Nothing but Trouble (23 page)

Jeremy’s eyes tightened into small angry bullets. “You yourself said you had learned every trade in the book. Certainly in there you learned how to break a man’s neck.”

“Yeah, they taught that in my manicurist’s class. Why would I do that?”

“Like I said. Betrayal. Revenge.”

“I’m not here to kill anyone! I just want to hang out at the beach with Davy, get a tan.”

But that wasn’t entirely true either. She’d wanted more
 
—
to maybe murder her lingering reputation as a troublemaker. Find a new one as a rescuer. “Why would I set up Jack?”

“To hurt Trudi.”

“I love Trudi. She’s my best friend.”

“But didn’t she blame you too? I read the police reports. She testified that she saw you with the cigarette that started the fire.”

“Trudi wasn’t even there
 
—” But her boyfriend Greg had been. And he’d also known the truth. PJ closed her eyes, pressed her thumb and forefinger to her temples. “I didn’t know that.”

“You purposely brought Boone out to the shooting range so that you’d have residue on your hands.”

She opened her eyes, wanting with everything inside her to shake his crazy words out of her brain. “I can’t believe you’re actually saying this to me. That you think . . . I didn’t kill Hoffman. Just like I didn’t shoot you. Someone’s setting me up, just like Jack. Someone who wants me out of the way
 
—”

“Stop. It’s time to confess the truth, PJ.”

A coldness pressed through her and she ran her eyes over him, saw the strong arms, lethal hands, face chiseled with the grim truth. Jeremy Kane, former SEAL, could probably kill a man with his bare hands.

“Boone!” She ran to the cell bars, framed her face with them. “Boone!”

What, was he on a coffee break?

Jeremy closed his mouth, and she thought she saw real confusion on his face. In her mind she saw everything they’d gone through over the past few days, from the garage to the pizza to the goat, from the B and E at the country club to the
moment in the car only hours ago when he’d looked right into her soul and spoken words of truth.

“What are you doing?”

She turned, gripping the bars behind her, measuring Jeremy, wondering if she could resurrect any of those fight scenes she’d learned as a stunt girl. “Boone!”

No Boone to her rescue. But the image of her mangled body in the middle of the cold, undecorated cell dissipated as Jeremy held up his hands as if horrified by her tone. “Calm down, PJ!”

“I’m not going to stay here and let you kill me!”

He recoiled as if she had slapped him, his mouth open. “What
 
—?”

“I’m not stupid. This is just so . . . predictable. Blame it on me, and then come in here
 
—what, were you going to tell Boone I attacked you? that you had to defend yourself?”

Jeremy wrapped his hands around her upper arms. “Stop it. I’m not going to hurt you!”

She launched out with the palm of her hand, connecting with his chin. His head snapped back and she ducked under his arm and leaped onto the bed. “Stay away.”

Jeremy pressed his hand to his chin but kept his distance. “Get ahold of yourself. I’m not going to hurt you.” He shook his head, as if she’d really rung his bell.

Good.
She balled her fists. “Yeah, there’s more where that came from, pal.” So what if her voice shook. And she was probably lying, because, well, she could do the math, and he had a good fifty pounds on her, not to mention a killer set of muscles. But she was quick. And a little bravado went a long way.

He ran his hands through his hair, and the anger deflated from his expression, matching his voice. “Put ’em down, slugger. I can concede that maybe I overreacted. It’s just that as I sat in the ER, it made sense.”

“I told you it was the drugs talking.” Her voice wobbled and adrenaline made her light-headed. She stepped off the bed, bracing her arm on the wall. “A dozen people saw me at the shooting range with Boone on Friday, even my mailman. What if one of those people is the real killer, and they’re trying to get everyone to look at me? Or maybe they were trying to take you out and make me run
 
—”

Jeremy folded his arms, eyes on her.

“I’m just saying there are other options. You out of everyone, Mr. PI, should understand that.”

She could tell she had his attention now, if not his confidence, by the way he sighed and scrubbed a hand down his face. “I guess, with your history, that’s not so far-fetched.”

“Yeah, and what if Hoffman wasn’t the Doc, like we thought, but maybe the Doc lives somewhere here in Kellogg, and the assassin tracked him through the Internet? And because Hoffman was selling Nero coins, he thought Hoffman was the Doc, only he got it wrong and
 
—”

Uh-oh, she was losing him.

“We’re back to that?”

“
 
—and now he’s going to get the real Doc while we sit here and argue, and Jack and I are going to go to prison for crimes we didn’t commit.”

