Clarity (22 page)

Mr. Spellman reached the landing and his eyes widened. Apparently he wasn’t expecting this much of a crowd outside his office.

“Is Cecile talking?” Mom asked.

“Not yet. She just made her one phone call,” Mr. Spellman said.

“To who?” I asked.

“Her lawyer, I’d assume.”

“That’s not good,” Justin said, shaking his head.

Nate’s cell beeped, and he flipped it open. “Interesting,” he said, reading the text message.

“What is it?” I asked.

“My boss says the Clayworth family is big into guns. Dallas and Stephen have won father-son competitions, and even Cecile is trained.”

“Maybe that will encourage the police to search their house for the murder weapon,” Mom said.

“I have to go,” Nate said, closing his phone. “My boss wants me to search through the archives for mentions of Cecile and guns and maybe even a photo of Cecile with a gun from some competition.” He smiled. “Interns get all the glamorous work.”

As Nate trotted off, Mr. Spellman turned back to us. “Nothing’s going to happen for a while now. Cecile’s not talking until her lawyer gets here and then who knows how long it will take for her statement.”

Mom said, “I still want to stay anyway. Clare, why don’t you go back, get some breakfast, and give Perry the news when he wakes up.”

“I’ll walk with you,” Justin offered, and we walked out together.

Only a week ago, I never thought I’d find myself walking beside Justin, in peace. But here we were, strolling along, enjoying the beautiful warmth of the morning sun. We didn’t talk much, and I didn’t mind. It was a comfortable silence. I didn’t want to slap him or yell at him. I didn’t want to fight about Tiffany. I didn’t even think about him with Tiffany, which was strange, considering that was all I had thought about every time I’d seen him the past three months. I’d never really stopped caring about him, and now I felt close to him again.

Gabriel had believed me after all, enough to get his father to bring Cecile in anyway. Both Gabriel and Justin had come
through for me and my family. A warm glow spread throughout my body, and as I took a deep breath of fresh air, I was enveloped in a sense of calm.

When we reached my house, he walked me up the porch steps and turned to leave. Suddenly, I realized I didn’t want him to go.

“Want to come in for a soda or something?” I asked.

“Sure,” he said with a wide smile.

I turned the knob, and the door opened. “Perry must be awake.” I’d locked the door behind me when we left.

“Perry!” I called out.

No response.

Justin shrugged and said, “Must be in the shower.”

I turned left to enter the kitchen, planning to grab us some Cokes from the fridge, then stopped short.

A body was on the floor.

All I saw were two feet sticking out from the other side of the kitchen island.

“Perry?” I squeaked.

I wanted to rush to his side, but a deep voice echoed in the foyer behind me.

“Don’t. Move.”

I slowly turned around and found a gun pointed at my head. My breath caught in my throat. I managed to squeeze out one word.

“You?”

TWENTY-FIVE

“STAND NEXT TO HER,” STEPHEN CLAYWORTH yelled at Justin, waving the gun around. “Don’t make any stupid moves.”

I stood in shock, unable to move even if I’d wanted to.

Justin put his hands up and inched closer to me.

“Cecile didn’t call the lawyer,” Justin said. “She called you.”

Stephen smiled. “Smart boy. You could be mayor someday.”

“Stephen, what are you doing?” I asked. I couldn’t believe this was happening. I was sure Cecile was the killer. The vision had been from her point of view.

“My mother called me with an order for one more mess to be cleaned up. But don’t worry, I called the lawyer for her on my way over. She’ll be fine. You all, however.” He grinned, and his face transformed. It was a Stephen I’d never seen before.

“Perry is unconscious in the kitchen,” he continued. “His prints will be all over this weapon. My mother and I will be free. And you will be dead and out of our hair forever.”

Stephen pointed the gun at me.

Justin let out a roar and charged toward him. Stephen aimed, fired off a shot, and Justin stopped like he’d hit a brick wall. He fell backward, and his body slammed onto the floor.

“No!” I screamed and fell to my knees beside Justin. Blood seeped from his body, too much, too fast. The room spun, and I squinted and tried to focus. I stared at Justin’s chest, but couldn’t see the telltale rise and fall of breathing.

