Contract Pending Read online

  “Tamara Grimaldi,” I said. “She came down with a forensic team to go over Yvonne’s house this morning.”

  “They got involved after Marquita died,” Bob Satterfield explained. “Seein’ as she died here, but lived there. We’re sharin’ information.”

  “Of course.” Todd looked miffed. “Well, she’s never going to arrest Collier. She likes him.”

  “If he did something she needed to arrest him for,” I said steadily, “she’d arrest him. He hasn’t.”

  Todd looked at his dad. Bob nodded. “Had to let him go at the end of the day. Wasn’t nothin’ I could do to keep him.”

  Todd sniffed. I devoted myself to my food.

  We got back to the mansion a little after eight. Todd did not try to kiss me goodnight, and his father did not try to kiss my mother. I was grateful. Mom and the sheriff probably did kiss on their own time, but I had no desire to watch. That would just be too weird. And as for Todd... I had no need for him to kiss me, either. Our interactions were definitely feeling the strain of that unaccepted proposal, mixed now with the guilt I felt over having slept with Rafe.

  I couldn’t wait for him to leave, and take his father with him. As soon as the door was shut behind them, I turned to mother. “I did not appreciate that.”

  She tried to look innocent. “What?”

  “You set me up. You knew Todd would be coming, and you knew I didn’t want to see him.”

  “You know you had to see him sooner or later, darling,” mother said reasonably.

  I planted my hands on my hips. “I wanted it to be later. After we’d both gotten some perspective. He’s upset with me. And disappointed. And I’m sure he was hoping that I’d tell him I’d changed my mind and wanted to marry him after all.”

  He’d had a very hopeful sort of look on his face when he first stepped out of the car. Keeping things businesslike had been like kicking a puppy, something I never do.

  “I’m sorry if I upset you, darling,” mother said, sounding not sorry at all. “But at least now it’s over and done with. And you can get back to the relationship you used to have.”

  I doubted we’d ever get back to the relationship we used to have, but I didn’t say so. “I’m going to take a drive,” I said instead, turning on my heel. “I can’t settle down to sleep after that. I need some time alone.”

  Mother nodded, although there was a tiny wrinkle between her brows. “Of course, darling. Be careful.”

  Fifteen minutes later I turned the nose of the Volvo down the rutted dirt track to the Bog. I had no idea whether Rafe would be there or not—he might have gone back to Nashville after Sheriff Satterfield let him go—but if he hadn’t, I wanted to see him. Apparently having interaction with Todd made me want to see Rafe. The irony was immense, and if Todd had any idea of the way he affected me, he’d probably cry.

  There were no lights on in the trailer, and for a second I thought about just turning around and going back. But no, I was here; at least I should check the door. And—yes!—unlike yesterday evening, Rafe’s Harley was parked under the carport in the back.

  After sharing his bed, I might have earned the right to walk in without knocking, but I knocked anyway. It was only when there was no answer that I tried the doorknob. It turned in my hand and I pushed the door in. “Rafe?”

  There was a sound from the back of the trailer. A rustle and something that sounded suspiciously like a curse.

  I let the door slam shut behind me and started making my way through the kitchen, shuffling my feet and keeping my arms out to feel where I was going. The interior of the trailer was almost pitch black. “Rafe? Are you here?”

  There was more rustling. My heart stopped for a second when I realized that maybe he wasn’t alone. Maybe he had company. Like... Tammy Grimaldi?

  But no. Surely neither of them would do that to me. And she had told me, apparently sincerely, that he wasn’t someone she’d ever be interested in that way.

  Even so, the fear gave my voice an edge. “Rafe?”

  He sounded resigned. “In the back.” I heard more noises. One of them the scrape of a match, and a moment later a tiny light illuminated the dark hallway. I hurried toward it.

  He was in the back bedroom, the one that had been his growing up. There was a bedroll on the floor, and that Penthouse-page of the almost-naked girl on the wall, and that was it. Except for Rafe himself, of course, sitting on the bedroll with his back against the wall, looking almost demonic with the light from an old-fashioned kerosene lamp flickering over his face and over the ridges and valleys of his upper body. The flame reflected in his eyes and created deep shadows under his cheekbones.

