Silent Killer (33 page)

He’d been putting this off, not wanting to upset his grandparents, but after his mom left, he told Nana and Granddad that they needed to have a serious talk.

“It’s not as if y’all won’t see a lot of me,” Seth tried to explain. “I’ll be over here all the time. It’s just I think it’s time for me to move back in with Mom now. I should be with her.”

“I won’t hear of it,” Granddad said. “You’re just a boy and certainly not old enough to make this type of decision for yourself. Wait another month or two. Please. Your mother isn’t the best influence on you and—”

“I’ll soon be sixteen. I’m old enough to know what’s right for me.”

“Seth, sweetheart, are you sure?” his nana asked.

“Yes, ma’am, I’m sure.”

“I do not want you living with your mother and being exposed to her fornicating with that man.” Granddad’s face turned red as he balled his hands into tight fists. “She is setting a bad example for you.”

Seth knew it would be futile to argue with his grandfather, a man who could see only one side of any issue—his own side. “I think Mom and Jack will probably get married.”

His granddad huffed.

“You could wait awhile, at least until school starts, and give us time to adjust to the idea that you’re leaving us,” Nana suggested.

“He’s not leaving now and that’s final!” Granddad stormed out of the room.

Nana patted his arm. “Give him a little time, please.”

“I will. He didn’t give me a chance to say that I’ll think about waiting until school starts to move in with Mom.”

“That’s good, that’s good. Thank you, dear.”

He could see the sadness in Nana’s eyes and hated that he had put it there. “I love you, and that won’t change just because I’m living with Mom. I hope you can persuade Granddad not to take Mom to court over this. He’s got to know that, at sixteen, the judge will allow me to choose who I want to live with.”

After he and Nana talked for a while, he felt better about the entire situation. Nana had a way of counteracting Granddad’s negativism with her positive attitude.

“I think I should spend some time with Mom today,” Seth said. “I want to explain things, to tell her that we’ve talked and—”

The doorbell rang, but before Nana could respond, someone pounded on the door. “Mona? Mona, let me in. It’s Elaine.”

“That was certainly fast,” Nana said.

“What’s she doing here?” Seth asked.

Nana rolled her eyes and sighed. “I have a feeling that your grandfather called in reinforcements.” She walked to the door, opened it and barely had time to move out of the way before his other grandmother stormed into the living room.

Grandmother pinned him with her sharp, narrowed gaze. “What is this I hear about your wanting to move in with your mother?”

“J.B. certainly didn’t waste any time,” Nana said.

“J.B. is worried, as well he should be,” Grandmother replied, never taking her eyes off Seth.

“I’ll leave you two alone to talk,” Nana told them. “I imagine I’ll find J.B. piddling in the garage.”

As soon as Nana left, Grandmother glowered at him. “You will not move in with your mother. Do you hear me? She isn’t a suitable role model for any young person. She is living in sin with that Perdue man!”

“I like Jack,” Seth said. “I think my mom loves him, and he loves her. I hope they get married. Mom deserves to be happy.”

“She’ll never be happy with Jackson Perdue. He was a good-for-nothing boy, and he hasn’t changed. He was all wrong for my Cathy seventeen years ago, and he’s still all wrong for her.”

“Don’t you think that’s Mom’s decision to make, not yours?”

Grandmother gasped. “You’re being impertinent. It’s her influence, isn’t it? She’s become someone I hardly know.” Grandmother ranted, seeming to lose control of her anger. “The only time in her life when she defied me, she wound up in trouble, and if she doesn’t watch out, she’ll wind up pregnant and unmarried again. How she can give that man a second chance is beyond me. He doesn’t deserve a second chance.”

Seth suddenly felt sick. His stomach knotted painfully. “What do you mean she’ll wind up pregnant and unmarried again?”

Grandmother stared at him, her cheeks flushed, her eyes wide as she realized she had inadvertently blurted out some horrible family secret.

“Was my mother pregnant with another baby before she had me?” he asked, and all the while his mind was calculating the years.

“Seth, please, I—I didn’t know what I was saying. I didn’t mean to—”

“Was I that baby? Was Mom pregnant with me when she married my dad…when she married Mark Cantrell?”

“Mark Cantrell was your father,” Grandmother declared. “In every way that mattered. He loved you. He was a good father.”