Jeremy looked away. She could see him struggling. About time someone listened to her.

“I wish I could believe you, PJ. But it’s too . . . tall a tale.
Or like you said, a Robert Ludlum novel.” He pursed his lips, swallowed. “Good try.” He got up and rapped on the door. “I’m done here.” It opened.

Had they been deaf to her cries for help? Sure, let the town pariah get murdered in her cell; that’ll solve problems.

“Jeremy, think about it. It could be true!”

She stepped aside as the door closed, his form blurry through her tears.

“Sorry, PJ.” Jeremy held on to the bars, not looking at her. “I’m really, really sorry.” Then he turned and walked down the corridor and probably out of her life.

* * *

So much for her lofty hopes of changing history, of making the world believe in her.

But even she had to admit her story sounded far-fetched in the light of day. Jeremy’s sounded much more plausible.

More probable cause in a court of law.

“Oh, PJ, what have you done?”
The words scalded her brain as she waited for Boone or someone to return. Ten years old, the words still stung on open wounds as she slunk back to the metal bed and stared at the ceiling. She ran a hand over her cheek, making a fist to trap the moisture inside.

She heard the words as she took the blanket the warden offered, rejected the meal, and laid her head upon her hands in the cell, realizing that Boone wouldn’t be returning.

She knew Boone did have probable cause to hold her, but why hadn’t he even questioned her? Maybe he realized it wouldn’t do any good.

Jeremy had probably confirmed that she’d lost her marbles, anyway. Maybe she was under a twenty-four-hour crazy watch.

And what about Davy? He would be safe with Maxine, but he’d feel abandoned again. Just when she was getting him to trust her.

She wiped her soggy cheeks, breath shuddering, and bruised herself tossing the night away on the hard metal, finally falling into an exhausted, spent slumber in the wee hours of the morning.

She woke up too soon, with a start, in a rush of panic, blinking against the dim fluorescence at one end of the hall, the gray press of sunlight at the other. Her stomach pinged, empty and roiling, and she needed to use the facilities, but she’d die before she stepped near the commode. She sat up and scrubbed her hands over her face, tasting her teeth, feeling wrung out.

Apparently she wasn’t getting a phone call, a lawyer, or even a trial. Just lock her away and forget about her.

Forgive me, Trudi.
PJ leaned her head back against the cement. Because the minute her mother showed up
 
—if it came to that
 
—to spring her, she intended to pack her Bug and floor it as far away from Kellogg as a half tank of gas and seven dollars could get her.

No wonder she reminded Jeremy of an alien. At the moment, she didn’t even recognize herself.

“To God’s elect, strangers in the world . . . who have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through the sanctifying work of the Spirit, for obedience to Jesus . . .”

Of course, now God chose to send that verse into her brain.

“While John saw visions of glory, Peter fought for the truth at
home among his Jewish friends, neighbors, and relatives,”
the pastor had said.

Just like she fought for truth. Couldn’t anyone see that?

Apparently her friends, neighbors, and relatives saw only the tainted PJ. How long did it take for Peter’s family, his town, to see that he’d been changed by his relationship with the Savior? that he wasn’t the same flawed guy who used to stink like fish? Or maybe he carried that smell with him forever . . . blending in with the guys at the dock because he could.

“One second you’re Lawn Girl; the next you’re Goat Procurer; to me you’re Princess . . . to Drippy you’re Auntie PJ. But only God knows who you really are and who you’re becoming in Him.”

Who exactly was that?

Trouble.

So maybe that was partly true. She’d always be the girl who poked her nose in, tried to help. Couldn’t leave well enough alone. Like with Jack. Or Davy.

“He keeps walking around expecting people to abandon him.”
Her mother’s words slipped in like a thief and stole her breath.

Poor Davy thought it was his fault he’d been left behind by his father.

His fault he’d been abandoned.

His fault he’d been put up for adoption
 
—oh, wait . . . no . . . She pushed the heels of her hands into her eyes. It wasn’t her fault. But it had felt like it over and over, as she tried to be a Sugar. Tried to be like Connie. Unflawed. Beloved.

She leaned back against the cold wall as a knife went through her chest. She could see it all
 
—the ballet classes, the Sunday
morning outfits: her disheveled skirt over a pair of tube socks and tennis shoes. Connie’s outfit beautiful and unsullied.

She could see her mother’s thinly veiled disappointment.

Flawed.
Flawed. Flawed.