  I swallowed. He looked breathtaking, but there was something forbidding about him tonight, something dark and unwelcoming. Like he hadn’t wanted to be bothered with me and wished I’d just leave.

  But at least he was alone.

  “I wasn’t sure I’d find you here,” I said, my voice not entirely steady. He cut his eyes to my face, but didn’t speak. “I thought maybe you’d driven back to Nashville after the sheriff let you go.”

  He shook his head. “Something I gotta do first.”

  “What?”

  He looked at me for a second. “I was expecting someone else.”

  “Who?” And I admit it, my heart clenched. Not Yvonne; she was in the hospital. Not Tamara Grimaldi; she must be back in Nashville by now. Who else could he possibly...?

  And then my breath stopped for an entirely different reason, and I felt myself turn pale. “Oh, my God! You’re waiting for Jorge Pena to come find you. Rafe... no!”

  His voice was even, calm. “He’ll stick around until he catches me. This way I’ll make it easy for him.”

  “But he’ll kill you!” He wasn’t even wearing a shirt, let alone something like a bulletproof vest. “Please, let Tamara Grimaldi try to catch him. She will! And then you’ll be safe.”

  He shook his head, and I felt panic curl through my stomach. My voice shook. “Please, Rafe. Don’t do anything stupid. I know you can take care of yourself, but he’s a killer. And I don’t want you to die. Not when...”

  He looked up, a warning in his eyes. “Watch what you say, darlin’.”

  I blinked. But before I could speak again, there was a noise outside. Like the crunch of a shoe on the dry ground.

  Rafe breathed a curse. “Someone’s coming.”

  “I can hear that.”

  “I wasn’t talking to you. Now I am. Listen...” He looked up at me, his voice coming faster, losing the lazy Southern drawl. “See the closet? The one in the corner? Get in there. Stay in there. Don’t come out, no matter what you hear. Not until I tell you it’s safe.”

  “But you’ll be all alone out here...” With someone who was probably Jorge Pena coming around the trailer as we stood here arguing.

  “I know what I’m doing. I need you to do as I say so we can both walk outta here.”

  His eyes were black in the low light. I swallowed. “Please be careful. If anything happens to you...”

  “Hold that thought.”

  The doorknob in the kitchen turned and he pointed to the closet. I went. Ducked inside and pulled the louvered doors halfway shut behind me, as silently as I could. And then I squeezed as far into the corner as possible and stood there, shivering in my fancy cocktail dress and my high heeled shoes, waiting for the showdown.

  Chapter 20

  I couldn’t see Rafe, but I could hear him. His breathing was slow and even, and if his heart was beating faster, it was impossible to hear from where I stood. Out in the hallway, slow steps were coming our way. I held my breath as they reached the door.

  “Hello, Rafael,” a soft voice murmured, and for a second, the world tilted; it was so not what I was expecting.

  Not Jorge Pena, but a woman.

  Jorge’s hypothetical partner in crime? Or someone else?

  I don’t think she was what Rafe was expecting either, because it took him a second to find his voice. “E
lspeth.”

  Ah. I had thought the voice sounded familiar, but I’d had a hard time placing it. Now I knew why; I’d spoken to Elspeth only twice in the past twelve years, and only for a few minutes.

  What was she doing here? Surely Elspeth Caulfield wasn’t working with Jorge Pena?

  I heard her footsteps brush the carpet as she came into the room. “It’s been a long time.”

  “I don’t get back to Sweetwater much.” Rafe shifted his weight on the bedroll. “What’s with the gun, sugar? You planning on shooting me?”

  Gun...?

  Elspeth giggled. “Of course not. Why would I shoot you?”

  After a second she added, her voice totally different; cool and businesslike, “Isn’t that Savannah’s car outside?”

  Uh-oh. A lead weight dropped into my stomach.

  Rafe’s even tone didn’t change. “I borrowed it. She didn’t need it tonight. Hot date with Todd Satterfield.”

  “Have you been seeing her?”

