28
Sadie couldn’t believe that Chief Thomas had canceled on them, especially at the last minute. Obviously, he didn’t believe Sly was a real threat. No one did. They saw his uniform and his badge and judged only by that; with Dawson, they saw the media reports and did the same. But how could Chief Thomas not see the reality? He’d witnessed Sly’s behavior around her. She’d gotten the impression he was on her side during their visit to Sly’s house.
It was because Sly was such a good liar, she decided. He could lie his way out of anything...
The moment they received the chief’s message, Dawson had her go inside and lock the doors. He also told her to keep her cell phone handy so they could contact each other at any given moment. Then he went out back to dig a small pit where Sly had been backing into the artichokes. Dawson said, because the moon was full, he should have barely enough light, and once Dawson covered the hole with plants and straw, Sly would never expect it to be there. If Sly returned to the same spot, he’d back into it when he tried to leave and wouldn’t be able to get out. And if his car was there in the morning, or he had to call for a tow, they’d have proof that he was still harassing them—proof that didn’t depend on Chief Thomas seeing Sly on the farm with his own eyes.
Dawson said it wasn’t much, but it was better than letting Sly peep into their windows at night without any repercussions.
After seeing the look on Sly’s face while they were at the bar, however, Sadie was afraid he’d do far more than peep. She’d never made him so angry, mostly because she’d spent their entire married life trying to appease him. And if Thomas had given away the fact that she and Dawson knew about his late-night visits, Sly wouldn’t fall into Dawson’s trap. He wouldn’t go anywhere near it. All of Dawson’s work would come to nothing.
Hoping to talk Chief Thomas into fulfilling his commitment, she called the police station. She was told he’d left for the night, so she tried his home. That didn’t help, either. His wife simply said he was “unavailable.”
What the heck did that mean? Sadie wondered. Where could he be? What could he be doing that was so important? She and Dawson were in trouble. She felt as if Sly had finally snapped. The way he’d behaved at the bar—so openly hostile despite the presence of many witnesses—proved he was dangerous. To make matters worse, he had no fear of punishment, believed he lived above the law, because he could live above the law so long as Chief Thomas supported him. Something terrible would have to happen to change that, and Sadie didn’t like to consider what that “something” might be.
She paced in the kitchen while waiting for the police chief to return her call, but that call didn’t come. His lack of response was beginning to smell like a purposeful dodge. He was acting to protect his officer, just as Dawson had always thought he would. And it was only getting later and darker. By now, Sly would be off work and out of the meeting—if there really had been a meeting.
She sat down to compose a couple of letters—one to Chief Thomas and one to Jayden. After she sealed them each in a separate envelope, she called Petra and asked to be able to say good-night to her son.
“Where’s Dawson?” Jayden asked once Petra put him on the phone.
Sadie couldn’t help smiling at that. He was so enamored with the new man in their lives. “He’s still working.”
“In the dark?”
“In the dark.” That concerned her, too. She’d been trying to suppress the worry that plagued her by telling herself that it was early yet. But Sly could still show up, could just as easily shoot Dawson while he was out on the tractor as any other time.
She hurried to the back door so she could check on him, just in case, and was mildly reassured by the rumble of the tractor. He was okay for now.
After closing and locking the door again, she returned to the kitchen.
“He needs to come in now,” Jayden was saying. “It’s bedtime.”
Sadie chuckled at her son’s bossy tone. “You’re right. I’ll make sure he does.”
After she told Jayden she loved him and that she’d see him tomorrow, Petra took the phone back. “He’s having a good time, is about to go to bed,” she said. “Don’t worry about him, okay?”
“I won’t. Thank you. I hope... I hope it’s not too much of an imposition that I asked you to take him with you.”
“Not at all. I know you wouldn’t ask unless you really needed it. And my parents love him. How are things in Silver Springs?”
She drew a shaky breath. “Tense.”
Petra’s voice took on a more serious tone. “What’s going on?”
Sadie had shared a little of her concerns about Sly. That was why Petra had agreed to take Jayden. Otherwise, she would’ve said she couldn’t babysit, that she wasn’t going to be home. “Sly is acting a bit...threatening.”
“He is.”
“Yes.”
“You’re frightened.”
“I am,” she admitted. “If anything happens to me, would you—”
“Whoa,” Petra broke in. “You don’t think this thing could go that far.”
