Whispers at Midnight (54 page)

She wasn’t going to be a happy camper if he did it again.

A profession of love and a lot of great sex didn’t add up to forever. Even that growled
You’re mine
that had made her heart go pitter-pat didn’t equal forever. She could deny it all she wanted, to him and herself, but forever with Matt was what she was hoping for. No, it was what she was praying for.

But Matt was clearly perfectly happy with great sex, no strings. As far as she was concerned, though, the problem with that was, once the great sex burned itself out, what they were left with was no strings.

If he opted out then, her heart was going to break.

He’d made no promises to her either, and she’d be wise to remember that. She could very easily find herself in Shelby’s shoes one day.

With that in mind, Carly pulled her arm free of Matt’s hold, murmured a polite “excuse me” to the others and went over to speak to Shelby, who was standing with her brother and Erin just outside the church’s arched doors.

“The wedding’s going to be beautiful,” she said to Erin. Then she smiled at Shelby. “Erin said you basically planned it. You’ve done a great job.”

“Thank you,” Shelby said. Her gaze ran over Carly. “It’s been fun. A lot of work, but fun.”

“You know, you two might be able to do some business together,” Erin said, clearly hoping to help ease an awkward situation. “Shelby’s a realtor. Carly’s opening a bed-and-breakfast.” She looked at Shelby. “If you have people come to town looking for a house, you could probably arrange to have them stay at Carly’s place.”

“That’s an idea,” Shelby said, and smiled at Carly.

Matt came toward them, talking on his cell phone, bringing Mike with him. He closed the phone as he reached them and put it into his pocket.

“Hey, Shelby. Collin.” He nodded at them by way of greeting, then looked at Carly.

“Something’s come up,” he said, and glanced at Erin. “I’ve got to go in to the office for a while. I won’t be any longer than I can help.”

“You’re always working,” Erin said in disgust.

“The better to pay for your wedding, sweetie,” Matt said, and glanced at Shelby. “I dropped that check off by your office, by the way.”

“The one for the photographer? Thank you.”

Matt’s gaze shifted to Carly, and his eyes softened fractionally on her face. “I’ll meet you at the restaurant. Mike’s back on duty. Good thing he didn’t leave, isn’t it?”

There was the faintest hint of dryness to that. Carly realized that discovering that Mike’s apparent lovesickness was directed at his sister rather than herself didn’t really please Matt either.

Could anyone say overprotective? She loved that about him, but he did sometimes carry it to extremes.

“I won’t be longer than an hour, tops,” Matt promised, then tugged one of Carly’s curls in an affectionate gesture and departed.

Watching him reverse his cruiser out of the parking lot, Carly reflected that she’d rather have Matt’s hair tugs than any other man’s kisses.

In other words, she had it bad.

“Could I talk to you for just a minute? In private?” Shelby asked in a lowered tone. While Carly had been watching Matt leave, Collin had moved off to say something to one of his groomsmen. Mike had taken advantage of the opportunity to talk to Erin. They were standing right there next to Carly and Shelby, but Mike had angled his body in such a way that he and Erin were able to talk more or less privately.

“Sure,” Carly said. Shelby pushed open the church door and stepped back inside the vestibule. With it open, Carly could clearly hear the strains of the wedding march. Those poor children must be trudging up the aisle one more time. She touched Mike’s arm, and he glanced at her. “I’m just going right here with Shelby.” She indicated the vestibule.

“Okay. Yell if you need me.”

Shelby was standing just inside the door. Carly glanced past her to see, at the front of the church, Reverend Musselman bent over talking to the children. The children’s mothers stood nearby, while the organist sat at her instrument with her fingers resting on the keys.

“Matt’s crazy about you, isn’t he?” Shelby said as Carly joined her. “It’s so easy to see.”

Carly looked at her rather cautiously. “We’ve been friends practically our whole lives.”

Shelby snorted. Such a homely sound from such an elegant woman was a surprise. “I just wish he’d been friends like that with me.”

“I’m sorry your relationship ended badly.”

“I am too. He’s by far the best catch in town, and I won’t hide that I wish I could have reeled him in. But you’ve clearly got him. Which brings me to what I wanted to tell you: As far as I’m concerned, he’s strictly off-limits now. I won’t be going after him anymore.” Shelby smiled, and Carly found herself almost liking her for the first time in her life. “Unless and until you break up, that is. Then I might.”

“Then
you’re welcome,” Carly said, and smiled back.

“I wasn’t very nice to you in high school, was I?” Shelby grimaced. “I’m sorry.”

“That’s okay. That was then, this is now, and we’ve both grown up.”

“Well,” Shelby said as the organist started to play again. “Now that I’ve said my piece, I think I’ll just nip into the rest room.”

She smiled and did, and Carly turned to go back outside. As her hand curled around the heavy brass door handle the wedding march filled the church. Reverend Musselman beat time in the air as the children lockstepped up the aisle.

“Carly.”

Carly turned inquiringly at the sound of her name. There was a man behind her. He’d just stepped out of the door on the other side of the vestibule from the one Shelby had disappeared through. The men’s side, Carly realized. He moved toward her, smiling, neatly dressed in khakis and a navy sport shirt. She smiled instinctively. She was still smiling when he grabbed her arm and clamped a chloroform-soaked rag over her face.

39

“Y
OU
’
RE NOT GOING
to believe this,” Andy said as Matt strode into the sheriff’s office. Antonio was still there—or he was back, rather, because he’d headed for the Home at the same time that Matt had left for the Beadle Mansion earlier. “I think this guy won the lottery.”

