Seeing Red (36 page)

“Why would I? It wasn’t Hollis Alexander she was blowing. Telling that detail would have done nothing but hurt her parents and you.”

“But it made you look more suspect,” she said.

“I’m not saying I wouldn’t have divulged those details if it had been necessary to save my own hide. But until that time came—which it didn’t—there was no need to destroy her. Besides, do you think the jury would have been likely to convict Alexander on circumstantial evidence if the defense attorney had made Laura sound like a girl who’d been asking for trouble?”

That was one child’s view she’d shed long ago. No matter how you sliced it, there was still a double standard. Boys who had sex with multiple partners were just being normal; girls who had sex with multiple people were whores without the pay.

“There’s another question I have to ask you,” she said.

“Shoot.”

“Why did you lie on the witness stand?” She watched his eyes closely in the glow from the overhead light but saw no reluctance, no flash of dishonesty.

“I didn’t.”

“Yes. You did,” she pressed. “You said you didn’t see Laura again after the two of you fought in the parking lot of the drugstore.”

“I didn’t. I went home. My mom was having a very bad drunk. I stayed there to keep her from burning down the house or hurting herself.”

“No,” Ellis said, shaking her head. “I heard the two of you talking as I was falling asleep. It was a few minutes before midnight. I didn’t ever tell anyone. It would have given them the wrong idea. They didn’t know you came to see her lots of times after her curfew.”

He reached out and took her hands. “That’s what you meant earlier when you said you’d always kept my secrets? You thought you were protecting me.”

She nodded.

“Oh, Ellis.” He raised her hand to his lips and kissed it.

“It wasn’t you?” she said weakly.

“No, baby, it wasn’t.”

Her throat started to swell.

He inched closer and touched her cheek. “It wouldn’t have made any difference. Alexander was caught.”

Closing her eyes, she thought about all she’d learned today.

With a slow shake of her head, she said, “But it wasn’t Alexander talking to her. He had an alibi from ten until one in the morning.”

She looked into Nate’s eyes. “And if it wasn’t you, it had to have been someone else.”

Ellis struggled to recall that moment. She’d been just falling asleep when she heard hushed voices and Laura’s quiet laughter. She remembered curling deeper into her pillow. She’d always liked to fall asleep with the sound of Laura and Nate’s quiet conversations drifting in the space between her and Laura’s house. Not that she ever heard much beyond the deep rumble of Nate’s voice dancing with Laura’s lighter one.

Ellis supposed she didn’t pay particular attention that night, because it was already set in her mind that it was Nate.

“It doesn’t matter who was at the window—if there really was someone. Maybe you dreamt it. Maybe it was Alexander and his alibi was fabricated. Alexander was caught. Nothing else matters.”

She supposed she
had
been very sleepy. Maybe Nate was right. Maybe it was more dream than reality.

The movement of the dock beneath her feet seemed to increase. Everything was becoming such a muddle. Why couldn’t this just be over?

“Ellis,” Nate said softly. “We need to go.”

The words left her in a rush. “Les Winkler thinks you’re not only guilty of murder, but you’re also the one stalking me.”

“Does he? And what do you think, Ellis?”

She squared her shoulders and faced him. “I think that if I was my rational self, I wouldn’t get in this boat with you.”

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY-SIX

N
ate felt as if Ellis had dealt him a physical blow. Good God, could she really think . . . Anger swept hotly over him. She’d defended Rory when Nate had suggested the possibility he’d left the roses and the doll.

He stopped himself. She was right. Ellis was a cautious woman but hadn’t heeded her own practices when it had come to him. He’d expected her unquestioning trust, and she’d given it.

What if he had been the bastard her uncle had thought him? Nate knew he wasn’t. But there was no way that Ellis could be certain.

With a voice more calm than his racing heart, he said, “Then don’t. Go to your mother’s. Stay with her and Ben.”

Her body tensed, as if his suggestion startled her.

He said, “You’ll probably be safer there.”

“I said if I was my rational self—which I obviously am not. Besides, I’m not putting my mother at more risk, not after Alexander got into my condo so easily.”

“I sense a ’but’ hanging in the air,” he said.

“No but. I don’t think you left that doll in my shower. If I did, I wouldn’t have come here at all. It’s just that there are so many unanswered questions. I’m so tired; I can’t think straight.”

Nate wondered if part of that inability to think clearly had led her to have sex with him. He turned away from the thought; it was too painful to examine.

He refrained from wrapping his arms around her and making promises he could not keep. Instead he asked, “Did you find out anything at the girl’s apartment complex?”

Ellis handed him her tote. “I’ll tell you when we’re in the boat.”

“You’re sure you want to go?”

“Yes.”

Before he stepped down into the boat, he held her gaze and said, “I’ve never lied to you, Ellis. Protecting you is the only thing that matters to me.”

“Get in the damn boat,” she said.

Not exactly a gush of sentiment, but it was a vote of confidence. Nate decided he would accept it as that.

After he was in the flat-bottomed boat, he helped her step down. She took a seat on the middle bench and faced forward—a sign she didn’t want to talk.

Nate sat on the rearmost bench, in front of the outboard motor, and maneuvered the boat away from the dock. He kept the speed low as they moved into the channel.

He allowed Ellis her privacy while the marina slipped slowly away. The white forms of the snubnosed shrimp boats were quickly obscured as the johnboat moved into the broad darkness of the river.

