OVER HER DEAD BODY: The Bliss Legacy - Book 2 (3 page)

A glance at the clock told her it was five minutes short of two A.M., which meant she’d been scrubbing and scouring since midnight. She felt like elephant droppings, beyond tired and into the realm of the living dead. But she knew she wouldn’t sleep, that if she went to bed she’d see them coming across the flat, dry earth. Hear the gunfire, the screams.

When her hands started to shake, she flattened her palms on the tabletop and forced the memory into the black hole it came from. Bad enough it haunted her when she tried to sleep; she didn’t need it when she was trying to stay awake.

A limp smile turned up her mouth. She was definitely in a no-win situation—or at least a no-sleep situation.

Picking up the mop she’d propped against the table, she walked back to the bucket of hot soapy water. If nothing else, insomnia was productive. She’d done more in the last two hours than Bridget had accomplished in the last week. The girl made a snail look like a turbo-charged roadrunner, but Keeley knew depression dogged her, pulled her down. Losing a baby so close to term took a terrible emotional toll.

What now seemed like a thousand years of nursing and religion had taught her that much.

The phone rang, clattered into the room like dropped china, rattling her heart and sending a chill through her chest. Who would call at such an hour?

She went to the old phone leashed to the wall near the kitchen door. “If this is a wrong number, you’re in trouble,” she said, in no mood to dispense a cheery hello.

A man’s voice curled into the room. “Am I talking to Keeley Farrell?”

“Yes, a very irritated Keeley Farrell.”

“You’re up late.”

“So are you. Whoever you are.” She didn’t attempt to hide her annoyance.

“At two o’clock in the morning, names don’t matter much, do they? Except maybe yours.”

Keeley stilled. “If this is some kind of obscene phone call, you’re wasting your sick breath, my friend. If you’ve got something to say, say it. In the next five seconds.”

He laughed, and it slid through the phone line as mirthless as a hungry snake. “You’re Mary Weaver’s godchild or something like that, right?”

Who was this man and how did he know about her and Mary? “Four seconds,” she said.

“Tough little cookie, huh?” He sounded amused now. “Well, guess what, sweet cakes, I’ve got all the time in the world. Not so sure about you, though.”

“Is that some kind of threat?” Keeley’s sleep-deprived mind staggered to full alert.

“Nope. But a woman alone … in a big empty house makes a man think a certain way. Only natural.” Keeley’s gaze, as wild and unfocused as her thoughts, scanned the room, looking for nothing, expecting anything.

Keep it together, Keeley. Keep it together.

Gripping the receiver tightly, and raising her voice over the thud of her heart, she said, “Well think about this. I don’t frighten easily, and I’m not alone,” she bluffed.

“Oh, yeah, the little blond parcel. A bit skinny, but usable.”

His oily words squeezed her lungs like a pair of cold, clammy hands. “Look, gutter-mind, why don’t you go get yourself some help before I get it for you—in the form of a police siren.”

He laughed before she heard his deep, raspy breathing coming down the line. His next words were lower, coarse and whispery. “I kind of like women with gumption. So much more fun than the dead kind.” He stopped. “As for those police you were talking about? A bad idea. A
really bad
idea. Wouldn’t do you any good anyway, because I won’t be calling again. Besides, you wouldn’t want them to find out about dear old Mary, would you?”

“What are you talking about?” Confusion paired up with the crazy flutter in her chest. “What do you know about Mary?”

“Everything I need to know and a lot you don’t. And most of it
ain’t
pretty.” He paused, and she heard him breathing again. Heavy, as though he meant for her to hear it. “Not as pretty as that bright red hair of yours. But, I have to say, that yellow scarf you’ve got tied around it? That’s a real bad color choice.”

Click.

Keeley’s hand flew to her head, the yellow scarf circling it, and at the same moment she heard the rumble of a car motor from the dark road beyond the fence. Her heart, wild as a dervish, danced up her throat.

She dropped the phone and rushed to the window in time to see the ruby of a car’s tail lights disappear around the corner.

Dolan James squeezed the receiver as tight as he squeezed his eyelids closed. “What the hell’s the matter with you? All you had to do was confirm she was there, not set her running, for God’s sake! …
‘Having a little fun’
? You’re fucking crazy. Are you even sure you spoke to the right woman?”

