The Masked Man Part 19

She heard the pounding of his feet behind her. He was close, very close. She could hear his ragged breath, almost feel it on her neck.

She stumbled and almost fell. She felt the brush of his hand through her hair and dodged to the right. The wrong way. It led to the cliff.

He tackled her and took her down hard, knocking the breath out of her as they fell. He quickly got up, dragging her to her feet and pulling her toward the cliff-and the lake below.

"This is the only way out," he said as she tried to fight him with her fists and kicked at him.

"No!" she screamed. It couldn't end like this. Mackenzie Cooper's face flashed in her mind and she cried out for him.

His arm around her chest, his free hand covering her mouth, Arnie dragged her the few yards to the edge of the cliff.

They teetered on the rim and she looked down, feeling the cold, wet air blowing up from the water. She thought she saw a light below her in the water, but realized it was lightning-a storm was approaching. Thunder rumbled somewhere out on the lake. Just like the night Trevor was murdered.

She tried to stop Arnie, but he was too strong. He picked her up and held her out over the edge of the cliff, out over the water, then he swung her body outward and released her.

She grabbed for him, got nothing but air. In that microsecond, she hung, suspended at eye level with him as lightning lit the sky around her. She thought she glimpsed regret in his expression. Sorrow. He teetered on the edge of the cliff as if to jump, then turned to look back, his face twisting in terror as if he saw Trevor's ghost behind him.

Then Jill was falling. She hit the water, the force of her fall driving her deep into the cold darkness of the lake.

At first she saw nothing, felt only the all-encompa.s.sing liquid prison. Then she saw light above her. Her lungs screaming for air, she started to swim toward the surface, toward the shaft of light that sliced through the clear water.

She made the mistake of looking down and saw the source of the light. A car rested at an angle on the bottom, its headlights s.h.i.+ning upward through the water.

The driver's-side door was open, the dome light on, the driver still behind the wheel, her hair floating around her face like a dark aura.

Jill let out a cry, swallowing water, losing critical air. Frantically, she swam toward the surface, following the shaft of light pointing upward from her red Saturn's headlights, the image of Rachel Wells bound to the steering wheel with duct tape branded on her brain.

As she neared the surface, she saw Arnie's body above her, the water dark around him, the side of his head smashed in.

She kicked away from him and broke the surface at last, gasping for air, choking on the lake water she'd swallowed, choking on the fear that still clutched at her chest.

From above her, Jill thought she heard someone cry her name. She swam toward the rocky sh.o.r.e, praying she wasn't imagining the sound of Mac's voice.

Chapter Fourteen.

It was late afternoon by the time the sheriff let Mac go into Jill's hospital room. He stopped just inside the door, shocked at the sight of her lying on the bed, so small, so pale. White as the sheets around her. Her eyes were closed, her lashes dark against her cheeks. His chest constricted at the sight of her.

He'd been so wrong. So very wrong. He closed his eyes as the pain and anger engulfed him, recalling what he'd read in the sheriff's report from Jill and Brenna's statements.

The sheriff had concluded that it had been Arnie who'd killed Trevor. After all the years of taking everything that Trevor dished out, Arnie had finally had enough when Trevor stole Rachel from him. He blamed Trevor for his father's heart attack, as well, but Rachel, it seemed, had been the last straw.

The sheriff had found evidence that led him to conclude that Arnie had also killed Rachel. But not before she'd made the call to Jill, which had brought Jill and Brenna down the lake road to meet her. Arnie must have been lying in wait. He shot the tire out on the van, attacked Brenna, then, wearing the black ski mask Jill had found in his glove compartment, gone after Jill.

When she'd gotten away and run, it was believed he must have gone to his car and come back, pretending he just happened on to her.

By the time Charley Johnson had called from the Kalispell Police Department to say that the skull was a positive match for a teenaged girl who'd disappeared nine years ago, the case was already closed.

More of the dead teenagers' jewelry had turned up in a safety-deposit box Trevor Forester kept at the bank.

Trevor was believed to have killed all eleven girls over the years. Arnie Evans was dead now, too. The coroner concluded that Arnie had hit his head when he fell from the cliff and was dead by the time he hit the water. Jill was just lucky to have survived.

