When a Secret Kills (4 page)

“You’re not in my hair.” Serena led her into a beautiful room done in tasteful antiques.

“You’ve always wanted your own house to decorate. You’ve done a wonderful job. This room is gorgeous and peaceful. Something I really need right now.” She gave her friend a quick hug. “Thanks for letting me stay.”

“Of course. I’d be hurt if you didn’t.” Serena motioned to the door to the right. “Bathroom is there, closet is on the other side.”

“Got it.”

Serena hesitated at the door. “So, what’s next?”

Jillian dropped to the bed. “I don’t know—I really don’t.”

Serena nodded. “We’ll figure it out. I have a date with Dominic after work so it’ll be a late night. We’re going to the evening worship service, then to dinner.”

Jillian shrugged. “I don’t sleep much these days. I’ll probably be up when you get back.”

Up and planning her next move.

Senator Frank Hoffman hung up the phone and leaned back in his leather chair as nausea swirled in the pit of his gut. He picked up the 1894 Colt Bisley from the desk and continued cleaning. As much as he loved shooting the old guns, cleaning them had become like therapy to him, helping him relax, get his thoughts in order. So he cleaned.

He rubbed the cloth over and over, in every crease and crevice. Then he attached a cleaning patch to the patch holder and ran the holder up the barrel of the gun. Mindlessly, he repeated the action, switching out the dirty pads for clean, while his thoughts taunted him.

Jillian was still alive and a professional assassin was dead. And not only was Jillian still alive, so were Alexia Allen and Serena Hopkins. How was this possible? How hard was it to get rid of three women? Three women who could ruin him. Or was it more than that by now? The longer they lived, the more the odds increased that Jillian would tell what she saw that night. If she hadn’t already.

No. If she had talked, he’d be in custody. He had to get rid of her immediately.

Frank finished cleaning the weapon and turned to settle it back into place on the wall behind him. He turned back to his desk, his thoughts on his career and the certain knowledge that, if Jillian Carter didn’t disappear soon, he would
have
no career to think about. Just visualizing such a thing struck terror into his heart. He’d worked so hard on keeping everything above reproach. His image, his private life, his physical health, his family appearances . . .

Everything. And now, in the length it would take Jillian to tell what she saw that night, he could lose it all.

Frank broke out into a cold sweat and looked at the calendar. Three months until election day. Campaigning was hot and fierce between the candidates, and Frank had no intention of losing—or going to jail.

Appearances. He had to keep up appearances.

And get rid of Jillian.

A curse slipped out.

“What was that?”

Frank jerked as his wife, Elizabeth, stepped into the room. Beautifully made up, she exuded poise and class. Exactly what he’d been looking for when he’d gone searching for a wife. The perfect political partner, one to inspire confidence in the voters; if such a woman would marry him, he must be worthy of their trust and their votes. “Sorry, I was just thinking about the debate coming up.”

She arched a delicate eyebrow. “Well, if you plan to use that kind of language, you can pretty much kiss your career goodbye.”

He rolled his eyes and stuffed down his impatience. “I think I can handle it.”

Her shuttered eyes gave him a cool appraisal. “Be sure you do.”

“Is there something you wanted?” He couldn’t help the impatience in his tone.

She narrowed her eyes. “Carmen will be home next weekend. I do hope we can at least have one family dinner while she’s here.”

Carmen. His daughter. His troubled daughter who seemed to
be trying to make something of her life. Finally. “Of course. Friday night?”

Elizabeth gave him a slightly warmer look. “Perfect. Here or out somewhere?”

“Let’s go out.” Being seen in public as a family was always good for a few votes. As long as Carmen behaved herself.

“Wonderful. I’ll tell Carmen.” She turned toward the door, then looked back at him over her shoulder. “You seem more stressed than usual, Frank, is everything all right?”

Frank forced a smile. “Everything’s fine. Where are you headed?”

“Girls’ night out.”

“Right. Well, enjoy yourself.”

“I plan to. Don’t wait up.”

And then she was gone, her light perfume lingering behind. He smiled. He’d brought that particular scent back on his last trip to Paris. She’d loved it and seemed genuinely happy with his gift.

Current problems intruded on his pleasant memories and he frowned once again.

Rising from the black leather chair, he paced his home office. He thought he’d had the best people that could be bought on this. But they’d failed to take care of the problem. Time after time, they’d failed. Maybe it was time to take matters into his own hands.

Literally.

He lifted them, palms up, and stared at them. Smooth and white. Yet even now, ten years later, he could almost see the blood dripping from them. Blood he’d never actually touched but caused to flow nevertheless. He still couldn’t believe he’d become a murderer. Never would he have envisioned himself capable of killing someone.

