The Lion, the Lamb, the Hunted: A Psychological Thriller (19 page)

“Then what?”

I fell silent.

“You know, Pat, we
are
both on the same side here, just in case you didn’t realize it. And if you’re worried about me trying to steal your story
or
your thunder, you’ve got the wrong gal, ‘cause I just don’t roll that way. Not that I expect you to believe that. You barely know me, but—”

“So what’s your point, CJ?”

“My point is that we both have the same interests here. That’s all. We’re after the same thing. It’s our job to find the truth. Everything else is secondary, at least from where I stand.”

I remained silent.

“Listen, Pat,” she said, her voice taking on a tone of diplomacy, “if you’ve stumbled across something important—and I get the feeling you have—I want to hear about it. But even if you’re still looking, I think I can help you there, too.”

“What makes you think I need any help?”

“That wasn’t what I meant.” She closed her eyes, smiled, shook her head. “All I’m saying is it’s pretty obvious you’ve been hitting some walls, and that’s not likely to change. Nobody here wants to talk to strangers about the Kingsley case. I told you that. It’s just the way it is. Me on the other hand, I’m from around here. I know the place, know the people, and I know a lot about this story…and people
will
talk to me.”

“I’m sure that’s true, but—”

“I wasn’t finished. I can help you cut through a lot of the crap around here. Why should we spin our wheels separately when we can cover twice the ground, twice as fast? Know what I mean?”

I thought about it some more.

“So what do you say, Pat?” She leaned forward, a slight grin. “Team player or free agent? Which do you want to be?”

I wrestled against my thoughts. CJ was right, there was no love for me here. Baker, Lindsay, and the creepy messages at the hotel had all made that painfully obvious. Then I thought about Dennis Kingsley. The moment I mentioned CJ’s name his whole attitude changed, and the wall between us fell. Suddenly, he trusted me and opened up.

But could I trust
her
? I wanted to, but trust and me, well, we’re not the best of friends. There were those old demons…I was used to working by myself. I was used to
being
by myself. It was lonely, but it was familiar. And safe.

“Hello? Still with me there, Pat?”

I brought my focus back to her. “Yeah, I’m here.”

“How we doing on that decision? Make any progress yet?”

Take the leap, Patrick. For once in your life, stop being afraid of everyone, and just do it.

I looked into her eyes for a moment longer, studying her eager expression. “Okay. But I need to know something, first.”

“Name it.”

“Are you willing to throw out everything you believed to be true about this case? To entertain new possibilities? Ones you never thought existed?”

She shrugged one shoulder. “Of course.”

“Okay,” I said, and took a breath
. “
I’ve found some things that could potentially blow the case wide open.”

She leaned forward with her elbows on the table. “Hit me.”

“I don’t think Lucas kidnapped and murdered Nathan Kingsley.”

Her expression fell, her jaw, too. “What the…are you serious?”

“I think he was wrongly convicted and sent to the electric chair, needlessly.”

CJ fell back in her seat and stared at me for a good five seconds, and then, “That’s crazy…where the hell are you getting this?”

“I assure you I’m not just throwing out theories with nothing to back them up. Since I got to town I’ve interviewed people extensively, read through scores of records, gathered quite a bit of information, and my gut tells me they got the wrong guy.”

“What kind of information?”

I pulled out a copy of Lucas’s alibi note from my pocket and slid it across the table, keeping my eyes on her.

She reached for it, held my gaze for a moment, then read it. The farther down she got, the wider her eyes grew. When she was done, she let it drop onto the table and stared at it. Then she looked back up at me. “Where did you get this?”

“From Nissie Lambert. Lucas’s sister.”
I told her the story, watching her face become stricken as I described Ronald Lucas’s choice to protect his daughter instead of himself. Then after I finished, said, “And that’s not all. I also think Jean Kingsley was murdered.”

“She committed suicide.”

“I don’t think so.”

“But she hanged—”

“Staged,” I said. “Made to look that way.”

“You’ve got to be kidding…”

“I’m not.”

“But why? And by whom?”

“Remember that name I asked you about? Michael Samuels?”

She nodded.

“I came across something interesting—and disturbing—while going through the visitation logs at Glenview. There was a guy lurking around the place while Jean was a patient. Signed in under that name claiming to be her nephew. Jean didn’t have a nephew, and the D.L. number Samuels left in the guest log comes up as a fake.”

“And you think he killed her?”

“The hospital records put him there, and so does an employee statement.”

“Who? And what did they say?”

