Whispers at Midnight (53 page)

The next one, from later that same night, read:
Don’t worry, I’ve kept my mouth shut all these years
and
I’ll keep it shut till I die. But it’s going to cost you. Say—a million dollars.

And a third one from that night:
See, you do remember. So do I. Everything. Genny was my friend.

“Jesus. She was trying to blackmail him.”

There were more in that same vein. Matt read them with grim triumph. Everything he had suspected was true. Then he looked at the e-mail address they were sent to. It told him approximately nothing that was of any use at all in the real world. “Who? Who is it? Who?”

Somebody who could afford to pay out a million dollars. Hell, that let out everybody he knew.

“Silverado42,” Antonio mused. “Sounds like an older guy. See, his birthday could be 1942 and he could have silver—gray—hair.”

“Or he could have a Ford Silverado, like my husband,” Doris said. Then she looked horrified at what that implied. “Oh, mercy, Matt, you know it isn’t him.”

Matt, who was pretty sure that Doris’s scrawny husband could be safely crossed off the list, said, “Don’t worry, Doris, I think Frank’s in the clear,” then looked at Andy.

“Any kind of electronic trick you can pull to find out who this guy is?”

“ ’Fraid not. We’ll have to go through AOL again,” Andy said. “You want to see his replies?”

Matt felt like kissing the kid. “Yes. Yes, I do.”

The first one read,
Who are you? What are you talking about?

Then,
Is this Marsha? Or Soraya? Or Carly?

Then,
Marsha? I know it’s you.

Talk about setting yourself up to be murdered. Marsha had tried to blackmail the kind of man who preyed on helpless little girls. The man who had killed one of them. He’d come after her to shut her up—and then he’d come after Carly, too. And almost certainly Soraya as well.

So far, they hadn’t been able to find Soraya, although they were checking all known addresses and trying to run down people who had known her. Matt had a feeling they might well be looking for her corpse, too. If so, then out of four little girls who had just happened to have the bad luck to get sick at a particular time while in the county’s protective care, three were now dead. Carly, his Carly, was the lone survivor.

At the thought, Matt’s blood ran cold.

“This is our guy. Find out who he is. Get on the phone to AOL right now, and tell them it’s a police emergency or whatever you have to do.” He looked at Antonio. “Like I told you, it’s the Home. Carly remembered what happened there.” He would go into the details later, when Andy and Doris weren’t listening. There was no point in broadcasting every little detail of Carly’s personal business to anyone who didn’t need to know. “The name she came up with was the Donkeyman. Could be a name, or some kind of kids’ variation thereof, could be something about the way he looked, could be somebody who took care of a donkey they had on the premises at the time. I want you to go over the Home’s records one more time for anybody who might have been called that by four scared little girls.”

Antonio nodded. “Will do.”

When Matt left the office about an hour later to head for the Beadle Mansion, he noticed that the quality of light was different. There was a cool hint of silver beneath all that brilliant gold. The sun still shone, it was still hotter than Hades, but there was a kind of stillness in the air, an edge of portentousness.

Portentousness, indeed, he thought, glancing up. Black clouds were gathering on the horizon.

For the first time in more than a month, it looked like it was going to rain.

38

M
ATT ALMOST MISSED
the wedding rehearsal. At Erin’s urging, Carly, as Matt’s date, had gone on to the church with Erin, Lissa, and Dani—and Mike, of course—and was sitting in a back pew when Matt rushed in about fifteen minutes late. Craig was there, having shown up a few minutes before to escort Dani to the rehearsal dinner afterward. Shelby was standing near the front, looking elegant in a black satin suit that made Carly glad she had gone for its polar opposite, a flame red sleeveless dress with a flounce around the hem. Its modest cut was belied by the curve-hugging properties of the silky knit.

All right, elegant was beyond her. But she could still (she hoped) look good. She had put the morning’s horrors firmly behind her, resolving not to rain on Erin’s parade by sharing them with anyone or even thinking of them again if she could help it. Accordingly, she’d lent a hand to some last minute details that Erin had requested her help with, chatted with Sandra (who had returned from Antonio’s aglow, and would, along with Antonio, be joining them at the restaurant for dinner), admired Lissa’s bridesmaid’s dress and in general kept busy until it was time to go upstairs and dress. By the time they left for the church it was almost as though the morning had never happened.

At Matt’s entrance the entire wedding party, which was standing in front of Reverend Musselman as he went over the ceremony with them, turned to look at him. He was wearing a charcoal suit that looked fantastic on his tall athletic frame, and when she saw him walk in Carly caught her breath. His eyes sought her out, and he grinned at her before looking toward the others. Besides Erin, in pistachio silk, Dani and Lissa stood in front of the altar too, both in pastels, along with two of Erin’s friends and a little girl belonging to one of them who was the flower girl. They were grouped behind Erin, while Collin stood beside his prospective bride holding her hand with four of his friends and his little nephew, as ring bearer, behind him. As an emergency stopgap, Mike had been filling in for Matt, walking Erin down the aisle in time to the organist enthusiastically playing “Here Comes the Bride” and passing her hand to Collin with so much barely concealed ill-will that Carly had been watching with the kind of horrified fascination usually reserved for train wrecks.

“About time,” Erin called to Matt accusingly.

“Sorry. I got tied up.” He tweaked Carly’s hair in passing—the man was a master at the romantic gesture—as he strode up the aisle.

“Where’s Andy?” Lissa glared at him, clearly blaming him for the absence of her date.

“He’s doing something for me. He’ll be at the restaurant, don’t worry.”

To Carly’s relief, as Matt took his place beside Erin, Mike retreated to sit beside her.

“You’re scowling,” Carly informed him in a whisper.

“I feel like punching him in the nose.”