  The mix of emotions in Elspeth’s voice was frightening, especially from my perspective. Hurt mixed with jealousy and threat of violence. Not a good combination.

  Rafe laughed. “You think Savannah Martin’d have anything to do with the likes of me, sugar?”

  “I saw you together,” Elspeth said. “At your house.”

  The soft words fell into the silence like stones. My stomach clenched. And not only because of that crazy mixture of emotions in her voice, added to the undertone of chilling, clearheaded insanity—not to mention the gun—but because I realized that it really wasn’t Jorge Pena who had shot at us that night. Just like it wasn’t Jorge who had broken into my apartment and slashed my nightgown and lipsticked my wall. It was all Elspeth. And she hadn’t been trying to shoot Rafe; she’d been aiming for me.

  But she’d been crazy enough to risk hitting him in the process. Like he’d said, we’d been standing pretty close together, and it wouldn’t have taken much to shoot the wrong person under the circumstances.

  “Three, four days ago?” Rafe’s voice was still level, conversational. “That was just sex, sugar. It didn’t mean nothing. She was upset, and I thought I’d be nice to her and see if I couldn’t get laid. That’s all.”

  “Are you sure?” She sounded suspicious. But also pathetically eager to believe him.

  “Course I’m sure. You think she’s gonna wanna take me home and introduce me to her mama?” He chuckled cynically. “Nah, sugar. She woke up the next morning begging me not to tell anyone.”

  He waited a second before he added, “Wasn’t like I didn’t expect it, you know? She’d had too much to drink; wasn’t like she’d’a wanted anything to do with me otherwise.”

  Again, the irony was almost too much to bear. Two months ago, I’d been playing this same scene, trying to get another nutcase with a gun—Perry Fortunato—to believe that there was nothing going on between Rafe and me. Now he was doing the same thing to Elspeth. And sounding very convincing, I might add.

  Unless he really believed it...?

  I had been upset the night I showed up at his house, and although I hadn’t been drunk, I’m sure he’d figured he might get lucky if he played his cards right. He probably wasn’t under any illusions about the possibility of a future. I’d made it pretty clear to him—before, during and after—that I wouldn’t be talking about what had happened with anyone. I certainly wouldn’t be taking him home to meet my mother; he’d hit that nail square on. It wasn’t like I could object to what he was saying, or the way he was saying it, when he was just repeating the things I’d already told myself, multiple times. But somehow it sounded worse when he said it.

  Did he really believe that the only reason I’d wanted him was because I’d been freaked out over Todd’s proposal and had had just enough wine to lose some of my inhibitions?

  Didn’t he realize that I was more than halfway in love with him? That I would have to be, to do what I did? I may have talked a good game—I may have come close to convincing even myself—but the truth is that I’ve never had ‘just sex’ in my life, and I doubt I ever will. I would never have slept with him if I hadn’t been emotionally involved.

  I missed the next few sentences in my bout of uncomfortable self-revelation. When I got back to the conversation, Rafe had moved on. He’d obviously made the same deductions I had, and realized that if Elspeth had shot at us that night on Potsdam Street, then it was Elspeth who had killed Marquita, and Elspeth who tried to kill Yvonne, as well.

  “What did she ever do?” he wanted to know.

  “You kissed her,” Elspeth said, as if this was a perfectly reasonable explanation for why Yvonne had to die. “Yesterday. At the cemetery.”

  “You were there?”

  Obviously. Although I hadn’t seen her, either.

  “In the parking lot,” Elspeth said. “I watched you. You kissed Yvonne. And you talked to Savannah.” She paused a moment and then she added, thoughtfully, “She looked like she wanted you to kiss her, too.”

  Rafe resisted the bait. Again. I could hear the effort it took for him to sound careless. “I kiss a lot of women, sugar.”

  “You can’t do that anymore,” Elspeth said, her voice tight.

  “You gonna shoot every woman I kiss from here on out?”

  “You belong with me,” Elspeth said. “Now that you’re back, we can be together again.”

  I recognized the undertone in her voice, that almost Joan of Arc-like serenity. Her eyes were probably glowing with semi-religious fervor, too. She’d looked that way the first time I talked to her, when she spoke about Rafe.