“No, of course not.” She didn’t want to scare Petra, but, in Sadie’s heart, she believed it could get that bad. She’d always believed it could get that bad, or she wouldn’t have let Sly control her for so long. “I’m just saying if the worst happens—not that it ever would—Sly’s mother will take Jayden. But will you make sure he gets the letter I’m putting under the front porch of the Reed farmhouse? He won’t understand what it means at this age, of course. So wait until he’s older, if you can. There should come a time when...when it will be important to him.”
There was a long pause before Petra said, “This is sounding pretty ominous, Sadie.”
“It’s a worst-case scenario, that’s all,” she said, trying to play it off. “Since most of our things are gone—” also thanks to Sly, she was fairly certain “—I’d like Jayden to at least have my words, my love. That’s all I’ve got to give him.”
“If you’re writing a letter like that, I think it’s time to call the police. I mean...someone else on the force, besides Sly.”
“Yeah. I’ll do that,” she said, even though she’d already tried—to no avail. “It’ll all work out. Just wanted you to know about the letter.” She didn’t tell Petra about the second letter. She figured Petra would find it when she collected the one for Jayden—and then Chief Thomas would understand how badly he’d misjudged both Sly and Dawson.
“I’ll keep it in mind. I hope it never comes down to that, though.”
“So do I.” She heard Dawson come in.
“Sadie?” he called.
“I’ve got to go,” she told Petra.
Her former neighbor seemed reluctant to end the conversation. “My parents have a guesthouse. Maybe you should come stay here in Ojai with them for a month or two. Sly wouldn’t know where to find you and...and maybe some time will be all that’s necessary to get things to settle down.”
“That’s a nice offer, but I’m the one who got Dawson into this. I can’t abandon him with the problem.”
“What about Jayden? Your leaving town would be better for him, don’t you agree?”
She shoved a hand through her hair. “I do. Definitely. But...maybe I’m just tired and blowing this out of proportion. I hope that’s the case.”
“Either way, I guess we can talk about it tomorrow,” Petra said.
“Right. Thanks.” Sadie hung up as Dawson came into the kitchen.
“It’s done,” he said, looking exhausted. “We have a nice trap.”
“Will Sly be able to see the pit?”
“Not unless he suspects it’s there, not unless he’s specifically looking for it. And on a darker night he wouldn’t be able to see it at all, so if he comes tomorrow or—”
“He’ll come tonight,” she said.
He studied her, obviously surprised by the confidence in her voice. “How do you know?”
“He won’t be able to stop himself.” She slipped her arms around his waist and rested her cheek against his chest. “He’s too angry. And he’s never been capable of delaying gratification—not when it comes to satisfying his anger.”
“I’ll stay up,” Dawson said. “You try to get some sleep.”
Sadie refused to go to bed without him. He was just as tired. Besides, she didn’t want to be caught at a disadvantage if Sly did show up.
“Let’s watch some TV,” she suggested. She put the letters out, but after two or three hours spent lying on the couch with Dawson, during which nothing happened, his breathing steadied out and her own eyelids grew too heavy to lift.
* * *
Getting the hatchet had taken much longer than Sly had anticipated. It wasn’t as if he could go out and buy one. He’d had to steal Pete’s from Pete’s garage, which meant he’d also have to return it before morning. He knew how the coming investigation would go, had to be prepared for it. That was why he’d gone to his mother’s house almost as soon as he left the station. He’d told her he was in trouble, had broken down in tears saying he needed help with his drinking or he was going to lose his job—and she’d been so concerned she’d bought every word and blamed Sadie just as he had.
“That girl isn’t who we thought she was,” she’d said, her lips pursed in disapproval. “She’s not worth it, Sly. You need to let her go.”
“But she’s not safe,” he’d replied, playing the good guy. His mother wanted to see him as the knight in shining armor he portrayed, so it wasn’t a hard sell. “She’s living with a murderer.”
His mother had wrung her hands at that. “We’ve got to get Jayden away from her somehow. He’s not safe out there.”
He’d agreed that he had to sue for custody of his son, even though he knew he’d never have to pay his attorney another dime. Then he’d “reluctantly” acquiesced when she’d insisted he stay the night rather than go home and “face that empty house.”
“That’s probably for the best,” he’d told her. “I’ll only try to drown my sorrows if I have the chance, and I can’t turn to the bottle anymore.”
After she went to bed, he’d gone into his room and stuffed the pillows under the blankets so it’d look as though he was sleeping if she came to check on him.
Once he was satisfied that she was down for the night, and all the neighbors would be, too, he’d dressed in the jeans and black hoodie he’d worn when he started the fire, taken his late father’s 8mm pistol from the closet and pushed her car out of the garage so he wouldn’t have to start the engine. It was important that his cruiser remain conspicuously parked in front of her house, so the neighbors could report that it had never moved and, with the garage door down, no one would know he’d simply used her vehicle.