Dolan looked down the darkened hall, saw the sliver of light creeping from his father’s room. He spoke in a low, tight voice, struggling to keep fear from rooting too deep in his chest.

“If you’ve botched this, Mace,” he said. “
Neither of us
will see a dime. Don’t you get that? …. I know, I know, I owe you. Christ, you remind me of it often enough. But no more ‘
fun
.’ We need to be sure about this Farrell bitch and what she’s doing there. Absolutely sure. And stop phoning this number. Call my damn cell like I told you to. You got that?”

He heard the rustle of newspaper coming from the room, and added quickly, “I’ve got to go. The old man’s awake. Sit tight, will you? And for fuck’s sake, leave her alone until I can figure out what to do. We don’t want her calling in the damn police.” He hit the
off
button, fought the urge to slam the phone into its cradle—or better yet, against the damn wall.

Jesus, it couldn’t get any worse than having Mace Jacobs involved. The guy was a goddamn pervert! Unpredictable as hell. Not that Dolan had any choice. Owing a guy a couple of hundred thou kept him interested—and close. Trouble was the asshole thought he was calling the shots. Well, he was goddamn wrong.

“Who was that, calling at this ungodly hour?”

Shit!

Dolan, still reeling from the phone call, didn’t answer. His throat sand dry, and his mind dead numb, all he could do was grip the phone in his hand. If he’d had any doubts about the validity of Mary Weaver’s last and unexpected call, Mace had laid them to rest.

He dropped his head and rubbed hard at the back of his neck.

This could not be happening. Mayday House was for real—exactly like the old woman said. And some woman named Farrell had moved in to run it.

“Dolan? Are you there?” His father’s voice seeped into the hall along with the light from his bedside lamp.

The man never slept. No change there. Old William considered insomnia, whether he was working his ass off and running all over the world, or dying, as he was doing now—although too slowly to suit Dolan—as added “productive time.”

Workaholics. Had to love the bastards—and the irony. So damn busy in life making the big bucks they never had enough time to spend them, then at the end forced to leave their golden stash to those with nothing but time. At twenty-six, Dolan had time to spare.

“I’m here, Dad.” He lifted his hand from the receiver he’d placed carefully back on the charger, tried to take his mind off Mace’s call, and sound as if his whole world hadn’t hit an air pocket and dropped him ten thousand feet. “And the call was nothing. A wrong number.”

Dolan brushed his straight, sandy-colored hair off his face and straightened his jacket. The suit hung on his thin five-ten frame as if tailored for a man twice his size, and his blue eyes felt dry, feverish. He blinked, forced himself to calm down before he took the few steps to his father’s bedroom door.

“It’s after two in the morning. Who would be calling anyone at this hour?” William James grumbled from his bed, the lines and hollows in his face looking like dismal smudges in the pale light from his lamp.

“Who knows?” he said, keeping his tone casual. “But the teenage cell phone brigade never sleeps, so it was probably some kid.” He assessed his father, an activity that since the diagnosis had become routine. Fortunately, every day he looked worse than the last. It wouldn’t be long now. Hell, it couldn’t be long, not after what Mace had told him. Plus Dolan was running short in the time and patience departments. The idea of Farrell nosing around in that house, finding out stuff, the chance of her getting to William—before he could get to her—scared the crap out of him. “And they’re not the only ones who don’t sleep. You should be lights out by now. You need your rest.” He stopped at the foot of the bed, coiled his fingers around one of its four posts, and forced a smile.

“I’ll be sleeping permanently soon enough.” He settled his rheumy gaze on Dolan. “Where have you been, anyway?”

With a prostitute, big Daddy, two of them actually, getting it off, and getting the hell out of this hospital you call a home.
“I took in a couple of movies.”

“You sure that’s all you took in?”

“I’ve been clean for more than a year, Dad. You know that.” He sounded nicely sincere, which wasn’t hard, because for once he was telling the truth, and he intended to stay clean until the son of a bitch was toes up and Dolan’s name was on the bank account. He couldn’t risk failing one of old William’s random drug tests. Fuck, he hated those. But the old fart had made it clear: the barest sniff of drugs, and Dolan was out of the house and out of the will. His way of cleaning him up. Hah! “I wish you could trust me a little more.” He put a trace of regret in his voice as an added touch.