  I’m sure he wanted to tell her that he wasn’t back, and there was no way in hell he’d want to be with her kooky self. He didn’t.

  “If we’re gonna be together,” he said instead, calmly, “you can’t go shooting nobody. I get into enough trouble without that. Why don’t you gimme the gun, sugar?”

  Silence. I’ll never know whether Elspeth would have done it or not, because now a new voice entered the conversation.

  “Better yet, why don’t you give it to me?”

  I jumped. I’d been too caught up in my own thoughts and the conversation to have heard Jorge Pena make his way into the trailer and down the hallway to the bedroom. Or maybe he was just really, really good at sneaking up on people without making any noise at all. I wondered how long he’d been listening to their conversation before he made himself known.

  It was horribly annoying to be stuck here in the closet, and not being able to see what was going on outside. On the other hand, I didn’t want to risk moving just in case they heard me.

  “No,” Elspeth said. Her voice shook a little. I guess she was less brave looking down the barrel of Jorge’s gun than she had been wielding her own. Still, she was brave enough to refuse to hand over her weapon.

  “It would be best. That way I won’t have to kill you.” Jorge’s voice was perfectly pleasant, but with an undertone of steel.

  “I expected you a couple days ago,” Rafe’s voice said. “Took you long enough to get here.”

  “You turned out to be more difficult to find than I had expected.” Jorge sounded irritated about that.

  Rafe sounded amused. “Glad to hear it.”

  “Hiding behind your girlfriend isn’t going to help you now I’m here, though. If I have to shoot her to get to you, I will.”

  Nobody spoke for a second.

  “I’m not moving,” Elspeth said. I rolled my eyes, even as I dug my fingernails into my palms deeply enough to leave dents.

  “It’s your funeral,” Jorge replied. I wondered if he was trying to be funny, or whether he just didn’t recognize the humor in what he’d said. It was impossible to know for sure without seeing his expression.

  I could hear Rafe shift his weight on the bedroll, but no other movement. No words, either. And I admit I was a little surprised by that. He’d never struck me as the kind of man who’d hide behind a woman. Whenever we’d been together and something happen
ed, he’d always put himself between me and it.

  “I’m going to count to five,” Jorge said. “If you haven’t moved by then, I’m going to kill you. And then I’ll kill your boyfriend. Is he worth dying for?”

  Elspeth didn’t answer. But she didn’t move either, because Jorge started counting.

  “Five.”

  I dug my fingernails into my palms, holding my breath.

  “Four.”

  Was there anything I could do? Leap out of the closet and distract him...? If I did, maybe Elspeth would shoot him.

  “Three.”

  Rafe would shoot him, given that opportunity. But Rafe didn’t have the gun. Elspeth did.

  “Two.”

  If I’d been Elspeth, I wouldn’t have waited for him to count all the way down. I would have shot him long before he got to...

  “One.”

  For a breathless second, nothing happened.

  And then the world exploded.

  One shot. Two. Three. Four...

  I think I screamed, but it wasn’t like anyone could hear me in the fusillade.

  And then there was silence, apart from my ringing ears and my own rapid gasps of breath. No one spoke. No one made a sound.

  I hesitated, torn.

  Rafe had told me to stay in the closet until he said I could come out. But what if he couldn’t talk? What he was bleeding to death outside, while I was standing in here doing nothing? What if he was already dead?

  I pushed the louvered doors aside, my mouth dry and my stomach in a knot.

  Nothing happened when I stepped out into the room. No one said anything. No bullets came my way. I looked around.

  In just the last few seconds, the bedroom had turned into a battlefield. Jorge lay crumpled in the door, his body halfway into the hallway and his knees bent up at an uncomfortable angle. There was blood spray on the door jamb next to him, and he’d let go of his gun, which was lying next to him. He didn’t move, didn’t so much as twitch.

  Elspeth was in the middle of the floor, still between Jorge and the bedroll, her pale blonde hair fanned out across the green carpet. She was wearing virginal white, and bright crimson stains blossomed on her chest, like Yvonne this morning.