The Bad Daughter(82)
“The fall?”
“At least.”
“Oh, God. We can’t let that happen. He’ll die in there. We have to find out who did this.”
Blake took her arm, led her toward the front door of the courthouse.
The sheriff was waiting beside it. “Robin…Blake,” he said, tipping his hat. “I was hoping I might be able to stop by this afternoon—”
Robin neither slowed down nor looked in his direction. “Go to hell,” she said.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
The sheriff showed up at their door at just after two o’clock that afternoon.
“We don’t want any,” Melanie told him, about to shut the door in his face.
“I’m here to see Cassidy.”
“She doesn’t want to see you,” Robin said, coming up behind her sister, their bodies forming a human barricade.
“I have a right to question the girl.”
“She has nothing to say to you.”
“Is that Sheriff Prescott?” Cassidy called from inside the house.
“It’s all right, sweetheart,” Robin called back. “You don’t have to talk to him.”
“No, that’s okay. I want to see him.”
“I think that’s my cue.” The sheriff waited for Robin and her sister to step aside before taking off his hat and entering the house.
“I’m in here,” Cassidy said.
Robin and Melanie followed the sheriff into the living room where Cassidy was sitting on the sofa, Blake beside her, watching an afternoon soap opera on TV. She was wearing the outfit that Robin and Blake had purchased at Trendsetters the day before. Her feet were bare.
“Sorry to bother you,” the sheriff said. “Hope I’m not interrupting anything too important.” He motioned toward the big-haired, big-bosomed actress on the screen who was almost drowning in tears, lines of black mascara trailing down her cheeks.
“It’s my favorite show. Bleeding Hearts,” Cassidy informed him. “That’s Penny. She just told her twin sister, Emily, that their father’s been molesting her for years, and now poor Emily doesn’t know what to believe.”
I know exactly how she feels, Robin thought, sitting down beside Cassidy and taking the child’s hand in hers.
“How are you feeling today?” the sheriff asked, shifting awkwardly from one foot to the other.
“Pretty good.” Cassidy clicked the remote on her lap, and the television screen went blank.
“I brought you your phone.” The sheriff removed it from his pocket and handed it to her.
Cassidy hugged it to her chest as if it were a stuffed toy. “Thank you so much. I wondered what happened to it.”
“You had it in your hand when the paramedics found you. We cleaned it up…” He didn’t bother finishing the sentence. “They treating you well here?”
“No,” Melanie said from the doorway. “We’re torturing her. In fact, until seconds before you got here, we had her hanging by her thumbs from the ceiling.”
“Perhaps Cassidy and I should talk in private,” the sheriff said.
“That’s out of the question.” Robin looked to Blake for support.
“Afraid you’re stuck with us, Sheriff,” he said. “The girl’s a minor.”
“Yes, she is,” Prescott concurred. “And I could call Child Welfare Services, I suppose. I was hoping not to get them involved, but…”
“What do you mean, Child Welfare Services?” Cassidy asked, glancing around the room with a look of panic on her face. “Why would you call Child Welfare Services?”
“If I’m being prevented from doing my job, if you’re being coerced or pressured in any way not to talk to me…”
“I’m not being pressured,” Cassidy said. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know. Please don’t call them. I don’t want them to take me away.”
“You feel safe here?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“Well, Alec has been arrested.”
“He didn’t do it.”
“Did someone ask you to say that?” The sheriff looked from Robin to Melanie, then back to Cassidy.
“No. No.”
“What did they say to you about Alec’s arrest?”
Cassidy paused to consider the question. “They said you think Mommy and Alec were having an affair, and that Alec killed her and shot Daddy and me. But it’s not true.”
“How can you be sure? He fits the description of the men you gave us—tall, muscular—”
“Yes, but—”
“But?”
“I just know it wasn’t him. He’s Robin’s brother,” she said, as if this was all the evidence she needed.
He’s also Melanie’s brother, Robin thought, knowing that the sheriff was thinking the same thing.
“And besides, even if it was him,” Cassidy added as Robin felt her heart drop into the pit of her stomach, “then I’m safe here because he’s in jail. But it wasn’t him,” she added quickly, seeing the look on Robin’s face. She glanced toward the ceiling, where a faint rocking could be heard. “Landon fits the description, too. He’s tall and muscular. But it wasn’t him either,” she added quickly.