The rheumy gaze shifted to sharp, and his father gave the barest shake of his head before turning his attention back to the book in his hands. Dolan didn’t expect his father to trust him, or believe him, and he wasn’t disappointed. It might have hurt him once; now he didn’t give a shit. In a matter of weeks, maybe even days, according to the doc, old moneybags, William Daniel James, would be ten feet under, and it couldn’t come soon enough to suit Dolan. Nor could the moneybags.

“You want anything?” he asked, pretending to care, when what he wanted to do was cut and run, have a drink, and figure out what to do about Mace’s call.

“No. Go to bed. If I need anything, I’ll ring the nurse.” William’s head lifted, then tilted to look more closely at him. Into my damn soul, Dolan thought, and as usual finding it—and him—wanting. After the scrutiny, the old man shifted his gaze back to his book, saying, “It looks like those ‘movies’ of yours took their toll.”

Dolan, dismissed, sucked up his anger, quelled the urge to pick up a poker from the fireplace and end this father/son bonding farce right now. “See you in the morning then,” he said. “Try to get some sleep.” He left the room and closed the door behind him, the poker idea fresh meat in his mind. He chewed on it as he’d done for weeks now.

Hell, he’d be doing him a favor, save the old bastard his last round of pain before the grim reaper culled him from the herd. The only problem was, there was nothing in it for him—except trouble. And, on the brink of inheriting a fortune, he didn’t intend to screw up. One wrong move and the cops would be all over him, and he hadn’t spent the last year doing the reformed and penitent son gig to lose out now. No, old William had to die a natural death.

In his room he locked the door and poured himself a drink.

Mayday House.

Until a few days ago, he’d never heard of it—or an ancient bitch named Mary Weaver.

He gulped down his booze, smiling through his anger. Shit, either way you looked at it, he had to count himself lucky. If he hadn’t intercepted the old woman’s call, listened to her rant about forgiveness or some crap like that, he’d have been royally fucked, and there wouldn’t be a damned thing he could do about it.

The more he thought about it, maybe it wasn’t so bad Mace had put a scare into Farrell. Scared people were stupid people. They made mistakes. And while he might want to eliminate everything and everybody connected to that damn house, the smart thing to do was find out if there were loose ends and tie them up. Records, diaries, crap like that. Because when the time came, he didn’t intend to leave a trace. Not a damn trace.

He turned it over in his mind, played the scenario through. It should look like an accident—the random act of some freako pervert. Mace qualified on that score. Hell, it’d be like tossing him a meaty bone. Dolan grinned. Looks like that rape and sexual assault record of his would come in handy yet.

Calmer now, he poured himself another shot and lifted his glass to the cavernous, luxurious bedroom. “Here’s to ya, Mary Weaver. Thanks for the heads-up.”

And don’t worry, I’ll keep my promise. Pass the message on to my dear Daddy—right after the old bastard’s ashes are flushed down the toilet.

Gus decided to use the Mayday House driveway, even though the amount of grass growing from the cracks in the cement told him it wasn’t the norm.

A few yards in, he lowered his head, looked out the windshield, and studied the three-story Victorian house. On the left, a turret pointed skyward like a cumbersome rocket. It looked too big, too top-heavy for the delicate lines of the house, like some kind of architectural afterthought that would drop off its third-floor base given the smallest tremor.

The porch yawed like a half-sunken ship, and the whole place looked as though it hadn’t been painted since the Great Depression.

Seriously ugly house, Gus decided. But he’d put this business off long enough, so the sooner he got this visit with Farrell over with, the better.

He pulled his new silver Jag to within a few feet of the front door. The early September day was a pearly gray from the light rain that had stopped a few minutes ago, but it was warm and surprisingly humid, so he tossed his leather jacket on the front seat before heading toward the six or eight steps leading to the porch and the front door.

He was halfway up when a voice came from behind. “Can I help you?”

He turned. A young girl was coming toward the house with a rake in her hand and towing a gigantic orange trash bag behind her. Pretty, he registered, in a whitish blond kind of way. But much too thin.

“I’m looking for Keeley Farrell,” he said, thinking he probably should have said the Sister bit.