Preface

Wilder, California, and Shadow Lake don't exist except in the writer's imagination. The setting for Shadows Fall was inspired by visits to the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California.

Chapter 1

FIFTEEN YEARS AGO

Tom Stevens' property, on the east-facing slope of Wilder Mountain, shared a boundary with the twenty-thousand or so acres of northern Sierra forest the Grays owned, which included Wilder Mountain Lodge and Shadow Lake on the west slope. The barest hint of a breeze stirred Tom's trees on this hot summer night, just enough to fool one into thinking it was cooler outdoors.

Sheriff Les Kendall waited on Tom Stevens' pea-gravel driveway for his deputies. Duane Prescott arrived last, well after the other two. He walked up to the three of them in the moonlight and stood with his hands on his hips. He was nineteen, with a stocky build and a square-shaped face, an immature mustache and a thick head of straight brown hair. His blue eyes seldom opened wide enough to let you get a grip on their true color. His uniform appeared shrugged on. "Why'd you call me, Sheriff?"

"Because we need a young mind, and you're the youngest." The other two snickered, and Les glanced at them. They shut up. "Where do the twins go on their midnight jaunts their father thinks they never take? Do you know?"

Duane didn't even have to think about it. "They swim in a pool in Carter's Creek, about halfway to the Lodge. It's on Gray property, so they don't tell their dad."

"Tom says Beth Gray threatened Ollie."

Duane cracked a grin. "Not likely."

"Tom thinks she's unstable, and there have been rumors."

"Gossip, Sheriff. She's had a tough time since her dad died. Her fiancé's out of the country, and she goes off to college herself next month. She's spending a quiet summer working at the Lodge."

"Ollie still up to his pranks?"

The front door of the house opened. Duane looked that way and nodded. "He locked her in the bathroom of a cabin she was cleaning two weeks ago. She was stuck for hours. She can't stand that, Sheriff. She avoids Ollie."

"Check the boys' room while I talk to Tom, then we'll head to the swimming pool. If we find those two having a moonlight dip, maybe I'll join them. Damn, it's hot!"

The other deputies checked outside the windows and doors for signs of a forced entry. Minutes later, when Duane emerged from the house, Les motioned him aside. "Find anything?"

"No sign of a break-in." Duane frowned at the house. "One boy's bed looks slept in, the other doesn't."

"Anything else?"

Duane shook his head, but he looked unsettled. Les watched him a few more seconds, wondering what was up. Then he decided the kid was just sleepy. Either that or Tom Stevens wasn't the housekeeper Duane's mother was.

Les turned and motioned to the others. "Okay, let's go. Maybe the uniforms will scare them out of worrying their dad this way again."

The moon was full, which made walking easy until they reached the woods. They used flashlights to follow a deer track through dense trees and undergrowth along the bank of the creek. Halfway to the clearing and the swimming pool, the oak woods opened out and the trail lay exposed, dappled by moonlight.

A gunshot cracked the still of the night, echoing off nearby hills.

The men continued at a faster pace, caution in their eyes, hands on their sidearms.

Another shot shook the air. A minute later the beams of their flashlights caught a swift movement through the trees in their direction. One of the Stevens twins came toward them at a run. "He's been shot!" The whites of his eyes shone in the moonlight.

"Who's been shot?" Les grasped the breathless boy's shoulder. "Where?"

"My brother." The youth twisted out of his grasp and bolted back through the trees.

Les ran after him, shouting for him to wait. Near the clearing, moonlight filtered more brightly through the sparser trees. They heard a shout, followed instantly by a high pitched cry and a third shot. Les and his men pulled their revolvers and broke through the brush along the south side of the clearing.

"She shot him!" The boy stood panting and sobbing at the edge of the woods, staring into the moonlit clearing, where his twin lay on the ground.

A flashlight lay beside the fallen boy, extinguished. Beth Gray stood near his feet, her arms at her sides. In one hand she gripped a semi-automatic pistol. She stared at the four men who aimed revolvers at her. Her luminous eyes looked black in the moonlight, the eyes of a cornered doe ready to dart away.

"Put the gun on the ground, Beth," Les said. "Carefully."

She looked at it as if seeing it for the first time; then she placed it on the ground. As she straightened, Duane Prescott moved to her side and placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Duane," she said faintly, and went into his arms like a pliant child.

Les moved to the boy on the ground, knelt beside him, tilted his head back and listened for breath. Instead he heard only the flies that had already gathered. He felt for a pulse, while his nose told him he wouldn't find one. Then he took a look at the boy's eyes with his flashlight.

"He's dead, isn't he." The sibilant sound of the girl's whisper carried on the still air.

The boy had been shot in the chest, and there was a gaping wound in his left forearm. A pair of woolen knit gloves was tucked into his belt.

Les looked at his watch, pulled out a notebook and recorded the time. Then he turned to the girl.

She wore shorts, and sneakers with no socks. Her T-shirt was tied in a knot at the waist. She looked as graceful as a deer, with long, lean legs. Les recalled thinking when she was a little girl that Beth Gray would grow into a beauty, and she had. She had a vital kind of allure that was both sexy and high-minded at once. She was the kind of girl a man wanted to touch but didn't dare, in spite of the rumors that she'd allow any male to touch her. Gossip, and those weren't the only rumors. She was seventeen, two years younger than Les's daughter Nora. Homecoming queen, valedictorian. Murderer? Les suppressed a shudder.

The twins' father stood at the edge of the clearing, staring at the dead boy. When the surviving twin put his arms around his father, Tom appeared to waken out of a daze. He held the boy for a few seconds before he went over and knelt by his dead son. "Ollie?" Tom's voice was hollow with disbelief. He nudged the dead boy's shoulder as if trying to rouse him.

"I'm sorry, Tom." Les moved to his side. "I can't let you touch him." He drew him away. Then Les turned to the other boy. "Are you Owen?"

The boy nodded.

"Whose gun is it, Owen? Do you know?" The pistol on the ground, a mother-of-pearl-handled semi-automatic, looked familiar to Les.

"She had it." Owen pointed at the girl.

Les turned. "Beth?"

"It's my father's," she said so faintly it was almost a whisper. She still stared at the dead boy, and she still clung to Duane.

"How did the gun get here, Beth?"

She blinked at Les, dark eyes wide, then she looked at the dead boy again.

"She shot him," the other twin wailed. "I saw, Dad."

Tom lunged at the girl. "You murdering whore!"

Les and two deputies pulled him away, while Tom fought them, determined to get at Beth. She clung to Duane like a drowning man to a life preserver.

"Take her to the station," Les said, reaching for his radio. It would be a half-hour before he could get more deputies out here.

"Sheriff, she didn't do this," Duane argued. "Beth wouldn't hurt anyone. Look, she's scared. Let me take her home."

"Take her in I said, Prescott."

Duane looked at the others, at Tom Stevens, then at Beth. "Come on, Beth." He led her away by the arm. Tom Stevens' torrent of obscenities followed the silent girl and the deputy out of the clearing.

"Mirandize her," Les called. "Follow procedure. And call her mother!"

Beth's mind labored out of the opaque white mist it had been lost in since Ollie--no, Owen--had come crashing through the brush and startled her, before all those uniformed men pointed revolvers at her, including, for an instant, Duane.

She focused on Duane's voice repeating words she knew from too many movies and television. She paused and looked at him. "Duane?"

"Let me finish, Beth. I have to do my job," he said and continued.

She kept walking, with Duane's hand on her arm. She didn't know this part of the trail as well, and she was glad he had a flashlight, because she'd dropped hers somewhere. The trees created a dark tunnel in front of them, lit by patches of moonlight. She tried to think about where she stepped, instead of what had happened and where they were going. This couldn't be happening. Ollie couldn't be dead. Just today he had pushed her into the lake and laughed with her sister Vicky about it.

The white mist hovered, threatening to engulf her. No, she had to think.

Duane stopped her at his truck, near the Stevens' house. "What's that in your pocket?" He made her empty the pockets of her shorts. She pulled the tennis ball out and handed it to him.

"What are you doing with a tennis ball in your pocket?" Duane looked like he didn't know what to do with her.

"Can I go home now?" Beth dared to hope this was another bad dream, just like all the other nightmares she had. She could be asleep at home, having a new nightmare, from which she'd waken, crying or screaming. Tomorrow Ollie would come looking for Vicky to go swimming with him. He wasn't really dead.

"No, Beth," Duane said. "The sheriff wants to talk to you. This looks bad. You understand that, don't you?"

The white mist threatened again, and she wanted to lose herself in it. But this was important. She wasn't dreaming. "Are you sure he's dead? Maybe--"

"Beth, don't say anything. I'm going to call your mom. She can get you a lawyer. Anything you say to me now, I have to tell the sheriff, understand? Did you understand what I said when I read you your rights?"

She stared at him. "You're still my friend, aren't you Duane?"

"I'm still your friend. Get in the truck. I have to take you to the station. Your mom will come see you there."

He held the door open. The cab of his truck was small and dark. Beth backed away. Her breath came quickly, one breath upon the last, and her pulse pounded in her ears. A scream like that of a small child trapped inside her wanted out. Holding it in made her feel sick.

Duane's hand pressed against her back. "The window's open, Beth. You can sit by the open window."

She looked at Duane.

"It's just my truck, Beth. You've ridden in my truck before."

She got in. Both side windows were open. Duane closed her door and she held her face close to the open window, where the moonlight caressed her cheek, a silver gauze that softened the hard darkness of the night. Duane got into the driver's seat and opened the sliding rear window. A delicious breath of air touched the back of Beth's neck.

"All the windows are open."

She held her face near the open window.

Duane closed his door, and Beth jumped at the sound. She felt his gaze on her. She didn't want to think what he wondered. She concentrated on the moonlight and the night sky. It could be Gabriel beside her, taking her on a moonlight drive. They could be leaving on their honeymoon, starting a new life. Everything would be different after this.

Duane put the truck in gear and moved it slowly down the length of the driveway. On the road, where he could easily have turned to the Lodge and driven her home, he steered instead toward the town in the valley. Beth prayed silently, over and over. Don't let this happen. Please don't let this happen!

When she and Duane walked into the sheriff's station, a female deputy met them. "Sheriff called, Duane. He wants you back out there, pronto. I'll help you process her." She grasped Beth's arm firmly as she spoke. Then she glanced at Duane. "You didn't use cuffs?"

Beth's fear took control. She pleaded, and cried. She didn't care about anything in that moment but her freedom. Tears streamed down her face, and her convulsive sobs made her words unintelligible even to herself. She screamed.

The ringing of the phone in the dead of night wakened everyone at the Lodge but three-year-old Rita. They'd slept with their doors open, because it was hot and the Lodge didn't take paying guests anymore, so privacy wasn't a concern.

Matt Gray, eleven years old, had the room next to his mother's, and he was the first out of bed. He went to his mother's door and listened. Only bad news came with a phone call in the middle of the night.

"What?" his mother said. Matt knew, by the sharp staccato of the single word, that something was very wrong. He stepped into the room, and his thirteen-year-old sister Vicky followed. Vicky had stopped to put on a robe. Matt wore only his boxers.

"That's impossible," their mother was saying into the phone. Then, more quietly, not out of calmness but disbelief, "She's here, I just spoke to her before she--" She put her hand over the phone. "Matt, see if Beth's in her room."

Matt ran into his sister's room, switched on the light and looked around. Beth's bed sheets were tossed, and her robe lay across the foot of her bed, but she was nowhere in sight. He checked the bathroom, then ran back to his mother's room. "She's not there."

"She doesn't take them anymore," Matt's mother was saying into the phone, "Not since her father died. Tell her I'm on my way, Duane. Talk to her. Please don't leave her alone." She put the phone down and moved from the bed to the closet faster than Matt had ever seen his mother move.

"What's wrong, Mom?" Jack came into the room behind Matt and Vicky. He was their second oldest brother, twenty-one years old. He towered over his younger siblings, with the voice of an adult, wearing a light cotton bathrobe, his hair wet from the shower.

"Beth's been arrested," Emily said, her voice under taught control. She began pulling clothes out of her closet. She peeled off her nightgown, and Matt felt torn between looking away and watching. His mother had never revealed herself to him before.

"Arrested? For what?" Jack wore a big grin, as though envious of his younger sister going out and having some real fun, without him.

"They think she shot Ollie Stevens. He's been killed."

Vicky gasped, and Matt looked at her. Her face was a mask of shock. "She really did it!" Vicky cried, and ran sobbing out of the room.

"Vicky?" Emily called after her. "What is she saying? Jack, stay with the younger ones and keep them calm. Wake Cornell."

Emily pulled on one of her schoolteacher dresses, over the pantyhose she'd dragged on so quickly she'd punched a hole in them with her thumb. She hadn't even noticed.

Matt hadn't dreamed Beth meant what she said today about killing Ollie. The first threat had been a joke. She'd laughed, and so had Matt, when he'd found her with their Dad's gun in her hand and she said she was going to shoot someone. The second threat had been the impulse of a moment's anger after being shoved into the lake. Beth wouldn't really do something that brainless, that heartless. She wouldn't suddenly turn violent. Not even against Ollie.

"Jack, you look so much like your father," their mother said. "Please be like him now. Help me. Cornell knows lawyers. She'll need a good lawyer. Zip me up, dear. My hands are shaking. Call Dr. Rayborne and have him come to the Sheriff's Office in Wilder. Tell him it's an emergency, that Beth's been arrested. She's in jail, and she's ... not herself. She needs a sedative."

Jack zipped her dress, then ruffled his damp, wavy red hair as he sat on the foot of the bed. Emily slipped her feet into shoes and picked up her purse. She hadn't combed her hair and she had no makeup on, but she looked nice, kind of like she was going off to church, except for the huge run in her pantyhose.

"Mom?" Matt grasped her arm. "Can I go with you?"

She hugged him. "Matt, of course you can't come. Look at you, standing here in your shorts. Go put your robe on. You're to stay here and listen to Jack and Cornell. They're in charge."

Peter Lloyd's young wife Claire pored over the morning newspaper. She read it every morning, and it always upset her.

"Look at this," she said now. "This seventeen-year-old girl killed a fourteen-year-old boy with her father's handgun, because he'd played some practical jokes on her and pushed her into a lake the previous day. She'd just graduated from high school with honors, and now she's thrown her whole life away. Look at her!"

Claire caught Peter sneaking two-year-old Emery a bite of pancake. "And stop feeding him that garbage. You poured a gallon of syrup on it." She pushed the paper in front of him.

Peter didn't see it. He watched Claire's eyes light up in response to his look. A slow smile appeared on her face. She shook her head at him.

"Come here." He dragged her chair closer to his. "Why do you want to start your day off that way?"

"It makes more sense than reading the same fishing magazine every morning. You don't have time to fish, Peter."

"That's why I read this. It's fishing meditation, a mini-vacation, before I go off to study serious medicine."

"Peter, look at her. There's something about her that makes me want to cry. It says she was homecoming queen."

Peter brushed Claire's cheek with his hand as he touched her blonde hair.

"She would've started college next month, now she'll spend the rest of her life in jail."

"There's not a thing I can do about it, Claire." He kissed her, and Emery squealed with laughter.

"Look at her." Claire pushed the newspaper in front of Peter and squirmed out of his grasp.

He looked at the newspaper, and the face in the photograph snagged his attention. He kept looking, trying to figure out where he'd seen the girl before.

Meanwhile Claire grabbed her tote bag and purse and kissed Emery. "Bye-bye, sweetheart. Be good. Daddy will pick you up at daycare. I have a doctor's appointment. Don't forget, Peter." She went out the door.

Peter finally looked up, but Claire was gone. "Why does she have a doctor's appointment?" he asked Emery, who only laughed at him.

Peter studied the picture of the girl, and read the article twice. What would drive a girl like her to kill? "I know you, but I've never met you," he said softly. "Explain that, Elizabeth Gray."

Without any reason but curiosity, he fetched the kitchen scissors and clipped the article before putting the paper in the recycle bin.

Chapter 2

THE PRESENT

Shadow Lake spread below the Lodge, its wet fingers intertwined with green fingers of new meadow grass and the darker greens of timber. An osprey sailed across the delicate blue with a thin whistling cry and landed in a tree at the lake's edge. Steep, dark mountains rose all around, rocky in places and dotted with meadows, the remainder of their surfaces covered thickly with trees. The lake reflected everything.

Beth stood on the shoulder of the road and drank in the view of her childhood home, her first in more than fifteen years. Wilder Mountain Lodge stood in the distance, a gray stone edifice backed up against the densely forested slope of a mountain overlooking the lake. The magnitude of the landscape dwarfed the Lodge so it resembled a child's sandcastle, but it was a massive structure, its four stories punctuated by a five-story tower. Ornate chimneys stretched skyward. Small diamond-shaped panes winked in the windows of the first floor.

Trees sighed above Beth's head. The world stood still. She could rest here, and find what she'd lost. Here she could touch the distant reaches of her soul and find peace.

She believed those things in this big silence. She sighed, and the elusive whisper of trees answered her. It was a subtle sound she remembered intimately from her girlhood. The osprey was a good omen, surely. She unclenched her jaw and breathed in the perfume of the trees and earth, willing fear to subside. She touched the trunk of a young tree and it pressed against her palm, pulsing in the breeze.

"Mommy, I'm hungry," a young voice called behind her.

Beth turned. Her four-year-old daughter Abby had her head out the window of the big white Mercedes parked in the pullout across the road. Liz Palmer's car.

"We're almost there," Beth called and hurried back across the road.

She drove to the Lodge and parked in front of the stone steps, got out and went around to Abby's door. Then she looked up at the Lodge and hesitated.

The higher windows with upright rectangles of glass were shut fast, the interior rooms obscured by heavy draperies or dustsheets and further shaded by the long galleries that wrapped around each upper floor. A stone terrace extended the length of the ground level until it abutted the solid bulk of the corner tower. The stone steps spread in a solid fan, rippling in hard gray waves to the new black asphalt of the parking lot.

Abby opened the door herself and got out. "Is my grandma here?"

"I hope so." What if her mother wasn't home, and she had to face someone else first? Beth tensed again.

Abby craned her neck to take in the massive building. "It looks like a castle. Are we going to live here, Mommy?"

"No. This is just a vacation, Abby."

"Beth!" One of the big oak doors swung open and Beth's mother, Emily Gray, hurried down the front steps toward them.

Beth ran to meet her and hugged her tightly, unwilling to let go once she had her arms around her. Years of separation compressed inside her, sealing a big emptiness she hadn't allowed herself to measure for a long time. She fought to push intelligible words past the constriction in her throat. A single word was all she managed. "Mom."

Finally her mother backed away. "I'm so relieved to have you home at last. How are you feeling? You look pale." She touched Beth's face.

"That's from lazing indoors the past few weeks. You look wonderful."

Emily didn't appear to have aged, except for a few more lines around her eyes and a coarser texture to her deliberately-darkened hair, which she wore short and permed. She was plumper than Beth remembered, but it didn't detract from her grace. She wore a fair-isle cardigan Beth had knit for her in pastel shades of mauve, lilac and blue, with blue jeans. Beth had never seen her mother in blue jeans before. Times had changed.

Emily's gaze lingered on Beth's face. "You're too thin."

"I really am fine, Mom." Beth smiled and turned to Abby, who hovered shyly beside her. "Abby, do you recognize Grandma from her pictures?"

Emily bent to touch the little girl's dark curls. "Abby, I'd know you anywhere. You look like your mother when she was your age. Don't you take after your father at all?"

Abby stiffened and looked at Beth.

"It's okay with just Grandma," Beth said. "I told her not to talk about Dan to anyone here," she explained to her mother.

Emily's eyes clouded. "If you decide to stay--"

Beth shook her head. "Only four weeks. We have deadlines."

"Nonsense. Dan told me you're not to worry about that while you're here, you can stay as long as you like."

Beth searched the windows of the second floor again. "Is anyone else home?"

"Jack was, but I sent him to run errands, to give you a chance to rest before facing too many people. Rita's in school, and Vicky's at work. The family will be here for dinner, and of course Faith's here. Rita stayed up late last night making a special dessert for your homecoming dinner."

The knot in Beth's throat tightened. "She must be so grown up."

"You won't know her. She graduates in June." Emily turned to Abby. "Do you like oatmeal raisin cookies?"

Food was the quickest way to Abby's heart. She bounced, shyness forgotten. "I like all kinds of cookies."

Beth started toward the back of the car, but Emily stopped her. "Come see your rooms first. I'll help you with your luggage later." She led them into the lobby, and paused to gesture at the big painting Beth had sent months earlier, of a flowering jacaranda tree.

"It was a delight to unwrap something full of blooms in winter. Leigh is looking forward to meeting you. He's one of our renters, a teacher and an artist himself. He's delighted with your work, especially the portraits."

They went up the stairs. "If there's anything you'd like changed, just say so," Emily said.

She'd prepared connecting rooms. Abby's was smaller, the walls freshly papered with a forest pattern incorporating flowers and woodland creatures with friendly faces. The single bed and simple furnishings were painted and dressed in the same theme.

In Beth's room, a cherry wood tester bed was arranged at an angle, as if inviting one to rest. Its crocheted lace canopy had fringed edges. A quilt covered the bed, and a frothy cable-knit coverlet lay folded at the foot.

Framed botanical prints hung on the cream colored walls. An antique pine dresser held a vase of wild flowers that gave off a delicate scent. The matching armoire supplemented a full-size closet. An overstuffed sofa and a wing chair were arranged cozily, and near the French doors stood a table Emily said should serve for spreading out art supplies.

Beth had requested the view, of nothing but trees, dark and thick against the mountainside. "It's perfect." She kissed her mother's cheek. "Thank you."

Emily helped carry their bags up, but Beth wasn't interested in unpacking more than immediate essentials while the sun shone. She briefly acquainted Abby with the rooms and their location in relation to the west stairs. Abby arranged her dolls and toys on top of a blanket chest near her window, while Beth placed sweaters and jackets where they'd be easy to find.

Downstairs, Emily led them through the empty bar and vast dining hall onto the west porch, where she served them a lunch of tuna salad sandwiches.

The outdoor air was brittle, dry, and aromatic with the scent of earth and growing things. The sighing of the wind in the trees was delicate and elusive. Beth strained to hear it even as she spoke.

"The Lodge feels empty," Beth said. "Dad would hate to see it closed for so many years."

"I'm sure it wouldn't remain that way if you decided to stay."

Beth put down her glass and asked Abby to run inside for their sweaters. She watched her disappear into the Lodge before she spoke again.

"Mom, I need to know how the others feel about my visit."

Emily lowered her eyes for a moment. "Holly, Vicky and Matt have voiced animosity toward you. They know I don't want to hear it, but--"

"They blame me for Ollie's death, you mean."

"Yes."

"There was a time when Matt answered my letters."

Emily's grave expression said more than her words. "I insisted he do that, when he was younger. Holly is the most vocal of--" she broke off, frowning.

"My detractors?" Beth arched an eyebrow.

"But she lives in town and she's focused on the baby. You'll have more contact with Vicky. Matt will be home next week. His school has an odd schedule; it's his spring break. I'm sorry, Beth."

Beth leaned back in her chair, more to let her mother think she was relaxed than because of any real ease she felt. Inside, she was tied up in knots. "I expected this. If my brothers and sisters are so divided, how must people in town feel?"

"I made a promise to your father that this would always be your home. If only--" Emily shook her head. "It's been so long. For all we know the killer still lives here."

"Abby said almost the same thing."

Emily's eyes opened wide. "She knows about the murder?"

"I couldn't risk having someone else tell her. We've been all through it during the past week. She understands as much as a child her age can."

"I've been so selfish." Emily lowered her eyes.

"Mom, you have a perfect right to know your grandchild. I realize how awkward it would've been to visit us and not tell anyone here where you were. It's good for Abby to see where I come from, but I'm afraid to be here. You can't expect this visit to somehow fix the past. Home is elsewhere now."

Her mother was in tears, and Beth felt responsible for them. She moved her chair over, put her arm around Emily's shoulders, and kept her gaze on the doorway where Abby would reappear. What was taking her so long?

The sound of small, skipping steps on the stone floor of the big dining room signaled Abby's return. The footsteps stopped suddenly, and Abby said a shy, "Hello."

Thinking she was lost, Beth took a breath to call her, but before Beth spoke a man's voice returned softly, "Hello there."

Emily met Beth's look, and they both listened.

"Who're you?" Abby said.

"If you're Abby, I'm your Uncle Jack."

"Uncle Jack, do you think Mommy killed that boy?"

There was a pause inside the dining room. Then Jack spoke in a weary tone. "I wasn't there, Abby. What does your mother say?"

Beth called Abby. She ran out with their sweaters. "Mommy, I saw Uncle Jack."

"I heard. Thank you, honey." Beth took her sweater and helped Abby with hers. "Finish your lunch."

Jack appeared, wearing a lopsided grin. He came over and kissed Beth's cheek. "She gets right to the point, doesn't she? My, you look sophisticated. Is that your car out front? Very impressive." He straightened and met Emily's look. "I got back early. I hope I'm not intruding."

"Beth has just convinced me she can only stay four weeks. Have you had lunch?"

"I ate in town." He pulled out a chair and sat with his legs stretched out in front of him, his arms folded across his chest. His auburn hair was cut short so its tight waves lay close to his scalp. This seemed to lengthen his lean face. He looked even more like their father than Beth remembered. Jack held Beth's gaze with his silver-green eyes, his lips forming a half smile. "Mom told us you've been sick. Glad to see you looking well. Has the place changed much?"

"I haven't had a chance to look around. It seems empty." She felt a need to make small talk. "But it's still spectacular. I used to think we had to have tennis, horses and fishing for entertainment, but--"

"Horses! Not in years. Not even a dog or a cat. You'll have to settle for fishing. The lake's still too cold to swim, and you'll have trouble finding anyone who has time for tennis." He lifted his eyebrows. "Not much of a vacation."

"I wouldn't say that. There are walks, and I've brought my paints and things with me. Abby and I will find plenty to occupy us."

"If you need fishing gear, it's stowed in the game room. Same with tennis rackets. They're getting old, but we still loan them out to people who rent the cabins, and there are fresh balls. The only boat is Leigh's canoe, but I understand the shores are best this time of year, where the water's shallow and warmer. I'm not much for fishing. You'll have to pick Peter's brain about that. Jay would've fished with you." He glanced at Emily.

"Peter?" Beth said.

"He rents one of the cabins," Jack said. "You'll meet him. I have to go now. See you both tonight. I've invited Amy, Mother. I hope you don't mind."

"Jack, I--" Emily began. But he was gone, down the side steps and around the tower toward the front of the Lodge, out of sight.

Abby craned her neck to see where Uncle Jack had gone. Beth stood, beckoning to her daughter. "Abby and I need to have a chat. I think we'll grab some cookies and take a walk."

"Get your bearings, both of you. Dinner is at six-thirty."

The kitchen windows were open wide, letting a chilly breeze blow through the room. There was no sign of Faith, but the cookies were arranged on two plates on the marble-topped center island. Beth handed Abby two.

"Look at you!" Faith said behind them. She stood in the pantry doorway. "All grown up and a mother yourself."

Faith Simms had cooked for the Lodge ever since Beth could remember. She'd stayed on when Emily let the other help go. She was a large woman who'd grown rounder, with graying hair worn in a bun compressed under a hair net. Her rosy face was creased like paper that had been folded and unfolded countless times. She hugged Beth, then beamed at Abby. "I've known your mother since she was smaller than you, Abby."

Abby smiled up at Faith. "The cookies are great. Did you make them?"

"I did." Faith shot a speculative look at Beth. "Are you home to stay?"

Beth shook her head. "Four weeks. We're on our way out for a walk."

"So long as we have a few chats in this kitchen, the way we used to. I've been hoping you'd make it back before I retire. How long did you think an old thing like me could hold out?"

"How old are you?" Abby asked with a wondering look. Faith laughed and shooed them out.

Beth and Abby wandered down to the lake, where they skirted the shoreline for a ways, walking slowly so as not to miss a bird or a squirrel or a blade of new grass. Eventually they sat on a sunny, dry spot near the water and Beth faced her daughter. "Abby, why did you ask Uncle Jack if he thought I killed that boy?"