"Mac?" She opened her eyes as if sensing him in the room.

He tried to smile. It hurt. As he moved to the side of her bed, he had the same feeling of failure he'd had when his wife, Emily, had died of cancer. Helpless. The pain excruciating. Unbearable. He'd promised himself he would never care that much again.

"I'm so sorry," he said, taking her hand. Her skin was surprisingly warm. He tried to think of the right words, but he knew there weren't any. He'd failed this woman. Failed himself. Worse, his feelings for her were killing him. "If I hadn't left you and Brenna..."

She shook her head. "You had to help Shane. I was the fool, taking off the way I did. Thank G.o.d, Brenna's all right."

He nodded. Arnie had only knocked Brenna out and dragged her into the pine trees. She'd suffered a slight concussion and a few sc.r.a.pes and bruises.

"I know why you're here," Jill said, her gaze locking with his. "You came to say goodbye."

He nodded, unable to speak.

She smiled, her eyes filling with tears. "It hurts to care so much about someone. I understand that. I understand why you can't let yourself do it again."

So she knew about Emily.

"I guess you heard-Shane and Zoe have decided to go to college together," she said. "They're going to the junior college in Kalispell, so Zoe can still work part-time at the bakery. They're in love."

"Yeah." He let go of her hand and stepped back. "I'd better go." There was so much he wasn't saying. Couldn't say. Best left unsaid. And yet it was hard to leave. As he turned and walked to the door of her room, opened it and went to step through, he couldn't help himself. He glanced back.

His eyes met hers, all the feeling they'd felt that first night arcing like lightning across the room, warming him to his center. And then he left and the door closed behind him.

MAC HAD ONE STOP to make on his way out of town.

Nathaniel Pierce greeted him. "I figured you'd be by today." He motioned Mac inside. "Do you have time for a drink? Or do you just want your pay before you leave?"

He grinned at Mac's obvious surprise. "Summer's almost gone. Your job's over. Nothing can keep you here now. Not even a woman. Not even Jill Lawson, it seems."

Mac took the last two twenty-dollar gold pieces from his pocket and held them out to the man. "That makes all twelve, right?"

Pierce nodded slowly as he took the coins from him. "I guess that concludes our business. Now, about that drink..." He walked to the bar in the ma.s.sive living room and filled two gla.s.ses from a decanter.

Mac watched him. "I know why you hired me," he said as Pierce offered him the drink. "You already had ten of the coins back and you could have gotten the other two as easily as I did. Probably more easily. But you didn't want Marvin or Shane. You wanted that fourth man. The shadow on the videotape you said you didn't notice."

Pierce held out one of the filled gla.s.ses. Mac took it and watched Pierce walk over to a small antique desk. He opened a drawer, took out a check, closed the drawer and crossed to Mac to hand him the check.

Mac took it and glanced at the amount. More than triple what he normally charged. "I know you killed them-Trevor, Rachel, Arnie. I can't prove it, but I know you did."

Pierce lifted his gla.s.s as if in salute, then took a sip. "Greed killed them."

"If greed killed, you'd never have been born," Mac said, putting down his untouched drink. He tore up the check and let the pieces fall to the highly glossed hardwood floor. Then he turned and walked out of the house.

He headed his truck down the lake road away from Flathead, away from Jill, telling himself he was doing her a favor by leaving. But he hadn't gotten far when he realized just how wrong he'd been. He slowed the truck, feeling a pull on him stronger than any he could remember.

d.a.m.n. He had to go back.

His cell phone rang. He clicked it on, thinking it might be Jill, disappointed when it wasn't. It was a friend he'd called about Pierce's gold coins. Mac had been curious just how much three lives were worth.

"Those dates you gave me of the two coins," his friend said. "Those are worth about two hundred bucks apiece."

"What?" Mac said, braking and pulling off the road. "I guess I should have told you. They're part of a twelve-coin set."

"Wouldn't make any difference. Those are common years. Even if you had the missing years, they'd all be worth about two hundred bucks, or about fourteen hundred dollars in total."

Mac felt his pulse pound. "You're sure?"

"You wouldn't have called me if you didn't think I knew my coins," his friend said. "Anyway, I have the book right in front of me."