But he had, hadn’t he? That night was such a blur. It had happened so fast. And it hadn’t been premeditated, he reassured himself. It had been an act of fury, of uncontrollable rage. And the determination to let nothing get in the way of his plans. But it hadn’t been premeditated.

He snorted. Like a jury would care about that now.

He continued to stare at his hands, then drew in a deep breath, curled his fingers into fists, and determined that, yes, he could kill Jillian with his bare hands as long as it meant he kept his secret. But hopefully it wouldn’t come to that. That’s what the help was for.

He picked up the phone and waited for the familiar voice to come on the line. “You need to get it done tonight.”

Nine-year-old Meg stomped across the field to the red barn that held her best friend. Texas Two Step was a brown-and-white paint horse who had become Meg’s favorite confidant. She pushed open the door and walked to the second stall on the left. The horse nickered and shoved his nose over the stall door.

Meg reached in to rub his silky nose and feed him the apple she’d snitched from the kitchen table. While the horse eagerly crunched his sweet treat, Meg talked. “Mom left yesterday, Two Step. She said she had to go ‘take care of some unfinished business.’”

She wiggled her fingers around the phrase like she’d seen done on television when quoting someone. “And she wouldn’t take me with her.” She frowned. “And now Uncle Blake’s leaving. I know it’s cuz he’s worried about Mom.” Meg sighed and Two Step nudged her hand. “Don’t have any more apples, boy. Sorry.”

Meg rubbed Two Step’s nose again just the way he liked. “I’ve got to come up with a plan to figure out what Mom and Uncle Blake are up to and what’s so important they couldn’t take me with ’em.”

“Meg? Are you out here?”

She jumped and Two Step tossed his head at the sudden movement. She clicked her tongue to settle him down and said, “Sorry, boy. Gotta go. I’ll come see you after school.”

Meg left the barn to find Grandma Jo almost to the door, hands on her hips. “Child, if you don’t quit running off, you’re going to add a whole new layer of gray to my head.”

Meg did her best to look appropriately sorry. “I just wanted to tell Two Step good morning.”

Grandma Jo sighed and shook her head. “Well, at least I usually know where to find you. Come on.” She placed a hand on Meg’s shoulder. “One day your sneakin’ off is going to get you in trouble.”

“Me? In trouble?” Meg practiced her angelic look and Grandma Jo laughed just like she knew she would.

“Get in the house and get your backpack, little girl. It’s time for you to get to school.”

School. Who cared about school when she had important things to think about?

Like finding out a way to go join her mom—wherever
that
was.

A knock on the door jolted Jillian from her light doze. She glanced at the clock and frowned as she realized her father still hadn’t called her back. Swinging her feet to the floor, she reached for the gun she never left far from her fingers. Approaching the front door, she kept herself to the side and looked out the window.

Colton. Here to deliver the large suitcase that sat at his feet. Her stomach flipped a few times as memories rushed in. Sliding the gun into her waistband at the small of her back, she pulled her shirttail over it to hide it and let out a slow breath. She gathered her nerves, and opened the door. “Hi.”

He stepped inside and set the suitcase in front of her. “We need to talk.”

She shut the door. “Everything all right?”

“Not really. I had to tie up some loose ends on a couple of cases and delegate a few more so I can focus on . . . other things for now.”

Meaning her?

The vague thought that she should be more cautious about being alone with the nephew of Frank Hoffman flitted through her mind. The Colton she’d once known would never have had anything to do with something like that. But what about now? Ten years was
a long time. He could be anyone by now. And Frank Hoffman was family to him.

“Jillian?”

The reassuring weight of her gun rested against her back. “Sorry. Come on in.”

Colton swept past her and into the foyer. She nodded him toward the living area. “Might as well get comfortable.” Although she didn’t think she’d ever feel comfortable in his presence again. How would he react when she told him about Meg?

Angry? Hurt? Definitely.

Demand to see her? Very possibly.

Which was why she couldn’t tell him anything just yet.

Colton seated himself on the edge of the couch and she could see the tension in his jaw.

“You want something to drink?”

“No.”

So he wasn’t going to make this easy on her. Well, what had she expected? She didn’t blame him. Jillian took a seat across from him on the love seat with the coffee table between them. She needed a buffer right now.

He clasped his hands in front of him. “Serena said you’re an investigative reporter?”

“Yes.”

“Are you here for a story?”

She frowned. “What?”

“You just accused my uncle, a prominent citizen of this state and a well-known politician, of murder.” He smirked and the cold look of disgust in his eyes hurt her to the core. Before she could protest, he said, “That would make a pretty sensational piece if you were to come out with something like that. You would become a household name overnight.”

Jillian closed her eyes and counted to five. Then ten. When she opened them, she said, “If I wanted to be a household name, I could
have been one years ago. I don’t care about name recognition. I care about getting my life back! I care about exposing a liar and a murderer. I care about the truth!”