Seth swallowed hard.

“Seth?” Grandmother reached out for him.

He sidestepped her and ran toward the front door.

“Seth!” she screamed. “Please come back. Let me explain.”

He rushed out onto the porch, down the steps and into the yard. He could hear his grandmother calling his name over and over again. Ignoring her, the rush of blood pumping through his body filled his ears with its roar as he ran up the street.

Mark Cantrell wasn’t his father. Not his real father. His mother had been pregnant with him when she’d gotten married.

He didn’t want to believe it. Had his mother lied to him his entire life? Had the man he had called Dad, the man he had loved and respected and tried to emulate, not been his biological father?

Winded from his fierce run, Seth paused on the corner of Mulberry and Fourth to catch his breath.

Grandmother had no reason to lie to him. In fact, she had been horrified when she’d realized she had blurted out the truth.

And what was that truth?

If Mark Cantrell wasn’t his father, then who was?

You know,
an inner voice said.
You know there’s only one man it could be.

Yes, he knew. There was no doubt in his mind that Jackson Perdue was the man who’d gotten his teenage mother pregnant.

She sat alone in the gazebo. Alone with her thoughts. Alone with God.

Had she made a terrible mistake last night? Surely God would not have allowed the wrong man to die. No, she had to believe that the man she had mistakenly thought to be Dewan Phillips had been God’s chosen sacrifice. She might make a mistake, but the Lord Almighty did not. Reverend Phillips was not innocent. It had simply not been his time. But his time would come.

God will show me the day of his punishment.

For now she would wait and pray and be thankful that no one suspected her of being the angel of death.

Perry Fuqua’s wife had seen a woman running away from the Phillipses’ home last night. Too bad for Missy. If the Lord hadn’t instructed her to leave Missy’s locket where the police could find it, she never would have done such a thing. But her work was far too important to God to risk being stopped before she completed her holy mission.

I’m sorry, Missy. I know you have endured so much misery, but I’m sure you will be all right. The Lord has told me that no real harm will come to you. By casting doubt on you, the police will have someone to focus on—leaving me free to continue doing God’s work.

She needed time to reflect on last night’s events. It was the first time that she had misunderstood God’s instructions. She had been so sure that He had wanted her to punish Dewan Phillips. But instead His wrath had destroyed Perry Fuqua.

Forgive me, Lord, for not listening more carefully.

You must know that as the Apostle Paul believed, so I believe.

“I have fought the good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day.”
II Timothy 14:7–8.

But you have not finished your course,
she heard God whisper in her ear.

Your work is not done. There are others to be punished.

She dropped to her knees, her hands folded in prayer, her eyes filled with tears. “I am Yours to command. Lead me to the unholy blasphemers, and I will do Thy will, wise and just Jehovah.”

Cathy had tried to telephone Jack several times, but apparently whenever he noted that she was the caller, he wouldn’t answer. She understood that he was working, that the new Fire and Brimstone Killer case took precedence over everything else, but the least he could do was give her one minute of his time. They needed to talk as soon as possible. All she wanted was to set up a time and place for them to meet to discuss Seth.

How would she ever be able to explain to her son why she had lied to him his entire life? And that’s what she had done. She could make every excuse under the sun, but in the end, the truth was the truth. She had allowed him to believe that Mark Cantrell was his father, and even though Mark had been a good father to Seth, he had not been his biological father.

If she couldn’t get in touch with Jack, then she had two options—either go ahead and tell Seth the truth or wait and hope Jack didn’t talk to him first. She hated both options.

As she paced the floor in her living room, trying to decide on a course of action, two things happened simultaneously. Her phone rang, and Seth, using the key she had given him, opened the front door and walked in. She smiled at Seth as she picked up the portable phone from the charger. When she noted the strange expression on his face, she gripped the phone tightly. He stood there, only a few feet from her, his whole body tense and his eyes riveted to hers. She glanced away momentarily to check caller ID, hoping it was Jack, but when she saw it was her mother, she silently groaned.

“It’s probably Grandmother,” Seth told her.

“Yes, it is. How did you—?”

“She’s calling to warn you that she told me Mark Cantrell wasn’t really my father.”

Cathy dropped the phone. It hit the floor with a loud thump.

“What did you say?”

You heard him. You know what he said.

