. “That’s what it was for.”

“I have some extra clothes you can have. We’ll work everything out,” Cali reassured her, patting her arm.

Michael cleared his throat. “Uhm, money might not really be a problem for a while… For a long time, really.”

“What do you mean?” Layla asked.

“Have you guys ever heard of the Cayman Islands?”

~

Chapter Twenty Three

THE CAYMANS

~

The old woman smiled, waving her hat. She beckoned, looking back over her shoulder as she stepped down from the porch and walked into a rose garden in full bloom. The scent of the blooms hung in the air, and the woman stopped, adjusting her hat and bending down to smell a pink rose… Something was tickling her belly…

~

Caledonia started awake, blinking into the blinding sun. She had flopped onto her beach towel to dry off after swimming in the warm tropical sea and dozed off– And now she glanced down to find a tiny hermit crab crawling towards her bikini top.

“Calvin!” she bolted upright. She looked over into his mischievous eyes, casting him a dirty look, “Very funny.”

“Aww,” he said, retrieving the crab from the sand, “You scared the little fella back into his shell.”

She huffed, rolling over onto her belly and turning her face away from him. He stretched out alongside her, trailing his fingers up and down her back.

“Don’t you know that you shouldn’t fall asleep in the sun?” He scooted closer, “Are you mad at me?” he whispered in her ear.

She grunted, hiding her smile from him.

“Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?” he asked, his seductive voice sending a tingle down the length of her spine.

She propped herself up onto her elbows and looked him in the eye, calculating. “Try the conch tonight.”

“Arghh,” he flopped over onto his back, “You’re killing me!”

Even on Grand Cayman Island, she could still find ways to be a more adventurous eater than he was, quickly
sussing
out the most interesting native delicacies and goading him to give them a try. She failed to see why he would come all this way only to seek out the familiar comfort of a cheeseburger.

He peeked under the straps on her back to see a tan line forming, leaning in to steal a salty kiss before getting up to offer her a hand. “We should get you out of the sun.”

They walked over to join Michael and Layla under the shade of a cabana, finding them both lounging on plush padded recliners and sipping frosty drinks garnished with fruit. The four of them were enjoying a first class vacation courtesy of Max’s ill-gotten gains, spending the last few weeks of winter in a tropical paradise while Michael closed out some offshore bank accounts.

Layla wasn’t the only one who had been setting money aside. Clearly, Max was more brutal than he was intelligent, and he had given Michael full access to his finances. Michael had been moving money around all along, playing a kind of banking shell game. He tried to explain it as simply as possible, impressing all of them with the machinations of his larcenous mind.

He generously decided they should split the money four ways, insisting on including Calvin to show his gratitude at being set free. Now they had time to think, they all sat around and talked about the future.

“I think we should use the money to rebuild the house,” Layla opined. She was still unable to shake the feeling that she somehow belonged there, and that there was some sort of unfinished business on that hilltop that needed to be attended to.

Michael nodded thoughtfully. “We could build a hunting lodge or something. Make it a real business.”

Layla grimaced and shook her head no. “How about a spa instead? Or a yoga retreat…”

“I’d make it a nature preserve,” Caledonia said, sitting up with her eyes flying open, “I know! A wildlife rehabilitation center!”

“You and your animals,” Layla sighed.

“Why don’t you do it all,” Calvin suggested, reclining on one of the soft chaises with his arms behind his head. “It’s not like you don’t have enough land!”

They all agreed, and the conversation took a serious turn.

“Cali’s right,” Michael said. “I feel like we should do something good with this money to make it… I don’t know… clean.”

“Coming from a money launderer,” Calvin observed, making them all laugh.

“I hate the fact it came from
him
too,” Layla said, unwilling to even speak Max’s name.

“I’m sorry I didn’t believe you,” Michael apologized for the millionth time. “I… I guess I just wanted to feel like I was special too. You know– extra smart because of the Athena effect.”

“The Athena effect that doesn’t even exist?” Calvin laughed. “Did you ever stop to think that maybe you’re so smart because you’re
just
smart? Your mother was some kind of genius, right?”

“That’s the smartest thing anyone’s said all day,”
Layla
smiled.

They all laughed again, together.

~

The next time Caledonia woke up she was sprawled across a large bed in a luxurious suite, a thin blanket the only thing between her and the warm breeze wafting in from the open doors facing the endless sea. She stretched, looking over to see Calvin sitting in a chair alongside the bed.

“What’s going on? Are you alright?” she rubbed the sleep from her eyes, craning her neck to see that he held a sketchpad in his lap.

She smiled, pleased. “You’re drawing again.”

“I wanted to remember this moment. You just look so… perfect… lying there all…. perfect.”

Her heart swelled with love for him, and when she next found her voice it was husky, deepened with emotion.

She lifted up the sheet, beckoning him in, “Come here.”

She didn’t have to ask him twice.

~

EPILOGUE

~

When the story hit the newspapers, it was chalked up to a gang-style hit, and assumed to be drug related. All of the murdered men had long rap sheets, so there was nothing surprising about the way their lives had ended. The killers had taken pains to destroy evidence, leaving the police with no leads.

A girl was not among the dead, and when Frank found out, he was livid. He questioned the man he’d tasked with finishing her off, brutally beating him to within an inch of his life, but getting nowhere. His shooter had no memory of that night, only the fading image of a girl with red hair and a vague recollection of the drive home. The little man finally concluded that the big idiot must have gotten knocked insensible by a blow to his thick skull. Frank finally let him go, disgusted by the whole episode.

He could hear his mother’s voice in his mind, saying, “Frankie, if you want a job done right, you better do it yourself.”

When weeks passed with no news of the redhead, he started to relax. Obviously, the girl was smart enough to lay low, and wasn’t going to do anything stupid. Hopefully the senator had learned his lesson, and would keep it in his pants from now on. Frank vowed to keep a closer watch on the horny old bastard, tempted to beat him senseless too.

It looked like the whole thing was going to blow over, and Frank’s bosses didn’t ever need to know what happened. He breathed a final sigh of relief, and cautiously decided to let it go.

~

The senator read the newspaper account over and over, his mind squirming like a toad. Four men had been found murdered execution style, with no mention of the girl at all. She must have gotten away… She must still be alive. There was no other possible explanation, and his mind raced, considering the implications.

She was out there somewhere, and he had unfinished business with her.

Senator Blackwell had grown bored with life lately, and that girl aroused him more than anyone had in years. He closed his eyes and remembered how she looked, quivering with delicious terror. She would have been his best one yet– he just knew it, and he cursed Frank for showing up when he did, unfairly thwarting all of his plans.

He licked his lips and picked up the phone, determined to track her down whether Frank liked it or not. He had just been denied the greatest pleasure of his life, and as much as he knew he should, he was unable to stop thinking about it.

He simply could not let it go.

~

THE END

~

The story continues in the sequel, “The Caledonian Inheritance,” due out in late 2013.

~

Other books by Derrolyn Anderson:

~

“Between The Land and the Sea”

“The Moon and the Tide”

“The Fate of the Muse”

“The Turning Tides”

“The Athena Effect”

~

www.derrolyn.com