“Then tell me the truth,” he gritted between clenched teeth.

“I am!”

A muscle in his jaw jumped, telling her how hard he was working to restrain himself. “Tell me the whole story,” he demanded. “Every last detail.”

Jillian bit her lip. “Fine. Where do you want me to start?”

“June 6th, 2002.”

Of course. Graduation night.

She wanted to fidget but refused to let herself. Rubbing her hands down her thighs, Jillian took a deep breath and looked at Colton. His usual happy-go-lucky countenance had disappeared to be replaced by a fierce frown and serious, hard green eyes. For a moment they simply stared at each other. Memories flickered across her mind. Memories she tried to forget. Memories that never should have been made.

“Wait. I need to say something first.” He pinched the bridge of his nose and took a deep breath. “I owe you an apology and . . . I’m sorry.”

She blinked. “Sorry? What for?”

A flush crept into his cheeks. “That night.”

“Oh. Right.”

He ran a hand down his face. “I’m getting ready to ask you to be open and honest with me. It’s only fair I do the same.”

She waited.

He swallowed hard and said, “I was wrong to . . . uh . . . let things get out of control that night. I could blame it on the fight with my dad or the feeling that I was getting ready to lose everything, but . . . the truth is, I was irresponsible and inconsiderate and I know it’s a mistake we can’t undo, but . . .”

Jillian listened even as her heart broke at his words.

Because they were so sweet and something she needed to hear.
And yet their mistake had produced Meg. Beautiful, adorable, sassy Meg. “I have to take some of that responsibility, Colton. I could have said no.”

He nodded. “We were both wrong, but I’ve waited a long time to get those words off my heart. I’ve already asked God’s forgiveness, but now,” he cleared his throat, “I’m asking for yours.”

Jillian’s jaw ached with the effort to hold back her tears even as a question formed in her mind. If Colton thought that night was a mistake, would he think Meg was one too? Shoving that thought aside to address later, she managed to whisper, “You have it.”

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Thank you. Now,” he cleared his throat and opened his eyes, “could you please tell me about graduation night?”

She nodded, glad to move past that difficult topic. Not that this next one was going to be any easier. “All right. I went looking for you that night, but you weren’t in the gazebo.”

His features softened a fraction. “I was having a hard time getting away from my dad. He wanted me to go to that party at Uncle Frank’s and I had no interest in it.”

“I know. When you didn’t show up at the gazebo, I thought maybe you’d decided to go after all.”

“No.” He looked away and sighed as he ran a hand through his hair. “I was about thirty minutes late getting there.”

“When you didn’t come, I wasn’t sure what to do.” She gave a shake of her head. “It was one of the few times I wished I’d let you buy me a cell phone.”

He studied her. “You were pretty stubborn about not taking much of anything from me.”

She set her jaw and stared at him. “You know why.”

“You didn’t want me to think you were interested in me because of my family’s money.” He paused as his features softened. For a moment he reminded her of the boy she’d fallen in love with. He nodded. “I knew that. I never saw greed in your eyes.”

His words shocked her. They were true, she just hadn’t expected him to say it. “Well . . .”

The hardness returned. “Anyway, after you saw I wasn’t there, what did you do?”

“I thought about just going on to the graduation dance, but I really wanted to find you. I needed to . . . I was—” She broke off and swallowed hard. She wasn’t ready to tell him why she’d been so desperate to see him that night. “It was a pretty night, so I started walking and found a pay phone. When you didn’t answer your cell phone, I called as many people as I could, but no one had seen you.” Colton had been in her graduating class and they had been planning to skip out on the graduation party to spend time alone.

“I didn’t have my cell phone with me anymore,” he murmured. “My dad threatened to cut me off if I didn’t start doing things his way, told me I’d have to make it on my own. I pulled the phone and my car keys from my pocket and threw them at him. Told him I didn’t need him or his money. And then I went to find you.”

“Only I had left by the time you got there.”

“I figured that’s what happened. I thought maybe you went on to the dance so I went over to the gym, but you weren’t there either.”

She shook her head. “I didn’t get there until later, like ten o’clock.”

“Why?”

“Because,” she drew in a shuddering breath, “I went to your uncle’s house. I wondered if you’d decided to go to the party after all, so I went home and got my mom’s car and drove over there.”

“I never went to Uncle Frank’s house that night.”

Jillian looked down at her hands. “And I wish I hadn’t.”

“Tell me.”

His simple command somehow made it easier to go back in her mind, to voice the details she’d never forgotten yet never spoken about. “When I got there, it was loud. I could hear the band playing, the people talking. I looked everywhere for you.”

He lifted a brow. “How did you get past security?”

“It was easy. I was already dressed for the graduation party.” She shrugged. “People were parking on the curb and checking in at the gate. I simply followed along behind a couple. The guard took me for their daughter.”