What had possessed her mother to take it upon herself to reveal Cathy’s deepest, darkest secret?

“Granddad got upset when I told him that I definitely planned to come and live with you. He called Grandmother to come over and try to talk me out of it. She became really frustrated when I told her that I liked Jack Perdue and hoped you married him. That’s when she spit it out—the truth that you were pregnant when you got married.”

“Seth, please, let me explain.”

“Explain what? That you and Jack Perdue had sex and you got pregnant and you suckered my dad—scratch that—you suckered poor old Mark Cantrell into marrying you when you couldn’t get Jack?”

“You’ve got it all wrong.”

“What part have I got wrong?”

“Mark knew I was pregnant, and he knew who my baby’s father was,” Cathy said. “We were not in love, but eventually we grew to love each other. And your father…Mark loved you as if you were his own.”

“But I wasn’t his, was I? I was—I am Jackson Perdue’s bastard!”

Dear God, her worst nightmare was coming true right before her very eyes and there wasn’t anything she could do to stop it from happening. The best she could hope for was that Seth would give her a chance to explain everything. But even then, was he mature enough to understand and to forgive her?

“I loved Jack. And he loved me.” Cathy tried to keep her voice calm, despite the fact that her emotions were screaming. “You were conceived in that love.”

“Why the hell didn’t you just get an abortion instead of—?”

“Never suggest such a thing. Not once did the thought ever cross my mind. I loved and wanted you from the moment I knew I was pregnant. You were my baby. A part of Jack and me.”

“Does he know?”

Cathy took a moment to steady her nerves before replying. “Yes, Jack knows.”

“How long has he known? Did he know back then, before you married someone else?”

“No, he didn’t know back then. I didn’t tell him.”
How could I have told him when he was missing in action half a world away and presumed dead?
“I—I told him last night. I realized that it was way past time for me to be honest with him…and with you. I intended to tell you, too, as soon as—”

“How’d he take the news that he has an almost-sixteen-year-old kid?”

Cathy froze. What was the best way to respond to his question?

Seth laughed, the sound a harsh, sarcastic chuckle. “Don’t bother answering. The look on your face says it all.”

“No, Seth, you don’t understand.”

“I hate you. You don’t know how much I hate you. I hate you, and I hate Jack. Damn you both!”

He turned and stomped toward the door. When she followed him and grabbed his arm, he shook her off, opened the door and rushed out onto the porch. She tried to catch up with him, but he ran off down the street, his long legs flying at a speed she couldn’t equal. She called his name several times, then stood there in the middle of the road and watched him disappear.

Cathy wrapped her arms around her waist. She couldn’t move, could barely breathe. She had to find Seth and talk to him. She had to make him understand.

But would he listen to her? Probably not.

First she needed to tell Jack what happened, even if it meant barging in on him at work. She had no choice.

Of all the public-service assignments she was forced to do to repay her debt to society, Felicity found only one of any real interest to her. Her position at the animal shelter would last two weeks, and today had been the first day of her second week. She had become fond of several dogs, one in particular, a mutt she had nicknamed Freckles because the pup had small black spots all over his white face and neck. Because her grandmother disliked animals in general and dogs in particular, she and Charity had never been allowed to own a pet. But now that she was older and could care for a dog all by herself, surely she could talk her dad into letting her adopt Freckles.

She had called her mom and told her not to pick her up at noon when her morning shift at the shelter ended.

“I want to have lunch with Dad,” Felicity had said. “It’s only five blocks from here to the church. I can walk there in no time.”

Preoccupied with Missy, her mother had easily agreed to her request. Mom had her hands full with Missy’s problems, the latest of which was her being questioned in yet another murder case. To say that her mom had been neglecting the rest of them ever since Missy had become a member of their family was an understatement. Missy had been a nuisance for quite some time, ever since Felicity realized that Seth Cantrell had a thing for her. Seth was blinded by Missy’s blond beauty and her damsel-in-distress persona. Now the whole world felt sorry for Missy. Yeah, okay, even she did, at least to a certain extent. Imagine being repeatedly raped by your own father. Yuck!

Felicity arrived at the church at twelve-fifteen, quickly made her way downstairs and hurried toward her father’s office in the basement. Her footsteps were muffled by the cushioned layer of industrial-strength carpet that covered the basement floor. The outer door to the minister’s office stood wide open, so Felicity walked in, expecting to see Erin McKinley at her desk. But the outer office was empty.

