Mean Streak(123)

“Ambulance should be here in a couple more minutes.” He shuffled his feet and divided an uneasy look between her and Hayes. Hayes, getting the message, mumbled that he’d see if there was anything he could do outside and left through the open door. She was reluctant to let him go but didn’t call him back, intuiting what Jack Connell was about to say.

“Emory, your husband is dead.”

She nodded. “She alluded to it. How?”

“Gunshot. Probably with the same pistol she was going to use on you.”

“Was it Jeff’s pistol?”

“No. One registered to him was found in an inside pocket of his jacket.”

“So she wasn’t lying about that. She told me he had a pistol.”

“He didn’t get to implement his plan, whatever it was, and I guess we’ll never know. He was killed inside the suite. Somehow Alice Butler got out without the deputy seeing her. Maybe the same way you and Hayes split the other night through the adjoining suite.”

He explained that after discovering Jeff’s body, he, Knight, and Grange had left the deputy there to guard the crime scene. “We were afraid for your safety and went looking for you at the motel. When I saw that my car was gone, we figured there was only one place you’d go.”

“My phone must have died before you got that part of the message. I told you I was on my way up here to warn Hayes.” She was watching him through the open doorway. His back was to her. He was talking to Buddy Grange and Sam Knight. “Alice knew.”

“She got here quick. She must’ve come upon the wrecked car and realized you’d set out on foot. She continued driving till she spotted you on the road, then—”

“Came up behind me, like before.”

“Before?”

She related Alice’s confession.

“So it wasn’t Jeff after all,” Jack said.

“Not directly. They both deceived me, and Alice told me he wasn’t all that bereaved when he thought I was dead. I believe that.”

“Hate to say it, but so do I.”

Hayes came through the door and rejoined them. “Ambulance driver is turning around so he can back in.”

Connell said to Emory, “I’ll pass along to Knight and Grange that Alice confessed.” He left them to go outside.

Hayes sat down on his haunches in front of her and took her cold hands between his. “Knight told me about Jeff. You okay?”

“It’ll take some time.”

“You have time.”

Absently she nodded. After a moment, she asked, “What happened at the Floyds’ house?”

“Norman and Will were on the lookout for me in front. Forgot to cover their back. They’re mean, but not too astute.”

“Lisa and Pauline?”

“Safe. I got there before the brothers carried out their wretched threat, which was probably an empty one. They wanted me, not Lisa.”

“Are they in custody?”

“They probably are by now. The mountain is crawling with cops of all varieties. I left Norman and Will easy to find, chained to the tree where they used to keep the dog.”

“Poetic justice.”

“I thought so.”

She touched the fresh bruises on his face.

He gave her a wry smile. “They didn’t go for the idea at first.”

Wanting to smile, needing to weep, she leaned forward and nestled her head against his neck. He wrapped his arms around her and held her close. She could feel his lips moving against her hair, but she didn’t catch the whispered words.

They stayed that way until two EMTs wheeled in a gurney.

Hayes tilted her head up and kissed her mouth, warmly and sweetly.

Then he stepped away and gave her over to the care of the EMTs, who insisted on strapping her to a board because of the head injury. As they wheeled her through the doorway and out into the yard, she caught sight of Sergeant Grange. She called his name, and he turned. He looked ashen, his shrewd eyes not as bright as usual.

She mouthed to him, Thank you. He acknowledged her gratitude with a quick nod, then cast his eyes down at the ground.

Looking for Hayes, she tried to move her head from side to side, but because of the constraint across her forehead, she couldn’t. When she didn’t see him, she struggled to raise her head, also to no avail. With mounting anxiety, she searched the yard as thoroughly as her peripheral vision would allow.

Finally she spotted Jack Connell. He was watching her, and in an instant she knew the cause of his bleak expression.

She ceased the struggle to raise her head. She wouldn’t find who she had been looking for. The tears that leaked from the corners of her eyes were also futile. That he had vanished should come as no surprise. He had told her he would, and he always did as he said.





Finish Line



All along the twenty-six-mile route through Atlanta, spectators and supporters had cheered on the runners, but those congregated near the finish line were especially enthusiastic.

When Emory ran across it and the announcer boomed her name, introducing her as the organizer of the fund-raising race, she received a roar of approval. She was then thronged by photographers from TV stations and print news agencies, all vying for a sound bite. In her breathless state, she kept them brief.

She received pats on the back and hugs from other runners. One of her patients, a six-year-old boy, shyly approached with his parents and asked for her autograph. A group of war veterans, who’d gone the distance in wheelchairs, lined up to high five and salute her.