“Huh. Uncle Frank wouldn’t be too happy to hear about that.”

“Once I was inside, I started looking for you. Even snuck into the private sections of the house. When I realized you weren’t there, I went out to the pond to sit and think about what to do next. People started leaving, but I waited because your parents hadn’t left yet and I hoped you would show up eventually.”

“I was out looking for you. It never occurred to me to check that stupid party.”

Jillian couldn’t stand sitting there. She got up and paced to the window and looked out. The sun crawled down the horizon. She turned back to Colton. “As the house emptied, I finally realized you weren’t coming, and I headed for the front door. As I approached your uncle’s office, he and another man were arguing.”

“Who was he arguing with?”

Jillian licked her lips. “At first I couldn’t tell. They were really going at it. I stopped because I had to pass by the door to get out of the house. I figured I’d wait until the other man left, then I would sneak on out.”

Colton rubbed his chin. “But that didn’t happen.”

“No.” She shook her head as the memories slipped over her. Turning back to the window, she stepped to the side and parted the blinds to glance at the backyard. Quiet. Peaceful. A mirage? She flipped the blind closed and rubbed her arms as a chill washed over her. “Your uncle yelled that he’d worked too hard to have everything destroyed and grabbed one of those guns off the wall—”

Colton’s gaze sharpened. “One of his antique collectibles?”

She waved a hand. “I didn’t exactly have time to study it, but it was one of those he kept on the wall behind his desk.”

“Locked and loaded,” Colton whispered.

“What?”

He looked at her. “It’s always been one of his sources of pride. He keeps those guns in prime working order. I remember him cleaning them all the time.”

“He leaves them loaded on his wall? That’s crazy!”

“And dangerous. Nevertheless, he did it. Still does it as far as I know. And everyone knew it.” He shook his head. “My dad used to harass him all the time about it. What happened next?”

“The man he was arguing with vaulted over the desk and knocked your uncle into the wall. They both landed on the floor, but the man was quick. He jumped up and grabbed one of the other guns, held it to your uncle’s head, and said he’d have him arrested if he ever threatened him again—and if he ever pulled a gun on him again, he’d better be prepared to pull the trigger. Then he threw the gun on the desk, turned, and walked from the office. I hid real quick behind the door that led to the patio. Unfortunately, that’s where the man went, through the sunroom and out onto the patio, and your uncle followed, furious and spewing threats. But he was acting . . . weird . . . too.”

“Weird?”

“Yeah, like he was drunk. He was slurring his words and stumbling around.”

Colton frowned and shook his head. “That doesn’t sound like him.”

“All I know is what I saw.”

Jillian noted Colton’s hard fists and white knuckles. He said, “Go on.”

She rubbed her palms on her thighs and pulled in a steadying breath. She had to finish this. “They started arguing again. I peeked through the crack in the door and . . .” She bit her lip as the horror of that moment swept over her once again.

“And?”

“Your uncle said something insulting about your aunt, lifted the gun, and pointed it at the other man, who looked scared and
said, ‘I’m walking away. I suggest you do the same.’ And then your uncle started to walk forward, made a weird sound, stumbled—and pulled the trigger.” She raised a hand and covered her mouth. Behind her hand, she said, “He just pulled the trigger like he didn’t care that he was taking a life.” Confusion flickered as it did every time she thought about the next part. “And then they both fell.”

“Both?”

“Yes. I didn’t have a good view of your uncle from where I was hiding, but the man he shot fell immediately. Then your uncle cried out and sank to his knees.” She closed her eyes tight, picturing the moment. “He still held the gun in his hand.”

“He wound up in the hospital that night with a mild heart attack,” Colton muttered. “I found out the next day. He had all kinds of tests run and came home late the following night.”

Jillian raised a shaky hand to shove a lock of hair behind her ear. “The man your uncle shot was dead. At least he sure looked like it. His eyes—” She shuddered. “I’ll never forget seeing that. I freaked. And ran.” She looked him in the eye. “I looked back to make sure I was getting away, but your uncle had stood up, looked right at me. Then he lifted the gun . . .” She shivered and closed her eyes. “If I hadn’t run when I did, he would have shot me too.”

“I don’t believe it,” he whispered.

Jillian walked over to Serena’s mantel. Then she looked back at him. After a long pause, she said, “Yes, you do.”

His expression hardened. She couldn’t read what lay behind his eyes. “I
can’t
believe it.”

“Then help me prove it didn’t happen.”

That stopped him. “But you just said it did.”

“And you don’t believe me.” She lifted her chin. “So help me find the truth.”

“Who was the man you say my uncle shot?”

Jillian froze, then bowed her head. When she lifted it, she said, “Governor Harrison Martin.”