As she opened the door to her father’s private office, she started to knock but stopped dead still when she saw Erin and her father kissing. Erin had her arms around Felicity’s father’s neck, and he was gripping her on either side of her waist.

Shocked beyond belief, Felicity backed up slowly, quietly turned around and ran into the hallway. She was halfway up the stairs when she heard her father calling her name.

He had nothing to say that she wanted to hear.

Her father was an adulterous blasphemer.

Just how long had he been having an affair with his secretary?

Oh, mercy! Her poor, sweet mother!

“Let her go, John Earl.” Erin came up and grasped his arm. “Maybe it was for the best. Better that she know now, that everyone knows.”

John Earl glared at his secretary, a woman he had thought of as a loyal employee and a good friend. He’d never thought of her as anything more and had had no idea she harbored any romantic feelings for him. Not until today. Not until a few minutes ago, when she had kissed him.

They had been talking, just talking. He’d been using her as a sounding board for his concerns about the situation with Missy. Erin had been consoling him, agreeing with him that perhaps Ruth Ann’s kind heart had led her to take on Missy as a charity case while neglecting her own two daughters, at least temporarily.

“Ruth Ann is a good woman, but she isn’t perfect. And she doesn’t love you the way I do. I’d never put anyone else’s needs before yours,” Erin had told him. “You would always come first with me.”

That’s when she had thrown her arms around his neck, told him again that she loved him madly and then kissed him. Thrown off guard by her actions, it had taken him a few seconds to respond by grabbing her waist and pushing her away. Unfortunately, Felicity had walked in and seen Erin kissing him and had jumped to the wrong conclusion.

John Earl grasped Erin’s shoulders and looked directly at her. “Erin, I’m sorry if I’ve ever done anything to lead you on, to make you believe that I reciprocated your feelings.”

She stared at him, her eyes wide and filled with disbelief. “But I love you. I’ve loved you forever. I know that if you’ll only admit it to yourself, you love me, too.”

He gave her shoulders a sound squeeze, then released her. “I believe it best if you go home for the rest of the day. Tomorrow, we’ll discuss how best to handle your resignation.”

“You’re firing me?”

“No, no,” John Earl assured her. “But under the circumstances…I’ll give you an excellent reference and help you find other employment. Now, please, Erin, go home. I need to call Ruth Ann and tell her what happened, and then I need to find my daughter and explain to her that what she thought she saw—”

Erin slapped him, then spun around and marched back into the office. He had to admit that he hadn’t seen that slap coming any more than he had the kiss.

Half a minute later, with her leather bag hung over her shoulder, Erin swept past him without a glance. He returned to his office, picked up the phone and called his wife. He had to put a lid on this before it exploded in his face and his entire family got hurt.

“Jack?” Officer Grimes stuck his head in the door of Mike’s office, where the task force was sharing a working lunch, barbeque from Big Ed’s Barbeque & Ribs. “That Cantrell kid is back. He wants to talk to you.”

“Seth Cantrell?”

“Yep. And from the way he’s acting, I’d say if you don’t come out and talk to him, I’ll have to handcuff him to stop him from coming in here.”

Jack glanced around the room. “Will you folks excuse me?” He looked at Mike and nodded toward the door. When he headed out, Mike followed him. They paused just beyond the open door.

“I need to take half an hour,” Jack said. “It’s personal.”

“Problems with Cathy’s son?”

“Yeah, something like that.”

“Can’t it wait?”

“I don’t think so,” Jack told him. “Otherwise, I wouldn’t ask for the time.”

“Okay. Go do whatever you need to do.”

Jack thanked his old buddy and then scanned the outer office for Seth. He saw him across the room, about ten feet away. The boy looked like hammered hell.

When he approached, Seth squared his shoulders and looked Jack right in the eye. In that instant, Jack realized that Seth knew the truth.

“Let’s get out of here,” Jack said. “I’ve got a thirty-minute lunch break. We can take a walk and talk.”

Seth nodded.

They walked in silence as they exited the sheriff’s department and crossed the street. When they reached the small park in the center of town, a block away, Jack pointed to a wooden park bench. “Let’s sit.”

They sat, one on each end of the bench.

“Let’s hear it,” Jack said.

“I know.”