"I wanted to know if he likes you. He was hiding in that big room, and he didn't hug you like Grandma and the other lady."

"Some people don't hug very much. I don't want you to ask people that. It's not polite."

"Why do I have to be polite?"

"Because we want to get along here and have a nice time. We're going to be polite and civilized. That's very important to Grandma, and this is her house."

"I just want to take care of you, like Daddy told me." Her earnest expression touched Beth's heart.

"That was when I was sick, and you did a wonderful job, honey," Beth said, smiling. "I'm lucky to have a little girl who loves me so much. Tell you what. Your job, while we're on vacation, is to just be a kid and have fun. And if I catch you not having enough fun, you're going to have to explain yourself, or ... get tickled!" Beth tickled her and she giggled and squirmed away, squealing.

"Okay, Mommy. I'm having fun, I promise!" Abby plopped into Beth's lap, belly down, still laughing.

They walked and rested intermittently, going slowly to accommodate Abby's smaller steps. On the return trip, they moved away from the chill of the lake and through the wide meadow, nearer the woods. Abby ran ahead of Beth every now and then, and once vanished for a few seconds beyond a stand of black oaks. Beth called to her, and Abby peered around a tree trunk, laughing.

They were nearly to the Lodge when Abby ran back to Beth and tugged at her hand to coax her off the trail, into the trees. "It's a playhouse, Mommy. Come see it."

It was the bike-shed, which Beth remembered all too well from Ollie Stevens' pranks. She shivered and told Abby to come away.

Abby disappeared around the end of the shed. Beth followed, and found the door open and Abby inside. Beth's heart raced. "Abby, come out of there! Look, it's full of trash. It's filthy."

"I can play here while we're on vacation. I brought my dolls." Abby bounced up and down inside the shed, pleading.

"You can play with your dolls in the nice room Grandma fixed for you. You're not to come outside by yourself. This isn't our backyard at home; it's a wild place, it can be dangerous." She heard herself uttering those words of warning she'd defied too many times as a girl and hoped Abby would be different.

Abby came out of the shed and peered at Beth soberly. "Are you tired, Mommy?"

"Yes. It's cold, and it'll be dark soon. Let's go get ready for dinner. You can put on a pretty dress and I'll tie your hair with a ribbon."

Abby took Beth's hand. Beth risked another glance behind her. The shed leaned into the sinking sun among the trees, its shadow stretching toward her, mocking her. She shivered again, unable to escape the memories. She hadn't expected to meet any ghosts so soon.

They met Jack on the west porch. His eyes flashed silver in the dusk. "Mom just sent me out to look for you two. You all right?"

"We're fine."

As she approached the door, Beth had a clear view of the kitchen through the windows. She glimpsed a slender girl with short, straight black hair who stood at the island, rolling out biscuit dough. This was Beth's youngest sister Rita, who was eighteen. Vicky, twenty-eight and slightly plump with strawberry-blond hair, sat on a stool beside Rita. She wore office apparel and a bored expression. Emily and Faith stood at the stove with their backs to the door, consulting over a saucepan.

Jack reached past Beth to open the door. The warm air met them, fragrant with the aromas of beef, mushrooms and a hint of garlic.

Emily turned from the stove. "There you are."

"Beth!" Rita cried out, and wiped her floury hands on a towel. She gathered Beth into a hug, then turned to Abby. "I'm Aunt Rita, and this is Aunt Vicky."

Abby hovered beside Beth, unapproachable. "Mommy's tired, and her name's Liz." She marched across the kitchen, through the hall door to the foot of the west stairs, where she turned and waited for Beth to follow.

"I'll be up in a few minutes. Do you remember the way?" Beth said.

"Yes." Abby grudgingly continued up the stairs alone.

"What was that about?" Vicky murmured.

"She misunderstood something that happened outside," Beth told her.

Vicky's expression went cold and blank. She turned away. Rita chewed her lip. Emily came over and placed the back of her hand against Beth's cheek. "You do look tired, and you're chilled. I should've made sure you took jackets."

"I just watched Abby run into the bike-shed. She thought it would make a wonderful playhouse. I overreacted."

Rita drew in her breath. "Oh, Mom, I forgot. It slipped my mind. I'm sorry, Beth. I was supposed to lock it last night. I'll take care of it now."

"No, it's all right, Rita." Beth smiled, feeling a need to lighten the mood in the room. "Mm, something smells heavenly in here."

"Nothing like home cooking," Cornell said, coming in from the hallway. "You waited long enough for it, and it appears you need a few of Faith's roast beef dinners." He was Beth's oldest brother, as different from Jack as he could be, with Emily's darker coloring and a stockier build. He slipped an arm around Beth's waist and kissed her cheek.

Beth hugged him. "Cornell, I'm so happy to see you."

"Was that Abby I saw running up the stairs? She didn't look happy."

"She's tired, and worried about her mother." Emily patted Cornell's arm, "Thank you for coming to dinner, let me get your sister some tea. It's chamomile, Beth." Emily dropped a tea bag into a mug and filled it from the urn of water kept forever hot beside the coffee maker. She turned towards Beth, "Honey or plain?"

"Plain, thanks."

"Let it steep for a few minutes. Why don't you lie down until dinner. I'll help you unpack later." Emily pressed the cup into Beth's hand. Beth climbed the stairs slowly to avoid spilling the hot liquid. Emily's voice followed her. "A playhouse! Rita, run lock the shed now. She's going to feel safe here."

Beth approached the family room an hour later and found Rita in the smaller dining room the family used, setting the table. She'd covered the antique walnut surface with old lace, on which she'd arranged Emily's wedding china with its delicate pattern of old fashioned roses. Rita moved briskly around the room as she arranged glassware and silver.

"Everything looks beautiful," Beth said as she entered.

Rita looked up and smiled. Then Beth followed Rita's gaze to the portrait on the dining room wall. It was one Beth had painted of Abby. "It looks just like her, Beth. Where is Abby?"

"Still in her room. She's never seen that painting. I was afraid she'd want to keep it, and I meant it for Mom. I coaxed her to wear that dress tonight. I'm surprised it still fits. She wore it for her baby sister's christening last fall."

"Her baby sister?" Rita said.

"She has two half-sisters."

The sound of steps in the hallway made them both turn. Duane Prescott came around the foot of the stairs, wearing a blue sheriff's deputy uniform, his badge glistening under the hallway's deer antler sconces. Beth froze at the sight of him.

He stopped at the dining room door. "Beth, you look fantastic."

His name stuck in her throat. "Duane," she croaked, remembering that he was now married to her sister Holly.

He entered the room. Beth stared, feeling trapped.

"I guess you're not too thrilled to see me."

She moved forward with her hand outstretched, and tried to smile. "You're family now."

"I'd prefer a hug," he said earnestly. She hugged him, then backed away into the table. "Excuse the uniform. I couldn't get the whole night off, just a couple hours for dinner."

Rita touched Beth's arm. "The others are in the family room with Mom."

Beth's oldest sister Sarah hugged her at the door of the family room, her honey-gold hair silky against Beth's cheek. Sarah turned to include her husband and daughter.

"Good to see you, Beth," Art Franklin said with a handshake. He was in his forties and gray-haired for his age. He'd married Sarah shortly before the murder, had never known Beth well, and appeared uncertain exactly how to take her now. But he was polite, and he smiled as nine-year-old Robin gave Beth a mother-directed hug.

Sarah introduced Jack's guest, Amy Rankin, who'd been a few years ahead of Beth in school. Amy greeted Beth quietly, then moved away to a corner with Jack. Beth visited with Sarah and Robin until dinner.

Holly and her four-month-old son Josh arrived just as the others were sitting down at the table. Holly took her place without a glance in Beth's direction, which had to be difficult, since Beth was seated right across from her.

Matt arrived last. He'd been eleven when Beth last saw him. Now he was twenty-six, tall and muscular. Except for his dark brown hair being straighter, his features were so like Beth's there'd be no question in any stranger's mind that they were siblings. They'd been close when he was little, and Beth longed to hug him, but he didn't acknowledge her by either word or look. He took the farther of the two empty seats between Beth and Rita.

"Sorry I'm late. I stopped in town to see Owen." Matt's announcement earned him an icy glare from Emily, and a smoldering one from Rita. He shrugged, looking smug, and avoided Beth's gaze.

The conversation was strained, but there were enough people present for there to be a steady drone of voices. If Beth was too silent, Duane made up for it. He sat across from her and talked, mostly to Beth and mostly about his son, who slept in an infant seat between Holly and Emily.

Holly tugged at the sleeping baby's blanket, fretted with his pacifier, adjusted his booties. When a strand of her long, copper-red hair slid over her shoulder and tickled his cheek, Joshua wakened and began to cry. Holly shot a cold glance at Beth, who couldn't help feeling she was, indirectly at least, the cause of the baby's distress.

They were well into Faith's delectable roast beef dinner when Abby appeared. She walked over to the baby and let him grasp her finger. Josh stopped fussing and cooed at her while his mother looked on, spellbound. "Mommy, you didn't tell me there would be a baby," Abby said.

Quiet laughter erupted. "That's your cousin Joshua." Beth beckoned Abby to the chair beside her and introduced the others. The three who wouldn't speak to Beth appeared at ease with Abby. Beth relaxed ever so little.

"Abby, who's that behind you?" Matt said.

Abby turned and saw the portrait of herself, wearing the same burgundy velvet dress she wore now; then she gazed into Beth's eyes. "You did that, Mommy." She got up on her knees and planted a kiss on Beth's mouth.

Matt's face darkened. He spoke only to Rita and Vicky after that. Holly returned her attention to Joshua. Jack looked as if he recalled some old resentment and didn't speak again. Amy looked only at her plate. Cornell sat quietly at the far end of the table, wearing a resigned smile. Sarah, shy to begin with, inched nearer her husband and daughter, and Art put his arm across the back of her chair. Even Abby and Duane grew subdued.

The ice had congealed again. It hardened as the minutes dragged and the silverware clinked. Beth pushed food around on her plate, thinking her mother had been blindly unrealistic to believe this welcome home dinner could succeed.

Holly and Duane got up to leave before dessert. Beth followed them to the dining room door, where Duane hugged her again. "I'm satisfied you're all right now," he said.

Beth turned to Holly, who was her nearest sister in age. There was no light of affection in Holly's grayish-green eyes. Beth attempted to bridge the gulf just the same. "Thank you for being here tonight. Abby and I both enjoyed meeting Josh."

"I came because Mom asked me to."

Beth wondered if the cold blast could be felt across the room. She felt the chill of it long after Holly's departure.

Chapter 3

Just after sunrise the following morning, Beth answered Rita's light rap on her door. "Mom sent me to invite you to breakfast. I didn't think you'd be awake." Rita's gaze fell on Beth's pink sweat suit, then the open French doors. "It's cold out."

"I need a run, but I'm worried Abby will feel lost if she wakes up alone in a strange place."

"Leave her door open. I'll listen for her. I'm right downstairs in the kitchen. She knows where that is."

"Thanks, Rita. I won't be long." Beth bounded down the lobby stairs and out the front door.

The lake beckoned, still and glassy. Beth warmed up on the front steps, then ran at an easy pace down the sloping meadow to the water. From there she moved onto the paved road leading to the cabins. It was her first run in several weeks, and she wasn't accustomed to the altitude yet. She turned back when she reached the first cabin.

A truck with a blue and white camper came along the road behind her, heading toward the Lodge. The driver tapped his horn as he approached, and waved as he passed. Out on the lake, another man glided a canoe toward the landing below the Lodge.

Beth ran on. The clean air moved in and out of her lungs. There were no freeway sounds, no airplanes above, no other people, and no smog. The only sounds besides her own were those of the birds and a fresh breeze rustling the trees and stirring the lake. The immense peace stilled her mind. The movement of her feet over the earth liberated her as nothing else ever had.

When she reached the parking lot she slowed and passed the blue and white camper at a walk. Its occupant was seated in the shadow of the cab. She would've called good morning and introduced herself, but his window was closed and he held a telephone to his ear. A cellular phone, up here. So much for leaving the city behind. Beth grinned to herself and continued into the lobby.

Peter Lloyd sat in his truck and watched Beth run up the steps and enter the Lodge, leaving the door wide open behind her; and he sincerely wished his phone hadn't rung just now. He'd hoped to speak to her out here, alone.

The second he'd seen her running along the side of the road, he'd been swept back to the day they first met. Every memory of her was as clear in his mind as if it had happened yesterday.

It had been in a hospital in Corona. Peter had known which room he wanted by the guard stationed outside. Inside, he'd introduced himself, explained the patient's injuries to her, the more urgent surgery she'd undergone to save her life, the surgery they'd performed to save as much function as possible in her left knee. She remained silent. He shone his penlight into her eyes and commented on how gray they were. No response, except from the pupils in those deep gray irises. He finally went to the door, his curiosity stymied.

"Does her family know she's here?" he asked the guard.

"Doesn't want them to."

Peter glanced back into the room. The flicker in her eyes was like a lantern signaling. He returned to her side, and for the fifth or sixth time he wondered why she was here.

Not literally why. He knew about the attack in the prison infirmary. A doctor had been killed and a nurse and three guards injured. The inmate who'd waged the brutal attack was dead. One of the injured guards had told Peter that a young inmate saved her life. This inmate, Elizabeth Gray. She'd been brought in well after the others, badly beaten, with fractured ribs, a lacerated spleen, and a gunshot wound to her knee.

Peter wondered why she'd appeared in his life again. Not that she'd actually been in his life before. Only her picture, and a strong sense of familiarity. It was a cosmic why, the why-am-I-here kind of why. He didn't expect an answer. It was the end of a long and arduous shift. He needed to unwind, he told himself, before the drive to his parents' house and then home. So he lingered at her bedside.

She stirred and said something he didn't hear. He leaned nearer.

"What happened to Tilly?" she murmured.

"Tilly?" Then he recalled the injured nurse. "She's down the hall. She's going to be fine. So are you, you realize that, don't you, Elizabeth?"

She blinked at him, then shifted her focus. Peter sat there for a full minute before she spoke again. "My father's a doctor. Was. I keep forgetting he's not there. The Lodge wasn't the same place, after he died."

"The Lodge?"

"Wilder Mountain Lodge, in the northern Sierras. I was the first Gray born at the Lodge in a hundred years. My father planned to leave the Lodge to me. My brothers and sisters didn't like that plan, but he used to tell me I was like him. I miss the Lodge, the lake and the trees."

"What is that, the Lodge? Is that your house?"

Her chuckle was silky, sleepy. "Too big. It's an inn, built like an English manor, during the Gold Rush days. Later it became a hunting and fishing lodge. My mother closed it, after my father died."

It started that way, and she kept talking. He should go home, the nagging voice of worry told him, not sit here and listen to a killer ramble on about her home and childhood. A murderer who'd grown up in a fishing lodge. "I used to like to fish, when I was younger," he found himself saying.

"You don't like to now?" Dark eyes watched him, wide and softly lit. He felt torn between going and staying.

"Try to rest. You're safe here." He forced himself to go.

On his way to lunch a couple of days later, Peter steered his way into Elizabeth Gray's room without planning to. She looked up, lay her book aside, and asked if it was raining outside.

He went to the window and peered at the wet parking lot below. "What do you know? It is."

"You work too hard, if you go around not knowing what the weather's like."

He grinned at her. "You're probably right."

She returned a close-mouthed smile that favored the cut lip and lightened her eyes. That lightness, that vital glow, softened the contrast of her darker eyebrows and hair with her pale complexion. He lifted one end of the book beside her, a copy of Anna Karenina. "You prefer Tolstoy to TV?"

She grimaced. "I'd just as soon read a steamy romance novel. My mother's an English teacher. She sends me lists of books she thinks will improve my mind, and she quizzes me in her letters to see if I've read them. I've told her I don't think poetry and literature are going to help me get an entry level job in another twelve years, but I do like the poetry."

The weight of her situation slammed home in Peter's mind. She'd be thirty-two in twelve years. "Aren't you eligible for parole before then?"

She didn't answer that. "When will I be able to run, Dr. Lloyd?"

"You're a runner?" His words came out choked.

"That's what I'm asking you."

He explained again that she'd need follow-up surgery, and lengthy physical therapy. "Let's see how it heals," Peter concluded. "I've been wondering why you helped that guard."

Her smile vanished and she looked at her hands. "Why not?"

Harry, another guard, barged in carrying a big rain-splotched envelope and emptied it onto the roll-away table. "Fresh letters, paper, pencils, and Wordsworth. Oh, and your drawing for Tilly." He glanced at Peter as he handed her a slender blue book and a roll of paper, then he turned and left the room.

"'Why not' isn't an answer," Peter said, getting back to why she'd helped the guard.

She clearly wanted to forget that conversation. He returned her look steadily, waiting.

"I can't think straight today. Doctors. A drug for every occasion, just like my father." Her gaze flickered. "My actions only baffle you because I've been convicted of murder. If anyone on the street helped someone out of a spot like that, they'd be praised, and no one would question their motive. You question mine because you think I have no regard for life. I've already been judged, Doctor."

Her bitterness disturbed him. What did she want? She'd killed someone. Of course that changed how people viewed her and her motives. Suddenly Peter felt anxious to change the subject. "What do you do besides read?"

"Draw, study, and work in the textile factory." She shook her head and shifted, looking pained and sheepish. "That's not true. I like to sew, and I want to learn upholstery; but the doctor before Severn said I shouldn't operate machinery, because I'm taking medication. I clean floors. Someone gets a perverse delight out of assigning a well-read inmate to janitorial and a less bookish one to the library. It's engineered to humiliate generally."

"What do you study?"

"Business. Are you always so serious?"

"Serious? No." Until Claire's illness, no one had ever accused him of being too serious. He rubbed his face. "I've ... had a tough year." He turned away and headed for the door.

"May you have only one," she said in a gentle tone. Then she picked up the roll of paper. "Will you give this to Tilly for me? I'm afraid I won't see her before she retires."

He took it from her and unrolled the color-pencil portrait. The woman in the drawing wore a knowing, humorous expression in her liquid brown eyes. Her broad smile was brilliant against mahogany skin and black hair. Humor dwelt in the graceful arches of her eyebrows, warmth moved in the gentle curve of her lips. The drawing was dated and signed in one corner, "E. R. Gray." There was a note that read, "Tilly, Happy Retirement. Please don't come back. Love, Beth."

"You're an unusual lady," Peter said, meeting her gaze.

"Ladies don't wind up in prison."

Peter's stomach growled as he left her room, and he tried to think only about lunch. There was lady written all over her face, in her speech, and enlivening her big soft eyes from deep inside. Why had she wound up in prison?

"She going to be okay, Doc?" Harry said. "I mean the leg."

Peter gave a non-committal answer and walked away. Then he turned around. "Why isn't she allowed visitors?"

"She doesn't want them. Never has." Harry frowned at her door and shook his head. "She's the only one I've heard of with that distinction."

"Why wouldn't she want visitors?" Peter said, half to himself.

"I asked her once. Said she's trying to leave her past behind. But you saw her in there, reading books and poetry her mother sends her. Doesn't sound like she's making a clean break, does it?"

Peter took the portrait to Tilly's room, and found five young men and women there. They crowded that side of the room and made enough noise for Peter to be relieved the other bed was empty. Tilly sat up in bed with one arm in a sling, laughing. She opened her eyes wide when she saw Peter, and grinned at him. "Hello."

"I'm Dr. Lloyd. I have something for you from Beth Gray."

She took the roll, thanked him, and had the young woman nearest her open it. Tilly's mouth opened, and the others began talking excitedly.

"Mom, I'm going to have this framed and hang it in the living room," the daughter who held the drawing said.

Tilly leaned forward, and the younger woman inched the drawing closer. Tilly burst into tears. "Oh, put it away before I spoil it!"

"Mom, what's wrong? It's beautiful."

Tilly looked at Peter with her great brown eyes swimming in tears. "That girl saved my life and drew this picture, and she won't let me visit her. Well, I'm going to write her once a week." Tilly looked at Peter again. "Children, get out. I need to talk to this man." She waved her good arm at them, and they filed out.

"I'm her nurse," she told Peter. "Have been for two years. She saved my life, and she saved that guard's life, when Dr. Severn was killed. Did she tell you what happened?"

"I heard it from the guard."

"Well she couldn't see it the way I did. Beth wouldn't pick up that gun to save herself. She couldn't. She saw something."

"Saw something?"

"Something only she could see, in here." Tilly pointed at her head. "It like to got her killed."

"Are you saying she hallucinated?"

Tilly looked disgusted. "She told me her own lawyer wanted to prove she's psychotic. But she's been evaluated and tested, probed and questioned until she doesn't care if she ever sees another doctor. No, I'm not saying she hallucinated!"

"What, then?"

"I don't know. Dr. Severn had just been saying how he thought she has posttraumatic stress. He'd just finished talking to her for the first time." Tilly's eyes filled with tears again. "Then he gets killed, on his first day. Nothing like that's happened in all the time I've worked there. With a gun. The guards don't even carry guns."

"Do you think she flashed back to killing that boy?"

Tilly glared at him. "So you think you know why she's in CIW."

"I read a newspaper article soon after she was arrested."

"Did she tell you why she's in prison?"

"She says she was convicted of murder."

Tilly nodded. "Exactly. She never says she committed murder, just that she was convicted. Do you see the difference? She says it's like a puzzle she should've solved but couldn't."

"Do you think she's in denial about the murder?"

"That child never killed anyone." Tilly pursed her lips, resolute.

"Tilly, did she tell you she didn't kill him?"

"She won't say, and there's no convincing someone who doesn't know her the way I do. But I see criminals every day who claim they're innocent. I see spoiled rich white girls who thought they could get away with anything until they got locked away for a while. She's different."

He couldn't help a smile. "Tilly, don't mistake affability for innocence." He'd grown uneasy about Beth Gray. He wanted a reason not to care so much, not to worry about her.

"Look in her eyes and ask her if she killed that boy, Dr. Lloyd."

Peter entered the guarded room early that evening and found his patient leaning over the rail of the bed, whimpering as she struggled to reach something out of view on the floor.

When she saw him, she lay back and moaned, clearly hurting a lot. She was sweating, and there was a wildness in the depths of her eyes. Drawings and art supplies were strewn across the bed, table and floor.

"It didn't hurt this much when she hit me. She really beat the hell out of me, didn't she?"

He picked up the drawing she'd been trying to reach, of an old gnarled oak tree. Then another, of a spruce. Both were signed and dated today. "Seems to me you should be studying fine arts instead of business." He gathered the rest together, collected the pencils and replaced them in the fallen box.

When he stood up, her wary, searching look didn't comfort him. The bruised side of her face and the cut lip gave her a desperate, rakish appearance. He handed her the stack of drawings and moved away. "If you re-injure yourself, you'll be stuck in bed that much longer. Call for help next time."

She nodded silently.

He remained beside her until she met his gaze. "Why are you in prison, Beth?"

She blinked. "You said you knew." She turned to place the stack of drawings on the table, then hesitated, clearly unwilling to repeat a painful movement. Peter rolled the table closer, took the drawings from her and placed them on it, within her reach. Then he sat in the chair on the other side of the bed and faced her.

"Talk to me, Beth. Why are you in prison?"

She spoke quietly, without expression, and didn't meet his gaze. "I was sentenced to fifteen years for the murder of a fourteen-year-old boy named Oliver Stevens."

"'Sentenced ... for the murder of.' You never say you killed him, do you?"

Her gaze flicked in his direction, cautious.

"You're careful never to say that, aren't you?"

"I don't have to be careful."

"Why?"

"Only lies require planning."

"Did you kill him?"

She looked at her hands and didn't answer.

"What do you have to lose by telling the truth now? You're in prison. Why won't you answer me?"

"Because ..." Her face took on a drawn look as the light faded out of it. She looked straight at him. "I don't want to see your eyes filled with disbelief."

Peter stood and turned away. He rubbed the back of his neck.

"He's dead. I'm locked up. Talking about it won't change that."

Peter turned to face her again. She rested her head against the pillow and gazed at the window with a hungry look.

"What did you see when you tried to pick up the gun in the infirmary?" he asked.

Her eyes widened and she met his look again. Then she slid her gaze away and closed her eyes.

He glanced at his watch. "I have to go."

"Wait." She focused on something not present in the room.

He sat down and waited.

She held out her right hand. "I saw ... my father's gun ... in my hand. I saw Ollie Stevens lying on the ground in the moonlight, that night."

"The night you killed him?"

She caught and held his gaze, then brushed beads of sweat off her upper lip. "The night he died."

"Did you see him die?"

She parted her lips, then she went still, watching Peter. "Picking up a gun that night got me into such a mess, I don't think I could ever do it again." She cleared her throat.

Peter sat and looked at the floor, feeling slightly ill. She still wouldn't say it, but now he grew convinced she was innocent. Twelve more years? It was almost as much a waste of life as Claire's illness. Almost.

He sat up straight, suddenly anxious to leave. That was when he remembered, stuck his hand in his pocket and retrieved the small bag of chocolate kisses. "These are for you." He placed them in her hand. "Tilly told me you love chocolate."

She smiled sweetly at him. "Thank you." She opened one, bit half of it off and sucked it with a rapt expression.

Peter had known her barely three days. He'd been hearing her voice in his dreams, seeing her face, and watching for her among crowds, ever since.

His attention returned to the present. The caller was his brother. "I tried you at home first. You're out early. Fish biting already?"

"Not yet. I'm about to have breakfast." Seated in the driver's seat of his camper, Peter watched the door Beth had left open when she entered the Lodge.

"Have you checked your mailbox lately? I want to be sure my package made it there."

"Tim, you didn't have to buy me a gift. You're buying me dinner--"

"I know, but I got a fantastic deal on this, from a client, so just enjoy it. When's your interview?"

Peter sighed, watching his friend Leigh glide his canoe to the landing. Then he said a hurried goodbye to Tim and went to meet Leigh. They walked around to the kitchen together.

Breakfast aromas drifted into the hallway along with the voices of the family Beth hadn't been a part of in years. A familiar ache, a longing she hadn't allowed herself to explore in a long time overwhelmed her all at once. She paused outside the kitchen door, leaned against the wall, and willed the heaviness to leave her before she faced the people in that room.

"You trust Rita to cook for your guests, Mom?" Jack said in the kitchen.

"They're family," Rita said.

"Beth brought some of her lemon marmalade," Emily said. "Put that out for the toast, Rita."

Vicky murmured something Beth couldn't make out, and Jack laughed. Beth pushed away from the wall and entered the kitchen with a cheery "Good morning."

Jack's laughter silenced as if someone had pulled his plug. Emily lifted her gaze from her newspaper and smiled. "Sit here, Beth." She beckoned to two empty places between her and Matt. "There's room for Abby next to you when she wakes up. All these strangers must be overwhelming for her."

"You're the picture of health, this morning." Jack's eyes flashed as he met Beth's gaze.

"Beth was always an active child," Emily said. Jack glanced at Vicky and chuckled. "What is it you find so amusing, Jack?" Emily eyed him over her reading glasses.

Jack looked thoughtful for an instant. "The drama of it all, Mother. More coffee?"

"Please."

Jack filled Emily's cup from a carafe on the table. "Beth?"

"Please." Beth wished she'd allowed herself time to shower and change. Emily looked impeccable, not at all like a woman who planned to grub around in a garden all day. Jack was neatly combed, in a polo shirt and trousers. Vicky wore mascara and lipstick. Her hair's tight curls were caught up in a precarious French braid.

Matt, on the other hand, was unshaven and dressed in ragged navy blue sweats. He watched Beth with a sleepily insolent expression, which she had trouble meeting.

Beth had just decided to take the chair nearest her mother when Jack placed her coffee beside Matt. Jack leaned back and grinned a challenge at his brother. They appeared to wait to see which chair Beth would choose.

"Sit down, Beth," Emily prompted.

The back door opened. Two men entered, said a general good morning and removed jackets, revealing plaid shirts tucked into blue jeans. Beth went over to introduce herself. After last night's dinner, two strangers were easier to face than her family, especially Matt.

She offered her hand to the man from the canoe first. "I'm Beth Gray."