“Sorry about your loverboy,” Stephen said. “But you won’t have long to mourn him. You’re next.”

I stood up to face him, and Stephen slammed the gun against my head. I fell back down to the floor in a dizzy slump. Sticky blood dripped down my forehead. Why did he do that? Why not just shoot me?

I looked up at him as realization dawned. “You want me unconscious.”

He narrowed his eyes at me. “What?”

“You can’t kill me when I’m awake and looking at you. You can’t.”

“Don’t tell me what I can’t do. I’ve already killed two people.”

I gave him a blank look. “Two?”

“Mother made a mistake by killing that bitch. We could have dealt with her in other ways. I tried. But Mother had reached the end of her rope.”

“So your mother did kill Victoria,” I said, wincing as my head started to throb. “Why?”

“Because she was a little slut who wouldn’t take no for an answer,” he spat.

I shook my head in confusion. “Was she your girlfriend or something?”

“No! She was one of my father’s … dalliances. He only saw her a few times, when he’d go to Boston. He thought he was perfectly clear about their situation. But something set that little bimbo off and she thought she could come down here.” He started laughing now, almost maniacally. “That idiot actually thought she could be more than a mistress.”

Voices echoed in my head. Nate had said the paper was investigating a possible Dallas Clayworth mistress. Joni had mentioned that she and Victoria cater-waitered fancy parties in Boston. Joni also pointed out that it was out of character for Victoria to come down here without knowing anyone and that in those final weeks, she’d been keeping a secret.

I did have all the pieces. I just hadn’t put them together.

Victoria met Dallas at one of his fund-raisers and they’d started an affair. She was fine keeping it quiet until her life at home fell apart. She lost her boyfriend and her best friend. So she decided to come down here to try to take her thing with Dallas to the next level.

“Dallas turned her away,” I said, lifting my eyes to Stephen’s.

“And then she tried to force his hand.” Stephen’s nostrils flared. “She threatened to go public. He’d lose the election.”

“Still,” I said. “She didn’t have to die.”

“My mother tried to reason with her on the phone,” Stephen said.

I remembered my vision, when I’d touched Victoria’s cell.

You don’t own him. He doesn’t want you anymore. He wants me.

I’d assumed Victoria had been fighting with Joni over Joel. But no. She’d been fighting with Cecile. Over her husband.

Stephen stared at a spot over my shoulder as if remembering a moment. “I even tried to reason with her myself, that night. I told her to leave my family alone and go back to Boston.”

I remembered Stephen in the vision, whispering insistently in Victoria’s ear.

He brought his eyes back to my face. “But none of it worked. So Mother decided to take things into her own hands. To protect our family and our future. She sent me home in a cab and then followed the girl and your brother back to the motel. She waited for Perry to leave, then went in and shot her with this gun. My father has a sizable collection. If the police search my house, they won’t even realize one is missing.”

“She told you she was going to do this?” I asked, hoping to keep him talking.

“No. But then that idiot Billy Rawlinson tried to blackmail her and she needed help. She told me to meet him and clean up that mess.”

“And Joni?”

“I did what had to be done.”

“Why?”

“That twit started her own investigation. She went to Yummy’s asking around about what guys Victoria had talked to that night. My mother saw her putting posters up. She got
too close. So I had to take care of that, too. Both of them would be alive now if they’d minded their own business.”

Pain radiated up from my knees, but I was too scared to adjust my position on the floor. I didn’t want to move one inch. I just wanted to keep him talking because, so far, that was the only thing keeping me alive. “So you’re saying they deserved it,” I said.

“I had to kill both of them, don’t you see? To protect my family. And now I have to kill you to protect my family. But you’re the last one. Your brother is in la-la land, ready to put his fingerprints on this gun — the murder weapon. He’ll be put away for life for killing his sister and the mayor’s son. There will be no doubt left about who killed the others, since he was already the main suspect anyway. I can go to college, get away, and start over.”

He swallowed hard. “I’m sorry about this, Clare. Truth be told, I liked you. I really did. That’s why I didn’t kill you right away after I saw you with Billy’s body, trying to use your ability.”

