Dead Girl Running (Cape Charade #1)(17)

Kellen reached the resort kitchen as Birdie pulled the van under the portico. She nipped into the kitchen. The pizzalike boxes waited for her on the counter; as she picked them up, she realized she’d interrupted a violent scene.

Chef Reinhart was shaking blood off his hand while Chef Norbert roared with laughter. The kitchen staff continued their work as if this madness was an everyday occurrence.

Kellen ducked out, placed the boxes in the van on the floor behind the driver’s seat and climbed in behind the wheel. “Chef Reinhart was bleeding, Chef Norbert was laughing and no one seemed to care.” Kellen put the van in gear and drove.

“I would never date a chef,” Birdie said. Which seemed like an odd thing to say, especially in a voice that ached with loneliness. During four years of deployment, Birdie had never been wounded. Then she came home, got married, and within two months, her husband, a Detroit police officer, was killed in the line of duty, ambushed outside their home. He had died in her arms.

“How’s it going?” Kellen asked gently. “Parents talking to you yet?”

“On the phone. My mom and my father-in-law, while my dad and my mother-in-law yell in the background.” Birdie’s parents and in-laws hadn’t wanted the new widow to take a job so far away, but she’d been looking for work when her husband died, job prospects in Detroit hadn’t improved and at Yearning Sands she could do what she’d been trained to do without the constant reminders of what she had lost. “I only remember at night.”

Kellen wanted to scoff at the idea of an eternal love. But although the welter of bitterness and pain tainted her marital memories, she knew most wives had never lived through hell, and no other woman had watched Gregory murder her cousin in her place…

*

The gas explosion sent a blast at Cecilia that lifted her, then slammed her into the ground. She lost consciousness, then came back, panicked. She smelled burning cloth. Burning flesh. Sweet Jesus, smoke drifted past her face.

Someone threw a coat over her head, blinding her, panicking her.

She fought.

Suddenly she was free. Her ears were roaring with some…sound.

A man leaned into her line of vision. He was shouting at her, gesturing toward his own head, then hers. She read his lips. “Lady, your hair was on fire!” She turned her head away from the direction of the house, coughed. Smoke clouded the air. A cab was parked haphazardly at the end of the drive where it met the road.

He was the cabbie. Not Gregory. The cabbie.

She lifted her head, looked toward the house.

Nothing was left but the foundation and burning pieces of wood, charred plaster and singed insulation dancing on the wind.

Off the cliff. Gone.

The roaring in Cecilia’s ears diminished. She could hear the cabbie’s voice now; she couldn’t yet distinguish the words, but he had his jacket in his hands, offering it to her, and he was averting his eyes and peeking at the same time.

She looked down at herself. Her linen slacks and cotton blouse had been shredded by the blast. Her panties and bra still covered her, but barely. Cecilia wrapped his jacket around herself. The arms were too long, and the hem barely reached her thighs.

Kellen was dead. Cecilia felt nothing but shock. Kellen, who had been so alive, so brave… How could she be dead?

And Gregory…was gone? Dead? Blown to bits? Cecilia felt shamed relief. And guilt. So much guilt.

The cabbie was still talking.

She could almost understand him. She stared, watching his lips.

“Are you hurt? You, uh, you were standing so close. You okay?”

She nodded. A lie. She wasn’t okay. Her lungs hurt. Her head hurt. She had blisters on her belly and blisters on her shoulders, and they burned like live coals. It didn’t matter. She was alive.

“I was called to pick up a passenger,” the cabbie said. “Saw the explosion. Was Mrs. Lykke in the house?”

Cecilia. The cabbie didn’t know she was Cecilia.

“I’m sorry, wow, what a tragedy, but the Lykkes always were a scary family with lots of ‘accidents.’” He did air quotes. “I should call this in. Right? Call the police?” He looked toward the main house. “Maybe not, though, because his mother and sister are coming to the site.”

Mother Sylvia Lykke and sister Erin raced toward the place where the house had been, and even from this distance, even with the ringing in her ears, Cecilia could hear them screaming.

In a panic, she said, “Drive me to the hotel.”

“But you want to stick around. You saw everything. Even more than me.” The cabbie was agog, thrilled at being on the front line of a breaking story. “The cops will want to talk to you. Get your testimony.”

“I want to go to the hotel.” Heart pounding in fear, she grabbed his arm, dug her fingers into his skin. “Take me to the hotel.”

“Right. You’re in shock. Let me help you—” He tried to support her.

She yanked herself away.

“Shock. Right. Don’t touch you. I’ll call, tell the cops I’m dropping you at the hotel. You can…do whatever you do for shock.”

“Lie down. Elevate the feet. Keep warm.” She had been a Girl Scout. She knew this stuff.

“Hospital!” The thought seemed to startle and thrill him. “Want me to take you to the hospital?”