“Can’t say who. I promised confidentiality.” Then I told her about the stained gown, how it got dumped, and about the missing guest log from the night Jean died.

“But you have no idea who Samuels is…or even why he did it?”

“That’s the part I can’t figure out.”

“What about Nathan? Do you think this Samuels guy also killed him?”

I let in some air, blew it out quickly. “There’s a chance.”

“Wow,” she said, now staring vacantly across the restaurant. “Just wow.”

“I know.”

She looked back at me. “But why would he have wanted them both dead?”

“Good question. I don’t know.”

“And how did Lucas get drawn into all this?”

“I think he was a pawn.”

“But whose?”

“Can’t figure that one out, either. But if I had to guess…someone with an awful lot of power. Someone with the ability to manipulate the system.”

I had an idea who that might be.

Chapter Thirty-One

The rest of dinner was very quiet.

CJ appeared deep in thought, probably trying to make sense of what I’d just told her, and by the look on her face, without much luck. For me, the reality of my mother’s and Warren’s involvement was setting in.

I drove CJ to the
Observer
to pick up her car. For a long while neither of us spoke. Finally she shifted in the seat so her whole body faced me and said, “I don’t know what I’m going to do if it turns out Lucas was innocent. I don’t know if I can deal with that.”

I kept my eyes on the road and nodded, not knowing what to say. There wasn’t an easy answer.

“Even if we clear his name,” she continued, “it doesn’t seem like that would be enough. It would be way too little,
way too late. He’s dead.”

“If we find the person who really killed Nathan, it’ll make a difference.”

She answered with silence, staring out her window, slowly shaking her head.

It was quite a change from the salty reporter I’d come to know, the one who just earlier had been trying to corner me. CJ Norris may have had a tough exterior, but I was discovering that the inside was very different. For the first time, she seemed vulnerable and uncertain. I thought about the contrast, the complexity, wondering why I found it so appealing. Was I attracted to her? Of course, but I had a rule I’d never broken and didn’t intend to now: I don’t date other reporters. Ever. I have a hard enough time holding on to women with normal lives; being with one of my own would only complicate matters to the nth degree. And with CJ, our strong personalities together would be like adding gasoline to a fire.

CJ screamed.

I turned to her and saw a large SUV outside the window just before it rammed us hard, sending us careening onto the shoulder. I overcorrected, tried to aim the car back toward the asphalt, but the SUV rammed us again, this time from behind. The impact threw the car forward and jerked us like a pair of floppy rag dolls.

u spy now u die

The words flashed through my mind like a grenade explosion.

The SUV punched into us from behind, this time harder. I could feel the sweat dripping down my forehead and my pulse banging through my body. There seemed to be no escape as our car—and our lives—went out of control.

I checked the rearview mirror and caught a glimpse of them coming up on us again, fast. They moved alongside us, just enough to nudge the side of the car with their front bumper. I fought for control of the wheel as they started to force us off the road again. Beyond it was a drop. We were riding the shoulder now, loose gravel flying up against the car’s undercarriage, the SUV now right alongside us, preventing us from getting back onto the road. I wondered how much longer until we went over the edge.

And then with a final burst of power, the SUV sent us right off.

Our car went down diagonally across the steep embankment. All I could do was hang onto the wheel and try to keep us at an angle rather than heading nose-first straight down the slope.

We finally hit the bottom, crashing into a dense group of scrub brush that brought us to a stop. My hands were clenched so tightly on the steering wheel that they had cramped closed.

Complete silence.

I wasn’t sure if I’d been hurt, felt no pain, but knew the power of shock, how it can have a numbing effect. I’d just narrowly escaped a bleeding crisis with the dog, now I was facing yet another.

Bleeding
.
Was I?

Just the thought was enough to renew my panic. As soon as my hands relaxed, I felt around my body, furiously patting my clothes like a man who’d lost a wallet full of hundreds.

mending mending mending…

The words repeated in my head as I kept checking for blood.

And then, relief: pants, shirt, head, neck, and arms all dry. I leaned back, closed my eyes, and took a deep breath; it felt like the first one since this whole thing had started.

But that relief had a very short shelf life. Panic returned when I glanced over at CJ: head back, mouth wide open, unconscious. Blood spilled down the side of her head.

“CJ!” I yelled, then leaned over and grabbed her shoulder. “Can you hear me? CJ?”

No response.

I fumbled in my pocket for my cell phone to call for help.

And noticed the single drop of blood on the seat between my legs.

Chapter Thirty-Two