I felt paralyzed. Every muscle in my body was stretched tight. “That was you in the woods watching me.”

“I gave you a second chance to come to your senses and mind your own business. But you didn’t. You kept pushing. Now I have no choice. My mother never should have started this. But I have to finish it.”

Maslov had been right. Stephen said she’d told him a redhead would bring him trouble, and I had. And she told me I was in mortal danger, and I was.

My breath came in short gasps and my lungs ached. I
blinked away a drop of blood that slid down my forehead. This was it. My last chance to reason with him. To beg for my life.

“You don’t want to kill me,” I said.

“Of course I don’t, Clare. But I have to.”

“This isn’t you. You’re not a murderer,” I pleaded.

“A couple weeks ago, I would’ve said the same thing. But you should know more than anyone how people surprise you. People can do things you never imagined they would. You think you know someone and then …”

He shrugged and cocked the gun.

Then my world went black. A heavy weight landed on top of me. I was on my stomach, my face mashed into the floor. I heard a gunshot. Wood splintering. Stephen screaming. The sounds of struggle surrounded me. I couldn’t see, and needed to know what was happening. I pushed up on my hands and rolled the weight off my back. It made an
oomph
sound.

“Perry?”

His head was bleeding and his eyes were eerily dilated. Definitely a concussion, but Perry had come to enough to save me when it counted. The front door was open. Detective Toscano and another officer had Stephen down on the floor, forcing his hands into cuffs as he screamed and writhed like an animal.

Perry leaned over Justin’s unmoving body and placed two fingers on his pulse.

Then he looked at me.

TWENTY-SIX

“I REALLY THINK YOU SHOULD GO HOME,” MOM said. “Get some rest.”

My fingers gingerly touched the bandage on my forehead. “I’m resting here.”

“Me too,” Perry said from the chair beside me. He had a matching bandage on his head. We looked like two idiots who’d decided to have a head-butting competition.

We’d been at the hospital for hours. My injury wasn’t bad. All it needed was some Tylenol and gauze. Perry had to have three stitches, and he had a minor concussion, but he’d be fine.

Justin … we didn’t know yet.

Gabriel returned to the waiting area with an armful of cold bottled waters, which we all grabbed and gulped.

“Gabriel,” my mother said, leaning forward in her chair. “How did your father know that my children were in trouble?”

Gabriel took a long swig of water. “This crazy lady called the station, freaking out, screaming that we had to go to your house right now.”

“Huh,” Mom said, pulling back her frazzled hair into a low ponytail. “Milly must have heard the commotion.”

Gabriel shrugged. “Whoever she was, she had a strong Russian accent. That’s all I know.”

Madame Maslov. I shivered. She must have had a vision of the confrontation and called the police just in time. I swallowed hard. I’d prejudged her just like so many people prejudged me. And I was wrong. She was no more a fraud than I was.

I went around the corner to toss my empty bottle in the recycling bin. Gabriel followed me. When we were alone, he gathered me to him and held me close, resting his chin on the top of my head. I sank into his embrace, sharing the weight of my emotions and exhaustion on his shoulders.

“I’m sorry,” he said, his voice soft. “You were right about the Clayworths.”

“Half right,” I said, sadly, pulling away. If I’d gotten the whole picture, I could have saved Justin.

“Half is more than I gave you credit for.”

“But you trusted me in the end. Enough to tell your father to bring Cecile in.”

“I also want to apologize for suspecting your brother.”

I forgave him quickly for that one, because I’d made a lot of quick and wrong assumptions lately, too.

“I want to know something,” Gabriel said. He took a deep breath. “Could we start over? Is there any way you could give me another chance?”

Before I could even think about Gabriel’s question, I saw movement over his shoulder. Mr. Spellman was speed
walking down the hallway. I sprinted over to him as he reached the waiting area. Mom and Perry stood up.

“How is he?” Mom asked.

“The surgery was successful, and he’s awake. We’ve been talking and everything. He’s going to be fine.”

My heart soared. I let out a deep breath I felt like I’d been holding in for hours.

A collective relieved murmur went around the room.

“My wife will only agree to go to the cafeteria if someone else keeps him company.” Mr. Spellman looked at me, and I nodded quickly.