"Leigh Turner." He held her hand an extra second or two, his intelligent hazel eyes level with hers.

"Leigh, it's nice to meet you." She turned to the taller man, and stopped short when she realized she knew him.

His pale blue eyes lit with what Beth presumed was recognition as he took her hand. His handshake was warm and firm, his voice deep and resonant, almost a caress. "Peter Lloyd."

"We've met before," Beth said.

His gaze deepened as if in surprise, then he shook his head. "I'm not from around here."

"You're just in time," Rita said, carrying plates to the table. "Sit down."

Beth took the seat nearest Matt, feeling challenged on all sides, and determined not to let it get to her. Leigh Turner took the seat across from her. Peter Lloyd sat beside Vicky.

"I'm sure we've met, Peter," Beth persisted.

He shook his head. "I must have one of those faces."

"No, I'm certain. I don't mistake faces. It was--" Beth glanced at Emily and closed her mouth, realizing she didn't want to say where they'd met, or how, in front of her mother.

Peter cleared his throat. His solemn gaze rested on Emily before it returned to Beth. Beth dragged her attention away and found Leigh Turner regarding her thoughtfully. "Certainly he would remember you," Leigh said. "Wouldn't you, Peter?"

"Most certainly," Peter agreed. "I moved here five years ago," Peter added, capturing Beth's gaze again. Now his eyes twinkled. "The fishing came highly recommended."

Jack chuckled. "We haven't decided whether Peter is more serious about doctoring or fishing. I don't think he knows."

"Peter's a physician." Matt said helpfully.

Beth barely noticed this was the first time Matt had spoken to her. She returned Peter's gaze, her knowledge confirmed. Why did he deny knowing her?

Jack leaned toward Beth with the last corner of his toast in his hand. "The marmalade isn't bad. No bitterness?"

His tone made her wonder if he hinted at something besides the quality of the marmalade. "No bitterness," she said evenly.

"Funny, I don't recall you being much of a cook."

"I'm not. Lemon marmalade, cookies and pies are the extent of my culinary skills, as my ex-husband and daughter will attest."

Someone chuckled. Beth glanced at Peter Lloyd again.

"Your talents clearly lie elsewhere," Leigh said. "You've come to the right place to let others do the cooking. Good food abounds here."

"Thank you, Leigh," Rita said and shot a smug look at Jack.

"Leigh teaches Robin's third grade class," Emily told Beth, "and he's an accomplished artist. I hope you'll show Beth your artwork."

Leigh's face colored. "The portraits you painted of your mother and daughter are extraordinary. Perhaps you'll give me some advice while you're here. Portraits are an enigma for me." He spoke with the softest hint of an accent.

"I've had a lot of practice with portraits," Beth said. "I'd love to see your work."

Peter Lloyd spoke to Vicky, and Beth's gaze returned to him and lingered. She couldn't keep her eyes off him, or her mind off the puzzle of his presence here.

"You're welcome to come by my cabin and see them anytime," Leigh said.

Vicky looked Beth's way, and Peter met Beth's gaze. His was steady, searching. Under the weight of it Beth lowered her fork, glimpsed Matt's keen glance, and then realized Leigh had spoken to her. She blinked at him. "I'm sorry?"

"Mommy?" Abby said upstairs. Beth excused herself and ran up the stairs. When she eventually returned to the kitchen with Abby, everyone but Rita had gone.

Chapter 4

Later that morning, Rita and Vicky took Abby into town. Beth watched them leave with trepidation, while Emily assured her that Abby would be fine and invited her to work in the garden. "If you're feeling up to it," she added.

Beth rankled at her mother's indulgent tone and opted to spend a few hours engaged in the one activity for which she preferred solitude. She pulled a purple and gray swirl-patterned sweater over her shirt. Then she carried her portable easel and charcoals down to the lake and found a sunny spot on the eastern shore to sketch.

She drew the Lodge, thinking she would complete a final painting of it in pastels. She rediscovered her affection for the outward form of the Lodge, distinct from the pressures she felt when inside it.

The Lodge made demands on Beth. Her family home had a hold on her, in associations and unfulfilled obligations. It had haunted her for years through memories of her father, and in the time and energy her mother spent attempting to redeem his dead dreams. But the Lodge didn't despise Beth, it didn't believe things about her that were impossible to disprove. It didn't scrutinize her every action as she felt her family had in the past several hours.

The proportions of the third sketch pleased her, and she began to fill in the shapes of the surrounding landscape. The sun wound its way along the ecliptic while she struggled with a vague feeling that she was missing something. She removed her jacket, and later the sweater, as she grew more frustrated. Finally she stood with her arms crossed, and studied the sketch. This should be as effortless as any portrait, but when she looked for what was missing she felt disoriented. She shook herself. She was overanalyzing. It was just a building!

She felt a chill in the air, and bent to pick up her sweater.

"Isn't that turning into a bit of a mess?" a male voice said behind her.

Beth whirled around.

Peter Lloyd stood several feet away with a fishing rod propped beside him as he calmly tied a fly onto his line. He didn't look up, but continued what he was doing.

He wore the gray and black plaid shirt he'd worn to breakfast, only now the sleeves were rolled up past his elbows, disregarding the chilly breeze. His threadbare fishing vest, which appeared held together by its pockets, hung open because the zipper was broken. A largish nose gave his face an appealing strength, and his skin was lightly tanned, with a healthy glow, but the mark of intervening time in the set of his mouth and in the lines around his eyes had aged him. The years hadn't been kind, but Beth liked his face better this way.

After a swift glance her way, he cast his line into the shimmering, sunlit water beyond the shade of the trees. The sinews stood out on his bare forearms as he gripped the rod. He turned his head and grinned at Beth. "Sorry I startled you. I saw you running this morning. I take it the knee healed all right?"

She dropped her sweater and walked over to him. "So you do remember me. What are you doing here?"

"Catching lunch."

"I mean what are you doing in Wilder?"

He lifted his shoulders, and smiled mildly. That warmed his eyes and made her tingle a little all over. "Waiting around for you."

"You started making points right off, denying knowing me."

He lifted his eyebrows and didn't answer.

Her breath caught in her throat as she considered he might actually be serious. "But why? I mean, are you following me?" There was a word for people who did things like that.

Mischief tugged at the corners of his mouth. He looked about to laugh. "I've been here for five years, Beth. I got here first."

"You don't know what a shock you gave me, showing up at breakfast. Then you wouldn't even acknowledge you knew me."

He turned to the water and played with his line. "Doctor patient privilege."

"I thought that was supposed to protect me, not make me feel like a fool. Aren't you taking it to extremes? The patient acknowledged she knew you."

"You told me, twelve years ago, you didn't want your mother to know you'd been injured. Does she know now? Or did you want to tell her this morning, at breakfast?" He glanced sideways at her.

She looked down at his battered boots. "No. I still don't want her to know ... and how else would I explain knowing you? Okay, I understand. Thank you. But why are you here?"

"I already answered that question." He returned his attention to his fishing line and reeled it in.

"So five years ago you came here because, years earlier, one of your patients mentioned the magic word, fishing. You rented a cabin and decided the fishing was so good you never wanted to leave."

He answered with a squint and a lopsided grin. Then he prepared to cast again and she got out of his way. The fly hit the water. "Where else can I fish in the pristine serenity of a private lake not overrun by tourists? You did mention your mother had closed the Lodge."

"Will you stop kidding around? Oh never mind." She walked to her easel.

"Why is it so important to you?" He turned to face her again, his eyes narrowed and his smile no longer in evidence, the fishing rod gripped loosely in one hand. "Why did you come back?"

She moved closer to him again. She couldn't help her curiosity. Whether it was his claim to have come here looking for her, or just the tug of intense attraction, she couldn't say. He irritated and intrigued her. "My mother didn't tell you?"

"Your mother doesn't talk to me much. Your siblings, who do, have no idea why you're here."

Beth absorbed this in silence, and remained silent.

A sudden tug on his line distracted them both. He brought in a rainbow trout with the speed and dexterity of practice, and dispatched it more quickly and cleanly than she'd thought possible.

He lay his rod down, came over and stood facing her with his hands on his hips. "Well?"

"My siblings could've told you, I wasn't allowed to come back. The conditions of my parole prohibited me from returning to the vicinity of the crime."

He looked resigned. "That's not why you're here, it's why you stayed away."

"My mother had never met my daughter."

He shook his head. "Your mother could've visited you."

She didn't go into the reasons her mother couldn't visit. "I own half of a business I used to love being a part of, but I'm burned out. I came here for a vacation, to relax and paint."

"You could vacation, or paint, elsewhere."

"You're an exasperating man."

His grin returned. "That's not the reason you're here either."

She took a deep breath. "I had a bad case of pneumonia. I decided life is too short to spend it avoiding the place and the people I love most. I had to see it again."

Peter nodded, appearing satisfied, yet he said quietly, "Any other reason?"

"My ex-husband wanted ... I suppose I do need to ..." She dropped her arms to her sides and looked around without seeing. Then she closed her eyes and heard a car on the Lodge road.

Why did he have to stand so close, and stir up memories of a time she'd rather forget? Weren't there enough unanswered questions in her life? Why couldn't she ignore him? "To see if I can reclaim any lost dreams. To see if the shadows are as scary in reality as they are in my nightmares. To see if Gabriel and I still love each other."

He frowned. "Gabriel?"

"Gabriel Handley. We were engaged."

He turned toward the lake, still frowning.

Beth saw Vicky's small green car arrive at the Lodge, and moved toward her easel to gather her things together. Peter stepped between her and the easel. He touched her shoulder, and when she felt his hand through her purple silk shirt she wanted to lean into his strength. She stood rooted to the spot, feeling the weight of his gaze on her as plainly as she felt his hand on her shoulder.

"You're planning to see Gabriel while you're here?" he said.

"Yes, probably. I need to."

He stood in the sun now, and his eyes were lighter, a pale blue with dark gray rims around the irises.

"I'm afraid," Beth said. "I mean, he's at the center of that part of my life. The most important things in my life before Ollie Stevens' death were Gabriel and the Lodge." She blew out her breath. "Why am I telling you this?"

"Maybe you need someone who understands your history, rather than someone who's a part of it." Did he mean himself? He removed his hand from her shoulder and tucked his fingers into his back pockets, but he didn't move away.

"I have to find out for certain, first, about Gabriel. Don't I?"

He shook his head, wearing a lopsided grin. "You're asking the wrong guy. What will make you happy?"

"I don't know anymore. All I know is I'm not happy." The truth in her words surprised her. So did her tears. She cleared her throat and watched Abby skip toward them, ahead of Vicky.

Peter moved away and looked out over the lake, where Leigh glided his canoe across the water toward the Lodge. "If you have to see him, just do it, Beth. Do it soon." He turned to look at her. "Will you introduce me to your daughter?"

Abby ran over to them and Beth scooped her up and kissed her cheek before turning to Peter. "Abby, this is Dr. Lloyd."

"Hello." Abby stretched a hand toward him, narrowing her eyes. "Doctor?"

"Hi, Abby." He grasped her hand. "You can call me Peter."

"Peter, are you the doctor who's going to tell Mommy she's better, when she's had enough vacation?"

He glanced the question at Beth. She sighed, put Abby down, and began gathering her things together.

Abby went on in a serious, grownup tone of voice. "Mommy was very sick for a while, and I was worried. First she dreamed bad dreams and she wouldn't wake up. Then she was in the hospital in sensitive care, and even Daddy was scared. He said I shouldn't be loud or make her play hard for a long time, 'cause we have to take care of her. And Aunt Stella thinks Mommy's a worker--a workercolic. She never used to sleep, but now she's always tired and she sleeps a lot. So, I think you should keep your eyes on her for a while. Just in case."

Beth threw up her hands. "I've told her I'm okay. Maybe she'll believe it coming from you."

Peter squatted down on Abby's eye level. "You don't need to worry about Mommy anymore, Abby." He glanced at Beth again. "She looks pretty healthy to me."

"Why is she always tired?"

"She's building up her energy again after being sick. Even Mommies are supposed to sleep, Abby. No more worrying." He tugged on one dark curl, and Abby skipped away to meet Aunt Vicky.

"Feel free to bill me for that," Beth said, smiling.

He returned her smile, in silence at first. Then he said, "No charge. Just don't make a liar out of me."

Vicky approached, with Abby beside her. "Are you eating with us, Peter?"

"No, I have my lunch right here. I'll walk in that direction, if you ladies don't mind my company," he said with a glance at Beth.

Peter picked up his fishing gear. Beth was slower gathering her things and followed the other three. Vicky and Abby went ahead, while Peter waited for Beth, and walked close beside her. When they neared the northwest shore of the lake, he spoke privately. "If things don't work out with Gabriel, I hope I have a chance."

She paused and watched him move in long strides up the gentle slope ahead of her. Surely he hadn't waited around here for five years for her to show up. He seemed too grounded in reality to do something like that.

He turned and watched her, blue eyes wide and pale in the sunlight. Sober eyes, steady and unshakable.

Of all the men she'd met in the past several years, he had the best chance. There were no secrets to keep from him, no wondering when to tell him what. She had this compulsion to blab her life's story to him. But she couldn't stay.

He veered off, waving goodbye with his rod.

Abby had run ahead to meet her grandmother on the front steps. Vicky hung back in the parking lot, waiting for Beth. She made a bright splash of color in her coral pink tunic and pale gold leggings, with her hair released from the braid she'd worn at breakfast, glistening gold in the sunlight. Her pale green eyes sparkled in her freckled face. She approached Beth with a little smile like the one she'd worn when she asked Peter to lunch. Beth began to think Vicky was warming up to her.

"Making the rounds already, Beth? Is that the example you set for your daughter? Are you planning to sleep with every man in the county before you leave? That should be a recuperative vacation." Vicky turned and strode the rest of the way to the steps.

Leigh Turner joined the family for lunch, which was again served on the wide porch, west of the empty dining hall, to take advantage of the unseasonably warm weather. Today two square tables were pushed together to accommodate eight.

After a few false starts at conversation, Rita had fallen silent. Abby was tired and picked at her food. Matt and Vicky were both surly. Jack wore the same smug grin he'd worn through breakfast, but he said nothing. Emily appeared to daydream, her face a placid mask.

"The orchard looks spectacular in bloom. Did you get a lot of fruit last year?" Beth said, attempting once again to fill the awkward void. Was this why neither Peter nor Leigh had been here for dinner last night?

"I'm not convinced the cold is over," Jack said. "Too bad you won't be here to make jelly when the fruit's ripe, Beth. Your lemon marmalade is excellent."

She glanced at him, feeling he was laughing at her, or at someone. "Thank you, Jack."

Emily cleared her throat. "Gabriel plans to stop by one morning this week, Beth. He doesn't know about your visit. If you'd like me to cancel, I can."

"I want to see him. Gabriel is part of the reason I'm here."

"Who's Gabriel?" Abby said.

Beth glanced at her and caught sight of Matt, watching her with an unreadable expression. Jack scraped the floorboards with his chair, excused himself and left the table.

"Is Gabriel my uncle too?" Abby persisted.

"He's an old friend of your mother's," Matt said. "You can call him uncle if you want to."

"Like Aunt Stella? She's not my aunt either. She works with Mommy and Daddy at--"

"Abby!" Beth said.

"Wups." Abby lowered her eyes, and spoke in a small voice, "I'm not s'posed to talk about that."

"Who said you can't talk about that?" Vicky glared at Beth.

"I said." Beth met the challenge in her sister's eyes.

"I'm sorry, Mommy."

"I know. I'm sorry I snapped at you, sweetheart."

"I'm not hungry. I ate stuff at the other peoples' house. Can I go play with my dolls?"

"May I. Yes, go ahead." Beth watched her go through the dining hall.

"So, since you're hiding, Abby has to hide from us too?" Vicky said. "She has to keep your secrets for you?"

"Victoria, that's enough," Emily said.

"It's not enough, Mom. I can't believe you help her hide the way she does."

"It has nothing to do with you, Vicky," Beth said. "The life I've made for myself is my business."

"Then why did you come back? How dare you, after what you did?" Vicky's eyes blazed. "How can you sit here as if you have every right, and expect us to treat you like one of us?" Vicky spoke slowly, through clenched jaws, her eyes cold as she met Beth's gaze. "Ollie is still dead."

"Yes. He would be just as dead if I were still in prison. No one and nothing can change the fact that he's dead. Believe me, I prayed that could change, a thousand times, during the trial alone."

In the long silence that followed, Beth attempted to eat, and found her appetite had vaporized. She excused herself and took the stairs slowly.

Abby lay asleep on the carpeted floor of her room, with a soft cloth doll tucked in her arms. Beth covered her with a quilt and sat on the floor beside her to watch her sleep.

"No matter how I may want to change the past," Beth whispered, "I'll never regret that it included having you."

That afternoon, Beth and Abby found Emily seated with Rita in the kitchen, planning menus and making a shopping list. Beth asked her mother for keys to the unused rooms, so she could take Abby on a tour of the Lodge.

A smile appeared on Emily's face, and she got up at once. "Of course, just wait here while I get them."

"I'm trying to decide what to wear for my graduation," Rita said. "Mom says it has to be a dress, not pants. I'm giving a speech. What do you think, Beth?"

Beth watched Rita's sparkling, deep blue eyes, which she found curious in a member of her family. Rita was taller than Beth, with wide shoulders, a slender, athletic build and long legs. Her hair was short, straight and jet black. She was a striking-looking girl. "I recently saw a slim, two-piece outfit, with one of those little flared skirts, a long, slightly-fitted jacket with a round neck, no lapels. It was made of a soft rayon, in Navy."

"Navy?"

"It's a serious color, but it would make your eyes shine like sapphires."

Rita cracked a smile. "Sounds nice, but I don't know, Beth. I'm a blue jeans kind of girl. Nobody would recognize me."

"Isn't that what commencement is about?"

Emily returned a moment later with a large ring of keys. She placed them in Beth's hand with a satisfied pat. "These are for you to keep. You have the run of the place."

The keys were all labeled. Beth went through them and came to one marked TWR, an abbreviation for the tower. She removed it from the ring and handed it back.

"If Dad's collection is still there, I don't want this one. Are there any others you should've removed before you gave them to me? I warned you the other day on the phone, Mom. The firearms stay locked up as long as I'm here. I don't want to risk any trouble, and I don't want the keys, for God's sake!" Her voice shook with barely contained anger.

Her mother stared at her. So did Abby. Rita sighed and sent her mother an exasperated look.

"It's illegal, Mom, for me to be in possession of a firearm. I don't want there to be even the hint of a question about that. Do you understand?"

"I thought you were just worried about Abby. Here, there are two others to the gun cabinets in the library. Let me find them." Emily took the key ring, removed two small keys and handed the rest back. "I want to think that's all over for you now."

"It will never be over. Never!"

The Lodge had been modeled after an English castle, by one of Beth's ancestors who'd made the bulk of his fortune in a gold strike. The interior layout was an educated guess at best, arranged to suit his personal tastes and later reworked when it was converted into an inn.

The center stairs led from the lobby to the second floor of the Lodge, and no farther. The east and west stairways led all the way to the fourth floor. The tower had its own spiral stairs and connected to each floor of the Lodge via the outside gallery, but since the tower was locked for the duration of Beth's visit, she didn't bother to explain to Abby how it fit into the layout of the Lodge.

They explored the ground floor first: the library, music room, game room, the downstairs drawing rooms and smoking rooms. Eventually they reached Beth's father's medical clinic, which occupied the east end of the first floor. Beth marveled at how clean the examining rooms were. On the second floor, they avoided the rooms the family members occupied and inspected instead the unused rooms in the east end, where dustsheets shrouded antique furnishings. Abby insisted on seeing each room, lifting the dustsheets to see the objects beneath.

The fourth floor rooms were different, having been used for storage and as staff living quarters in distant years, when the Lodge had been in service first as a luxurious family residence and later as an inn. On the fourth floor, at the southwest corner of the Lodge, beside the tower, Beth eyed the last door and told Abby the tour was over. She moved toward the stairs.

"But we didn't see that one," Abby said, thorough as always.

"We're not going in there," Beth said.

"Just to look?" Abby pleaded.

Beth stood facing her daughter. This was ridiculous. How could she expect Abby to go through life avoiding the things she avoided so irrationally? That room carried no significance to anyone but Beth, of something that had happened before her earliest memory. It was the stuff of nightmares, but a child's nightmares. It wasn't something an adult should fear.

She nodded, inserted the key in the lock and turned it.

Her feet wouldn't move her past the threshold. She broke out in a sweat and her pulse thundered in her ears while she let Abby peek into the room, holding her firmly in her grip.

"You're not taking her in there, are you?" a male voice said.

Beth jumped.

Cornell stood on the stair landing several feet down the hall.

Beth drew Abby away, shut the door and removed her key from the lock. "No. You startled me, Cornell."

"I'm sorry." He came closer, looking annoyed with himself. "Mom told me you were showing Abby around. I haven't been in most of these rooms myself in years. Mom goes through them twice a year like clockwork, but she's obsessive about this place. Why did you open it?"

"Abby wanted to peek inside."

"I wouldn't think you'd want to go anywhere near it, especially with her."

"Abby doesn't share my fears, and I see no reason why she should. I thought about taking her inside, but as soon as I had the door open, I ... changed my mind." Her feet had changed her mind.

"Come visit for a while. You don't have to scare up every ghost in the place your first week here. Come on, Abby."

Late that same night, Beth woke with a shriek and sat up in bed, shivering and breathing hard. It took a moment to recall where she was.

She shivered, breathless, still caught in the terror of the dream. She pulled the covers closer to ward off the chill, took deep, slow breaths and told herself it was just a dream.

But she knew this wide-eyed, lingering apprehension. There would be no more sleep tonight, and she'd brought no work or knitting with her. Once she was calmer, she might sleep again. She had to get her mind off the dream.

She turned on the bedside touch lamp and slipped into her robe. She padded down the center stairs, through the lobby, into the library on the left. Her mother kept a stack of paperbacks on a corner shelf near the door. She snatched one off the top without looking at it and started back through the lobby.

"Bad dream?"

Beth jumped away from the murmuring shadow, releasing a sharp cry. It moved out of the darkness at the foot of the stairs into the faint light of the front lampposts shining through the diamond-shaped panes.

"Matt! You scared the hell out of me."

Like her, he was in his robe, barefoot.

"Sorry. I heard you cry out earlier. Then I wondered where you were going at this hour."

This was a hell of a time for him to start speaking to her, in the middle of the night after a nightmare. But his room was next to hers, so it was no surprise he'd heard her.

"I'm sorry I wakened you." She hugged the book. "Excuse me."

He followed her to the stairs. "Doesn't that frighten Abby?"

"What?"

"The screaming. Doesn't it wake her up?"

"Hardly ever. She's a sound sleeper. If I exchanged rooms with Abby, maybe it wouldn't waken you."

"That would put you next to Vicky. I normally only sleep here on weekends. I just wondered if you were okay." He stood beside her on the same step, speaking in a hushed tone. "What do you dream about that frightens you?"

"A shadow, with--" She stopped. Her voice had risen in pitch. "I can't talk about it now."

He watched her for a few seconds. "Well, try to get some sleep." He continued up the stairs ahead of her and into his room.

Chapter 5

Beth made a detailed color drawing of the Lodge from her spot beside the lake the following morning. As she worked, she realized what had been missing yesterday. The flags. The stars and stripes, with the grizzly bear flying below, billowing in a stiff mountain breeze, had been one of her favorite sights as a girl. "What happened to the flagpole?" she said aloud, to herself. She would ask her mother.

She couldn't help glancing around every so often, wondering if Peter would appear. He didn't, and neither he nor Leigh had shared dinner with the family last night, or breakfast this morning. Mealtimes with just the family were grimly silent, Abby's gregarious nature subdued by the implicit tensions. It was her own presence that caused the tension, Beth knew, yet she longed for a break from it.

She glanced up once and spotted Leigh approaching across the sloping meadow from the direction of the Lodge. He waved and shouted good morning. Then he came and stood beside her and studied her work.

"I've never noticed the diamond shapes of the panes reflecting light that way. How does that happen, when they're in shadow? Oh, I see, it would be the reflection off the lake at dawn. You have to know it the way you do, I suppose, having grown up here."

"For some reason I know it better today than I did yesterday. I think even Peter would like this one."

"I think he would wonder why you're painting the Lodge instead of the lake." Beth turned to read his expression. Leigh met her gaze and grinned. "Peter is an honest critic. Objective and analytical."

"Refreshingly honest," she said, grinning. "Where are you from, Leigh?" She began filling in the orchard grass as she listened to the soothing rhythm of his speech.

"I was born in Boston, but I spent most of my childhood in Austria. When I was thirteen and my mother remarried, I came back to live with my father."

"Rita told me you and Peter eat at the Lodge with the family when I'm not here. You're not staying away because of me, are you?"

He put his hands in his pockets, looking uneasy. "Your mother thought the family should have some time to themselves while you're here, to work things out."

"She asked you to stay away?"

"For dinner, at least."

"Don't, please. I'll talk to Mom about it. The family isn't growing any closer without you. We hardly know what to say to one another in private. If you can stand the awkwardness my presence effects, I'd like you to share our meals."

"I would appreciate that. Faith and your sister are rather marvelous cooks, and meals were part of the original agreement with your mother. Sometimes Peter is busy."

She went back to work. "Do you fish, Leigh?"

"You're not what I expected," he said. "I thought you'd be more like Vicky."

"Oh. My father's family were all redheads, and my mother's--"

"That's not what I meant by comparing you to Vicky. After prison, I expected you to be bitter, and I expected you to be more worldly than your sisters, in a crude way, while ... you're rather elegant."

She looked at him in some surprise. "I'm relieved you can say kind things about me, but I am bitter, Leigh. So bitter, I'm amazed I can contain it for any length of time." She brushed off her hands and turned to face him. "My freedom was stolen from me. I didn't understand at the time what made people think I could be so violent. I realize now how damning the evidence was. But things were brought up at the trial, things I know I didn't do or say. They made me sound ... cunning. Even psychotic." She shook her head. "I've learned to keep my bitterness inside."

"Don't you express it, even in your artwork?"

"What purpose would that serve? I find myself wanting to blame someone from time to time, and I rail against the hopelessness of changing the past. Sometimes I'm even angry with God."

"No one knows about the burning inside," he said. "Beth, will you let me make a pencil sketch of you?"

"I suppose."

He nodded, then his expression clouded again. "I've found something I think you ought to see." He turned around and looked in all directions, even up at the dense shrubbery on the hillside that sloped toward the road. Beth waited, itching to resume her work. Finally Leigh spoke again.

"Soon after I came here, my students showed me the pool in the clearing where Ollie Stevens was killed. I thought they were talking about something that happened recently, something they remembered and needed help coping with. That was when I learned about you."

Beth turned away to remove her paper and collapse her easel. She'd suddenly had enough.

Leigh went on. "I developed a morbid fascination with the place, and the murder, and I started researching it. I talked to people, read old newspaper accounts. I learned more details as time went by. Often they were in conflict. For instance, I heard there was a note you wrote Ollie, telling him to meet you there that night, but the note was never found. The Stevens twins had a secret mailbox where they left each other messages, but no one knew where it was. I started thinking how natural it might be that the hiding place was near where the boy was killed, since the two were connected, and I wondered more and more about the notes."

Beth shivered involuntarily.

"I'm sorry," Leigh said. "You don't want to talk about this."

"Go on." She'd finished packing her things and stood listening. She zipped up her jacket.

"I found an old tree near the swimming pool, about thirty yards into the woods. It was hollow, and someone had placed a wooden birdhouse inside it. Inside the birdhouse I found an old tin box, rusted shut. I destroyed it, prying it open. There was a note inside, wrapped in an old plastic bread wrapper. It aroused my curiosity, and I took it home."

He pulled a piece of folded paper out of his shirt pocket. "This is a photocopy. The original is at my cabin." He handed the paper to her furtively, and glanced around again.

Beth's thoughts, which had seemed so lucid earlier, dissolved into a white mist, and she hardly knew how to register what Leigh was saying. She half expected to find one of his drawings on the paper when she unfolded it. But it was a photocopy of a hand-printed note, all in block letters. The second line had been scratched out:

"OLLIE--

IF YOU DON'T STOP BOTHERING

STAY AWAY FROM ME OR I'LL KILL YOU.