“He might have denied Christ, but that day when Jesus offered him forgiveness, he finally heard the truth
 
—that Jesus loved him despite his flaws.”

“Please, God, help me to hear the truth like You told Peter.” PJ closed her eyes, hearing her breathing, her heartbeat.

“Sometimes, someone just needs a champion.”

“I knew you had it in you. Just needed someone to hold your hand.”

“I’m glad I told your father to buy that jacket. It’s the real you.”

She wasn’t sure why she’d expected to hear a male voice. But her mother’s words splashed over her like rain, into her heart, her soul, spilling down her cheeks.

Maybe she, like Davy, just expected the worst. Maybe she’d blocked out the truth. She’d been living with the belief that she wasn’t what God wanted. But the very fact that Christ died for her said that God liked her.

The truth pressed against her chest, burning.

He liked her before and after she’d become a Christian. With or without flaws.

God believed in her.

And she could probably surrender to someone who liked her enough to die for her.

“He gave everything completely to God
 
—his future and his reputation and his dreams. And that’s when God took over and did amazing things in Peter’s life. And He’ll do that in your life.”

Just like God did with Peter.

PJ caught a tear on her hand, swiped her fingers across her face. “Okay.” Her voice was tiny against the cement ceiling. “Okay. I don’t know what’s going on here, but You do. And right now, I’m going to trust You.” Footsteps in the hall cut her voice to a whisper. “Please, save Jack, save Trudi. Save . . . me. I’m handing it all over to You.”

Boone appeared at the cell door. “You talking to me?”

She shook her head.

Wearing a tired expression, he unlocked the door.

“What’s this? Breakfast?”

“I’m sorry you had to spend the night. We couldn’t find the bullet, and yes, your prints were on the gun.”

“Big surprise there.”

He opened the door. “You’re free to go.”

She wasn’t sure if that last line was a joke or not. “I don’t understand.”

“We don’t have enough evidence to hold you for attempted murder.” Boone managed a sad smile.

Free to go. Wow, that was quick, even for God.

She straightened her shirt and walked past Boone on cramped legs.

“Not so fast.” He grabbed her arm and lowered his voice. “Please, Peej, don’t leave town.”

Oh no. This time she was sticking around until the bitter end.

Freedom. PJ expected
 
—no, deserved
 
—sunshine and blue skies on her first day out of the clink. But a chill seeped through the building, cold and angry from the drizzle outside as PJ collected her keys, her bag.

She didn’t look at Boone as she left, just pushed open the doors and stood under the awning, watching the rain run off the sides into a muddy puddle framing the stoop. Her car was parked a block away at the impound lot. She calculated the rain and puddle, did a cursory search for an umbrella
 
—hello, certainly she had an umbrella in the black pit of her bag?
 
—and realized that she’d be an otter by the time she got home.

No, not home. To Maxine’s to get Davy, who was probably already a mess by now. She wasn’t sure how she was going to explain her absence to a four-year-old. She raised her eyes to heaven, shaking her head. “I could use someone on my side here.”

Behind her, the door opened, bumping her, and she tripped out from under the awning into the sniper line of rainwater. It doused her, dripping off her hair, down her shirt. “Oh!”

“PJ, get out of the rain!” Boone grabbed her arm, pulled her back.

She shook out of his grip. “It’s your fault
 
—you pushed me off the step.”

He looked as wrung out as she felt. “Need a ride to your car?”

It didn’t take a mind reader to see the apology in his eyes, even if he couldn’t muster the words. “Just this once.”

He touched her elbow. “Stay here. I’ll pick you up.”

Sometimes she just didn’t understand men. Where did chivalry fit in with unfounded accusation?

Boone splashed out into the rain and a moment later pulled up in his black F-150 pickup. She covered her head, letting her purse take the punishment, dodged the puddles, and slipped into the cab. “Where’d you get this?”

“The Mustang is just for special events.”

Like what, breaking her heart?

He drove her to the impound lot in silence, stopped at the gate, and even pulled out his wallet to pay her fine.

She let him, turning away from his actions, reminding herself that she’d already forgiven him once. Maybe she could someday forgive him twice.

He drove to her Bug and reached out to touch her arm before she could slide out of the cab. “Peej
 
—”

“There’s nothing to say, Boone. I’ll see you round.” She closed the door on his words.

* * *

Ethan and Maxine lived in Lion Heights, a development of suburbia just north of Kellogg. With split-levels and updated ranches, the houses looked straight out of
The Brady Bunch
, each yard perfectly groomed, not a blade out of place, bright impatiens hanging from the narrow porches near the doors being jostled by the wind and rain.