Mac thanked him and clicked off, then floored the pickup. Pierce had lied. Mac wasn't sure why that surprised him. The coins weren't rare. So what the h.e.l.l had getting them back been about? Just simple vengeance?

Mac remembered what Shane had said about Arnie thinking there was more in the metal box than just the coins and if there had been something else, Trevor had it. His heart leaped to his throat. Oh, G.o.d, he had to be wrong.

BRENNA CAME IN shortly after Mac left Jill's hospital room. "I heard they were releasing you and I figured you'd need a ride home."

"He's gone," Jill said, and finally let the tears come.

Brenna rushed to her. "Oh, sweetie." She hugged Jill, gently rocking her.

The nurse came in and shooed Brenna away, saying Jill needed her rest. The sleeping pill gave her nightmares. Or maybe the nightmares were just from the past few days and everything that had happened.

Jill awoke with a start a couple of hours later, and for a moment she thought Mac was in the room with her again. He wasn't. He was gone. Gone from her life. Leaving her empty inside and lonelier than she'd ever been, mourning what could have been.

The doctor released her, and Brenna drove her to the bakery. Zoe and Shane were there, along with Jill's father and his woman friend Darlene and a bunch of Jill's friends, all gathered to welcome her home.

Although seeing them lifted her spirits, she still felt empty inside, as if some part of her had left with Mac. Darlene had baked a cake, which she cut and which Zoe served with coffee.

Darlene was pet.i.te and gray-haired, with twinkling blue eyes and a cheery disposition. Perfect for Jill's father.

The phone rang every few minutes. Jill didn't feel like talking to anyone right now and asked her father to take messages. People were calling to wish her well. Other calls were from reporters from other newspapers wanting interviews, he said.

Jill looked through the array of flowers and cards that had been sent. Many of them were from her regular customers. She was deeply touched.

"This one has a note on it that says you have to read the card before eight-fifteen," Darlene said, and glanced at her watch. "You're barely going to make it."

Eight-fifteen? Jill took the card from the large bouquet of red roses, hope soaring through her as she ripped open the envelope and read: I can't leave you. Meet me tonight at the cottage at 8:15 unless you're too smart to get involved with a man like me.Mac Jill began to cry.

"Is it bad news?" Darlene asked, sounding concerned.

Jill hugged her. "No, it's wonderful news."

Zoe came up and read the card over her shoulder. "Too cool," she said. "You'd better get moving or you're gonna be late. Take my car."

MAC FLOORED the gas. It hadn't been about the coins. Or revenge.

His breath escaped in a rush. "No." He'd felt from the first that everything about this was wrong. He'd known. On some level, he'd known.

Pierce had his coins. Shane said he thought something else was in the box. But whatever it had been, Trevor must have taken it.

The sheriff's report. Jill's words: "Arnie said someone was after him, trying to kill him. He'd seemed so afraid."

But she hadn't seen anyone and in the end concluded Arnie had just pretended they were being chased so he could get her to the same spot where he'd killed Rachel Wells. But Mac knew better now. Arnie had been trying to save Jill by throwing her into the lake.

Arnie hadn't fallen or jumped. Pierce had probably struck him with something. If Mac hadn't gotten to Jill when he did, if he hadn't seen the skid marks on the road, then the van with the flat, if he hadn't gone back to the skid marks, driven down through the orchard...

Mac watched the headlights eat up the pavement.

He dialed the hospital. Jill had already been released. He called her home number. No answer. He dialed information. Got her father's number. No answer there, either. Information gave him Zoe's number. The phone rang and rang, and finally it was picked up. He could hear rock music. "Zoe?"

The music stopped with a suddenness that was both comforting and jarring.

"h.e.l.lo," she said with a giggle, her attention obviously elsewhere. Shane must have been with her.

"Do you know where Jill is?" he asked.

"Mac? She went to meet you."

What? "Meet me?"

"Yeah, she got the note you sent with the flowers."

He'd never sent a woman flowers in his life. Not even Emily. He wished now that he had. That he'd had the sense to send them to Jill with a note telling her to meet him.

"Where was she meeting me?"

Zoe let out another giggle. "You should know."

"Where?"