BETH"

"I don't understand." Her voice shook. So did her hand. She gave the paper back.

"You didn't write that. The printing isn't yours." He held the paper out to her again.

"I know, but--" She suddenly understood and looked into his eyes. "How do you know it isn't my printing?" She frowned, dispirited and more confused than ever.

He met her gaze. "You said earlier you sometimes want to know who to blame for what happened to you, that you sometimes blame God, that your freedom was stolen. You weren't surprised just now when I said the printing wasn't yours."

"You're taking my word for it? You don't even know me. My own sis--"

He raised his hand. "I saw your printing recently, on the back of a photograph you sent your mother. I'm convinced you didn't write this note. But let's prove you didn't. Give me a sample of your printing."

"Are you a handwriting expert?"

"No. I have a friend, a calligrapher, who studies antique documents. I've mentioned this note to him. He offered to look at it, to compare it with samples, if I could get them."

"When did you find the note?"

"Almost three years ago."

"But it couldn't have still been there, more than twelve years after Ollie died."

"It was sealed in that tin, in plastic, sheltered from the weather."

"But it's not the note they talked about at the trial."

"That one is probably lost forever. There were supposed to be several threatening notes, weren't there? This was most likely written by the killer."

She stared at him again for a moment, then closed her eyes. "If I let myself believe this--" She broke off, afraid to finish the thought. She took a deep breath.

"That you can clear your name?"

She straightened, suddenly decisive. "I want to see the original."

He nodded. "Can you come to my cabin now, and bring a sample of your printing?"

Beth picked up her easel. "I'm sure I have something in my room. Vicky's the only one home."

"No need to tell her where you're going. She won't want to come anyway."

Something in his tone made her curious. "Are you and Vicky romantically involved?"

He nodded. "We were, until shortly before you came home. Her attraction to me has waned in favor of Peter."

Beth dropped her things off in her room. Vicky watched Beth and Leigh leave the lobby together, no doubt convinced Leigh was about to be debauched.

Leigh spoke of the weather and other equally mundane topics while they walked just over a mile and a half to his cabin. It stood nestled in the woods, between fingers of land that reached out into the colder depths of the lake, overshadowed by the bulk of mountains to the south and west. A small beige truck stood in front of it.

"Peter lives there." Leigh nodded in the direction of the furthest cabin as he opened his door for Beth. She glimpsed Peter's blue camper, just visible through the trees to the south, before Leigh closed the door. Then she pulled her samples out of her pocket.

"May I see your artwork, while you compare these with the note? I need a distraction."

He showed her into the smaller room he used as a studio and left her alone to study the drawings and paintings that lined the walls and filled the corners and cabinets. Her opinion improved with each new revelation. Leigh was better than she ever hoped to be. Apart from his sheer talent, she withheld something from her work, the very emotions Leigh couldn't believe she didn't express.

Everything he painted he blessed with honesty. He expressed it all: the stark loneliness of an ancient incense cedar in the cemetery, the frigid depths of the cove outside his own back door, the splash of an osprey plunging feet first for a fish. There was sorrow here. There was danger, exultation and mastery.

Beth dragged her attention away with difficulty when Leigh appeared in the doorway, and she spread her arms as she faced him. "Leigh, you have such treasures here. Have you shown much of your work?"

"Only to friends, and my pupils. I've given quite a lot as gifts."

"What does Peter say about your artwork?"

"He says I'm brutal. I'm not sure what he means. I don't depict any sort of cruelty. Except for the osprey, but that's survival, and Peter kills fish all the time."

"Leigh, do you even know how talented you are?"

"Actually, I do think I'm rather good," he said with a mild smile. "I value your opinion though, because I admire your work so much. Your mother's shown us other drawings and things from time to time, but in portraits you capture spirits."

"For a long time all I did was people and trees."

He smiled mildly. "Peter's favorite is the jacaranda."

She looked away, heartened by that after Peter's criticism yesterday, and perplexed that his opinion meant so much. "My work is tame and banal in comparison. Leigh, don't you want to sell it?" She turned to face him again.

He'd backed away. "No, I think not. Please, choose one of these for yourself. I'll be interested to see which you like."

She chose the drawing of the old cedar tree in the cemetery. It wasn't as dramatic as many of the others, but it was a familiar scene, something from home that she wanted to keep. "Thank you, Leigh."

"Your samples don't match the note. Come see."

Beth sat at his kitchen table and compared the note with her own printing. No one could mistake the printing for hers. She took a deep breath, let it out slowly as she allowed the seed of hope to plant itself in her mind.

"Part of me wants to take it straight to the sheriff," she said, "but in his mind the case is closed. I don't feel right about you and I being the only ones who know about it. Do you mind if we show it to Peter?"

"Do whatever you wish with the note, Beth. You can keep it, or let my friend study it, or turn it over to the sheriff. Of course we can show it to Peter. Shall I call him now?"

"Please, and I do want your friend to look at it. Will you show Peter and me where you found it?"

He phoned Peter, who came at once and listened while Leigh explained how he'd found the note. Then Peter studied Beth's samples briefly, while Beth's tension mounted. She longed to hear him announce that this proved she wasn't a murderer. He remained silent.

The three of them rode together in Peter's truck, parked in front of the Lodge, then walked past the tennis courts and empty stables, across the orchard and main road, to the trail leading into the woods. Where it split, they took the left fork leading alongside the creek. They crossed over a rough wooden footbridge and continued until the mixed forest opened into an oak grove, then into the sunlit clearing where Carter's Creek filled a deep, tranquil pool.

Beth's gaze went directly to the spot where the dead boy had lain, a silent shadow. She paused at the near edge of the clearing, remembering. She'd noticed the gun near his feet, where tiny plants now forced their way out of the soil, preparing to bloom. Moonlight had glinted off the mother-of-pearl grip, enticing her to touch it.

"Beth?" Leigh's voice drew her back to the present. Both men watched her, and she realized she'd been staring at her hand for some time. Peter touched her shoulder. She glanced up, intensely relieved by the contact, believing his touch had the power to anchor her in the present. He didn't speak, but his quiet eyes communicated understanding. Gratitude flooded through her and she moved on, with Peter's hand on her back as he steered her around the edge of the clearing.

An old California black oak stood in the gully Leigh descended. It was fire hollowed on the uphill side. The hollow was large enough for a toddler to stand in, sheltered from view by thick brush and large, scarred rocks. The birdhouse was still there, faded and splintering, on top of a rock that was flat on top and just small enough to have been moved here by two boys.

Leigh removed the rotting lid of the birdhouse and showed his companions the rusted metal flakes.

No one said a word. Leigh replaced the objects and they returned to the clearing.

Beth walked deliberately to the far edge of the clearing and pointed at the ground.

"I found him here," she said. "At first I couldn't tell whether it was Owen or Ollie. They were identical twins. I could usually tell them apart, but that was when they were animated, and it was by expression and mannerism. When I saw the green gloves stuffed under his belt, I realized it could only be Ollie. He never let Owen wear them.

"The gun was there." She pointed at the ground. "I recognized it, and I picked it up. When Owen came running through the trees, he startled me, and I fired it accidentally.

"But not at him, or Ollie, or anyone. I never could--" She stopped, took a breath. "There were seven rounds fired altogether, but only three hit Ollie, two in the arm and one in the chest. They never found any of the other bullets, but I know the clip was full earlier that day."

"Earlier that day?" Leigh cast a furtive glance at Peter.

Beth nodded. "I'd found my father's desk drawer jimmied open that afternoon. The gun was kept in it. I checked the gun, then I locked his office. Matt came in while I was there and asked what I was doing. I said I was going to shoot someone. It was a stupid thing to say, but as kids we joked around that way sometimes, trying to scare each other.

"I forgot about finding the desk broken into. So did Matt. I didn't mention it again until after I was arrested. They thought I broke open the desk and took the gun to shoot Ollie. That made no sense, because I had a key to it.

"They found residue on my hands. The note they said I'd written Ollie, telling him to meet me, was still here somewhere, according to Owen. The sheriff and prosecutor theorized the wind blew it away." She glanced at each of the men. "I remember it as a hot, still night, with a full moon and no wind."

She turned away, wondering why she bothered to tell this. She hated to even think about it. "I never wrote those notes. I didn't kill Ollie."

"Why were you out here that night?" Peter asked.

She hung her head. These memories exhausted her. "I used to walk at night when I couldn't sleep. My mother discouraged it, but it was as if I had the world out here to myself. She'd forbidden me to go out that night, after Vicky accused me of planning to. Something wakened me, though, and I couldn't get back to sleep. A noise, pea gravel hitting the window. I wanted to obey my mother, but I heard someone run off into the brush." What was she forgetting? She brushed sweat from her upper lip, sighed, and moved away to lean against a tree, holding her head.

"It's all right," Peter said. "You don't have to talk about it."

"I do. I want you to understand." She pointed through the woods. "I was back that way, closer to the bridge, when I heard the shots. I ran toward them instead of away." She met Peter's look, couldn't read his expression. "I didn't sense any danger. I thought it was a poacher, and I was indignant, as if I owned the place." She shook her head, looking down at the ground.

"People heard you threaten Ollie earlier that day," Leigh said.

She nodded. "Ollie used to deliberately frighten me. That's a whole story in itself. That afternoon was different though. He pushed me into the lake when I was wearing a wristwatch my father gave me. I wasn't frightened, I was angry. I thought the watch was ruined, and it was the last gift my father gave me before he died. I told Ollie I hated him and I'd kill him if he came near me again. I didn't mean it, it was--"

She caught her breath, remembering something else. "He said, 'I got your love note.' At the trial I thought Owen was making the notes up. Especially when he wouldn't say where the secret mailbox was."

She stopped talking, worried she sounded more crazy by the minute. She looked at Peter, who shifted his gaze to meet hers. The lines of his face softened and he motioned to her. "You'll be expected back."

They left with Peter in the lead and Leigh at the rear. Where the trail widened enough, they walked abreast with Beth in the middle. They moved at a leisurely pace, mostly in silence, with the dappled sunlight that played through the branches above waving on their shoulders. When they left the trail and crossed the main road again, they skirted the orchard and approached the Lodge and Peter's truck from the lake road. The cars in the parking lot indicated the others were back from church.

Leigh retrieved the drawing he'd given Beth from the cab of Peter's truck, and handed it to Peter. "She chose the cemetery. I need to find Emily before lunch and take care of next month's rent. Excuse me." Leigh hurried toward the Lodge, pausing to wave at Vicky, who stood at Rita's upstairs window looking out.

"Uh-oh." Peter turned and leaned against his truck door, facing the lake and Beth with a mischievous glint in his eyes. "You've been seen with me again. You're in for it now."

"So you know my sister's attracted to you?"

"I wouldn't call it attraction. It's more like fishing. Vicky goes after a lot of fish, but the one fish she's caught she never bothered to reel in."

Beth broke into a grin. "What does that mean? Does everything come down to fishing, with you?"

"Not everything." Peter sobered and looked at the lake.

"What are you doing here, Peter?"

He handed her the drawing, held her gaze as his hand brushed hers. "I already answered that question. Have you seen Gabriel?"

"No. It's only been a day since I told you I would."

"I'm impatient."

She started toward the Lodge. He fell into step beside her.

"I haven't baited my hook, Peter."

"You don't need bait. You have allure."

She avoided looking at him, but couldn't resist a smile at his audacity. His nearness insinuated itself on her awareness, wrapped up with an explicit pleasure. He was impossible to ignore.

Beth sliced bread, for lunch, while Rita made sandwiches and Emily tossed a big green salad.

Jack sat at the table with the newspaper and a freshly opened beer in front of him. Leigh's drawing of the cemetery lay on the table as well.

Jack laughed at it. "The cemetery. Isn't that a bit ghoulish, Beth? I know Leigh has macabre tastes, but I thought prison would have cured you of that."

Beth handed her sister two slices, then followed Rita's gaze. Cornell, Matt, Peter and Leigh stood in a half-circle out on the porch, talking. Abby hung onto Matt's hand. The kitchen door stood open and the four men and little girl had just turned their heads in this direction.

"Don't you ever think before you speak, Jack?" Rita said.

Jack leaned toward her, narrowed his eyes and said quietly, "I always do."

Emily carried the salad to the table, picked up Leigh's drawing and shook her head at it. "I don't understand why he gave you this one. Surely he's done something more cheerful."

Beth said nothing, considering this came from the woman who'd recommended she read Anna Karenina in prison, after attempting suicide. None of Leigh's subjects appeared to have stepped in front of a moving train.

"Take it up to Beth's room for her, Jack, before it gets soiled. Call the others. Lunch is ready."

Chapter 6

The ancient incense cedar that still stood sentinel over the cemetery was a giant with lace-like foliage, a heavily buttressed trunk, and cinnamon colored bark scarred by time. Its trunk was five feet thick and generously dotted with woodpecker holes, some filled with acorns from neighboring oaks. The top of the tree was dead, the victim of a lightning strike. Thick newer branches stuck out at right angles to the trunk, and shot upward to form a graceful canopy of flat green fronds. The tree grew several feet from the farthest of the graves, on the slope of the hill that rose gently to the west beyond the burial place.

Beth carried three white rosebuds from her car. She lay the first on her father's grave and the second on the new mound of Jay Handley's. She sat on the ground beside Jay's grave, recalling the last few conversations she'd had with him, fifteen years ago. Than she got up and searched for Ollie Stevens' grave and placed the third rosebud on it.

She would've left then, but she suddenly remembered too clearly the sight of the boy lying dead in the moonlit clearing. She pulled a tissue out of her jacket pocket, dried her eyes, turned back toward the parking lot and stopped. Peter's camper was parked beside her car, partially obscuring it from view. She glanced around, then turned full circle, searching for him among the headstones and the trees. She spotted him leaning against the trunk of the old cedar, with his head back, his arms folded across his chest and his eyes focused upward. Beth watched him until he looked at her and waved. Taking that for an invitation, she climbed the slight incline.

He wore faded blue jeans, and a T-shirt under the familiar plaid shirt, which was unbuttoned, with the sleeves rolled up. Beth wondered if he ever felt the cold.

"Roses," he said when she stood beside him. "Your mother's aren't blooming yet. Did you get those in town?"

"No, I robbed the vase in the dining room. That's part of my agreement with Mom. I don't have to go into town while I'm here."

"Where's Abby?"

"With Holly and Vicky." Beth shrugged. She turned and placed a hand on the bark of the big tree. "When I was a girl, I thought this tree was hallowed, sacrosanct, what God would be if He were a tree." She turned and leaned against the tree to watch him, basking in his smile. "What are you doing here?"

The smile became a pained expression. "You keep asking me that."

"I mean here by this tree, right now."

"Oh." He looked away.

"If you prefer to be alone, I can leave. I was about to."

"I'd like you to stay." He met her gaze again.

"Do you have an office in town, Peter?"

"I don't think most city doctors would call it an office. It's the old barbershop." He gestured toward his truck. "There's also my portable office, and I work three days a week at the hospital in McGuffey. I came here on vacation, during the summer. I camped and fished until the weather turned; then I talked your mother into renting me the cabin for the winter." He shot her a quick glance. "I've been looking around for more space, where I can have a staff. Suitable properties are scarce."

"I'm surprised you haven't persuaded my mother to lease you my father's clinic, at the Lodge."

He was shaking his head. "I've discussed it with her. She doesn't want to."

After a moment's silence, she said, "I'm having trouble with my decision to only stay four weeks." Beth stole a glance at those blue eyes.

"Sounds like we have the same problem."

"Not exactly." Hers had no solution.

He straightened, moved away from the tree and stood facing her. "The murder?"

"What else is there? It's all people here think about when they see me."

"There's lots else, Beth. What do you have, where you're living now?"

She sighed. "A partnership in a successful business, a little girl who happily divides her time between her father's house and mine, a house in a quiet neighborhood, and financial security. The downside is that my work is suffering because I'm not sure whether it's really what I should be doing with my life, my life is suffering because I feel burned out, and I've always disliked living in the city."

"Whereas here you have...?"

"Here I have a lot of people who don't want me around; a reputation as a murderer and, apparently, a loose woman; a few people who do want me. And yet, here I feel whole, natural. I just can't stay." She fell silent, depressed again.

"I'm divided between city and country," Peter said, "between living near family and fishing from my back porch. Between a polluted environment and a pristine one, between a stressful position on a hospital staff where I could stay busy earning a considerable income, and a small family practice that may be satisfying but may not pay the rent. Between memories, and possibilities.

"Let's vote," he said. "If you want Beth to stay, raise your hand." He raised his. So did she. He lifted his eyebrows. "It's unanimous."

She laughed. "If you want Peter to stay, raise your hand." The result was the same. "We both knew what we wanted all along." She noticed him watching her hands, and she fell silent, self-conscious. She pushed away from the tree. "I have to go. See you at dinner."

"Beth."

She stopped. She didn't want to leave. But he was about to get serious. She'd seen it in his eyes, and her instinct was to run.

"There's something I've wanted to ask ever since I met you." He caught one of her hands in his, frowned at it with a caution approaching tenderness. Then he rubbed his thumb across the lengthwise scars on her wrist. "Why did you do this?" He looked into her eyes.

Beth felt frozen to the spot, her gaze locked with his.

Why? She worked in a business where she used her hands, shook hands with people, gave presentations, handled fabric in the presence of employees, vendors and customers. Dozens of people saw her hands every day. She saw them notice, then steal the first opportunity to look more closely. She recalled Dan tracing the scars on one wrist with his fingertip one night when he thought she slept, and she recalled the expression on his face when he'd looked up to find her watching him and she'd pulled her hand away.

"No one's ever asked," she said.

Peter released her hand and dropped with ease onto the ground, patted the earth beside him, then draped his long arms over his raised knees and waited, peering up at her.

She leaned against the tree, afraid to sit. She realized letting go of the restraints that contained her memories was the only way to give an answer that would satisfy him. He'd see through anything else.

"Jack would call it one of my flirtations with death. If I'd succeeded, I would've been buried here." She slid ungracefully to the ground and looked over the graves.

"It was the night after Owen Stevens testified that he saw me shoot his brother. I knew as soon as the words were out of his mouth that I'd be convicted. I could see it in the jury's and judge's eyes, even in my attorney's. None of them would look at me.

"I felt abandoned, hopeless, and desperate to put an end to my fear of being locked in a small dark cell somewhere."

She glanced at Peter. The look in his eyes pushed the feelings back into the past for a few seconds.

"They'd been watching me since I was first arrested, but I never considered suicide before that day. The impulse was sudden, and the opportunity arose immediately, because of a near riot outside the jail. I took that as a sign it was meant somehow.

Beth stopped, sweating. A cold, familiar knot tightened in her stomach. She got up, moved several feet away into the brush, and vomited. When the spasms receded, they both sat in silence beside the tree, while she continued to wrestle with the memory of the damage she'd inflicted on herself.

"A persistent young doctor patched me up, and I hated him for it," she said eventually. "I pleaded for two days for them to let me die.

"Then Jay Handley came and sat with me, and talked. He repeated stories I'd heard dozens of times over the years, and he reminded me of things Gabriel, Kelly and I had done as kids. He talked about his faith. He was certain that everything happens for a reason, that there would be a day in the future when I would understand why all this was happening to me."

She met Peter's solemn gaze. "Jay saved my life. He made me want to live again. He made me believe I could get through whatever happened, that I possessed the strength I needed to survive. I wish I'd been able to thank him properly while he was alive." She sniffed and brushed her wet cheeks.

"And here you were today, crying for the dead boy."

She looked at her hands and spoke slowly. "He had a father and a twin brother who loved him."

"That's true, they were victims too. But I know something about grief. It's a deep cut and leaves a scar, but it ceases to hurt so acutely or so often, given time. Injustice, hatred, and fear, when they're perpetuated the way they have been against you, continue to destroy.

"My God, Beth, when I see who you are today in spite of all that, I have to admire and respect you. You're the kind of person who insists on being terrific at whatever you undertake. You have a bearing, a presence that makes people take notice. You're a loving mother with an adorable, happy, healthy child. I'm stunned by what you've done with your life. All that, and you haven't even healed yet."

"Healed?" She said in a small voice. "What makes you think I haven't?"

"A little girl who says you're a workaholic, who thinks you never used to sleep before you had pneumonia. She lives with you. She knows you better than anyone."

"Children need more sleep than adults. She's asleep when I go to bed and she's still asleep when I get up in the morning."

"I'll bet you always argue this way when you know you're wrong."

"I've always been a light sleeper. Any little noise wakens me, and with Abby, I'm always listening for her."

"Why don't you just give in for once?"

She shot him a sharp glance. His eyes, bluer now as the sun sank toward the west, were tightly focused on hers. "Sometimes I have nightmares," she admitted. She had to look away. "Sometimes I don't sleep at all."

"What haunts you?"

"Memories."

"It can't be the murder. You said you went out that night because you couldn't sleep. What memories?"

"Just ... memories. They overshadow everything sometimes. If I work hard, if I stay busy, I can keep them pushed into the background."

"You haven't healed."

"Do you have to act like a doctor right now?"

He was silent for a moment, and then he spoke in a low tone. He sounded tired. "I'm sorry. I don't want to be your doctor. I want to be your friend. More than that, if possible. I care about your well being, your happiness. When something you did fifteen years ago is so immediate, so fresh and exposed a wound today that just talking about it makes you lose your lunch, it's too present and too painful for you to say you've healed. It still eats at you."

She closed her eyes and sighed, then heard him move. He stood in front of her, offering a hand up. They walked to the parking lot together. "You knew you'd want to stay," he said.

She nodded.

"Will you take me on a tour of your favorite places? I'll drive. Bring Abby."

"When?"

He thought. "Tentatively, Tuesday. I may get a call and have to cancel."

She smiled. "I'll pack a lunch on Tuesday morning, and if you don't show, Abby and I will take a walk around the lake and eat ourselves silly.

"Peter." She stopped him with a hand on his arm as he was about to get into his truck. "The note Leigh showed us today. Do you think it can help prove I didn't kill Ollie?"

He took a moment to answer. "It convinces Leigh. That's something."

She stepped back. "It doesn't convince you?"

Peter met her gaze. "You convinced me a long time ago."

The shower revived Beth slowly. She stood under it longer than she needed to. She wanted the fine spray to wash away the clamor of thoughts, to relax muscles tensed by reliving the past. So much had happened in two days, she wasn't feeling the least bit rested. Her mind reeled.

She turned off the tap, squeezed water out of her hair, wrapped it in a towel and reached for another. She dried off, savoring the plush texture of the thick towel. Then she stepped out of the shower, and stopped dead still, gaping at the closed bathroom door. She'd left it open.

She rushed over and turned the doorknob, and it fell off in her hand. She bit her lip. A scream rose in her throat.

It couldn't really be closed. She stared at the doorknob in her hand. Her heart beat furiously.

"Abby." It came out broken and ended in a sob. "Abby!" She called three or four times before she heard a faint reply. "Abby?"

"Mommy?"

"Abby, honey, open the door for me." Her breath felt constricted. Her heart pounded.

The latch rattled. "I can't. This thing fell off."

"Abby, go find Grandma. Tell her my bathroom door is stuck."

"Why is it stuck?"

"I don't know, honey. Tell Grandma, and stay with her. Hurry!"

Abby's footsteps faded away. Beth took a deep breath, and still felt she couldn't get enough air. She was sweating and shivering at the same time. Her heart hammered.

She stepped back into the shower and struggled with the window, her fingers slipping and fumbling in panic. It was stuck as fast as the door.

She wrapped a towel securely around her and attempted to busy her mind with something besides the shut door. It's a big bathroom, she observed. Twice as big as her bathroom in the house she shared with Abby. But the doorknob had never fallen off that door, and the door had never closed by itself.

Deep inside her, the frightened little girl from her nightmares screamed. If those screams broke through to the adult Beth, she would lose control.

She unwrapped her hair and combed it with a shaking hand, looking at the frightened blur of her face in the steamed up mirror.

"Beth?" It was Matt, jiggling the latch.

"Yes!" She flew to the door. "Matt, can you open it?" Her voice broke up in sobs of relief.

"I'm working on it. Take it easy."

"Where's Abby?" She secured the towel around her again.

"Downstairs with Mom. I told her to stay there."

The door opened and he stood aside. Beth ran across the bedroom before she remembered her robe and hurried back for it. She went into Abby's room to put it on, then paced across the carpeted floor several times, to keep moving until her panic subsided. She returned to her room. Matt cast a glance at her, and she looked more closely at what he was doing. He was putting the doorknob back on.

"No! Take it off, Matt. Please, remove the whole thing. The latch. Everything." Her words came out as a clipped, quivering demand.

He looked at her for a few seconds, eyes steady. "That'll just leave a hole in the door, and no way to keep it closed."

"I don't want to close it. I never close it. You can take it off at the hinges if you like." She dropped onto the sofa near the window to wait, wrapped her robe around her legs and drew her knees up. She held her hands against her face, attempting to think calming thoughts. A minute later, she was still shaking.

"Beth." Matt stood beside her holding the canvas tool bag. "It won't latch now. You can't get stuck in there again." She thanked him. "Can I get you something? A glass of water? Beer? Jack's got some killer single malt Scotch whisky, and Mom has brandy."

She pushed her hair back and peered up at him. "A cup of Mom's chamomile tea might help."

"Ah, the herbal approach. I'll bring you some." He started to go.

"Matt, the bathroom window is stuck too. Can you open that?"

"Sure. Be right back."

He left the tool bag and fetched her tea. When he returned to the bathroom, Beth heard squeaking, creaking noises, and finally the smooth sliding of the sash. A cold evening breeze blew through the room, caressing her cheek. She gripped her tea mug in both hands.

Matt closed the window and came out. "All done." His voice sounded rough.

She thanked him again, this time more profusely, and he stood there holding a claw hammer and something else that jingled in his hand. "What is it?" She sat up straight.

He showed her what he held: shiny nails, bent and mangled from being removed. "It was nailed shut."

Peter weighed a gold Rolex watch in one hand while he spoke to his brother on the phone. He'd called to thank Tim for the gift and to tell him it was far too extravagant.

"The jeweler's a client," Tim said. "You'll need to dress better if you take that job in Sacramento."

"Tim, I'm not interested--"

"You could buy your own cabin and fish on your days off and vacations. How often do you think opportunities like this will come along as you get older? Neither Claire nor Emery would want you to continue grieving this way. Stop chasing dust devils--"

Peter interrupted to say he had to leave for the Lodge.

"What's so important about Sunday dinner at that place?"

Going into that would only fuel Tim's argument. Peter had explained, years ago, why he was here. He wished he'd never told Tim about Beth.

It had been one of their men's nights, Peter and his brother playing chess in Peter's living room.

"I love Emery and my girls being so young." Tim took a swig of his beer. "I hope they never grow up."

"You're a sentimental guy," Peter observed.

"Sure, I'm as sentimental as the next guy. I come here so I can leave Morgan home with the girls."

"Your move."

"You're the only person I can say that to who will understand," Tim went on. "I love her, but I have to get away one night a week or I'll go bananas."

Peter shrugged. "I didn't marry her. Make your move and change the subject."

Tim moved his knight. "I'm supposed to let you know the baby-sitting offer still holds. Might I suggest Emery sleep over?" Tim said with a devilish grin. "Are you seeing anyone? See, there's this woman at the bank--"

Peter groaned. "Tim, don't let your wife fix me up. I'm begging you."

"Misery loves company." Tim leaned back with a challenge in his eyes.

"Tell her I'm seeing someone."

"I need a name and an occupation. Morgan likes career women."

"A ... super model named Veronica."

Tim raised his eyebrows, then laughed. "How serious is it?"

"It's building slowly. She travels a lot."

Tim wasn't smiling anymore. "Seriously, Peter. In a fair universe, I'm the one who'd be widowed."

"That's a hell of a thing to say."

"Morgan had to practically blackmail me into marriage. You're a natural husband and dad."

"I'm not going to marry again just so I'll have someone to eat my corn flakes with."

