Chapter Twenty-five
EDEN waited as long as she could stand to. She heard no sounds, not even animals. Nothing slithered or scurried. After what seemed like hours but was probably only minutes, she heard the sound of a car being started. Whose car? she wondered. And where was it going?
And what about Stuart? Who had he been telling to drop his gun? The scary Mr. Jolly?
As quietly as she could, Eden left the relative safety of the trees and made her way back to the icehouse. Silently, she went inside. It was dark, so she had to feel her way around. She nearly slipped on a puddle of blood from Brad’s leg, but no one was in the icehouse.
She went outside and stood still, listening, but she heard nothing. She took two steps and tripped over a body. Cautiously, wishing she had a light, she bent down to the body. When it groaned, she reached into her pocket and pulled out the gun Jared had given her. She’d heard of safety catches. Was there one on this gun? If there was, was it on or off?
The person on the ground groaned again, and she recognized the voice. “Stuart? It’s me, Eden.” She put the gun back in her pocket and bent down to her son-in-law. “Are you all right?”
“My head hurts. Someone hit me. Where’s Missy?”
“Melissa is—” Eden said pointedly, then made herself stop. She’d always hated that nickname. “I don’t know where anyone is or what they’re doing. I heard you tell a man to stick his hands up. Who was he?”
“I don’t know. He’d been shot in the leg.”
“Oh,” Eden said flatly. “That was Brad. I was hoping—”
“That I’d rescue everyone and be a hero?” Stuart asked sarcastically. “Wouldn’t that foil your plans of getting my wife and child to leave me and live with you?”
“I don’t want them to live with me,” Eden said as she took his arm and pulled him upright.
“That’s what you’ve always wanted. You’ve done everything you can to make Missy think that I’m incompetent and that I can’t support my own family. You’ve—”
“Stuart, do you think it’s possible that you could tell me what’s wrong with me after everyone’s life is safe? What happened to Brad? Where is Melissa?”
“I don’t know. I flew from New York to Raleigh, then drove a rental car to Arundel. My intention was to pick up my wife and take her home. You can imagine my surprise when I saw my mother-in-law inside a car beside some strange man at eleven o’clock at night. I did the natural thing and followed her—you. When I saw you turn into a dirt road, I parked just off the highway and walked in. I saw the light and got here just in time to see…”
“See what?” she asked gently.
“See that man get shot in the head. Who was he?”
“Drake Haughton. He worked for Brad, the man who was shot in the leg,” Eden said. “Stuart, I think we should go. I have a feeling that everyone has gone back to my house and they’re waiting for me.”
“For you?” Stuart asked, and Eden couldn’t help grimacing. Stuart made it sound as though he couldn’t believe anyone would want her.
“Stuart,” she said, her teeth together and her hands made into fists. “Yes, my daughter does want to leave you, and, yes, she wants her and the baby to live with me. As you know, I have a lot of influence over my daughter, so it’s up to me what she does with her future. If you don’t cut out your snide, catty, jealous remarks, so help me I will do everything in my power to get her to leave you. Do I make myself clear?”
“Yes,” he said softly. “What do you want me to do?”
“Can you drive a car?”
She could tell that he was fighting back a sarcastic remark, but all he said was “Yes.”
“Then follow me. We’re going to get Brad’s car and go back to Farrington Manor.”
Eden nearly ran through the woods, listening to the sounds, but she heard nothing that made her think that people were hiding nearby. What had happened? Where was Melissa? she thought, and her entire body started to shake, but she got it under control. Where were Jared and Brad? Remi?
Eden pulled the key Brad had given her from inside her pocket and handed it to Stuart. As soon as he started the car, she climbed into the backseat. She was going to search for the weapons that Brad had told her were hidden in the car.
“What are you looking for?” Stuart asked as he turned the car around and headed for the highway.
“Guns. Knives. Explosives. Whatever I can find,” Eden said. Her head was hanging over the backseat as she searched the floor. She found a pistol taped under the driver’s seat. There was a rifle under the overhang of the backseat.
“I think I’m lying on one,” came a voice from the back.
Stuart slammed on the brakes so hard that Eden’s face hit the back of the seat. She felt blood begin to run from her nose.
In a second, Stuart had jumped out of the car and run to the back, where he threw open the big back door. Eden, dripping blood, hung over the seat. Her daughter, her beautiful daughter, was lying on her side, curled up in the back of the Jeep.
Eden reached for her daughter, but Stuart beat her to Melissa. He pulled his wife from the car and was kissing her face all over.
“I was crazy with worry,” Stuart was saying between kisses. “Don’t you know that I wouldn’t have a life without you? You’re my very breath. You’re everything to me.”
“I thought you didn’t care about me anymore,” Melissa was saying, crying and kissing Stuart back.
Eden turned away from them and sat down in the backseat. There was a box of tissues on the floor, and she pressed a handful to her bleeding nose. In her lap was a pistol, a rifle across her legs. Did every mother have this moment? she thought. This moment when she realized that she’d lost her child?
“I think we better go,” she said softly, but no one heard her. She was tempted to climb over the seat and drive away. If she was sure Melissa—and, okay, Stuart—would be safe, she’d do it. But Eden didn’t know who or what was still outside.
“Let’s go!” she said, louder, making them hear her. Holding hands, not wanting to separate, Stuart and Melissa sat side by side in the backseat and Eden drove back to Arundel. When she stopped the car in front of the sheriff’s house it didn’t take much persuasion to get them to get out.
“Mother,” Melissa said. “I don’t think you should go back there. I think you should stay with us and talk to the sheriff.”
