Paradise County (53 page)

B
y twilight of the following day, they were all out of the hospital except Eli, who was going to be there for a couple of weeks, the doctors told Joe. He’d already undergone surgery for the bullet wound in his chest, and would, with time, recover fully.

“I haven’t had a chance to thank you yet,” Joe said to Neely as he accompanied her and Alex back to Whistledown to get their things. The house was badly damaged; no one would be living there again unless extensive repairs were made. It had also been declared a crime scene by the police, and was cordoned off with tape. They’d had to get permission to enter to collect their things. “You saved Eli’s life.”

“I have my good points,” Neely replied with a cocky grin. Like Alex’s, her hair was singed to the point of frizziness and she had a few superficial burns. The burns to Joe’s legs were a little more serious, but they were bandaged and didn’t seem to be slowing him down.

“I admit it. You do,” Joe agreed. This conversation took place in the upstairs hall, and Alex, who was in her bedroom packing, listened in with a smile. In her opinion, which she had already expressed, Neely was a heroine. Her sister had saved her life, too.

Joe walked into Alex’s room, and she paused in her packing long
enough to smile at him. He had constituted himself her and Neely’s bodyguard for this visit, although the danger was past. Tommy had arrested Homer about twenty minutes after he’d gotten the whole story from Neely, Alex, and Joe. Homer had simply gone back to the Dixie Inn, confident that he had eliminated all witnesses. The state police, to whom Tommy had turned Homer over, had said that if he hadn’t been stopped Homer would certainly have killed again: he had already killed twenty-two women and four men. He’d kept an extensive photo collection of his victims in his house; its duplicate had been displayed on the walls of the room in Whistledown’s basement, and had been destroyed.

As soon as he was taken into custody, Homer had confessed. Laura Welch had been one of his victims, as they had already guessed. After her last visit to Joe, she’d spent the night at the Dixie Inn. Homer had taken her as she’d slept.

“Tell me something: Why are there secret passages in my house?” Alex asked, shifting so that she could look up at Joe. “It’s not some kind of weird local custom, like basketball worship, is it?”

Joe grinned at her.

“Apparently Whistledown was part of the Underground Railroad,” he answered. “It dates from before the Civil War, you know. They used to hide runaway slaves down in that room beyond the coal bin. The passages were there to slip them in or out of the house in case the slave catchers came. There was another passage leading out of the basement too, toward the creek. It’s half caved-in since the rains, but apparently that’s where Homer was stashing the bodies, stowing them very neatly in plastic garbage bags. That big rain we had the night you got here apparently washed some of the bags out.”

“How did Homer know about it?” This was Neely, calling from her room.

“He grew up at Whistledown. His family owned it about twenty-five years ago. The passages weren’t a secret, really. Everybody had kind of forgotten about them, is all.”

“Believe me,
I
didn’t know anything about them,” Alex said firmly. “I wouldn’t have spent the first night in this house if I had known.”

“Actually, you didn’t,” Joe said under his breath, and Alex, remembering her panicked run down the hill, grimaced at him.

He came around the side of the bed toward her and crossed his arms over his chest, looking at her consideringly. Alex lifted an inquiring eyebrow at him and continued packing.

“Now that you don’t have a place to live anymore, I guess you’ll be starting to think about heading back to Philadelphia,” he said.

Alex stopped packing and met his gaze. “That depends,” she said.

“On what?” His eyes were suddenly very intent on her face.

“On you.”

“Oh, yeah?” He started to smile.

“Yeah.”

“Alex.” He reached over, caught her hand, and pulled her toward him. But when she would have wrapped her arms around his neck he held her a little away from him so that he could see her face.

“Marry me.” His voice was husky.

Looking up at him, at the sea blue eyes and the beautiful mouth and the tan, strong face, she felt her heart turn over.

“Yes,” she said, smiling at him. Then she wrapped her arms around his neck and rose up on tiptoe to kiss his mouth.

“Did I hear what I just thought I heard?” Neely shrieked from the doorway. “Did you just say you’d marry him?”

“You got a problem with that?” Joe asked, lifting his head. Alex turned around in Joe’s arms to smile at her sister.

“Well, no,” she said, and grinned impishly at Joe. “I don’t know how I’m going to adjust to having Eli for a nephew, though.”

Joe groaned.

“We’ll work it out,” Alex said firmly.

A little while later, possessions packed, they were ready to go back down the hill to Joe’s house. Joe was already carrying suitcases downstairs.

“Have you seen Hannibal?” Neely asked Alex. Alex had already been looking for him, and shook her head. “We can’t leave him.”

“No,” Alex agreed. The cat had been one of the biggest heroes of all. And remembering that, she suddenly had an idea where to look.

“Come on,” she said to Neely, who frowned at her but followed.

When Alex stepped out onto the upstairs porch, a rush of cold air hit her in the face. It was the time of day when twilight turns to night, and the porch was deep in purple shadows. The sisters walked along it, calling for Hannibal. All of a sudden, he came walking toward them from the far end of the porch, purring loudly, his tail proudly erect and waving.

Beyond him, shimmery and indistinct but unmistakable for all that, was the image of a man.

Alex stared. There was no mistake: her father was standing there, smiling at her and Neely, his hands in his pockets, his silver hair gleaming, his blue eyes warm with love. He was dressed as she had often seen him, in a tweed sport coat and open-collared shirt tucked into khaki slacks.

As she watched, eyes wide and lips parted in wonder, he began to fade. He lifted a hand in farewell, and then he was gone as completely as if he had never been there at all.

Only deep purple shadows remained in his place.

“Daddy!” Alex and Neely cried at the same time, as Hannibal twined around their ankles. Then they exchanged glances.

They had both seen him. There was no mistake.

“Alex!” Joe was bellowing, clearly faintly alarmed at not being able to find her.

“Let’s go,” Alex said. Neely scooped up the still-purring cat, cradling it in her arms. Then the sisters turned away, walking from the cool purple shadows of the porch into the bright warmth inside.

Epilogue

O
n a bright Saturday in December, Joe leaned on the rail near the finish line at Gulfstream Park. On one side was his dad, jumping up and down and yelling fit to kill. On his other side was his new wife, Alex, who was jumping and screaming, too. All four kids were bouncing like kangaroos around them, and the noise level for the group was several decibels more than his ears could normally stand.

But this wasn’t normally. This was watching Victory Dance sweep the Magna Futurity by six lengths. He couldn’t believe it.

Two thoughts went through his mind as he watched that skinny fleabag of a horse run his way to half a million dollars and a piece of glory, and caught a glimpse of his shrieking wife at the same time.

The first was, When you’re hot, you’re hot.

The second was, Dreams do come true.

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