"But you see dozens of women every day. Isn't there anyone who interests you enough to ask her out?"

"Yes, and I do. We have coffee or lunch, maybe dinner and a movie. The feeling never seems to stick. There's only been one person I really--"

"Claire's dead, Peter. It's been five years. You're thirty-three."

"I know. There's only one person besides Claire I've ever had those kinds of feelings about."

"Oh, besides Claire. Who?"

Peter shook his head. "She was a patient, when I was a resident. She had no family nearby. We talked."

"You felt sorry for her?"

"No. I visited her, the way you visit a friend in the hospital."

"What was her name?"

"Elizabeth Gray," Peter said with an immediacy that surprised even him. He frowned at the chessboard. "Beth. She recited poetry."

"You should look her up." Tim picked up his beer. "Call her."

Peter shook his head. "You don't understand. She wasn't interested in me that way, Tim."

"No, of course not. She threw you out of her room, right?"

"She was lonely." Peter met his brother's gaze, wondering if Tim would understand.

Tim's smile slid into a lopsided grin. He patted Peter's arm. "You weren't this serious until you started talking about her. The worst she'll do is tell you to get lost."

Peter frowned at his beer. It had been five years. Was she still in prison, or had she been paroled? He tried to recall everything she'd said about where she was from. The lake. Would she return there when she was free? Or would she go looking for that entry level job she'd been so worried about?

On Father's Day, Morgan and the kids had taken Tim and Peter to breakfast at a restaurant called Birdie's. The place sold fresh-baked muffins and every item on the menu had a bird's name. Afterward, Peter waited outside with Morgan and her girls for Tim, who'd made a last-minute stop in the restroom, and for ten-year-old Emery, who had some coins he wanted to blow next door at a vending machine that dispensed squiggly creatures he deemed perfect for scaring the girls. Claudia and April were onto him, and conspiring to scream.

Peter stood on the broad sidewalk near a bricked courtyard, under the hot Pasadena sun. Somewhere beyond the continuous chatter produced by Morgan and her daughters, he heard familiar, musical laughter.

The sound emptied Peter's mind of all else, leaving him with a blinding hunger. He cast about, hoping to see Beth Gray standing behind him.

He scanned the people waiting in line to get into the restaurant. He looked up and down the sidewalk, listened to the drone of traffic moving by, the roar and wheeze of a bus approaching from the next block.

"What is it, Peter?" Morgan said. "You look as if you suddenly don't know where you are."

He heard the laughter again, then her voice, and he turned just as she came through a shaded doorway and started up the sidewalk. Walking, with no limp, but a graceful sway of her hips. Her heels clicked past him on the sidewalk. Peter took a step toward her.

Emery barreled into him. "Dad, look what I got!"

"Just a minute, son." He kept going.

"But Dad." Emery dragged at his arm.

Beth turned around and Peter thought she'd seen him. As Emery let go of his arm, Beth waved a hand in the air, then turned and ran. She reached the corner as a bus squealed to a stop. She dug her hand into one of her bags, searching, while passengers alighted.

Claudia and April erupted into screams behind Peter, then into giggles. Beth looked in their direction. Then she bounded up the steps into the bus. It moved away.

Morgan placed her hand on Peter's arm. "I'm relieved to see you taking an interest in women, but you can't just follow them home."

"Follow who home?" Tim said behind them.

"Peter's girl watching," Morgan said.

Peter turned and walked into the shop he'd seen Beth emerge from.

"Where are you going, Dad?" Emery called after him.

"You should've seen her, Daddy," Claudia told Tim. "She's absolutely stunning!" April called to her, and Claudia ran the other way.

Inside the shop, Peter approached the woman at the counter. "The young woman who just left here, with dark curly hair," he said. "Her name is Beth Gray."

"Your Beth Gray?" Tim said behind him.

The woman stared at Tim, then Peter. "I know who you mean. She buys a lot of my yarn."

Peter glanced around the shop. It was filled with yarn. Balls, skeins, cones, a rainbow of colors lined the walls. He turned back to the woman. "I haven't seen her in years, and she got on a bus just now, before I could speak to her. Does she come in here often?"

"She comes to browse and visit about once a month."

"Does she live in Pasadena?"

"Dad!" Emery called from the doorway.

The shopkeeper shook her head. "I believe she's been living in Los Angeles, but she's moving away. She has a new job. A dream job, she says, out of town. She's thrilled because she's had to work two jobs here, to make ends meet. She didn't say where she's moving."

Peter turned away slowly.

"Dad, come look what April found." Emery dragged Peter out into the sunlight, toward the bus stop, where April and Claudia bent their heads over something.

"Look, Uncle Peter. Your lady lost this. It fell down the step when she got on the bus." April handed Peter a ball of fine, soft, cream colored yarn.

"Good grief," Morgan flatly intoned. "She rides the bus and works two jobs, yet she'll pay twenty-two-fifty for a ball of yarn? She's not very sensible, Peter."

"Who cares if she's sensible, Mom?" Claudia said. "This is romantic."

Emery read the yarn label. "Lace-weight kid mohair. What's that?"

"It's just like her," Claudia said. "It's like finding Cinderella's slipper."

It lay like a cloud in Peter's hand, soft and elegant, a whisper of reality. If not for this and the children's buoyant witness to Beth's departure, Peter might believe she'd never been here at all.

Now, in his cabin, Peter looked at the gold watch Tim had given him. He recalled when he'd given up, for a brief time, the possibility he'd ever see Beth again, on the day Emily had announced Abby's birth. Peter imagined Beth happily married and as far out of his reach as possible. It was then that Peter had told Tim about Beth's murder conviction.

This gold watch and all the other gifts Tim had sent in the past few years were reminders of the things Peter could buy for himself if he would get back onto his old career track. His brother was bribing him to behave normally. Tim thought Peter was hiding out, still grieving. Chasing dust devils, meaning Beth.

"Peter?" Tim waited on the other end of the line for an answer. He'd asked what was so important about Sunday dinner at the Lodge. "I'm talking about your future. The job in Sacramento--"

"Stop playing big brother, Tim. I'm nearly forty."

"That's what worries me. You're forty and you're on a permanent fishing trip."

"You're just jealous because Morgan won't let you do what I'm doing."

"Well, don't hock the watch for bait. Is dinner still on, for your birthday?"

"Dinner's still on." Peter slipped the watch onto his wrist.

"Morgan wants to know if you're dating," Tim said in a weary tone.

"Tell her yes."

"Tell her yes to shut her up, or tell her yes because it's true?"

"It's sort of true. I'm spending Tuesday with someone."

"Not the super model again?"

"She could be a super model."

"They could all be super models if you've been hiding out in the mountains long enough."

Peter hung up and looked at the watch again. Don't hock it for bait? He could hock this watch for a new truck. Where did Tim think he was going to wear it in Wilder? Here people would look on it as pomposity.

Leigh arrived, and Peter headed out. Leigh's tie had an interlocking key pattern. He gave Peter's blue cashmere turtleneck and beige herringbone-weave blazer an approving nod. "Who are we trying to impress?"

Peter didn't reply. Everything he wore tonight but his underwear had been more bribes from Tim. If they impressed Beth, it would be Tim impressing her. He got into his truck, and Leigh followed.

"I wonder if Beth finds this sort of gathering as difficult as I used to find dinners with my father," Leigh said moments later, as they crossed the parking lot at the Lodge. He followed Peter up the steps.

"She's been in tougher situations than this."

"Yes, but there's more to the tension here than a murder fifteen years ago, Peter. This family is unhappy in ways you and I don't know the half of. Outsiders never do."

Peter didn't plan to remain outside. He swung the near half of the double door wide and gestured for Leigh to enter.

Chapter 7

Emily was just crossing the lobby to the library. She stopped and eyed Peter in that schoolteacher way she had that made him want to fidget. In five years he hadn't gotten past that look. She smiled at Leigh and patted his arm. "You look very refined, both of you. Make yourselves at home in the family room. I'm afraid dinner may be delayed." She continued into the library.

Peter paused in front of Beth's painting. The jacaranda tree blooming on the big canvas stood alone on a green lawn. Half the blossoms had dropped. A cloud of violet-lavender mist mingled with a cloud of deep, feathery green above. A carpet of fallen lavender blooms and green grass mirrored it below, connected by a rich, somber brown trunk.

"She is something, isn't she?" Cornell said, coming up beside him.

"Does she sell her work?" Peter asked.

Cornell chuckled. "I wouldn't know. Look around for an E. R. Gray and see what the dealers turn up."

"She doesn't want to stay, Mom!" Jack's words bit into the air.

"Excuse me," Cornell said and followed the voices into the library.

Peter exchanged glances with Leigh and they took off in the other direction, toward the northwest part of the Lodge and the private family room where Sarah, Art, Robin and Abby visited. They were seated there, minutes later, when Matt called everyone to the table.

Art Franklin groaned as he got to his feet. "I'm exhausted. I hate Sundays."

Sarah smiled at Peter. "He says that every week, but he lives for Sunday."

"Why didn't Art's newspaper consider Beth's visit newsworthy?" Jack said, entering the family room against the flow of traffic to pour himself a drink. "People in town want to know why it wasn't reported."

Sarah sighed and didn't respond.

Duane waited near the door while the others filed out. "Wow, Peter and Leigh, are you trying to make me look bad?"

Vicky smiled at Peter as he passed. "You look nice," she said sweetly.

If she liked this, she'd love his brother. He followed the others, and within minutes everyone was seated but Beth.

From where he sat, across from Art, Peter could see the bottom of the west stairs. He trained half an ear to the conversation and watched for Beth.

"I don't know," Matt murmured to his mother. "I talked her out of going for a run."

"Beth wanted us to wait for dinner so she could run?" Vicky said.

"She didn't want us to wait," Matt answered.

Peter glimpsed Beth on the stairs, and couldn't help watching her sky blue dress as she moved. It fit her narrow waist loosely and fell to well below her knees. The knit fabric flowed with the contours of her body in a way that Peter found positively luscious. An enameled silver butterfly fastened her hair back.

"Sorry I'm late," she murmured and eased into the chair between her mother and Abby. She wore a haunted expression and her eyes were red-rimmed.

"Where did you fish today?" Art asked Peter.

"I didn't. I had paperwork to catch up on." He glanced at Beth.

"Paperwork?" Jack said. "I saw you walk out of the woods with Beth and Leigh just before noon."

Peter nodded. "We took a walk before lunch."

Beth's gaze remained fixed on her plate. She wasn't eating.

"That drawing you gave Beth of the cemetery," Jack said. "Who selected that one, Leigh, you or Beth?"

"Beth chose it."

"What made you choose that one, Beth?"

She spoke so softly Peter barely heard her. "The cedar tree."

"The tree?" Jack chuckled. "Beth can find the positive in anything. She gets convicted of murder, and comes back home driving a big white Mercedes like it's nobody's business."

Beth placed her hands against the table edge and leaned back, watching Jack warily.

"Jack," Cornell said in a warning tone.

"I can see why you didn't miss fishing today, Peter," Jack continued. "Did she beguile you with her version of the story?" His pale eyes flashed, his gaze moving from Leigh to Peter, back to Beth. "What's the verdict, guys? Guilty or not guilty?"

Vicky leaned forward to look at Peter.

"Come on. No harm in anyone knowing that, is there?" Jack persisted.

"What's it to you, Jack?" Matt said.

"Jack, that's a subject we will not discuss at this table," Emily said.

Jack continued. "It's on everyone's mind, even Abby's. It's the first thing she said to me when we met Friday. Right, Abby?"

"Stop it, Jack," Rita said. "Abby doesn't know anything about that."

Beth put her arm around Abby. "Leave her out of this."

"This isn't the time or place, Jack," Holly said.

"Holly, I'm not saying anything you haven't wanted to. You, Matt and Vicky want Beth here less than anyone. Is it because of our two guests you don't think this is the time or place?"

He turned to Peter and Leigh. "I haven't said anything tonight to hold a candle to what these three have been saying elsewhere."

"Shut up, Jack!" Matt said.

Abby blinked at Matt. She looked shocked and frightened.

Jack chuckled, eyeing his brother.

Abby stared at Jack, her gray eyes dark and wide with anxiety. Beth wore the same expression.

"Please stop this," Emily said with a quaver in her voice. "Holly's right, Jack. No one wants this discussion but you, and it's not fit for the table."

Jack fell silent, but he continued to watch Beth.

Beth reached for her water glass. She still hadn't eaten, and Peter found his own appetite waning in the ensuing silence.

"Where have you had the most luck lately?" Art asked Peter. "Fishing, that is. Lake or streams?"

Peter didn't answer for another breath or two, and when he did his voice was thick with the anger he contained. "Lake's full of trout, and they're hungry this time of year. Planning to do some fishing soon?"

"Robin likes to fish, but she's never had much luck, so I want to up her odds a little. Her grandmother owns a lake. She should've caught her fill of fish by now."

Emily and Beth spoke quietly to one another. Duane teased Rita, Robin and Abby. Holly and Sarah talked about people they'd seen in church. Leigh, Cornell, Vicky and Matt belabored the problem of too little snowfall suitable for skiing during the past season. Jack ate in silence, drinking Scotch.

Peter looked over once and found Beth watching him, her tears dry. A half smile appeared, revealing a few even, white teeth before her mother spoke to her again and she looked away.

"Mommy, Aunt Holly says I can hold Josh," Abby announced over dessert.

"After dinner. Is it all right?" Holly asked Beth.

"Of course," Beth smiled at her sister in surprise.

"I'll take some pictures," Emily said.

"Mommy should get a baby too," Abby told Holly. "I could help take care of him."

"Your mom has to get married first," world-wise Robin told her. "She can't have a baby by herself."

"I used to be a baby."

"I was married to Daddy then, Abby," Beth said carefully.

Abby turned and gaped at her mother, as if this was news to her.

"Who would wake up when the baby cries in the middle of the night? You or Mommy?" Duane said. "That's a bone of contention in our house."

"Mommy wakes up anyway, when she has bad dreams. What's a bone of condition?"

"A bone of contention is something people fight over," Jack said in a gruff tone. "Like your mother."

Abby went still and quiet, and leaned toward her mother while warily eyeing her Uncle Jack.

"Jack, you're not making any points with Abby," Duane said, "or with anyone else for that matter. Why don't you put a lid on it?"

"Yes sir, Deputy." Jack pushed back his chair and left the room.

"What is with him?" Holly said.

"Amy broke up with him today," Vicky said.

"Victoria, please!" Emily said.

"I've had enough too." Vicky left the table.

After dessert, Sarah, Robin and Art left for home. Abby held Josh in the family room, while Emily took snapshots. The others cleared the table and started on the kitchen. Peter and Leigh stayed in the kitchen to visit.

Art returned, calling from the hall. "Beth? Where's Duane? Both of you come look at this."

Beth tossed her apron over the back of a kitchen chair and followed him through the lobby. Peter followed. Art led them across the parking lot to the narrow space between his tan Jeep Cherokee and Beth's car. He pointed at the right hand side of the Mercedes.

"It's a sin to do that to such a beautiful automobile," Art said.

The damage was plainly visible under the white light from the lampposts. A single word was painted in large red block letters along the side of the white car: MURDERER.

"Shit," Matt said.

"Son-of-a-bitch!" Duane touched the red paint. "It's dry. Matt, get your mom's camera. I want a picture of this."

"I have one in the Jeep," Art said.

Duane turned to Beth. "Maybe it can be rubbed out."

"There's no point in doing anything about it until I leave," Beth said. "I guess word's gotten around that I'm here." She walked away toward the lake.

"Beth, wait," Duane called after her. "Let's try to figure out when this happened."

She shook her head and kept walking.

Beth stood on the upper level of the boat landing, facing the water with her hands on the railing. The stiff, chill breeze ruffled her hair and her dress. She didn't look up when Peter's footsteps sounded on the wooden planks. When he stood beside her, she turned her head ever so slightly and peered at him from the corners of her eyes. "What possessed me to think I could come back, even for a visit?"

"You have a right to be here, Beth."

"Do I?" Her voice sounded hollow. Water lapped against the landing, churned by the wind.

"Duane will report--"

"Duane arrested me, Peter! Oh, I know he didn't want to, but I can't forget, no matter how hard I try, how one day he was my friend and the next he was locking me up for murder. I wish he'd let someone else do it, so I wouldn't have this association in my mind." A moment later she sighed again and spoke more calmly. "Why does it have to be so beautiful, yet so unattainable? Why can't I stop loving it?"

"There are other places like this."

She sighed again and said without conviction, "I suppose there are."

"I've a hunch you could find a nice little bed and breakfast inn somewhere."

She shook her head. "Nobody wants to stay at the Bates Motel, Peter. These people know me, and look how they act. How do you think strangers would?"

"Don't tell them."

"Secrets make you lonely. Besides--" She turned from the water and smiled at him. "I'm a lousy cook."

"What happened tonight, Beth, before dinner? Matt said you wanted to run. What was that about?"

She lowered her gaze and shivered. "That was about me being claustrophobic and getting stuck in my bathroom."

"Claustrophobic. Since when?"

"Ever since I can remember." She continued to shiver.

Realization hit him. "My God, Beth, you were in prison!" He took off his jacket and put it around her shoulders. "You're freezing out here. Can we talk in your room?"

She looked up at him.

He kissed her, tentatively at first and then, because she responded, with more confidence. Her lips were full and soft, and she let him have his way for several wondrous seconds. He broke the link with difficulty.

"Look, Peter," she said breathlessly.

"I know. You want to see Gabriel first. At least I know I have a chance."

"Look!" She pointed over his right shoulder at the sky.

A full moon rose over the mountain, a gigantic pearl dimming the stars in that portion of the sky. Silhouettes of towering evergreens were dwarfed against the moon and sky. As they watched, the moon's bright arc cleared the trees.

She stared at the moon until he put his arm around her to steer her toward the Lodge. "Your room?"

"Peter." She hung back.

"To talk," he said firmly, promising himself that was all they would do, and she nodded.

Peter waited in the lobby while Beth went to check on Abby. When she returned, they climbed the stairs together.

"Mom's reading to her. She'll bring her upstairs if she gets sleepy. They really do need this time together. It means a lot to all three of us."

"That's reason enough to stay, isn't it?"

Her door stood open. The bathroom light was on and a cold draft hit them as they entered. She closed the bathroom window and adjusted the wall thermostat.

"I'm sorry about the cold. It's a bad habit I have, forgetting windows." She returned his jacket and got a sweater from her closet. They sat on the sofa, where she took off her boots and curled her feet under her. She pulled a big afghan off the back of the sofa and offered to share it with him.

"When I was six years old, Mom took us to a department store in Sacramento, at Christmas time, to see Santa Claus. We got into the elevator to ride up to the floor where Santa was supposed to be. As soon as the elevator doors closed, I panicked. I screamed and beat on the doors, convinced I was going to die if I didn't get out of there immediately.

"I didn't understand why I was so frightened, I only knew that I was. On the drive home I wouldn't let Mom close the windows, so we drove all the way up, on a December day, with the car windows wide open. Dad gave me a sedative when we got home."

She fell silent, her gaze distant, her eyes wide and dark.

"No one knew why you reacted that way to the elevator?"

She nodded. "My parents knew, but I'd never been in an elevator before."

"What did your parents know?"

"One morning when I was three, I came up missing. I was found trapped in a small closet in an unused part of the Lodge." She shivered again. "I get the shakes just talking about it. Pretty weird, considering I don't remember."

"How did you get in there?"

"I don't know. I don't remember."

"Who found you?"

"My father. I think that's what most of my nightmares are about. A shadow, and hands shoving me into that closet and leaving me there. A voice whispering." She leaned her head on her hand and clutched the afghan close to her body. Every muscle appeared tense with remembered fear.

"Did you get any kind of therapy?" Peter asked.

"No. Dad gave me pills. Valium, mostly." She paused, watching his eyes.

Peter remembered she'd been on tranquilizers when he treated her. Her record had said they were for anxiety. The prison guard had mentioned panic attacks.

"I don't want therapy, Peter, and I don't take drugs anymore. They were for survival, in prison, not for feeling good. Before that, they were my father's idea, not mine. I never liked them."

They were both silent for a moment.

"Ollie used to play on my fear," she finally said. "He and Owen came here with their dad whenever Tom worked on one of the cars, and they were friends with Vicky and Matt. Ollie was about nine and I was twelve, when he locked me into the bike-shed one day. We were playing hide-and-go-seek. After that he found opportunities to lock me into the shed, the boathouse, even the shell of his father's truck. I don't know how he was able to lure me into those situations so many times. Sometimes I wouldn't even realize he was nearby. Once, when we were older, I was cleaning one of the cabins and he locked me into the bathroom there. It was hours."

She flipped the afghan off her lap. Her eyes were wide, and her movements restless. "That was shortly before the murder. A matter of days."

She met Peter's gaze. "For anyone who gets involved with me, there are a lot of things to reckon with besides a criminal record. Dan didn't have the luxury of knowing about my past. The secrets ruined our marriage. At first he said he didn't want to know about the past. I considered it a blessing and kept quiet."

"What about the bathroom, tonight?"

"The door was closed when I got out of the shower. When I tried to open it the doorknob fell off in my hand. Abby couldn't open it from the outside either, so I sent her for help. I couldn't open the window, and when Matt checked that, he found it had been nailed shut.

"Peter, I didn't close the door tonight. I never do. In almost thirty years I haven't closed a door without giving it a second thought. I drive people crazy going around leaving doors and windows open. I would've remembered closing it."

"Abby?"

She shook her head. "She doesn't understand my claustrophobia, but she knows my habits. She wouldn't close it."

"So you think someone came into your room while you were in the shower."

She closed her eyes, nodded, then met his gaze. "Abby was playing in her room."

"This worries me, Beth. If the person knows how you react to being closed in--"

"Someone wanted to frighten me badly, and they succeeded." She looked at her hands.

He wondered if this was one of those nights she didn't sleep at all.

As if reading his mind, she said softly, "You see, it started at night. Someone came into my room and carried me away in the middle of the night, and the night time hasn't felt safe since." She twisted the corner of the afghan. "The past few nights, in this house, it's very close and very real."

Peter glanced at his watch. "I promised Leigh a ride home." He stood, glanced around, and spotted the telephone. "Beth, I know it's been hard for you to come back here. If you need anything, I want you to call me. For simple friendship or for any other reason." He took a card out of his wallet and held it out to her, pointing at the numbers. "This is my cabin ... my office ... my pager." He took out a pen and wrote on the card. "This is my cellular phone."

He really didn't want to leave her. "Lock your door, and call me if you have a nightmare or if you want to talk."

Chapter 8

Clouds moved in from the west, late Monday evening, and piled up against the western face of the mountains. They loomed heavy in the sky before dawn on Tuesday. A brisk wind buffeted the branches of trees, and waves crisscrossed the surface of the lake.

The kitchen was warm and smelled of freshly brewed coffee and rising bread. Beth was there, with Abby and Faith. Her colorful sweater fell open to reveal her flannel shirt as she packed sandwiches into a small cooler. She turned at the sound of the door, and smiled radiantly at Peter, sending a thrill through him.

"Biscuits will serve them as well as toast," Faith said, "especially with my turkey and bacon gravy."

"Faith is fixing us an early breakfast," Beth said.

Peter turned to Faith. "Do I get turkey and bacon gravy?"

The older woman cast him a dire look. "Only if you agree not to utter the word cholesterol in my presence for at least four weeks."

Faith reserved for Beth the most perfectly done eggs and the tallest biscuits. Peter watched, thinking the people who wanted Beth to feel welcome were nearly enthusiastic enough to make up for those who didn't.

The three of them bundled into warm outdoor clothes and stole out to Peter's truck before any of the other family members appeared.

"Where are we going? You're in charge," Peter said, eyeing Beth's blue jeans and hiking boots.

"There's a waterfall I want to show you. It's tricky to get to, and it often dries up halfway through the year. We'll have to walk a ways."

She gave him driving directions. The sunrise broke, bright pink, through briefly parting clouds over the eastern mountains. Peter turned onto a narrow dirt road that wound uphill south of the lake, through rugged country. He stopped the truck when the road became alarmingly narrow and deeply rutted. "How much farther?"

"Not much, but we go the rest of the way on foot. I heard there wasn't much snow this year, but it shouldn't be dry yet, if there's still runoff here." She pointed ahead, where a seasonal stream ran over the road. Peter parked the truck and they got out.

Abby, who'd been sleepy and quiet during the drive, now kept running ahead. Beth made her take her hand, and they climbed what became no more than a narrow deer track with numerous switchbacks that could easily be missed if they didn't watch the trail closely. Beth seemed to know it well.

Peter felt vague relief that Beth had a small child's safety in mind. He knew fishermen who would do anything and go anywhere to find the prime, out-of-the-way spot, or climb where they had no business climbing, just to get a good view of the fish below.

"It's not much farther," Beth said as if reading his thoughts.

They were half an hour from the truck when the trail widened again and swept gently around onto a ledge that would have been wide enough for his truck if there'd been a way to get to it. It led clockwise around the side of the mountain. Suddenly they rounded a curve and came on a panoramic view of distant, jagged peaks still packed with snow and, closer, a thin veil of water which sprayed downward for a couple-hundred feet or more, into the rocky, brushy, tree-lined ravine below. The trail ahead of them led to within thirty yards of the fall, and then switched upwards to the right in a rocky, neck-breaking incline, over the ridge. Beth stopped at a safe distance from the drop off, and turned to smile at Peter, still gripping Abby's hand in her own. "This is as far as we go."

The waterfall beyond her shimmered and threw off a frothy, white mist. Beth's face was radiant after the brisk walk. Her smile was wide and bright, and her eyes shone in the silvery light of the cloudy morning. Dark tendrils of hair escaped from her hat in the damp wind. Peter moved closer.

The water appeared to erupt from the midst of a stand of small, leaning trees on a rock ledge above and across from where they stood. It started its fall in a satiny ribbon a few feet wide, then glanced off the rock face, splitting into a fine spray.

Peter sat on the ground, and Beth did the same, gathering Abby into her lap. Now and then a gust of wind blew fine droplets of spray against their faces as they sat and listened to the music the water made.

"It won't be there in August. At least it never was, in my memory," Beth said, long, silent minutes later.

"Did you come here often?"

"Yes. Once, we climbed over the ridge there, and--"

"You climbed that?" He gaped. One wrong step up that steep trail, and you could fall a thousand feet.

"I wouldn't do it today," she said. "We used to think nothing could happen to us. Gabriel, Kelly, and I. We did take too many chances. We didn't even carry rope."

"Whose idea was it?" The look she gave him was her answer. "So you really did those wild things people say you did?"

"Some of them, but I wasn't flirting with death, the way Jack makes it sound. That wasn't it." She looked away.

"What was it then?"

"I guess it was a rebellion against that closed in, trapped feeling I had at home. My father wanted to control my activities, even things that were simply a matter of personal taste. I felt truly free only when I was doing something he didn't want me to do. My career is even a kind of rebellion. When I was paroled, I couldn't do what he wanted me to, which was to run the Lodge, so I did what he used to discourage me from doing."

"What do you do?" he asked. She hesitated and he raised his hands. "It's just us here. I won't tell."

"I design clothing. Women's sportswear and knitwear." She tugged at the sweater under her jacket. "Sweaters are my specialty."

"How is that a rebellion?"

"Dad hated for me to sew or knit. When I did, he'd just buy me some new clothes and tell me I didn't need to waste my time. He was a terrible snob about it. He never understood my need to create something uniquely mine.

"I didn't start drawing, and later painting, until I was in prison. At first I just drew things I wanted to remember from home. I also drew clothes I wanted to make when I got out, but then I started drawing the other women and their families. It was a way to have something to offer them, and I discovered I was good at it."

"Like the one of the nurse, Tilly."

"Yes. I drew people the way they should look. I showed them how they were beautiful. I helped them create an image of who they wanted to be, who they were inside. I used snapshots to draw women with their children, who couldn't be with them except during visits. I drew them with their husbands, boyfriends, parents, siblings, pets and friends. I learned to watch people's faces and body shapes, to see how they'd look with different expressions. A lot of that has helped me in the design business. You have to be able to visualize how a garment will move on the person who wears it."