She drove slowly, deciphering house numbers, not sure what she would do after she picked up Davy. Or how to explain to him that she hadn’t abandoned him.

The Hudsons lived in a long ranch on a cul-de-sac; PJ took in the handicap access ramp as she pulled up. It struck her that from the outside looking in, no one realized how different life was for someone in a wheelchair.

She pressed the bell and waited, shifting her weight on the steps, stifling the urge to race back to her Bug and call her mother to pick Davy up. She could probably just leave her duffel and clothes at Connie’s. They could donate it all to charity
 
—

No. She would stay. Needed to stay. For Davy. At least until Connie got home.

Emptiness shook her as she looked at the black void beyond that.

Maxine opened the door, her smile warm against the brisk, wet air. “Hey! You okay?” She held a towel and wiped her hands. “We’re having pancakes. Want some?”

PJ wanted to fling herself into Maxine’s arms. “That’s okay. But I’d take some of the coffee I smell.”

“Coming right up.” She turned toward the kitchen, and PJ
followed her past the expansive tiled entry with a gilded mirror that captured a blue and white vase filled with fresh lilies on the sideboard underneath. The perfect, refreshing escape out of the chaos of the world.

“Jeremy called. Said you were tied up with the investigation, asked if we could keep Davy overnight,” Maxine said over her shoulder.

He did? PJ didn’t have time to sort that out, however, because Davy spied her and jumped off the stool, launching himself at her.

PJ caught him and swung him around, squeezing tight. “You okay, little man?”

He pushed back, his hands on her shoulders. “I had a sleepover!”

Not a hint of shadow in his beautiful blue eyes. PJ pressed a kiss to his forehead and pulled him close again, breathing the smell of his skin, fresh and innocent. “I missed you.”

“Me too,” Davy said, although he didn’t put as much gusto into it as she would have liked as he untangled himself from her arms and hit the floor. He climbed back up on his high stool. “More pancakes, please.”

Maxine stood at the griddle on the counter, holding a pancake turner. “Coming right up, kiddo.”

Daniel and Felicia were steering their pancakes through a sea of syrup as Maxine poured PJ a cup of coffee and set it in front of her. “Have a seat.”

Maxine’s kitchen and family room connected into one long room with no carpet, probably so wheels could roll easier. PJ stared out the large picture window that overlooked the neighbor’s backyard. Beside the window, brown velvet drapes
framed French doors. No keeping secrets in this house. Maybe no need, either.

“Is Ethan around?” PJ sank onto a microfiber brown sofa in the family room and picked up what looked like a photo album.

“He’s working on his Web site.”

PJ opened the book.

“Those are from our early years,” Maxine said, “so no laughing. Hey, c’mere, you.” She caught one of the twins making a break from the counter. “Let me wipe your face.”

PJ paged through the pictures. “I’ve never seen such a put-together scrapbook.”

“I love to scrapbook. It’s a wonderful legacy for the children.”

She flipped back in time to pictures of just Maxine and Ethan posing at a tall gate. “Is this Buckingham Palace?” She recognized the red uniform, the bearskin busby of the soldier.

Maxine leaned over the back of the sofa. “Yeah. Ethan used to work just down the street. We would watch the changing of the guard on his lunch break.”

“You used to live in London?” She turned another page. “The Eiffel Tower.” Again, they stood together, arms around each other.

PJ was about to turn the page. “Wait, he’s standing in these.”

“Oh, sure. That was a long time ago. Before Ethan’s . . . accident.”

PJ’s curiosity meter flickered into the red, but she couldn’t stop herself. “How was he hurt? Car accident?”

Maxine went quiet behind her.

PJ turned and looked up at her. “I’m sorry; I shouldn’t have
 
—”

“No.” Her voice pitched low. PJ wasn’t sure if it was for the kids or if rehashing their loss brought the pain fresh to the surface. “He was shot.”

“Shot?” PJ wasn’t sure if she spoke or just mouthed the word.

“In Germany
 
—Berlin, actually.” Maxine wrapped her hands around the edge of the sofa. “They never caught the assailant. We were walking home from the Brandenburg Gate when Ethan just crumpled beside me. I didn’t even hear the shot. We didn’t think he’d live, but he pulled through miraculously. We moved to America for rehabilitation and finally to Minneapolis because of Courage Center.”

