The Final Victim(95)

"Nydia?" Royce calls. "Are you here? There's a reporter out front."

Ever-efficient, the housekeeper must have already been on her way from the kitchen; he can already hear the faint, familiar creak of the front door opening.

Then comes the hum of female voices, followed by the unmistakable groan of the screen door.

"Nydia, no, don't!" he calls, wondering why on earth she'd let a reporter into the house.

Too late.

He can already hear footsteps clicking across the tile and hardwood floors, heading right for him.

Then a stranger appears in the doorway.

A stranger who looks familiar…

Why?

She must be on television, but she doesn't have that polished journalist appearance. Her hair falls loose past her shoulders without a hint of hair spray, and the blond streaks are from the sun, not a salon. That much is obvious in her tawny, freckled face and golden arms and legs.

Plus, she's wearing shorts, a T-shirt, and Dr. Scholl's-hardly camera-ready attire.

All right, so if she's not a reporter, who is she?

"Mr. Maitland, I'm so sorry to bother you-"

The moment she speaks that preamble, in precisely the words she spoke to him once before-Mr. Maitland, I'm so sorry-Royce recognizes her.

Not from the six o'clock news…

No, Royce realizes, as the toast and honey roil on a churning sea in his gut, she was a lifeguard at the beach on that fateful Labor Day weekend.

"So, we meet again," Williamson says, baring his teeth in what doesn't quite pass as a smile as Gib settles into the interrogation room for what promises to be yet another round of relentless questioning.

Tyler is here, which is a good sign. When he left yesterday, Gib wasn't entirely certain he'd see the lawyer again. Which might not be such a bad thing.

After Tyler had badgered him for every detail of his trip to Mexico-which, of course, Gib claimed not to recall-he left, saying he was going to verify that Gib really had been on the flights he'd claimed to have taken, and that he was going to locate Cassandra, provided she's listed in the Boston white pages.

Gib would venture to guess that she is, but who the hell knows?

If Tyler really wants her number that badly, Gib isn't about to keep it from him. It's in his cell phone's memory.

Along with a couple of other numbers he isn't particularly anxious to have come to light.

In response to Williamson's smarmy greeting, because it seems the detective is waiting for a response, Gib says, "Yes, we're all in our places with bright, shiny faces."

All right, that probably wasn't the kind of response Williamson had had in mind.

Tyler glares at Gib, then asks the officers to explain the reason for this meeting.

"I'm glad you asked," Williamson says, "because I'm pretty anxious to tell you. In fact, I couldn't wait to get here."

He shoots a significant look in Gib's direction.

Terrific.

Are they going to: (a) have Grandaddy's body exumed, (b) try to pin a murder on him, to complement the assault charge, or (c) come up with some bogus witness who claims to be able to place him in the cemetery that night?

The answer, Gib discovers as he listens to Williamson's preamble with mounting anxiety, is (d) none of the above.

In the end, it's Dorado who delivers the sucker punch.

"We went through the evidence we took from your room again, Remington," the detective says, a gleam in his dark eyes, "… and we found something very interesting hidden in what looked like regular-old containers of shaving cream and hair gel."

"Hey, where have you been?" Kevin's voice asks, so loud in Lianna's ear that she instinctively shushes him, then feels ridiculous.

It's not as though anyone can hear his voice coming over the phone line in the study with the door closed.

Royce is safely stuck downstairs on the couch; her mother's car isn't in the driveway.

"I've been stuck at Oakgate, where else would I be?"

"You said you'd try to meet me yesterday afternoon. You never even called to set it up."

"I know." Her tone is hushed. "But I couldn't."

"How come? Was your mother up your butt now that she's hanging around at home again?"

"Actually, I fell asleep."

He snorts.

"It's the truth," Lianna tells him with a shrug. "I was really wiped out. I slept all afternoon." Which is probably why she managed to wake up so early this morning. It wasn't even nine o'clock when her eyes opened of their own accord.

"Anyway," she tells Kevin, "I found out my mother changed the number here last week and didn't tell me. Were you trying to call me at all?"

"Uh… Yeah. All weekend."

"That's why you couldn't get me. Sorry."

"It's okay. I'm glad you called. Let's hook up tonight."

"Tonight?" Lianna hesitates. "I don't know if I should sneak out, Kevin. If my mother catches me again…"

"Come on, she'll never know. And I miss you."

A smile curves her lips. "I miss you, too."

"So then let's go. I'll pick you up."

"What time?"