They both fell silent and watched the water fall from the side of the mountain for several more minutes. Even Abby was quiet, sitting cradled in the warmth of her mother's lap. The sound of the water had a soothing effect. The birds and other wildlife were strangely silent. The clouds had taken on a light, puffy texture.

"Peter, you were married when I first met you, weren't you?" Beth asked, looking over at him.

"My wife died."

"I'm sorry." Her look of shared pain made him want to look away, but she held his gaze, her eyes narrowed against the cold breeze and intent on him. "When did she die?"

"Shortly after you left the hospital. She had breast cancer."

She was silent while she digested that. Abby sat up and watched Peter. Beth said softly, holding his gaze, "She must have been young."

"Twenty-five."

"What was her name?"

He suddenly felt cared for in a way he hadn't in years. He thought how different the two women were in appearance and personality, and yet similar in the feelings they aroused in him.

"Claire. Her name was Claire." He stood and held out his hand. "Let's head back. I've a feeling it's about to snow."

They reached the road as the first snowflakes drifted down. The wind had grown colder, and they were relieved to gain the shelter of the truck. Once inside, with the engine on and the heater going, Beth pulled off Abby's gloves, then kissed the top of Abby's head. "This is Abby's first snow. I'd forgotten how quickly the weather changes here."

"Sunshine, lemons, no snow, jacarandas, the garment industry. Los Angeles? Just between us," he assured her.

Beth sobered as she met Peter's gaze. "San Diego. I can't let people here know what I do, because our business could be hurt if word got out about my record. It's not just Dan and me, we have employees."

"Understood. Where to now?"

"Do you know Sylvia Maxwell?"

"No. Who's Sylvia Maxwell?" He'd expected her to show him her favorite scenery all day, not visit someone's house. Peter turned the truck around.

"Sylvia took care of me when I was little. Dad called her my nanny, but she did housekeeping at the Lodge as well. Now she grows herbs, culinary and medicinal. My father didn't approve of her doctoring people with herbs, but he trusted her. She was the only baby-sitter I ever had, after the closet."

A prim, shy woman answered the door at the little ranch, which was neatly kept, with a vast greenhouse, a painted barn and well-maintained pens for a few goats and sheep. Sylvia was tall and soft-spoken. Her smooth, fine-grained skin showed only a few tiny wrinkles around her eyes and some faded freckles. Peter guessed her age at near fifty. She appeared squeaky clean, and Peter liked her at once.

Sylvia's eyes widened as she took in the three people on her porch. She shifted her gaze swiftly to Peter, to Abby and back to Beth. A smile broadened across her face, and she put her arms around Beth, squeezing her eyes tightly shut as she hugged her.

"It's you, it's really you. Come in, it's snowing!" She looked at Peter again.

Beth made introductions. Sylvia stroked Abby's cheek, smiling into the little girl's eyes. When she turned to Peter she acted cautious at first and then friendly in a shy, wide-eyed sort of way. He offered his hand. "Beth is taking me on a tour of her favorite places," he said. "Your house is one of them."

The furniture in the front room was old and mismatched, arranged for comfort and practicality, not style. Fresh flowers in vases added a single patch of color to each room.

They sat around a gleaming Formica table in Sylvia's kitchen with mugs of hot tea, and milk for Abby. Half a plate of fresh oatmeal cookies was consumed. A big black cat rubbed against each visitor's legs, purring loudly, then reclined on the rug in front of the stove to wash himself. A fire crackled in the next room, while Sylvia told Beth about her garden, the weather and her animals.

Beth was quiet, and finally Sylvia fell silent and just watched Beth for a moment. Then Abby needed to use the bathroom and Beth went with her.

Sylvia said quietly to Peter, "It's a marvelous thing, how when you perform surgery, you remember for the patient how his or her body should be."

Peter stared at her, wondering what in the hell she was getting at. She pushed the plate of cookies toward him. He took one and bit into it.

The serene gentleness never left her voice. "You can't do that for Beth, here." She pointed to her head. "Her father didn't want her to remember."

"Why?" Peter's own sudden anger startled him, and he backed off. "Why?" he said again quietly.

"I never knew, but she knows he didn't want her to, and it frightens her."

Her father made no attempt to help her remember? This was what Beth had left out, Peter realized.

"As far as I know he was a good doctor," Sylvia said as if reading the question in his eyes, "but he made a terrible mistake with his daughter."

"Do you realize he may have cost her six years of her life, and her home?" Peter said, his anger rising again.

"Yes and no." Sylvia met his gaze with a mild smile. "I'm not convinced he caused that, and she didn't lose those six years. Her life wasn't shortened. The past can't be undone, Peter. Nor should it be forgotten. One must learn from it and live with it."

Beth and Abby returned to the kitchen table.

When they left, Sylvia made Beth and Peter both promise to visit again soon. "And you must bring this pretty little one with you. I'm so happy to have met you, Abby."

The three visitors hurried out to the truck through gently falling snow. It had begun to collect in a light carpet on the ground.

"Indoor picnic, at my cabin?" Peter said. Beth responded with enthusiasm.

"I didn't know snow was so cold!" Abby exclaimed as she followed Peter's example, stamping her feet on the mat inside his door.

Peter lit a fire, and Beth spread the lunch she'd prepared on the kitchen table. They sat down to eat with hearty appetites. Peter made coffee for himself and Beth, and they ended the meal with thin slices of Rita's blueberry cheesecake. Abby began to totter sleepily. Beth lay her down on the couch near the fire and pulled off her shoes. By the time Peter fetched a blanket from his bedroom, Abby was asleep.

Beth picked up her satchel and took out her sketchbook. She showed Peter two color drawings she'd made of him, one of him reeling in the rainbow trout from the shore of the lake Saturday morning, the other of him leaning against the tree in the cemetery on Sunday.

Peter felt a strange mix of feelings as he studied the drawings. She'd captured expressions he rarely saw in a mirror, or in photographs of himself. She saw something deeper than he allowed others to go, as if she'd seen into his soul. He recalled his thoughts in the cemetery when he'd visited, in his mind, with Claire and Emery.

He flipped back to the first drawing. "You do this from memory, like it's nothing, like you've got this little camera in your brain that freezes time."

"I've been told I have an eidetic memory."

"You have more than that."

Her smoky eyes spoke depths of gratitude. She returned to the drawing. "What about fishing makes you sad? Did your wife fish with you?"

He led her into his bedroom and showed her the photographs he kept on his dresser, of his parents, his brother Tim, and Claire. Finally he said, "This is my son, Emery," as he picked up a picture frame.

It was a moment before Beth spoke. "He has your eyes." She turned to face Peter, serenely expectant.

"He was killed in a bicycle accident when he was eleven. He'd be seventeen now." Peter put the picture down.

Beth's tears spilled over. He brushed her cheeks with his fingertips. "That was a long time ago."

"I'm so sorry, Peter." They stood close. He didn't want her to move. "You used to fish with Emery?"

He had to take a deep breath and force his next words out. "Not nearly enough. He used to beg me to take him fishing on the weekends. I think about those lost weekends sometimes when I fish."

The phone rang. He went to his study to answer it. Afterward he found Beth in the kitchen, picking up the remains of their lunch.

"You have to go?" she said.

He nodded. "I'll drop you and Abby at the Lodge."

The snow had ceased to fall, and the clouds had begun to part, allowing a few rays of sunlight to begin the melting process. The light dusting of snow would be gone by evening, just a memory.

They'd arrived at the Lodge and Beth was opening the front door for Peter, who carried Abby, when they heard the truck pull up. Gabriel Handley stopped his new silver-gray Dodge Ram in front of the steps. The sheriff's daughter, Nora Kendall, sat beside Gabriel in the cab.

"I'll take Abby in while you say hello," Peter said with a nod in Gabriel's direction.

Beth followed his gaze and drew in her breath. Gabriel stared up at her.

Peter paused long enough to look back and see Beth wrapped in Gabriel's arms. The big man's bulk engulfed her slender body.

Matt met Peter inside and took Abby from him. Peter hurried out to his truck past Beth and Gabriel. The pair still stood within the circle of each other's arms when he drove away, and he saw Nora, looking bewildered, seated in the silver-gray truck.

Gabriel held Beth tightly, while she clung to him. Then she spotted Nora. What was Gabriel doing with the sheriff's daughter?

"When did you get here?" Gabriel asked Beth, his deep blue eyes shining and intent on her.

"Friday morning."

"How are you feeling?"

"Fine. I'm all better. I'm so sorry about your father, Gable."

"I know. He missed you." He touched her cheek lightly, looking into her eyes. "You're so different. All grown-up and so ... I'm not dreaming?"

She smiled. "I'm lucky you recognize me."

"I'd know you anywhere. Was that Abby I just saw with you and Peter?"

"Yes. You have someone waiting. Why don't you both come in?"

She glanced that way in time to see Peter drive around the curve in the road, beyond the trees. It wrenched something deep inside her to watch him drive away alone.

"I can't stay," Gabriel said. "We're on our way to an engagement party in Auburn."

She nodded. That explained his clothes, the black trousers, white dress shirt, and forest green silk tie with a pine cone design. She glanced again at Nora.

"I stopped to let your mom know I'll be here tomorrow morning. I haven't seen your family since the funeral." He turned and glanced at Nora. "I really do have to go. I wish--"

"No, please don't keep her waiting."

"You'll be here tomorrow morning? Beth, I want to see you. I need to talk to you."

"I'll be here." She watched him return to the truck, and she waved at Nora, who nodded, unsmiling.

Beth looked in on Abby, sleeping soundly on her bed covered with a quilt, then Beth returned downstairs to look for her mother. She started in the library and from there followed a sweeping sound to the eastern end of the Lodge and one of her father's old examining rooms. Emily was on the floor, scrubbing it by hand with a brush.

Beth stood outside the door and watched her mother for a few seconds. This was why these rooms had appeared spotless the day Beth and Abby toured the Lodge. Emily kept them as sterile as they'd been when Lauren Gray required it so many years ago, except back then one of the maids had done the work, and not on her hands and knees.

Emily said something in a low tone that Beth couldn't make out.

Jack answered. "She had to be sedated on a regular basis."

He stood beyond Beth's line of sight, near the open door. Beth backed away a couple of feet.

The scrubbing noise stopped. "Jack, you know the reason--"

"Mom, face facts. She was always unstable, and she got worse as she got older. Remember all those crazy stunts. Dad realized before he died that she wouldn't be able to handle the responsibility, the pressure of running the Lodge. It would've been too much for her. He knew he couldn't mask her problems forever with drugs."

"Beth is perfectly--" Emily let out an exasperated sigh.

"Perfectly what? She didn't remember hitting that deputy. Maybe she doesn't remember killing Ollie."

"Is that why you harangued her and Abby at the table Sunday night? Because you believe she killed Ollie?"

"I don't want to, but this visit has gotten me thinking how she changed after Dad died and she wasn't getting his little magic pills anymore. Maybe you just refused to see that."

"That was a difficult time for all of us, especially Beth. But Beth is not a killer, Jack. I may not have agreed with Dad about how he handled her, but he was right about the Lodge. You want to sell it! It was of utmost importance to Dad that the Lodge remain in the family, as it is to Beth. She would've managed it just fine. She still may. She's years younger than your father was when he took it over."

"Did it ever occur to you that the reason none of us others bothered to show an interest in the Lodge while Dad was alive, was we knew it would go to Beth? We never had a chance. She's not running the Lodge and never will. There's no one to hold onto it for, Mom."

Beth moved silently away.

The kitchen was filled with the lingering aroma of baking. Faith sat at the table, wrapping loaves of bread in plastic bags. She got up to take the picnic containers from Beth. "Matt said you were back, and the cherub is asleep. You look done in yourself. You need a nap or some coffee."

"I had a cup at Peter's. Any more and I'll never sleep tonight. I'm okay, Faith."

"Then sit and visit while I finish up here. Where did you go today?"

"Gabriel's waterfall and Sylvia's place. We ate our lunch at Peter's. Abby saw her first snowfall."

"Gabriel's waterfall. If it ever had another name, it wouldn't have mattered to you kids. I always meant to have you show me where that is, but I'm probably too old, too fat, and too arthritic now to get anywhere near it, and I stay out of the snow if I can help it. I swear there's more of it than there used to be. What did Sylvia think of your sudden appearance on her doorstep? And what did she make of Peter, and he of her?"

"She was happy to see us. I think they like each other."

"Matt told me Gabriel was here. He left in a hurry, didn't he?"

"He was on his way somewhere with Nora Kendall."

"Oh." Faith sat down beside her. "Is that what's got you down?"

"No, I just--" Beth sighed, leaned her elbow on the table and rested her head against her hand. She couldn't get Jack's words out of her mind. Unstable. In essence he'd told Mom that Beth was mentally ill. She'd never realized anyone in the family thought of her that way. "I'm tired."

"Well, no wonder. Too many things pulling you in all directions at once. It's not the place to come if you really need a rest. Not with all that's left unfinished."

"Not with all the animosity toward me, you mean?"

Faith nodded sagely. "They all talk to me. I've been wondering when you would come back to finish things. I never thought you'd give this place up without a fight. Neither did your father. But you don't appear to be putting up any kind of a fight. Your mother thinks it's because you're still not entirely well. I think it's something else. I think with all that murder business, and being locked up for so long, someone finally found a way to break your spirit."

"Spirit." Beth shook her head. "I used to do a lot of foolish things, Faith. It made everyone think I was out of control, and crazy enough to commit murder. As for fighting, I feel as if I've been fighting off shadows and demons all the years I've been away, they hammer at my mind. I'm so tired. I don't want to fight anymore."

She sighed, reviewed her words, and realized how crazy they sounded. Shadows and demons ... nightmares. Claustrophobia. Then there was the reality she hadn't mentioned. Her suicide attempt. And she didn't remember hitting that deputy. Maybe Jack was right.

"I'm going to lie down. If you see Mom, will you tell her Gabriel stopped by? He'll be back in the morning."

She left the kitchen and found Matt standing near the bottom of the stairs. He moved aside to let her pass with a quiet, "Hey Beth."

"Hi Matt." Now he'd spoken to her exactly five times in five days.

Chapter 9

Beth wakened a couple of hours later to find Abby lying beside her on the bed, watching her. Abby sat up. "Hi Mommy. Did you have a good nap?"

"Yes. Did you?"

"Uh-huh. Grandma looked at you, to see if you were okay." She switched to a whisper, "We were quiet."

"You certainly were," Beth whispered back, uneasy that she hadn't wakened. She was usually a light sleeper.

"And you didn't have any bad dreams."

"No." Beth tossed the afghan aside and swung her legs off the bed, still half-asleep. "Abby, I'm sorry I wake you sometimes when I have bad dreams. Does that bother you very much?"

"It used to scare me, when I was little, but it doesn't anymore."

Abby still seemed little to Beth, though she sounded far too grownup at times. "Good, because it's just silly for me to have bad dreams so often. It's not anything that should worry you."

"You're not silly, Mommy." Abby hugged her. Then she jumped off the bed, tugging at Beth's hand. "Come on! Hair, face, teeth!"

Beth let her giggling daughter lead her into the bathroom.

Minutes later, Abby ran out of the room ahead of Beth, and bounded down the stairs in search of her grandmother, with an armload of dolls.

"Slow down. You're in the house!" Beth called after her.

"Get some sleep?" Jack stood in the hallway outside his door.

"Yes, thanks." Beth started to follow Abby, but Jack moved to block her way.

"I want to apologize for the other night."

"You do?"

He lowered his eyes. "I said some rotten things. I shouldn't have brought Abby into it, and I shouldn't have said anything at dinner. Mom's right about that. I just don't understand why she's still trying to push the Lodge at you. Of course you don't want it now. Do you?"

Her mother had only tried to persuade her to stay once. Why was he so worried about it? Beth remained silent, and watched him.

"Anyway, I'm sorry." His piercing silver-green eyes, prominent cheekbones and curly auburn hair weren't all that reminded her of her father. Lauren Gray had been an intense man. Jack was more like him than anyone.

"Okay," she said, feeling the response had been coerced out of her.

He started to move away.

"Jack, I didn't come here with the idea of disrupting anyone's life. I'm here for a rest. I really need it, and I want Abby to know Mom. That's all. Can we be at peace while I'm here, and part on peaceful terms? I'd really appreciate that."

He appeared to consider her words, watching her face. Then he let out a breath. "Sure." He entered his room and closed the door.

Beth wakened mid-scream, out of breath and drenched in sweat. She sat up, breathless, and grateful for the air she breathed. It was two-thirty in the morning.

"Beth!" Matt rattled the doorknob. "Let me in."

She grabbed her robe, opened the door and gestured him in, whispering, "Be quiet."

"Be quiet?" He looked amazed.

"Beth?" Emily appeared in the hallway in her robe and slippers. "What happened?"

"It's just a d-dream." Beth pulled her robe on with fumbling hands. Matt hit the light switch, and Beth blinked at the two of them. "I'm s-s-sorry." Her teeth chattered.

Then Matt's arm was around her. He steered her to her bed, sat beside her and held her. She kept shivering.

"Mommy?" Abby said, standing in her doorway, her voice stuffy with tears.

"Mom," Matt said softly, and nodded his head toward Abby.

"Yes." Emily appeared suddenly to make sense of the situation. She took Abby by the hand and led her back to bed.

"Beth, what's wrong?" Rita stood with Vicky and Jack outside the open hall door.

"It was a nightmare," Matt told them. "Close the door, Rita." Matt dragged the quilt off the bed and wrapped it around Beth. "Some nightmare, Beth." He rubbed her arms.

She nodded and swallowed hard. "The demon."

"The demon?"

"My name for it. I don't have it often, but it scares the hell out of me." She nodded her head toward the door. "And everyone else."

"How often does the demon strike?"

"Last time was in the hospital. It may be the reason my doctor insisted on a long vacation."

"That would do it. You have nightmares every night, or just here?"

"Lately, at home too. They're more frequent than ever. I don't know why."

"What do you suppose triggered the demon?"

"My knee. It was cold today, and it snowed. That made my knee ache."

"What's wrong with your knee?"

She glanced at Abby's door, through which her mother had vanished. "I injured it a few years ago."

"What does that have to do with a bad dream?"

"Everything. It--" She stopped, looked at Matt. He watched her face. "Nothing."

"Come on, Beth." He grasped her hands. "Your hands are freezing, and you're still shaking. I'm calling Peter." He reached for the telephone.

"No! Please don't disturb him. I've already wakened everyone else. I'm all right, Matt, really. You and Mom go back to bed. I'll sit with Abby."

He held her fast. "Beth, you're in no state to calm a frightened kid. Mom can handle Abby, and she wants to. Will you please talk to me about this? What was the dream about?"

She took a long time to make up her mind, but his arms around her and his watchful eyes somehow convinced her to trust him. "I don't want Mom to know. The dream is related to something that happened in prison."

"Shit," Matt murmured. Beth hesitated. "Sorry," he said. "Go on. What happened?"

"I was in the infirmary to get my pill. They gave me tranquilizers."

"What puts you in such a good mood, the pills or Tilly?" the guard named Corcoran asked. Beth wanted to turn and look at her, but kept moving, reminding herself this wasn't Wilder. Corcoran was one of the less belligerent guards, but you had to be careful what you said to the uniforms, no matter how they treated you.

Inside the infirmary, the nurse named Tilly welcomed Beth with a dazzling smile. "What are you doin' here, girl?" She stood with her hands on her big hips, her mahogany skin glowing, her teeth as white as her uniform. She always greeted Beth the same way.

"Fifteen years, and I need drugs to get me through them." Beth's greeting changed with her mood. Today she was edgy.

Tilly gave her a long look. "Sit down. There's a new magazine."

Beth picked up the months-old copy of Glamour and flipped it open. She paused to swallow a pill and water, then went on flipping pages restlessly, hardly glimpsing what was on them.

At home she would've run along the lake road on a morning she felt this way. She could run here, at certain times, but it didn't empty out the disquiet that filled her. She couldn't run far enough to escape the shadows of the night, and no trees or lake fed her on their peace.

"Open," Tilly said, and checked inside Beth's mouth with a penlight to make sure she'd swallowed the pill. "New doctor's here. He's reading your file. He wants to talk to you."

"I don't want to talk to him." Beth put the magazine down.

"You haven't met him."

Beth spoke quietly, because she didn't want either Corcoran or the new doctor to hear. "I grew up with a doctor. Why do I have to keep answering to them?"

"I keep asking myself the same thing. Guess I need to retire, and you ought to have stayed out of trouble. Just do what you're told, honey."

Beth kept her gaze on her hands, afraid to meet Tilly's.

"Fine, you just sit there and look at those pretty white hands. I won't let you shut me out."

A man in a white coat approached. He was young, with inquisitive eyes. Tilly turned to him. "Dr. Severn, this is Elizabeth Gray."

"Beth. Good morning." Beth smiled and stuck out her hand. Her greeting was a reflex, something her father had reinforced since birth. Dr. Severn stared at her, then glanced at Tilly.

"Our one and only charm school graduate. She's had her med." Tilly moved away. The doctor started in with his questions.

Several minutes later Beth walked to the door, unsettled after talking about things her father had insisted she keep quiet. She'd never known precisely what it was her father had feared about those things, but Beth always feared speaking of them. She liked Dr. Severn, though. He seemed to know all the right questions to ask. A secret compartment had opened up inside her, and she'd wanted to empty it out.

Corcoran opened the door and motioned Beth ahead of her.

Out in the hallway, another guard and inmate met them. It struck Beth as peculiar that the other inmate followed rather than preceded the guard toward the infirmary. As Beth passed them and glimpsed the gun the inmate held to the uniform's back, the inmate looked at Beth with cold, feral eyes. The hair raised up on Beth's arms and her insides went slack. Where had this woman gotten a gun? The guards weren't armed with guns. The thought flashed through Beth's mind, but was as quickly driven from it.

Corcoran shouted, behind Beth, and the gun fired. Corcoran slumped to the floor. The other inmate urged the other guard on toward the infirmary. Beth glanced around. Another uniformed body lay on the floor across the hallway, motionless. Beth knelt beside Corcoran, tried to rouse her. "Corcoran?"

Corcoran didn't stir, but she was breathing.

Beth didn't have time to go look at the other guard. The inmate with the gun and guard-hostage were now entering the infirmary. The door was closing.

Tilly! Beth ran back in, catching the door just before it closed. Her pulse pounded in her ears and her breath rasped in and out so loudly that she couldn't hear herself think. She hung near the door and watched the armed inmate advance into the room behind the guard. Tilly and the doctor stood behind a desk with their backs to the door, intent on their conversation. Hadn't they heard the shots, Beth wondered? Then Tilly glanced over her shoulder and met Beth's gaze. Dr. Severn turned and walked toward the guard.

"Tilly get down!" Beth called.

The inmate shoved the guard aside and fired. The doctor crumpled to the floor. Tilly moved, but no more than a few inches before the woman fired again and she fell. "Tilly!" Beth screamed. The inmate swung around and aimed the gun at Beth.

Time seemed to stand still for an instant. Then it moved very slowly. The guard hit the inmate from the side, jarring her. The gun went off, dropped to the floor, and the guard and the inmate fought. The inmate was larger and faster. She knocked the guard to the floor, then snatched up a chair and hit her with it repeatedly.

They moved nearer the door as they fought, away from where the gun had fallen. Beth darted in that direction, attempting to escape the fight, and to get a glimpse of Tilly. The gun lay on the floor in her path. Beth stopped and stared at it.

The inmate started toward it. "Get out of my way."

Beth seized a metal stool, swung it, and the inmate ducked and backed away two steps, cursing. Then she continued toward the gun.

This time Beth waited until the inmate passed her. Beth hit her hard, with the wooden seat of the stool. The inmate fell. Her eyes were open, blinking, but she didn't move.

The guard lay on the floor across the room, watching Beth and the gun. She appeared unable to come get it. She pleaded with her eyes, and Beth knew what the guard wanted her to do. Beth stood over the gun and stared at it, sweating. Then she squatted and reached for it.

Her father's pistol was in her hand, the one with the mother-of-pearl on the grip. She could see it clearly, and she could see Ollie Stevens lying on the ground in the moonlit clearing. The memory shut out all else. Beth was touching the gun.

"No!" She jerked her hand away as if burned. An alarm went off, blaring in her ears as she stood up. Red lights flashed near the ceiling. She held her hands to her ears.

The other inmate was moving.

Beth glanced at the guard, whose face had gone slack. She thought she was going to die. We're both going to die. I can't do it.

Beth kicked the gun in the guard's direction, but didn't kick it hard enough. The guard stretched her hand out, her fingers nearly on it. Beth rushed over to push it nearer. In her peripheral vision she glimpsed the inmate coming at her with the metal stool. It struck Beth hard on her left side, and she fell on top of the gun and the guard's arm. Beth tried to scramble away. The next blow hit her upper back, and her arms collapsed as pain dazed her, tingling her fingertips. She whimpered, raised up on her elbows and pushed at the gun again, with both hands. The guard grabbed it.

Beth turned away from the guard and struggled to a squatting position, intending to get out of the way so the guard could fire, but in her daze Beth moved too slowly. The stool slammed into her chest, sending a stabbing, choking pain through her that made breath a sudden impossibility.

The stool was on the floor now. "I'm going to kill you!" the inmate screeched as she grabbed Beth and shook her like a rag doll, too intent on expending her rage at Beth's interference to notice the guard now had the gun.

Beth fell, face down. She lay still for a few precious seconds, breathless and dizzy. She lay on the guard's foot, with her face shoved up against a cabinet near the door. Her face hurt as much as the rest of her now. She tasted blood. Something underneath her, some piece of broken furniture she no longer had the wits to identify, jabbed her in the side. Beth felt for the floor, trying to figure out which way was up. Everything spun.

She slid off the guard, staggered to her feet and tried once more to get out of the way. She stumbled a few feet and paused, off balance. She held her head with her right hand and helplessly watched the inmate move toward her again. Beth fell into her, the same instant the guard fired.

Splitting, searing pain tore through Beth's left knee. She screamed with her last vestige of breath, and slumped against the inmate. Then the floor slammed into her face.

Beth tried again to get out of the way of the guard with the gun and the inmate who wanted to kill her. She turned upright, intending to lunge as far away from them both as possible. The inmate kicked her in the chest. Beth doubled over on her hands and one knee, wheezing, and slipped in her own blood. She turned over with her last fragment of strength and watched the metal stool rise again, as though in slow motion.

"Why don't you just die!" the inmate raged.

That and the flashing red lights were the last things Beth saw before she heard a shot, and the inmate fell on top of her.

"I don't remember anything after that, until the hospital." Beth was shaking again.

Matt's eyes were wide. "That's what the nightmare's about? Getting shot?"

"No. The nightmare doesn't even make sense. It's not anything I remember. It's--there's blood everywhere, and I can barely breathe with her on top of me. I can't move. I'm trapped under that dead woman, for what seems an eternity. All I can see is her face. Her eyes are open, but she's dead. I wake up screaming, in pain and out of breath."

Matt sat watching her, for several long seconds. Then he took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Okay. I won't tell Mom. Get into bed. I'll stay until you're asleep."

Beth rose before the sun, donned pink sweats, and went out before anyone else was awake. She paused on the front steps to warm up and stretch her legs. It was cold out, but clear, with a faint gray mist hovering over the surface of the lake.

Peter drove up, jumped out of his truck and came up the steps with a buoyant smile.

"You're out early, even for you," he said. "I didn't think I'd see you. I have a full schedule today, and I'm about to beg Faith for a quick early breakfast."

"She's not here yet, but I can get it for you."

He shook his head. "You're on your way out. I'll stop in town."

"Nonsense. It's early for this anyway, and cold."

She was about to lead him inside when Faith drove up, bustled out of her car, and waved at them as she hurried inside.

"Well. You're better off with her cooking."

"I'd like to spend Saturday with you," Peter said.

She nodded slowly. "I'd like that too."

He smiled and rolled his eyes upward for an instant. "I don't suppose you like to fish?"

She laughed. "You had to ask sooner or later."

"So, it's a date?"

"It's a date."

He moved closer and held both his hands out, reaching for hers. Then he pulled her closer still. He kissed her.