Eden didn’t bother to explain her motives, but she knew that by the time she waited for the sheriff to get out of bed, have a couple of cups of coffee to wake himself up, then take forty-five minutes or so to understand what Eden was saying, there’d probably be half a dozen more people dead. She had an idea that Mr. Jolly was waiting for her to return to the house to sign the papers before he left. And he’s welcome to the paintings, Eden thought as she sped away, leaving her daughter and son-in-law standing on the sidewalk.
The streets of Arundel were empty at that time of the morning, so Eden ran the red lights and made her way to the bridge as fast as she could. She went over the bridge at sixty, twice hitting her head on the roof of the car. I won’t sign anything until he releases everyone, she thought.
She stopped the car on the road, jumped out, grabbed the two weapons, and started running toward her house. Standing on the side of a wooden flower bed, she looked into the living room window. She could see a light in the center hall and she thought she could see the silhouettes of at least three people. Who were they?
“Where the hell did you come from?” came Jared McBride’s voice close to her ear. “I thought you were inside.”
“Who is in there?” she asked as she handed him the rifle and the pistol. She still had the little gun in her trouser pocket.
“Granville and his son-in-law are taped up and on the floor in the hall. Jolly and his goons are moving around.”
“I guess you know that man Jolly.”
“Oh, yeah. We’ve never been able to get him on anything before because he leaves no witnesses. Where’s your daughter?”
“With her husband at the sheriff’s.”
“When Jolly hears the sirens, he’ll shoot Granville and the kid.”
Eden swallowed. “What do we do?”
“We do nothing. Now that I know you’re safe, I plan to go in there, and—”
“And save everyone? All by yourself?”
“If you think that you are going with me, I’ll tie you up first.”
“Sex later. Right now we have to think about business.”
Jared gave a snort of laughter. “You can’t go in there. There’ll be gunfire.”
Eden swallowed again. “How about if I go in there, sign his papers, and he leaves with the paintings?”
“You think he’ll leave after he gets them? Wave good-bye? Say thank you? No, he intends to kill anyone who’s seen him.”
“But Melissa is already at the sheriff’s house.”
“He’ll get her later.”
Eden pulled the little gun from her pocket. “Show me how to work this thing.”
Jared hesitated, then took the gun from her. “I want you to know that I’m only doing this because I have no other choice. I want you to go in the back, up those little stairs, then come down the big stairs. Just wait there and do nothing. When the time is right, I’ll shout, ‘Look out!’ then I want you to fire this. Don’t try to hit anyone because you’ll miss. Just shoot in the air. The noise will create a diversion and that’ll be enough. Understand me?”
All Eden could do was nod, then she followed him to the back of the house. He climbed on the giant air conditioner on the ground, lifted the window up, then bent down to help Eden to climb up. She started to climb through the window, but he stopped her, and for a moment she thought he was going to kiss her, but he didn’t. Instead, he just looked into her eyes, and the look said that he’d die to save her. Chills ran up her spine, and she leaned toward him, but he gently pushed her toward the window.
She knew the old house well. No one else could have sneaked around on the old floors in silence, but she could. She knew to lift up on the door to the stairs so its hinges wouldn’t make noise, and she knew that she had to step over steps six and nine or they would creak. When she reached the top of the stairs, she put her ear to the door and listened, but she heard nothing. Slowly, she opened the door and peered out. Tyrrell Farrington’s paintings had been stacked on the floor, ready to be taken out of the house. When she heard a sound outside, she tiptoed to the window. Two men were loading a paneled truck with the paintings. They were taking their time and seemed to be arguing about how to get all the paintings into the truck, but Eden knew that soon they’d return to the house, to this hall, to get the paintings stacked there.
There are too few of us and too many of them, she thought. Bad men were outside and in, and it was only her and Jared. If only she could create a big diversion, she thought.
On her bedside table was her ring of keys, the one Brad had given her when he’d turned the house over to her. Her first thought was, What are they doing there? They should have been in her handbag.
In the next second a ray of moonlight came through the window and landed on the little silver angel on the ring. Mrs. Farrington’s angel. Eden looked at the angel, and she could hear Mrs. Farrington’s voice. She’d always hated the cellar, and one of her many reasons was that she was afraid that everything in it would explode. Eden smiled. She knew what to do and how to do it.
A second later, she was running down the stairs, leaping over the creaking steps as she whispered “Thank you” to what she knew was Mrs. Farrington’s watching spirit.
In the dark kitchen she could hear the voices of the men in the hall. The two men from outside had come back in. She heard Jolly’s voice, and he sounded agitated. The thought of Brad and Remi tied up on the floor gave her new courage. She hurried across the room to the pantry. First, she lifted the window that led to the side porch. She’d read that a thief always planned his exit first. When the window was open, she lifted the door in the floor, then she took out the gun Jared had given her. She knew she couldn’t shoot something small, but maybe she could hit a wall full of jars of twenty-two-year-old pickled fruit. They’d had time to ferment by now.
Turning her head away, she aimed at the wall she couldn’t see in the dark and shot. She was rewarded with an explosion—and the exploding jar set off a chain reaction. As Eden dove through the open window, she heard men running. She hid behind an overturned chair, her breath held, as she heard men shouting. The next second, she heard a door slam and knew that Jared had locked the men in the pantry. When one of them started to come out the window, Eden fired a shot in his general direction and he went back inside. Two minutes later, she heard sirens, and in the distance, she heard a helicopter. Eden stayed where she was, the gun aimed at the open window, ready to shoot at anyone who tried to leave the pantry. There were tears running down her cheeks.
It was over.