After a few minutes, Ellis turned in her seat, swung her legs over, and faced him. “Kimberly’s roommate didn’t recognize Alexander,” she said. “But one woman at the complex thinks she saw him in the crowd the morning they found the body.”

“Coming to see the fallout of his work, no doubt.” Nate guided the boat to the right of a white reflective buoy.

“There was a rumor that morning that someone had seen a black Hummer in the parking lot around the time Kimberly was attacked. No one seemed to remember where they’d heard it. If Alexander started that rumor, he knows you drive the Hummer.”

Nate nodded silently.

“What if he knows the Hummer and the plantation go together?” she asked, tension crackling in her voice. “He’ll know to look for us there.”

“It’s possible,” he said evenly, watching the river.
And if he does, I’ll kill him without a single moment’s hesitation.

“Well,” she huffed. “That makes me feel better.”

He looked at her. “I don’t want you to feel better. I want you to stay sharp.”

Nate’s words sent a chill over Ellis’s entire body. She sat there for a moment, darkness pressing on her chest as if she lay at the bottom of the river.

She focused on the motor’s steady putter and the calm slap of water against the aluminum hull.

It was so damn dark. And she couldn’t be more out in the open.

The darkness had a physical presence, a hovering bulk that crowded so close she felt it on her skin.

She assured herself that no hands would reach out of the night and drag her to her doom.

It did no good.

The feeling of suffocation was made worse by the weighty stillness of air that spoke of an approaching storm.

She turned away from Nate, just in case he could see the panic on her face. Stripping off her jacket, she drew a breath that felt like wet cotton.

She could not freak out. She
would
not.

Because they were traveling from the river into a webwork of creeks that laced through a pitch-black marsh, they were barely moving fast enough to keep the mosquitoes off.

She lifted her hair off her neck and secured it with the clip she’d taken out in the restaurant, hoping she wouldn’t throw up all over the bottom of the johnboat.

She tried to divert her thoughts from the darkness.

But the things that rushed into her mind were worse.

She thought of her father’s accident. She saw the image of Buckley’s twisted body and bloody head. She recalled Ava’s description of Kimberly Potter’s green sandals laying a trail to her body in the dunes. That hideous doll hanging in her shower . . . .

Suddenly she wasn’t hot anymore.

She jerked herself to the edge of the boat and vomited over the side.

Immediately she held up her hand. “I’m okay.”

Thank God Nate spared what was left of her dignity and didn’t stop.

Weakness. She hated it—most of all in herself.

Reaching down, she scooped a handful of water and splashed it on the back of her neck. It was briny, but at least it was cool. Then she dug in her bag for a piece of mint gum.

Her stomach settled and she breathed a little easier.

Soon after, Ellis noticed a flicker of lightning, lifting the tarry blackness of the sky to battleship gray. The wind came up, ruffling the tall grasses on either side of the creek.

She wondered if they’d make the plantation before the storm hit. It had been a long while since she’d seen the dot of a shoreline light. But here in the low country, light was gobbled up quickly by black water and thick vegetation.

“We’ll be there in five minutes,” Nate said, breaking the silence for the first time in a long while.

“Since when do you read minds?”

“You looked up at the lightning.”

A gust of wind hit her in the face.

“Do we
have
five minutes?” she asked.

“If not, we’re going to get wet.” He didn’t sound concerned.

Didn’t he know the danger? They were traversing a maze in the dark. On water. In a metal boat.

Maybe he’s so used to danger that it doesn’t faze him anymore.

Belle Creek Plantation should be coming up on the right side. She strained to see lights.

All she saw was black.

Nate turned the boat.

Lightning flashed, and Ellis nearly jumped overboard when she saw how close they were to a long narrow pier.

Nate said, “You can’t see the house from the creek unless all the lights are blazing.”

Leaning forward, she reached out to grab one of the pilings as Nate cut the motor.

The wind gave another gust.

He quickly climbed onto the dock and tied up.

The first fat drops of rain hit the aluminum boat. It sounded like someone was pelting it with acorns.

She handed her tote up to Nate just as a loud crack and a brilliant flash happened simultaneously. She jerked her head down into her shoulders. Great defense against lightning strikes, she thought.

Temporarily blinded, she held perfectly still.

The rain cut loose in wild slashing sheets.

“Here,” Nate called to her. “Give me your hand.”

“I can’t even see you.”

He latched on to her arm and pulled, helping her out of the boat. Wrapping one arm around her, he started moving.

Ellis felt like a blind woman being led down the plank. She hoped she didn’t step off the side of the dock. “I can’t see a damn thing.”

Moving them steadily ahead, Nate laughed and held her close. “And they let you drive after dark?”

“Don’t you have a light in the stable yard?” She should be able to see it from here.

“Power must be out.”

“Lovely.” More darkness. It would be better once she was inside, she assured herself; that lancing sense of vulnerability would ease.

“Where’s your sense of adventure?” he asked.

“Thanks to Hollis Alexander, I don’t have one.” The truth that she normally guarded slid right out of her mouth.

They climbed the steps to the covered porch. Once out of the downpour, Nate let go of her. He dug in his pocket, then inserted a key into the wide wooden door he’d been hanging when she first discovered he was back.

It seemed much longer than six days ago. “If I hadn’t seen you that day,” she asked, “would you have come and gone and never let me know?”

He pushed the door open but made no move to go inside. “I don’t know. That had been my plan.”

She stood there for a long moment, surprised at how much his admission hurt. It seemed inconceivable that she could have gone on, maybe forever, not knowing what had happened to him.