“What?” Matt glanced in surprise at Antonio.

“Not me,” Antonio said. “I wish. Him.” He pointed at the computer. “Nice threads, by the way.”

“Who?” Matt asked, ignoring that last. He moved to stand behind Andy and looked down at the screen.

“Silverado42. Look at this. It’s an e-mail to Marsha from Jeanini8.”

The message on the screen said:
Ohmigod, you’ll never guess who won the lottery. That guy, you know—that creep from when you were a kid. You know, the one who comes into the grocery in Macon where my sister works.

Matt looked at the date: approximately two weeks before Marsha disappeared.

“Now look at Marsha’s reply.” Andy clicked the mouse, and another message popped up.

You mean DingDong the Donkeyman? Get outta here!

Matt started to feel a bubble of excitement.

“Here’s Jeanini8 again.” Another click.

It’s true. I swear to God. He won LottoSouth—24 million!!!!

“Back to Marsha.” Click.

How do you know?

“And Jeanini8.” Click.

You know he’s been living in Macon forever, and he’s been coming into the grocery where she works every week. He’s been playing the same numbers for the last five years. My sister knows them by heart. He hasn’t come forward to claim his prize yet, but the store gets 100 grand for selling the winning ticket and they’re going to give my sister a bonus because she’s the one who sold it.

“And Marsha.”

Do you happen to know his e-mail address?

“And Jeanini8.”

I got it from my sister, who got it from the frequent shopper card he filled out. Here it is: [email protected]. What, do you want to say congratulations?

“And Marsha.”

Something like that.

“And Jeanini8.”

You’re bad. By the way, don’t tell anybody I told you. The store told my sister not to say anything until he comes forward because of his privacy or something. I don’t want her to get in trouble.

“And Marsha again.”

Don’t worry, I won’t tell.

“That’s basically it for the important stuff,” Andy said.

“Jesus Christ.” Matt’s hands tightened on the back of the chair—his chair—that Andy was sitting in. “There it is right there. The whole thing. I was wondering why Marsha decided to start blackmailing him now, after leaving him alone all these years. The bastard won the lottery. Once Marsha started blackmailing him, he must have been afraid they all would. So he decided to eliminate the problem.”

“Can you believe that?” Antonio said with disgust. “I play that damned thing every week and I’ve never won so much as a dollar.”

“So we’ve basically got it all figured out,” Matt said, ignoring Antonio
in favor of turning various bits and pieces of information over in his head. “The only thing we still don’t know is who the bastard is. Any luck getting the name out of AOL?”

“Not yet,” Andy said. “I’m working on it, though. But I think I may have found a quicker way. I found Jeanini8’s phone number. She e-mailed Marsha her new one.”

“Shit,” Matt said as Andy handed him a piece of paper with a phone number on it. “You are shitting me.” He looked at Andy. “Anytime you want to marry my sister, just let me know. She’s yours.”

Andy looked alarmed. “Well, uh—”

“Or not.” Matt grinned at him, recognizing a fellow commitment-phobe, even if the kid was just barely old enough to shave.

“Want me to call?” Antonio reached for the phone.

Matt shook his head. “I will.”

This was one call he really wanted to make. Jeanini8, whoever she was, knew who the bastard was. As soon as he got the name, the perp was going down. Not even Erin’s party was going to stand in his way.

The phone started to ring. Antonio, who was closer, answered it. After the initial, crisp, “Sheriff’s Department,” he just listened for a minute, a look of growing horror on his face.

“Oh, crap. Oh, no. Oh, man. Hold on.” Antonio’s face was gray by the time he put a hand over the mouthpiece and looked at Matt.

Matt was already rigid with alarm. He knew Antonio, had known him for years. He’d never seen that particular look on his face.

“What?” he demanded.

“Carly’s disappeared. From the church. She went back inside to talk to Shelby and Shelby went to the bathroom and Carly vanished. They’ve looked all over. Mike’s shitting bricks.”

Matt’s blood turned to ice. He felt as if all his internal organs had suddenly seized up. For a minute he went all light-headed and had to put a hand down on his desk to steady himself. He knew what had happened, knew it as well as if he’d been an eyewitness: the bastard had grabbed Carly.

At the thought of what he might be doing to her right that very minute, Matt broke into a cold sweat.

“Fuck,” he said. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.” It was more prayer than curse.

Then he got a grip and looked at Antonio.

“Get some roadblocks set up,” he said hoarsely. “Call the state police. I want men, I want helicopters, I want infrared equipment. And I want Billy Tynan’s dogs over at that church pronto. Tell him I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

Then he picked up the phone and punched in the number for Jeanini8.

40

“H
ELLO,
C
ARLY.”
He was leaning over her, whispering almost tenderly. Carly blinked, staring up at him. He was all blurry. She felt woozy, dizzy, sick at her stomach. Where was she?

“What happened?” she started to say, only to find she couldn’t. There was something over her mouth. Something preventing her from speaking, from opening it, from drawing air in through it. She moved her head from side to side. Something, carpet, cheap, scratchy nylon carpet, abraded her cheek. She was lying all curled up on carpet. Whatever was over her mouth stayed in place. She managed to get her tongue between her smashed-together lips. Slightly bitter, sticky, plastic—duct tape. At the realization her eyes widened. Slowly his face came into focus.