"I feel completely warmed up now," she said when she found her voice.

Beth was helping Faith in the pantry when Gabriel arrived before breakfast. Matt led him in through the back door.

"Come in, young man," Faith said. "Are you too rich and famous yet to enjoy my humble biscuits?"

"I've missed your biscuits, Faith." He hugged her and then Beth.

"Abby, come meet Uncle Gabriel," Matt said. Gabriel grasped Abby's hand and glanced from her to Beth with obvious admiration. Then he sat down to eat breakfast with the family.

Rita entered in a lavender robe and slippers, hair uncombed.

Gabriel tousled her hair. "Rita, my lovely. You look ravishing."

Rita shook her hair into it's original disarray and joined the group at the table. "What brings you here so early?"

Gabriel grinned at Beth and appeared to ignore the question.

After breakfast, Beth, Emily, Abby, Matt and Rita gathered in the family room to visit with Gabriel.

Each time Gabriel threatened to turn the conversation to Beth, she avoided with a question about him, or his work, or his sister Kelly and her family.

After two hours of this, Gabriel stood abruptly. "Beth, will you take a walk with me? I hope you don't mind, Emily. We have some things to discuss in private."

"Can I come too?" Abby was halfway to the door already.

"No, Abby," Emily said. "Stay here with me."

Gabriel led Beth out toward the orchard. Apple trees had begun to blossom, snowy white against new leaves, young grass and deep blue sky. There was no sign this morning that snow had fallen yesterday. The sun shone warmly. Gabriel remained silent until they reached the trees. Then he faced her. "Beth, why are you here?"

"I didn't think you would question it."

"I'm not. I've always believed this was where you belonged. But I need to know what it means to me. I hardly slept last night wondering."

"I came here for multiple reasons. You're one of them. I understand it's been a long time, and you have your own life now. I do too. I'm honestly not sure I'd want there to be anything still between us, romantically that is. It's just that what you and I had was taken away."

"Taken away? Beth, you ended it. You sent back my ring. You wouldn't see me or write to me. I wanted to make things work for us. I would've waited for you."

She sighed deeply. "I know. I did to you what Dan did to me. I decided for us."

"Dan?"

"Abby's father."

"He left you?" He stared at her in disbelief.

"Dan told me that I used to say your name in my sleep."

"You're kidding."

"Gable, you have no obligation to me. What we had was over a long time ago. You're right, I ended it. Obviously you're not the only reason I'm here. If you don't want anything to do with me, just walk away. No hard feelings. You're one of those ghosts I had to face. I hope we can always be friends." She started to move away, expecting him to follow her back to the Lodge and that comfortably crowded room where Abby waited.

"It's not that simple." He walked in her direction. "Beth, wait. It's barely sunk in that you're here. Let me--"

She thought he was about to walk past her. Instead he stopped in front of her, then took her in his arms and kissed her. It was a long kiss, the culmination of fifteen years of wondering, waiting, missing. She returned it in kind, inhaling the heat of his breath. It broke through barriers to feelings she'd buried long ago. Passion she'd forgotten.

He paused long enough to look into her eyes. His were dark and fixed. Then he kissed her again.

Leigh offered Beth a cold beer when they reached his cabin that afternoon. She accepted it gratefully. Her visit with Gabriel had rattled her. She was able to relax a little after the beer, to sit still long enough for Leigh to feel he made some progress.

Abby sat with two of her cloth dolls, talking softly to them and eating crackers, getting crumbs on Leigh's sofa, while Leigh directed Beth's movements. She began to sympathize with the models who worked for her and Dan, and the absurdities they put them through to get a fashion show or an ad layout just right. Leigh's frustration was evident in his face and his voice.

"Something's happened to you. What's going on?"

"I don't understand what you want."

"The burning inside. Like at lunch the other day, with Vicky."

He wanted to portray her anger? She stared at him, and then she must have hit the thought or emotion he was looking for, because he ordered her to freeze. She was positive she couldn't and didn't. He worked feverishly for another hour or so. She told him not to worry and bade him goodbye, assuring him when he offered the promised ride back to the Lodge that she and Abby both needed the walk. She was restless and stiff from sitting still for so long.

On her way out she glanced in the direction of Peter's cabin. The blue camper was nowhere in sight. She walked, with Abby beside her, looking forward to dinner and to seeing Peter again.

What about Gabriel? The thought came like a breeze blowing from the wrong direction.

It was a long walk for short legs, and Abby was cranky by the time they neared the Lodge. She ran ahead and refused to respond to Beth's calls. Beth ran in the direction Abby had gone, and came upon the bike-shed among the trees and overgrown brush.

She heard Abby murmuring to her dolls.

Beth approached the far end of the shed. The door stood open. It was supposed to be closed and locked. It had been, the last time she'd walked this way. Apprehension replaced mental clarity as she moved closer to that open door and the sound of Abby's voice.

Abby stood inside, at the far end of the shed, talking to three dolls propped against the wall. The third doll wasn't one of Abby's.

"Abby, come out of there." Beth's words came out weak and pleading, her voice rising in pitch. She got no response. "Abby, what did I say?"

Abby turned her head and spoke in a plaintive whine. "Mommy, my dolls like it here. It's our playhouse. And look, they found a new friend. Can we stay for a while? It's not dirty anymore." She turned her back again.

Beth took a deep breath and stepped onto the threshold. Then she saw that Abby was right. The debris was gone. Someone had swept the floor and washed the windows. Sunlight streamed through them.

Why?

She had only a second to wonder before a door hinge creaked and she was pushed violently from behind. She fell, and heard the hasp slam home, a padlock slide through the eyehole, then click shut.

She lay sprawled on the floor with the wind knocked out of her.

"Mommy?" Abby said, round-eyed.

"Oh, God, no," Beth gasped, scrambled to her feet and pushed against the door. She pounded on it and called out, fighting back screams, which wasn't hard, considering she hadn't yet regained her breath.

"Open the door, please!" She gasped a few more times, sucking in air that wanted to come out again in screams. She coughed, and pleaded with whoever was out there. She ran to each of the windows, to catch a glimpse of who'd done this. Meanwhile Abby watched her mother's panic escalate, and began to panic herself.

"Mommy? " she said again, and again, her voice rising in a rhythmic, hiccuping chant. "Mommy? Mommy?"

Beth saw the look on her daughter's face, and the walls of her mind crashed in. She'd been so careful to keep this terror from touching Abby. She had to regain a sense of calm.

Abby kept repeating her Mommy mantra.

Beth didn't dare touch her, for fear her panic was contagious and would transfer with the merest contact. Abby would feel her shuddering terror. She had to talk to her, to calm her with words.

"It's a game, Abby. Someone's playing a game with us."

"I don't like this game. I don't want to play."

"Okay. You play with your dolls, and I'll play this game."

She glanced at the strange doll again, and knew why it was here. A flash of anger rose inside her along with her panic.

Abby watched her, and Beth knew she wasn't fooling her. Abby was too smart. Then Abby turned to the dolls again, and sat on the floor facing them.

Beth breathed a sigh and looked around. Two windows faced north and south, each about two by two-and-a-half feet in size, with four panes each. They were set into the two longer walls of the shed, with a solid wall on the end where Abby sat, and the door on the other.

The south window had opened at one time. They'd used it to collect money for the rental of the bicycles kept here. Now the top half of the window was boarded over. It was a sash window, but it was nailed shut.

Three nights ago, the window in her bathroom had been nailed shut, and Matt had removed the nails--with what? Beth cast around. The shed was perfectly clean, and empty except for that doll Abby had found. Some insane person had actually gone to the trouble to wash these useless freaking windows!

Again, Beth had to fight back her screams. Stay calm, stay calm. She glanced at Abby, who sat facing her dolls, silent. What was she thinking? That Mommy, who screamed like a banshee in the middle of the night, had finally lost it? Beth felt crazy, and she wanted to hurt the person who'd locked Abby in here with her.

She touched the south window. The glass shuddered ever so little, loose in its frame. The mullions were wood, dried and cracked with age. She glanced at Abby again. If she could break the window and somehow get all the glass out without cutting herself in the process, maybe they could climb out.

Break it with what? She glanced at her hands, glimpsed the scars on her wrists, and almost wretched. She looked down at her shoes. Instead of sturdy boots or even something as substantial as running shoes, today she wore soft canvas slip-ons. She wore no jacket, because the sun was so warm today, only a pullover sweater. Abby wore the same. No shirt underneath, just a sweater, stirrup pants, socks and canvas shoes. She always wanted to match what Beth wore.

They could be trapped in here for hours. Beth recalled how Faith was always hot and kept the kitchen windows open while she worked. She'd have them open today, and she might hear Beth's screams, if only Beth could get one of these windows open.

"Stop it, you can't do this," she whispered. Then she glanced at Abby, who'd turned around to watch Beth, her expression wary. Beth tried to smile at her.

Abby stood up and faced her with stubborn resolve. "Mommy, let's go back to Grandma's."

"Not yet. Play with your dolls. I have to think." Her own voice sounded distant. Panic was a thread away from overwhelming her. She couldn't let Abby see her fall apart utterly. But she had to get out of here, soon, or Abby would see. She would see something a four-year-old shouldn't. She would see her mother throw a screaming, raving fit.

Beth played it all out in her mind several times before she acted, wanting to do it as safely as she could. But her thinking was muddled. She didn't feel rational.

She told Abby to sit facing the far corner, making it a game. Beth stripped off her own sweater and put it over Abby's head to protect her from flying glass. Then she closed her eyes and shielded them with her left hand while she attacked the window savagely with her right. The brittle old glass wasn't all that loose after all. Finally it cracked, and then shattered. The sound echoed clear across the lake. Then Beth yelled, hoping that someone would hear.

She called as loudly as she could until she was out of breath and her throat felt raw. Then she talked to Abby and soothed her quietly for a few minutes, telling her it was okay, Mommy was just trying to get someone to hear and let them out, because the door was stuck.

She picked up her sweater and held it in her right hand while she picked bits of clinging glass off her skin and her bra with her left. Abby watched her, and began to cry. Beth followed her gaze, saw the blood that dripped from the cuts on the back and side of her right hand. It was all over her sweater, on Abby's clothes, and on the floor. She stared at her hand, wondering why it didn't hurt.

She shook her sweater out and put it on. It was too late now to worry about bloodstains, and she was shivering.

She returned to the window, avoiding standing too near it because of the jagged glass that still clung to the edges and fell in pieces from time to time onto the sill and the floor. She breathed the clear, cool outside air in deep draughts, watching the ripples on the lake. She could hear the breeze blowing softly in the trees, but she couldn't get out without injuring herself further and frightening Abby more in the process.

She shouted again, and waited.

"Hello?" a distant male voice called.

Beth yelled incoherently, between sobs. The next time he called she recognized the voice.

"Matt, it's Beth! In the bike-shed. Abby's with me. We can't get out."

A moment later the lock rattled, then she heard the jingle of keys.

"It's a different lock, Beth," Matt said. "I have to get the bolt cutters." He came to the window and peered in. "Is she cut?" he demanded.

"No. It's my hand. I didn't realize I was bleeding when I touched her. She's okay, just please hurry." She shivered, teeth chattering.

"Okay. Calm down, I'll get you out." He disappeared from view, and Beth heard his footsteps withdraw at a run. She sat on the floor beside Abby to wait, trying not to think about anything, afraid she'd sob uncontrollably if she spoke. She held Abby in the curve of her left arm and rested her bleeding right hand on her knee.

Abby stopped crying and leaned into Beth's arm. She didn't speak or move. Beth was too consumed with anxiety to do anything for Abby but hold her.

Long minutes later, Abby leaned over and looked at Beth's cut hand. "Does it hurt?" She looked up at Beth. Her eyes were wide and dark.

"Only a little. Peter will fix it." Beth started shaking again, and cursed herself silently for it.

"Look, Mommy. Rosemary got hurt too." Abby held up one of her two dolls. It had a smear of blood on its clothing. She hugged the doll close, and snuggled closer to her mother. Beth kissed the top of Abby's head, letting her lips linger on her fine hair.

They heard footsteps outside, then Matt's voice, comfortingly near, "It's me, Beth. I'll have you out in a minute. You okay in there, Abby?"

"Yes," Abby called. She smiled up at Beth. "Uncle Matt is my best uncle."

Minutes later Matt pried the lock off and the door swung wide.

Beth stayed where she was, afraid she'd be unable to stop running once she moved. She wanted to get Abby out of here first. Matt had the same idea. He came in and sent Abby out to Rita. Then he gave Beth a hand up and led her out. Her knees felt like rubber. She glanced at Abby, who waited for her beside Rita.

"Please get her away from me, so I can go to pieces," Beth whispered to Matt. She was sweating again and felt lightheaded.

"Abby, you and Aunt Rita run ahead and ask Faith if Peter's on his way yet." When Rita hesitated, he added, "Now." They hurried off through the trees.

His voice sounded as if it came from far away, and Beth stumbled as she took a step closer. Her vision was spotty and swimming. She blinked and shook her head, attempting to clear away the dizziness. She clutched at Matt's arm.

Chapter 10

Beth lay on the ground, blinking up at the sky, the trees, and Matt's anxious face. She blinked a couple more times, then started to sit up.

"Damn it, Beth, lie down. You just fainted. How long were you in there?"

"I don't know. We left Leigh's at three-thirty. Does Abby seem terribly frightened to you?"

"She seemed okay. You're the one who worries me."

"Abby was scared until she knew you were coming back to let us out. Matt, Abby found a new doll in there. She was playing with it when I reached the door. Someone pushed me from behind with the door. They must've seen Abby run in. When Abby wandered in there on Friday, the shed was dirty, full of trash. Now someone's cleaned it and washed the windows. What do you make of that?"

He watched her and said nothing.

"What time is it?"

He glanced at his watch. "Almost five."

She sat up and looked at the shed. "The son-of-a-bitch lured Abby in there and locked her in with me. Why would anyone do that to her, even if they hate me?"

"Why did anyone ever do it? You were younger than she is when it started. God, someone loves to see you scared. I'd forgotten how this fear is for you, it's bigger than I remembered." He watched her with a pensive look.

She glanced at the shed again, feeling its proximity too keenly. "I don't see how you could forget. It was supposed to be my motive. Can we go now? I need to get away from here."

"Wait a few more minutes." He was silent for a moment, watching her face. Then he said, "It wasn't Ollie, you know, back then," Matt said.

"What do you mean?"

"Ollie played his little pranks, sure. But the worst of them weren't his doing. Someone else terrorized you all those years, doing this kind of thing. Ollie wasn't this diabolical." He nodded his head in the direction of the shed again.

"Dad was certain it was Ollie."

"Dad was wrong!" Matt looked angry, then he softened. "Owen knew Ollie better than anyone, and he says Ollie didn't pull all those pranks. He had a crush on you, he wanted to get your attention. Ollie teased you, but once he realized how panic-stricken you were by being locked up, he didn't do it again. When he pushed you into the lake that day, it was intended as a harmless prank. He knew you were a strong swimmer. It was someone else who terrorized you, Beth, and it looks as if they're still at it."

He nodded toward the shed, and Beth shivered. "Ollie didn't do this, and he didn't lock you in your bathroom on Sunday. He's dead."

"Has Owen ever told you why he lied in court about seeing me shoot Ollie?"

Matt looked disgusted. He rocked back on his heels, holding the crowbar upright. "He didn't lie, Beth."

"Yes, Matt, he did. I didn't shoot him."

"You admitted it. Don't start denying it now, not to me. Save it for Mom."

"What do you mean I admitted it?"

"Your confession to the parole board. I know all about that. Owen's father was there, remember? You told them you shot Ollie. You described it in detail, and you wept."

Her tears were instantaneous.

Matt pushed himself up, and turned away.

She stood and moved around to face him. "Matt, I would've said anything to get out of prison by then. Anything! It was my third try. So I lied. I told them I killed Ollie. I'm not proud of it, and it's one of the most difficult things I've ever done. And yes, I cried. You have to know how desperate I was. Matt, look at this!" She held her bloody right hand out to him. "I would've done anything to get out. Anything!"

She sat down with her back against a tree and her knees drawn up, to work the choking sobs and the aching tears out of her system.

A moment later, Beth sniffed. She must be a sight. Dan wouldn't recognize her. This was not Liz Palmer behavior. Liz Palmer lived in another world, and she never cried.

The sun would dip behind the mountains soon. The breeze was already cooling. She felt the chill of approaching dark in her fingers, and her right hand ached. Matt came over and offered his hand, pulled her to her feet, then stood facing her.

"Tell me again that you didn't do it." His eyes shone, steady on hers, his lashes wet and unwavering. He waited.

She returned his gaze. "I didn't kill Ollie."

"Then how can you stand to speak to me, knowing I helped send you away?"

She almost smiled, she was so relieved. "Why were you so nice to me, before? You've been extremely brotherly in the past twenty-four hours for someone who thought I killed his friend."

"I never wanted to believe you did it, or that Owen lied, or that what I said in court could help convict you if you were innocent. Beth, I'm sorry about the things I said at the trial. I've been sorry since I testified."

"You were eleven years old and you told the truth, though it hurt to tell it. I knew that at the time. I thought you were an awfully brave kid. It sounds crazy, considering where I stood, but I was proud of you."

He released a dry laugh. "You're right, that does sound crazy."

"You're right about one thing. Someone is still terrorizing me, and Ollie's dead."

He looked down, placed a hand behind her shoulder and turned her toward the Lodge. "You're terrorizing me. You're bleeding again. You act like you don't even feel it." He gently raised her bleeding hand and made her hold it against her chest.

He went on talking, and mentioned being ashamed he'd never taken a first aid course, if he really wanted to be a doctor, so he'd know how to handle a situation like this. "This doesn't make me look promising."

"You want to be a doctor?"

"I start med school soon, at UCSD."

"I wonder why Mom didn't tell me. I didn't know you'd gone back to school until I got here. Last I heard you were working at the Stevens' garage."

They started back to the Lodge.

Peter met them at the edge of the parking lot and guided Beth to his camper.

He frowned at her hand, then glanced in the direction from which they'd come. "What happened?"

"Someone locked her in the bike-shed with Abby," Matt said. "She fainted after I got them out."

Peter glowered at Matt, and the crowbar. Then he met Beth's gaze.

"I cut my hand breaking the window." She sounded like her portable radio when the batteries were low. She couldn't get the damned quiver out of her voice.

"Where's Abby now?"

"With Rita. I protected her from flying glass with my sweater, but I'd like you to see her too, just to be sure."

She sat on the back step of his camper while he applied a temporary bandage. He finally turned to Matt. "Did you call the sheriff?"

Matt looked at Beth uncertainly. "Faith might've."

"The son-of-a-bitch locked my little girl in there with me!" Beth clenched her fists, and winced. Now her hand hurt.

"Easy," Peter said. "Ride to my office with me and I'll take care of this there." He guided her toward the cab of his truck.

The sickening, suffocating feeling returned. Beth broke into a sweat. "Peter. I--" She eyed the cab of his truck, reminding herself she'd ridden in it just yesterday. Today everything was different. "There's Dad's office. Mom cleaned it yesterday." Her voice, high-pitched with tension, reminded her of Abby in the shed. Beth felt queasy.

"My office will be better," Peter told her. "I have everything I need there."

"Come on, Beth," Matt urged. He promised to call the sheriff and check on Abby.

Peter urged her toward the cab.

Later, Peter sat on a stool in his office, giving Beth's numbed hand his solemn attention. She watched his eyes and began to realize what a crazy thing she'd done. "I really messed up, Peter."

"You were foolhardy. But there's no serious damage to your hand. Relax. This is what I do best. Now that I think of it, that's something you and I have in common. We both like to sew."

She managed a shaky smile, followed by tears. "None of this was supposed to touch Abby, ever. I wanted to protect her from this fear. I should never have brought her here."

"Tell me what happened."

She sniffed, blinked away tears, and told him. He remained silent, his attention on her hand. By the time he'd cleaned, stitched and bandaged her cuts, she'd related the whole story. He was about to add a splint to the dressing he'd devised.

"Is that really necessary?" she asked.

"Yep."

"Yep?"

"I'm assuming you want the same hand you started out with. If you were going for a new look, I could've been creative myself and added a flounce or a ruffle, maybe some mother-of-pearl buttons, but I usually stick with what nature intended."

She fixed him with what she believed was her most baleful glare. "I don't expect you to understand."

He provided a sling, and she chewed her lip but said nothing. He inspected her scraped chin for splinters, then began cleaning up. "I need to check your hand within forty-eight hours. That's really necessary. The stitches come out in ten days."

She thanked him and asked what she owed him.

"No charge." He didn't look up.

"Of course there's a charge, Peter."

"I don't want you to pay me." He met her gaze. "I've told you, I don't want to be your doctor. I want another kind of relationship with you. But I couldn't very well leave you to take your bloody hand clear to McGuffey because I felt more like kissing you than stitching you up."

Mollified, she watched his steady blue eyes. He felt like kissing her? She wished he would.

He moved to the window and lifted a slat in the blinds. "Do you mind talking to the sheriff?"

"He'll send one of the younger deputies, who'll act nervous, write everything down and do nothing."

"You don't think he'll be concerned about Abby?"

"I don't know." She stood and looked down at the flimsy paper gown. "This is a bit airy."

"I'll call Matt." He went out to his front office.

She waited. What time was it? Why didn't she ever remember to wear a watch? She cast the privacy curtain aside and searched for a clock. There wasn't one. She picked up her bloodstained sweater, wondering whether it was a total loss. It was a favorite, patterned with purple and gray swirls. She'd knitted it by hand from Shetland wool during some of those endless, sleepless nights. She shook the sweater and a shard of glass fell onto the floor. She cursed and flung the sweater away from her.

The sweater landed at Emily's feet as she entered. "Beth? How are you feeling?" She picked up the sweater.

"Careful, that's full of bits of glass." Beth pointed at the shard on the floor. Emily picked it up and put it in the trash.

"Here, I brought clean clothes, and I'll drive you home. Peter says he'll follow us, and see Abby. But Rita says Abby's fine. Matt went with Duane to look at the shed."

Emily closed the privacy curtain. Beth donned the clean sweater and pants as quickly as she could, which wasn't fast, because of the splint and the numbness. She whipped the curtain open so suddenly she startled her mother. "I need to go for a run."

"Don't be silly. You don't go running after you've fainted."

"Who made up that rule?"

"Try to relax." Emily tucked Beth's arm into the sling.

Beth fought back fresh tears and the urge to take out her anger on her mother. She was silent during the drive. The look on Abby's face when she'd seen Beth sprawled on the floor of the shed, the nightmares and all the times she hadn't been a normal, comforting, responsible mother piled up in Beth's mind like dark clouds building for a storm.

Peter followed. When they arrived, Beth waved him up the stairs and remained in the lobby with the doors wide open, still not ready to face Abby. What would she say to her?

Emily returned with Beth's sweater. "I believe I can get the blood out of this. It's too lovely not to make the attempt. Perhaps you should go upstairs and be with Abby while the doctor--"

"He's more fit to be with Abby than I am."

"Beth, how can you say that? You hardly know him."

"Hey." Jack came in and closed the door. His gaze fell on Beth, shifted to the sling, and the corners of his mouth twitched. "What happened to you?"

"Mom can explain. I need to get cleaned up." Beth ducked past him out of the room.

Minutes later, Peter entered the kitchen and poured himself a cup of coffee. It was hot, fresh and strong. He stood sipping it, debating whether to go shower and change before dinner or to stick around and hear what Duane had to say.

"Appears she'll mend," Faith said. "It won't surprise me when she leaves, after this. She wouldn't have, before, but she's changed."

Peter turned silently to look at Faith. She faced the stove, fanning herself with a dishtowel. Peter wondered if she'd ever ignited a towel that way, or blown out the gas flame.

The back door opened and Matt and Duane came in, along with a chilly gust. Matt shut the door hard and removed his jacket.

"I'll ask Abby again about that doll," Duane said. "Maybe she brought it back with her.

"She told you she didn't. Don't treat her like an idiot, Duane. They took the lock. Why risk coming back at all if they were going to leave the doll behind?"

"Why didn't you hold onto the lock and the doll?"

"I wanted to get Beth away from there," Matt said. "I wasn't thinking about evidence. Besides, you're always harping about fingerprints. If I had thought of it, I wouldn't have wanted to touch anything."

"Why clean the shed?" Duane said. "That's nuts."

"It's someone who plans things out," Peter said. "Both times, they prepared in advance and waited for the opportunity to trap Beth. The window nailed shut and the doorknob rigged on the bathroom door. The doll, and a padlock nobody had a key to. How did they know Abby would be interested in the shed?" He looked at Matt.

"What doorknob?" Duane asked.

"You're right, Peter." Matt sat backwards on a chair and draped his arms over the back rest. He glanced at Duane. "Oh. Beth got locked in her bathroom Sunday night, before dinner."

"Why didn't anyone tell me? I thought she acted like she didn't feel well, at dinner. She'd been too quiet and she didn't eat, and I thought, the way your Mom always fusses like she's afraid Beth will relapse or something...." He looked at Peter. "Where is Beth?"

"Upstairs," Peter said. He refilled his coffee and sat down at the table.

Duane did the same. He placed his notepad on the table, pencil poised. "Matt, who has a key to the shed?"

"Everybody in the family."

"And me," Faith said from the stove.

"I meant you, Faith, when I said family. We all have keys. You know that, Duane. Holly has keys."

"Does Beth?"

"To all but the tower and gun cabinets." Matt glanced at Peter. "Remind me to show you the tower sometime, when Beth's not around. We're supposed to keep it locked while she's here. I guess you don't hunt, do you?"

"I learned to shoot when I was a kid, but killing fish is the furthest I go these days," Peter said.

Matt nodded. "We had to learn to shoot. Dad insisted. He used to stage shooting matches, have us compete with each other. Mom said we were competitive enough, that he didn't need to bring weapons into it. Rita was still too small to learn by the time Dad died." Matt nodded toward the hall door. "She always won the matches."

Peter looked that way just as Beth entered and took the chair beside Matt.

"Beth, what happened at the shed?" Duane said.

She described the entire incident while Duane took notes on his yellow pad.

"Did Abby leave the unknown doll in the shed?"

"She had one of her own dolls in her arms just before Matt opened the door, but I didn't see what she took with her. Ask Abby. She may not know where her sweater or shoes are most of the time, but she keeps track of her dolls."

"She says she left it in the shed," Duane said. "Now the doll and the padlock are gone. Beth, why didn't you tell me you were locked in the bathroom the other night?"

Beth stared at him for a second. "I didn't think of it. But someone lured Abby into the shed today. I want to know who did this."

"Do you mind if I talk to Abby again?" Duane said.

Matt jumped up. "I'll get her."

"Have her bring the dolls she had with her today," Duane told him. Matt nodded and ran up the stairs.

Faith placed a steaming mug in front of Beth. "Chamomile."

"Faith, did you hear Beth yell?" Duane asked.

"Matt and I both heard the glass break, and the shouting. It took him a few minutes to figure out which direction the sounds came from."

"How long had Matt been in the kitchen?"

"An hour or so, studying and eating, with Rita going in and out teasing him. She was in the laundry room when the shouting started."

"Who else was home?" Duane asked. "Do you know?"

Faith shrugged, with her back to him, working as she talked. "Ms. Gray walked through once this afternoon. She was on her way out."

"Out?" both Duane and Peter said at once.

Faith turned slowly and looked at each of them. "Out that door." She pointed at the back door. "The only door I notice when I'm working. I haven't seen her since."

"How soon after Emily left did you hear Beth?"

"Duane." Beth frowned at him with her mouth open.

"It's a reasonable question, Beth," Duane said, holding her gaze for a second.

"About a half-hour," Faith said, watching Beth.

"Beth, how long were you in the shed before you broke the window?" Duane asked.

"I don't know."

"You weren't wearing a watch?"

"No." Beth frowned at her tea.

Peter watched Duane make notes. Matt returned with Abby, and returned to his chair. Abby sat beside Beth, across from Duane, and arranged two cloth dolls in her lap.

"Abby, tell me again about the doll you found in the shed. Do you know where it is now?" Duane said.