“I’m sorry.” And because it felt right, however foreign, PJ cupped her hand over Maxine’s.

Maxine smiled at the gesture. “The good news is we were finally able to have children because of it. I’d never been able to get pregnant before. We had to do things the newfangled way
 
—in vitro
 
—but we got Felicia and Daniel out of it.” She glanced at her twins. “Who would have thought out of the darkness might come a new future for us? We just consider each day a gift from God.”

PJ couldn’t speak, didn’t know how to follow those words. She could learn a lot from Maxine.

Maxine slid her hand from PJ’s as Ethan motored out of a room just off the family room. He smiled at PJ. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

“Thanks for keeping Davy.” She cleared her throat. “We should get going.”

“Any pancakes left, Maxine?” Ethan snagged his wife’s hand as she walked by and pulled her down for a kiss.

PJ turned away before she got soggy again. She kept thumbing through their past. “Is this the Louvre?”

Ethan wheeled over to her. “Yes. Art used to be a passion of mine. I was a professor of art history at Oxford a long time ago.”

PJ turned another page.

“That’s at an archaeological dig in Italy.” Ethan pointed to a picture of himself in a pair of Bermuda shorts, a handkerchief around his head.

“Did you know that in Italy, they’re digging up a palace that belonged to Nero?” PJ said, proud of that piece of trivia.

“Yes, I did. They’ve been excavating for a couple decades.”

“I read online that they unearthed a number of rare coins from the dig. But they were stolen.” PJ looked at Ethan and gave a short burst of incredulous laughter. “You’re not going to believe this, but for a while in the last two weeks, I actually thought that Ernie Hoffman had been killed because he was collecting those coins.”

Now she was the prime suspect. Right next to Jack. Her smile faded.

Ethan had also lost all expression on his face. In the kitchen, Maxine’s spoon dropped to the floor with a wild clatter.

“What?” PJ glanced at her as she crouched to pick it up.

Ethan was shaking his head.

Something low and repugnant started in PJ’s stomach, that same feeling she’d had ten years ago, when she smelled smoke from the country club, or when she watched the goat go hooves up, and especially when Boone hauled Jack away for murder.

She just might need to put her head between her knees.

“Davy, time to go.” She didn’t want to know if Ethan was who her brain screamed he was. She just wanted to leave. Because paramount in this situation was the fact that if she was right
 
—and for the first time she longed to be definitely, horribly wrong
 
—an assassin still stalked the neighborhoods of Kellogg.

Where was Boone
 
—or even Jeremy for that matter
 
—when she needed him? She couldn’t meet Maxine’s eyes. “Thanks so much for taking care of him.” She strode over to Davy, wiping his face. “I’ll call.”

She would. Right after she barricaded herself and Davy inside her house. Or maybe she’d call Boone first.

Because the truth was as deafening as the doorbell buzzing through her head. Whoever had killed Ernie had also fired on Jeremy. Or maybe her . . .

“C’mon, Davy.” She took his hand.

The doorbell rang again. PJ stepped back as Maxine crossed to open the door.

Oh, whew, it was just the mailman. A breath of relief passed through her.

Colin stood there with an envelope in his hands. “I’m looking for Mr. Ethan Hudson?”

“That’s me,” Ethan said, rolling up.

Wait
 
—what was
her
mailman doing on this side of town? She couldn’t even get pizza delivery in her neighborhood. No way the mail route extended this far.

PJ couldn’t move as she stared at the envelope with the little green sticker on the front.

Someone Ernie knew.

Someone Ernie trusted. Someone no one would notice.

Someone like the mailman.

Colin extended the clipboard to Ethan.

PJ’s breaths came fast, one after another, and she clamped her mouth shut. Davy squirmed next to her.

“Excuse me, PJ,” Ethan said.

But PJ couldn’t tear her eyes off Colin. He looked back at her then, a little surprised, as if he only now recognized her. His smile vanished.

She dropped Davy’s hand and gave him a nudge. “Go play with Daniel and Felicia.”
Go
.

Maxine frowned. Ethan took the clipboard.

As Ethan signed, Colin stepped inside and closed the door with a soft click. “Hi,” he said to PJ.

PJ lifted a hand, gave a timid, unarmed wave.

Then, from behind him, Colin pulled out a gun. And of course, she recognized it as the heavy .22 Ruger Boone had introduced her to.

Colin, aka the mailman, aka Rembrandt’s assassin, turned his attention to Ethan. “You’re hard to track down, Doc.”

Why, oh why, didn’t anyone listen to her?