Carly had no doubt that Mike was referring to Collin. “It’s her choice.”

The look on Mike’s face told her his opinion of that.

“The wedding’s day after tomorrow,” she reminded him, still whispering.

“Yeah, I know. What do you suppose her reaction would be if I stood up at the place where they ask for objections and say I have one?”

“I hope that’s a joke.”

“Not cool, huh?” He sounded glum.

Carly shook her head, picturing the scene that would result. “If you’ve got an objection, I suggest you put it to Erin before she starts walking down the aisle. Way before. Like, today would be good.”

“She knows I have an objection.” There was so much dejection in his voice that Carly patted his leg. He gave her a rather wan smile. “I’m glad things worked out for you with Matt, anyway.”

“Me too. Listen, Erin can’t be totally indifferent to you. She was in the kitchen with you last night.”

“Yeah,” Mike said gloomily. “We ate roast beef sandwiches.”

He sounded so disgusted that Carly giggled. She couldn’t help it. He shot her an unamused look.

To her surprise, when the adults’ part of the rehearsal was over (the flower girl and ring bearer were being put through their paces a few more times under the watchful eyes of their mothers and Reverend Musselman), Matt pulled her into the vestibule, which was a small and intimate space paneled in beautifully aged dark wood that rose to the ceiling. Light filtering through a pair of stained glass windows on either side of the doors spilled rainbows over the hardwood floor, and discreetly recessed doors on either side led to small retiring rooms used by brides and their attendants for last-minute primping and to await their cues, and rest rooms.

Once he had her alone, Matt brought up the subject of his deputy.

“So what’s the deal with you and Mike?” he asked.

To say that caught her by surprise was an understatement. Carly looked at him—it wasn’t quite as far as usual because she was wearing extremely high heels—and was amazed by something she saw in his eyes.

“You
are
jealous,” she said, and at the idea of Matt—gorgeous Matt, whom she had loved all her life and who definitely knew how to put the thrill in thrilling—being jealous of Mike the Stolid, she chuckled. “That’s hilarious.”

The look he gave her told her that he didn’t think so.

“There’s something up with him. He’s always hanging around the house even after he’s done working, he’s weird with me lately—and then he sits beside you and you two whisper and you giggle and pat
his leg. I
know
you’re not interested in him, but … is he coming on to you? Are you somehow encouraging him? Tell me I’m imagining this.”

“I love you being jealous.” She grinned hugely at him and curled her hands around his lapels and, after a glance around to make sure they weren’t being observed, rose up on tiptoe to press a quick kiss to his mouth. “You’re cute when you’re jealous. Actually, you’re just cute anyway.”

“You’re better than cute. You’re beautiful. And you’re mine.” He slid his hands around her upper arms and pulled her against him. His lips curved in the slightest of rueful smiles as he looked down at her. “Okay, so I’m jealous. A little. Not much. So go ahead and laugh. You’ll pay for it when I get you in bed tonight.”

“Now you’re scaring me.” She made big eyes at him. What he was actually doing was exciting her madly. If he was going to make her pay in bed, she could hardly wait. “Just for the record though, Mike isn’t after me. He’s after your sister.”

“What?” Matt looked startled. “Which one?”

Carly shook her head at him. “I cannot believe you have missed this: Erin.”

“She’s getting married on Saturday.” Sounding dumbfounded, he looked back inside the sanctuary to discover the others coming toward them en masse. “Does she know?”

“I think so,” Carly said dryly, freeing her arms and stepping back from him because this was, after all, a church. “How do you think I was able to talk Mike into taking me out that night? He wanted to make Erin jealous. No way in the world he would have done it otherwise.”

“Jesus.” Matt looked back at her and shook his head. “I don’t believe this. Women. You think Erin’s interested in him back?”

Before Carly could reply, they were surrounded by people. Everyone except the still-rehearsing children crowded into the vestibule, talking at once, then spilled out onto the sidewalk and parking lot. It was only about nine-thirty, which ordinarily in July meant that the sun was a little less hot than at noon, but was still bright. This
evening, though, for the first time in weeks the sky was clouded over. There was a heaviness to the air that warned of coming rain.

Life was like that. Take a shower and the phone rings. Plan a wedding and it rains.

While they waited for the children to finish, the rest of them stood around talking. Matt had his hand curved negligently around Carly’s arm just above her elbow as they stood with Dani and Craig and two of Collin’s groomsmen and their dates. All of a sudden Carly had the sensation that she was being watched. Startled, feeling as though a cold trickle of water had suddenly run down her spine, she glanced around—and met Shelby’s gaze.

Shelby was far better than the alternative. For a moment it had almost felt like the monster’s eyes had been on her again.

But they weren’t, of course. Not here at the church, when Matt was with her and it was still full daylight and she was positively surrounded by people. She was still feeling a little vulnerable from her experience of the morning—which she absolutely, positively, was not going to think about. If she did, she would get upset, and Matt would know, and he would get upset and take her home, and Erin’s rehearsal dinner would be spoiled.

She was going to think about anything else instead. Even Shelby.

The other woman was definitely attractive. Cool and a little haughty in that fitted black suit. And, dammit, elegant.

Three things Carly knew she would never be.

Knowing that Shelby had slept with Matt bothered her a little, but then, Carly reflected, Matt’s ex-girlfriends were practically legion. If she was going to let herself get bent out of shape every time she ran into one, she was going to spend a lot of time feeling like a pretzel.

And Matt
had
slept with Shelby, then panicked when Shelby started letting him see that she thought their relationship was getting serious and done his kiss-and-run thing and left her high and dry. If Shelby was upset over that, Carly couldn’t really blame her. She hadn’t been a happy camper herself when Matt had pulled that same stunt on her.