Just to be safe, he’d pushed her Pontiac Grand Prix clear to the end of the street before getting behind the wheel. But that was when the hunt for the hatchet had started. Before he remembered seeing one at Pete’s place, he’d almost decided he’d have to shoot Sadie and Dawson. Two bullets accomplished the same goal. Except...he liked the idea of hacking Sadie to pieces and letting Dawson take the blame for it. Dawson would be dead, too, of course—his body hidden so well that it would never be found—which meant he’d never stand trial for her murder, but that didn’t matter. His disappearance would be enough to convict him in the minds of everyone who mattered. Sly would then be totally vindicated for his actions the past few weeks and, so long as they couldn’t prove he had any part in Sadie’s murder and Dawson’s disappearance, life would go on pretty much as it had before Sadie decided she had the nerve to stand up to him.
In other words, he’d win the battle they’d started.
“Poetic justice,” he muttered as he went over his plan, again and again, while parking his mother’s car on a deserted side road not far from the farm and walking the rest of the way. He would’ve preferred to get closer. He’d have to bring the car to the house after he killed Dawson so that he could dispose of the body before morning, which would eat up valuable time. But—he felt the solid weight of the hatchet he carried as he walked—if he was going to pull this off, certain things had to be handled in a certain way.
Fortunately, he was a cop: he knew exactly how to get away with murder.
* * *
Dawson came awake. He wasn’t sure why, since dawn was obviously a long way off and he couldn’t hear or see anything he’d consider alarming. Although most of the lights were off, they’d turned them off and left the TV on. Some ’80s sitcom blared in the room.
Sadie, still asleep in his arms, started to rouse when he moved. “Something wrong?” she murmured, and then she came awake, too, as if she suddenly realized that they’d fallen asleep and shouldn’t have.
“Everything’s fine,” he told her. “I’m just going to check.”
“No.” She grabbed him before he could slide out from under her weight. “Let’s stay together.”
“At least let me look out the window.” He wanted to do more than that—wanted to go out and see if he’d caught anything in his trap—but he hesitated to leave her alone. He knew she was frightened, and he felt she had good reason to be.
He couldn’t see anything to be concerned about in the front. He checked a few of the other windows, but clouds had rolled in front of the moon, dimming its light. He couldn’t make out anything except an abundance of shadows, some of which could indicate the presence of a human being, but probably didn’t. “Where’s your phone?” he asked. “Why don’t you see if Chief Thomas has returned your calls?”
Sadie sat up, rubbed her face and reached for her cell, which was on the coffee table. “Nope.”
They’d had the ringer on, wouldn’t have missed it, but he thought maybe a text had come in. “Nothing at all?”
“No call, no text, nothing.”
The police had really left them on their own. But Dawson wasn’t surprised. Since when had they ever done him any favors? “What time is it?”
“One-fifteen.”
There was a lot of night left.
“I hate that we’re letting Sly disrupt our lives like this,” he grumbled. “He wins as long as we are always watching our backs, can’t live a normal life.”
“That’s nothing new for me,” Sadie said. “But I feel bad I’ve dragged you into his sights.”
“You didn’t drag me. I put myself there.”
She cast him a discouraged look. “I’m still sorry.”
He pulled her to her feet. “Don’t be. You’re worth it. The fire investigator will find something. Then we’ll be out of this. But for now, let’s go to bed. We can’t wait up, expecting the worst, every night.”
She seemed reluctant, but after making sure all the doors were locked—again—he convinced her to accompany him to his bedroom. “If he does something tonight, Chief Thomas will know we were right about him.”
“That’ll be small consolation if we’re dead.”
He didn’t respond. What could he say? She was right.
They used the bathroom and brushed their teeth before falling into bed. Dawson was still tired, but he didn’t go to sleep right away. He curled around Sadie, hoping to offer her some comfort and security.
“I’ve been trying so hard not to love you,” she whispered.
He kissed her neck. “How’s that going for you?”
“I’m failing. Miserably.”
He couldn’t help smiling. “Like I said, maybe we were meant to be together.”
“Or maybe, just when I’m finding some happiness, Sly will put an end to that, too.” Her hand pulled his up to her mouth so she could kiss it.
“That’s not going to happen.”
“The same type of thing has happened to other people.”
He held her tighter. “I’m not going to let it happen to you,” he promised, but it was only a few moments later when he heard a subtle noise, a rattle, that told him someone might be trying to get inside the house.