"No."

"Where did you see it last?"

She looked at her mother, then turned back to Duane. "I left the other doll there. It wasn't mine."

"How do you know which dolls are yours? How are yours different from the other doll?"

"Mommy made my dolls. That other one is hard. Mine are squashy, and mine have regular clothes. They're like people, and they have names."

"May I see your dolls?" Duane asked.

Abby handed them over. "That's Rosemary, and that's Constanza. Mommy names them."

Duane grinned, touched the embroidered faces, and fingered the yarn hair. "Cute, Beth. And squashy. The faces are realistic, for homemade dolls. Nice eyes." Duane handed the dolls back to Abby and made notes. "Okay, who else was there, Abby, besides you and Mommy?"

"Uncle Matt came and talked to us. Then he went away. Then he came back. He opened the door, and Aunt Rita was with him." Her voice lilted, as if Aunt Rita's appearance had been magic.

"Was anyone else there?"

She glanced at Beth, who watched Duane. "Just Mommy."

"Did you see who put the other doll in the shed?"

"No."

"Did you see who pushed Mommy and closed the door?"

"No."

"Beth, do you remember what the other doll looked like?"

"It's a hard plastic little-girl doll, as opposed to a baby doll or a fashion doll. It's about eighteen inches high with blue eyes that open and close, and curly blonde hair. It's dress is pink organza, with a ruffled white tulle and lace petticoat. The dress had a full, gathered skirt, and short puffed sleeves. There was a tiny dark smudge on its nose. Now that I think of it, although I assumed it was new, it was a type that was made several years ago, and the plastic was slightly discolored, as if with age."

Duane was making notes as fast as he could, and when Beth finished he looked flustered. "That's quite a description."

Faith came over. "Mind if I ask a question?"

"Go ahead," Duane said.

Faith spoke to Beth. "The first day you were here, you came in from walking with Abby and told us she'd run into the bike-shed and wanted to play there. Your mother, Vicky, Jack, Rita and I were here in the kitchen."

"Yes," Beth straightened a little in her chair. "Abby thought it would make a fun playhouse. I said so when I came in."

"Well, I'm wondering who else Abby told about this playhouse she'd found. She's been everywhere with your sisters and your mother in the past few days, to town and to church. If Matt thought he could cut that lock off with bolt cutters, why couldn't anyone? Maybe that's why they needed a new lock. Could even explain why the bolt cutters were missing when Matt looked for them. This didn't have to be someone with a key."

"That wouldn't explain Beth's bathroom," Matt said.

"Since when does anyone here lock doors?" Faith said. "The place is unlocked when I arrive in the morning and you're all asleep. I rarely need to use my key. There are times in this big empty place that I hardly know whether anyone is home or not, and it would've been easy for someone to come in and see which rooms were being prepared for guests and, in this case, which was the adult's. It seems to me, rather than asking who has a key, you should be asking who would most like to see Beth leave this vicinity, too frightened to ever show her face again. Now, who would that be?"

"Ollie Stevens' family," Peter said, half to himself.

"Right." Faith looked at Matt, who glanced angrily around the room but said nothing.

"The only family left is Owen," Duane said to Beth. "Tom passed away a couple of years ago."

"Mommy, can I go play?" Abby asked.

Beth deferred to Duane.

"Just one more question, Abby. Did you tell anyone besides Mommy that you wanted to use the shed as a playhouse?"

She nodded. "Robin. She has dolls too. And Aunt Holly."

"Thank you, Abby."

"Go ahead and play with Aunt Rita, honey," Beth said.

Duane turned to Matt. "Does Owen know Beth is here?"

Matt shifted, glanced at Beth, and nodded. "I told him."

"When?"

"A week before she arrived. Right after Mom told us."

"How did he react?"

Matt glanced at Beth. "Owen cursed and called her a few names. Then he said he wants to talk to her."

Peter leaned forward. "Why?"

"I don't know. I told him it wasn't a good idea. When I saw him Friday night, he said it again. I told him to stay away from her."

Duane stood up. "I'll talk to him."

Matt got to his feet. "Owen didn't lock them in the shed."

"Someone did, and Faith's right. He's got the most reason to, or thinks he does."

"Duane, let me talk to him. He trusts me. I'll find out where he was today, and why he's so anxious to see Beth." Matt grabbed his jacket off the hook.

"Let him, Duane, please," Beth said.

Duane looked at her for a few seconds, then nodded at Matt. "I guess it can't hurt to let you have first crack at him." He followed Matt out.

Chapter 11

Matt parked in front of Owen's garage and approached the repair bay in the deepening dusk. Owen stood wiping hand cleaner off his hands with a blue paper towel, about to lock up his tools for the day. He turned when Matt approached. "What's up?" Owen said.

"Have much work?" Matt asked, looking around.

"Why, you need a job?"

"No, I start med school soon. You know that."

Owen shook his head. "You're really going to do it?"

"Sure. What have you been up to today?"

"This and that. Pumping gas mostly. One brake job, two oil changes. Dull day in dullsville." Owen pulled a beer out of his mini-fridge. "Want one?"

"No thanks, I have dinner with my mom soon."

"Huh. You live in a whole different world, Gray." He twisted off the bottle cap.

"Guess so." Matt glanced around the shop again. They were alone. The garage was dirty, grimy with what looked like decades of black grease. It smelled of dirty motor oil and carburetor cleaner.

"How's your sister?"

Matt hesitated. How could he ask what he needed to ask? Owen was his friend. "Vicky?"

"No, the dangerous one. Beth."

"Not so great. Someone locked her and her little girl in the bike-shed today."

"No shit?" Owen looked genuinely surprised, his beer bottle poised midway to his mouth. "Who do you suppose did that?"

Matt shrugged. "Same person who always did it, I guess. This time they went after Abby too."

"I bet everyone's ticked off about the kid. Even Vicky."

"I told Beth what you told me, Owen, about Ollie not being the one who locked her up all those times."

"Will she talk to me?"

"Why do you want to talk to her?" Matt watched Owen's face. His toffee-brown eyes were wide.

"Private reason." Owen looked away. "I heard she drove into town in a big white Mercedes."

"Where'd you hear that?"

"One of Vicky's friends. Is it true?"

"Yeah. A new one, by the look of it." Matt thought about the red paint spelling out MURDERER on her car.

"What does she do to make that kind of money?" Owen took another swallow of his beer.

"She doesn't talk about it."

"Huh. Maybe she took up a life of crime while she was inside. Say, do you think if Ollie were here today she could still tell us apart, the way she used to?"

Owen's tanned face was smudged with grease, his brown sun-streaked hair rumpled and badly cut. His brown-gold eyes were watchful again, the whites standing out against his tan and the grease. At twenty-nine, he was no longer the sweet natured kid who used to follow his more aggressive twin everywhere. Something had happened to Owen.

"Who knows?" Matt said with a shrug. "We've all changed."

"Will you tell her I want to talk to her?"

"I'll tell her, but I doubt she'll talk to you unless she knows why first, probably not even then. So do you want to tell me why, or just forget the whole thing?"

"I want to ask her why--" Owen broke off, took a long swallow of his beer, sloshed a little, and the hoppy smell of it wafted over. Matt was getting the feeling it wasn't his first beer today. "I want to know why she tried to kill herself, and I want to know why she confessed, after six years. Why'd she wait so long?"

"I know why she did that. I'll tell you."

"I don't want you to tell me. I want her to tell me."

"Why?"

"Just tell her, will you?"

"Sure, I'll tell her. So ... you were here all day? You didn't come up to our place at all?"

"No, I told--" Owen broke off, seeing through Matt's words. "Why, you fucking son-of-a-bitch. Get out of my garage!"

"Look, it was me or Duane. He was on his way here to question you himself. I convinced him to let me talk to you instead."

"Get out. Go home to your dinner, your mom and your precious fucking murdering sister. Go on!" Owen threw his beer bottle and it shattered on the cement floor at Matt's feet. The smell of the spilled beer, mingled with the other odors in the garage, followed Matt out the bay door.

Matt turned as he walked. "Why'd you lie, Owen?"

"Get the hell out!"

Matt turned fully to face Owen, walking backward toward his truck. He shook his finger at him. "You lied in court, and you lied to me, didn't you? You didn't see Beth shoot Ollie!" He turned toward his truck again and kept going, listening.

Silence followed him. He reached his truck, opened the door and looked back. Owen stood still, staring at Matt, silent. Matt got into his truck. He'd just closed the door when Owen rushed toward him. Matt rolled the window down a few inches.

"You tell her, Gray. Tell her I want to talk to her!"

"I'll tell her." He started the engine and was backing out.

"She killed my brother!" Owen slammed his fist down on the front fender of Matt's truck.

"Don't dent my truck, Owen."

Owen spoke in a low, strangled voice. "Get out of here before I take a tire iron to it."

Matt drove away, shaken but finally feeling that he had some answers. Owen's silences said more than his words.

Duane returned after dinner and met with Beth and Matt in the library. Beth sat at the end of the oak table, her face expressionless, her manner cool, reminding Matt of his mother.

"Okay, Matt, shoot," Duane said.

Matt placed his hands flat on the table and described his visit with Owen, while Beth returned his look, her face placid.

"Was anyone working with him today?" Duane asked.

"Didn't look like it, but he must've had customers. I don't think it was him, Duane. It's hard to believe he'd think to clean that shed, for one thing. You should see his shop."

"Did he say why he wants to talk to Beth?"

Matt met Beth's gaze again. "He wants to ask why you tried to kill yourself, and he wants to know why you confessed after six years. Do you want to talk to him?"

She shook her head. "I don't owe him any explanations." She glanced at Duane. "Does everyone here know about my ... confession?" She appeared to hate the taste of the word.

"Tom Stevens ensured the sheriff was aware of it, and word got around," Duane said.

Beth looked down at her hands.

"I asked Owen why he lied at your trial," Matt said. "All I got was silence. He didn't deny lying."

"Do you think he's a danger to Beth or Abby?" Duane asked.

"How do you know who's a danger? There's some nut around here who does housecleaning in sheds and plays with dolls."

Duane turned to Beth. "About the doll, Beth. I don't know what organza and tulle are. I'd ask you to draw a picture of it if your hand--" He eyed the sling.

"I'm left-handed, remember? I'll run upstairs for materials." She headed for the door.

Duane waited until she closed the door. He wore a pained expression. "Vicky told Holly Beth woke up screaming in the night."

Matt nodded. "Every night since she's been here."

"How does she seem to you?"

"Except for the nightmares, too quiet. How does she seem to you?"

"When I'm in uniform, she looks at me like I'm a snake shedding skin."

Matt grinned. "Perfectly understandable."

"I'm serious. She was relieved to leave the room just now. Watch when she comes back. She stays as far away from me as she can without being rude. Maybe it's prison that does that. Creates a permanent loathing for cops, for the uniform. At least she hasn't passed it on to her kid."

He was silent then, studying Matt for a minute. "When did you change your mind about Beth?"

Matt rubbed his face. "I never wanted to believe she did it. I never stopped caring about her. She used to write me these letters when she was in jail. Homesick, lonely kind of letters, you know? Then, today was the first time she told me she didn't kill Ollie. Owen confirmed it for me when I confronted him about lying in court. I know now that he lied, Duane. I know him. The way he just looked at me when I asked him.... But I don't understand why." Matt glanced at his brother-in-law. "Duane, how come you never questioned her confession? You arrested her."

Duane made a face. "That wasn't a confession, that was desperation."

Beth returned with a sketchbook and colored pencils, and went to work. The two men watched the image of the doll take shape on paper. She worked quickly and in surprising detail. Within minutes she tore out the page and handed it to Duane, who wore a dumbfounded look.

"It's not my best work, but you'll know the doll if you see it." She sounded doubtful, and she flipped the previous pages of the sketchbook back as she spoke.

Matt watched, and shot his hand out to stop her. "Wait. May I see that?"

It was the drawing of Peter landing a trout on the lakeshore. Beth released her hold on the sketchbook, and Matt slid it nearer, turning it around. "Look at this, Duane."

Duane looked, then grinned at Beth. "How'd you get the fish to sit still?"

She smiled and said nothing, her gaze on the page.

Matt flipped the page and found the other picture of Peter, in the cemetery. "Did he know you were drawing this?"

Beth shook her head. "I did it from memory, the following day. The fishing scene is from Saturday."

"You mean you can do something this detailed, from memory, of anything you see?" Matt didn't recall her even drawing when she'd lived at home. Just sewing and knitting, and spending a lot of time with their father, learning how to run the Lodge.

"Things that catch my attention. Things I really look at."

Matt looked at her with new respect. "I'll have to be careful how I act around you. You don't miss much.

"Why'd you draw Peter?" Duane asked.

It was innocent curiosity, but Beth colored, obviously flustered.

"Must've stuck in her mind," Matt said casually, rising from his chair. "Are we done?"

"For now." Duane picked up the drawing of the doll, shrugged on his jacket and headed for the door. Beth and Matt followed and Duane held the door for them. "No promises, Beth. There's not a lot to go on."

Beth woke with a start, but not from a nightmare. A sound had wakened her. She lay still, watching the darkness. Someone moved out in the hallway. Beth got out of bed, went to the door, opened it and searched the hallway in both directions. She heard a faint noise on the west stairs opposite her.

The sheer drapes on the windows at each end of the hall filtered a faint gray illumination from outdoors. Nothing moved. There was no sound except her heartbeat gradually slowing while her eyes strained into the darkness.

Then she heard a sound on the stairs right in front of her, unmistakable and familiar. Something thudded onto one wooden step after another as it went, sometimes skipping a step, down the stairs. She moved to the head of the stairs, leaned over with one hand gripping the railing, and peered down. A hall light at the foot of the stairs illuminated the fuzzy yellow tennis ball as it dropped off the last step and rolled into the kitchen.

At a rustling noise behind her, Beth flew into her room, closed and locked the door behind her.

She sat on the edge of her bed in the darkness, stifling frightened sobs. Tears of grief for a lost time, when she'd wandered boldly outdoors on summer nights, as a girl, and had laughed at herself for the alarm a cat roused, batting a tennis ball down the stairs.

How different this house was, full of real shadows, not just those she remembered in nightmares. That was no house cat who played with a ball in the dark tonight. It was a person, whose intent was to intimidate her, threaten her, terrify her.

She searched for Peter's card on her nightstand. She phoned the printed number for his cabin. His line rang four times before his machine answered, then his message played, professional and businesslike. She felt more alone than ever. When the message ended she almost hung up. Then she glanced at his hastily written cellular number, and couldn't make out whether two of the digits were sevens, ones, or nines.

"It's Beth," she said quickly. "I can't read your handwriting. I picked a hell of a time to finally call. It's Wednesday night--no, one-forty-five Thursday morning. I'm--having a disturbing night." She paused to clear the tearful, tremulous sound out of her voice, trying not to feel let down. Peter couldn't know she would need him tonight. "At least I didn't waken you."

Chapter 12

Peter knocked on Sylvia Maxwell's door, late Thursday morning, and waited. He'd just decided to check the outbuildings when he heard her call. She crossed the road, carrying fly-fishing gear and two fish, which shimmered in the sunlight.

"Doctor Lloyd, how nice to see you again so soon."

"Call me Peter. Nice catch."

"Aren't they? Let me share them with you for lunch." Her eyes shone. "I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed fishing, until you reminded me."

"I reminded you?"

"I've heard what an avid fisherman you are." She dropped her gear on the porch, opened the door and beckoned him inside. "You could've come in, I wouldn't have minded. Remember, when you come again. My door's always open. Have you eaten?"

"I'm expected at the Lodge for lunch, thank you. Maybe next time." He followed her into the kitchen, where she put her fish away. Then she sat at the table with him.

"The other day you told me Beth's father didn't want her to remember. Were you referring to her being locked in a closet as a child?" Her smile vanished, and she nodded. "She told me you were her nanny."

Sylvia's eyelids lowered for an instant. "Yes."

"She must trust you, or she wouldn't have brought Abby here."

Sylvia smiled. "She used to say this was one of her havens."

"Did you ever form a theory about who might've done that to her when she was three?"

She shook her head. "I was hired months afterward, when Vicky was born. I think her father had begun to suspect the incident had a lasting effect. He said Beth had nightmares and didn't like to sleep alone at night. He hired me to care for Beth, not the other children. I lived there and had the room next to Beth's until she was eight. After I moved here, I still worked at the Lodge and spent a good deal of time with Beth, but she was usually with the Handley children when she wasn't in school or with her parents. Even at four and five she was independent and tough to keep up with." Sylvia's eyes focused on another time.

"You love her," Peter said.

She blinked, then met his gaze. "As if she were my own. I sometimes felt I understood her better than her parents did. Her father saw what happened to her when she was three as something ... distasteful. He wanted to pretend her fear didn't exist, to hide it. I used to ask her about her nightmares, but she was afraid to tell me about them. Her father told her it wasn't healthy to dwell on them. He gave her drugs to help her sleep, and he said all else she needed was a firm hand, strict supervision. All she wanted was to know she was loved and accepted, fears and all."

"Her parents loved her. Certainly her mother does."

"Oh yes. I don't mean to imply otherwise. But some parents insist that their children live out the parents' dreams for them, instead of their own. Her father singled her out, almost from birth, for special treatment, special plans. The other children saw it and resented it."

"Why did he do that?"

"I don't know. In appearance, she's more like Emily than the other girls. He made some kind of connection with Beth, from the day she was born. She, Emily and the Lodge were the most important things in his life. None of them fulfilled his expectations. I believe he died a disappointed man."

"How did he die?"

"His brakes went out on that first hairpin turn below the Lodge. He went into the ravine, and his car burned with him in it." She shuddered. "The family was devastated. He was their backbone, and suddenly he was gone."

"How long after that was the Stevens boy killed?"

"Let's see, that was November. Oliver was killed the following August. Nine months."

"Who lived at the Lodge when the murder occurred?"

"All of Beth's siblings, except Holly and Sarah. Sarah was twenty-four, married and living in Wilder. Holly was in nursing school, in Sacramento. She was nineteen. Cornell had gone on to law school, but he'd dropped out a few months before his father died. He came to live at the Lodge again just after the accident. He was twenty-five. He worked in McGuffey at the car dealership he now owns, as a salesman. Jack worked there too, at the time, and lived at the Lodge. He was twenty-three and recently out of college. Vicky, Matt and Rita were thirteen, eleven and three.

"I visited Beth while she was in jail here. When she was sent away, I wrote letters. Later I lost touch with her. She surprised me, showing up here the other day. Do you think she'll stay?"

"Someone's trying to drive her away." Peter told her about the bathroom door, the paint on the car, and Beth and Abby being locked in the shed. "I'd like to figure out who killed Ollie Stevens."

"Duane used to spend a lot of time with Beth, Kelly and Gabriel. They came here together sometimes. I think Duane was infatuated with Beth. I suppose a lot of boys were, and still are." She challenged Peter with a look, eyes sparkling. "You should've seen her then. Full of life, and fearless. The claustrophobia was there, but in the background most of the time. There were a couple of years when she was hardly bothered with it at all, when she was a teenager, and she really wasn't afraid of much else. She was full of passion, sparkle, laughter. Oh, how she laughed. She took delight in everything, and she could make people laugh at themselves and feel good about it. She was the perfect choice to run the Lodge.

"Of course, there were those who resented her. Especially her sisters. She shone so brightly she appeared to dim everyone else's light, and they thought she made them feel inferior on purpose. She didn't even realize it.

"She's mellower now, I think," Sylvia concluded. "More cautious. She's lost so many people, she's afraid of losing any more. She needs them too much."

"And she won't welcome me casting suspicion on her family or friends," Peter said.

"She's likely to defend them with more loyalty than they've granted her."

He glanced at his watch and stood to go. In the front room, he paused, looking around at the spare hodgepodge of furnishings.

He turned to face her. "What do you believe, Sylvia?"

She looked thoughtful for a few seconds, then said, "There's a seed of light and a seed of darkness in every human heart."

"Darkness?"

"It's there, in the most innocent child. I don't know whether Beth killed Ollie or not, but she was convicted on the testimony of a frightened, grieving boy whose other claims were never verified. She was found with the gun in her hand, but she admitted firing it by accident. The notes she supposedly wrote were never found. She was known to take walks at night, which explained her being there. She was a crack shot. She wouldn't have spent three cartridges to kill him, at that range, and hit him in the arm twice. But she was the only suspect. Anyone is capable of murder if pushed far enough, and she was pushed. If Beth hated and feared anyone it was Ollie Stevens, and who can say how the mind will operate once one has decided to kill? If she did, it's not my place to excuse her. But I love her. Prove her innocent if you can, Peter. I'd like to see that happen."

He continued to the front door, where he grasped her hand. She looked him in the eye. "Did you fall in love with her just this past week?"

"I--" He stopped, at a loss. "I was in love with her before I met her. When I first saw her, it was like recollection, but more complicated, and confusing. I was married at the time, to a woman I loved deeply."

"I hope you persuade her to stay. She belongs here," she said wistfully, and opened the door for him.

Peter listened to his messages, after his shower, when he was torn between eating and sleeping. Sleep was beginning to feel more necessary. When he heard Beth's message, he finished dressing and drove to the Lodge. Matt came out, waved at Peter, and walked over to meet him. Peter got out of his truck.

"I wondered if you'd show up today," Matt said.

"I wondered myself," Peter said. "Beth left a message during the night. She sounded upset but didn't say why."

"She was wakened by a tennis ball."

"A tennis ball?"

"Yeah. I don't understand either. She was awake half the night after that. She crashed right after breakfast, and she's been asleep ever since."

Peter glanced up at the Lodge with its brooding galleries and tower. "It can feel oppressive, Matt, even to someone not being deliberately terrorized."

"Tell me about it. This place has too many staircases, too many dark corners and empty rooms. It ought to be so full of people you can't help running into someone each time you turn around. That tennis ball was the last straw for Beth. She was ready to pack her bags and leave this morning. Now Mom wants me to change the locks on Beth's rooms." He glanced at his watch. "If you're hungry, Faith has sandwiches made up already. I grabbed a couple myself."

Peter's pager beeped, and he groaned involuntarily.

Beth wakened, feeling hung over, and wondered if it was from too little sleep or just the fact that it had been split into fragments. She had a dull headache, her cut hand throbbed, and her mouth felt parched. It took her a minute to realize where she was. Someone was knocking on her door. It was Rita. "You have a phone call. It's Gabriel."

She'd promised to spend the day with him. She called, "Okay!" and reached for the phone, then started apologizing, but he cut her off.

"How about a quiet afternoon together, and dinner at my place?" he said. "I already lined up a sitter. Rita."

Peter arrived back at the Lodge at three, at Duane's request. The white Blazer with its star-shaped insignia and light bar on the roof stood parked askew, nowhere near an actual marked space, directly in front of the steps. Peter found Duane in the kitchen drinking a cup of coffee. Faith poured Peter a cup and handed it to him.

"How do you rate?" Duane said. "I have to get my own coffee, and I'm family."

"He pays rent," Faith said.

"You wanted my help?" Peter said.

Duane led the way into the library and closed the door. They sat at the reading table. "Emily will join us in a minute," Duane said. "I want to ask you something first. Beth's been having these nightmares. Her dad used to give her drugs because she couldn't sleep, and she has this claustrophobia. She tried to kill herself once. Holly says Emily used to have nightmares and bouts of depression, years ago. She thinks Beth and her mother may have, uh, some kind of mental problem that's hereditary, only Holly thinks Beth has it worse. What do you think about that?"

Peter looked away, disgusted. "I'm not a psychiatrist. If Holly is worried about them, she should talk to her mother and Beth, find out what's on their minds. Now ask me a question I can answer."

Emily settled into a straight-backed chair at the far end of the library table, with an imposing demeanor that reminded Peter, again, of his ninth grade English teacher. He understood Duane feeling daunted by the prospect of questioning her. But Duane started in, suddenly unabashed and authoritative.

"Doctor Lloyd is here as a favor to the Sheriff's Office," he explained calmly. "Emily, Faith saw you leave the Lodge a little before four-thirty yesterday, through the kitchen door. Where'd you go?"

"I was dusting the dining room, with the windows open, when I heard a noise outside that sounded like a seagull. It reminded me of Santa Barbara. We lived there when we were first married. I think now the sound must have been Beth's first cries for help, before she broke the window. You know, muffled, high-pitched and far away. I went out through the kitchen so I wouldn't have to unlock the dining room door, but I didn't hear it again. I was finished in the dining room, so I came in through the lobby. Then I went up to my room and read."

Duane took a drawing of the doll in the pink dress out of his file folder and placed it in front of Emily. Emily donned reading glasses she kept on a chain around her neck, and stared at the drawing. "Where did you get this?"

"Beth drew it," Duane said, with a quick glance at Peter. "That's the doll Abby found in the shed yesterday."

"It can't be." She looked up, the teacher telling a student he'd just given the wrong answer.

Duane pushed the drawing closer to her. "Emily, this is the doll Beth says Abby found in the shed yesterday. Are you saying you recognize it?"

"It's impossible." Emily pushed the drawing away. Her voice cracked. "I threw it out."

Peter remained silent, but it was like watching a brick wall collapse when someone stood too near it.

"Emily, when did you throw the doll away?" Duane asked.

She cleared her throat. "Shortly after Lauren died."

Duane sat up straight. "This doll?"

She nodded. "I remember that smudge on its nose. I never wanted to see it again."

"Whose doll was it?"

"Beth's."

"Beth didn't recognize it."

Emily shook her head. "She never saw it. It was a gift from her father for her birthday."

"What birthday?"

Emily shook with sobs, and raised her hands to her face.

Peter glanced around, spotted a box of tissues, and brought them over.

"Emily," Duane said, "I need you to tell me about this doll."

"Beth's father bought it for her third birthday. We were too upset to notice it was missing at first, but after a couple of days, when we realized it was gone, we thought the person took it." She looked at Duane, then Peter. "The person who shut her in the linen closet."

"Linen closet," Duane repeated in an uncertain tone, his eyes wide. "That happened when she was three?"

Emily said to Peter. "This will be confusing to you."

Peter shook his head. "Beth explained."

Duane cleared his throat. "When did the doll turn up again?"

"Shortly after Lauren died, when I went through his storeroom in the clinic. I found it wrapped up in old tissue paper in a box, with that smudge on its nose. I didn't know what to make of it, and I never wanted to see it again. So I threw it away, in the Dumpster."

"Are you certain it's the same doll? Didn't any of the other girls have one similar?"

She put on her reading glasses and studied the drawing of the doll. "I know this doll. I didn't want Lauren to buy it." She glanced uneasily at Peter. She fell silent for two or three seconds, looking down at the drawing. "I didn't like its eyes."

Gabriel set his coffee table for a quiet dinner, with candles and a bottle of Chablis. Soft music played on the stereo, and a fire crackled in the fireplace. He'd prepared spicy stir-fried chicken with vegetables.

"It smells wonderful," Beth said as he poured the wine.

"Not bad for an old bachelor."

They ate seated on the sofa with their plates in their laps, their thighs touching. Beth relaxed, and realized all at once what a relief it was to have a meal without her family present.

She wondered if Peter was eating with the family. She'd meant to call him today, after leaving that cryptic message on his machine.

"Something wrong?" Gabriel watched her face.

She shook her head, sipped her wine and resumed eating. "I was thinking how relaxed I feel here. Things have been strained, at the Lodge."

"Where do you live, Beth?" She took so long to answer he must've thought she didn't intend to. "I'm not going to come looking for you if you don't want me around," he said. "I feel like I can't hold a proper conversation with you, because I don't know anything about your life. Where do you live? What do you do?"

She told him about the business and her artwork, about Dan, Stella, and Abby. There wasn't much to tell about her evenings, she explained. She spent them with Abby, and when Abby was with her father, Beth spent the evenings alone, working, knitting, sewing, reading or painting.

"It sounds boring to anyone but me. Even to me, sometimes."

He grinned. "It sounds lonely, for the girl who used to work at the Lodge, playing hostess to people from all over the country."

"I do that at the office. Dan says I showcase the business. He claims people buy his designs because of me, which is ludicrous. He was a huge success before he hired me."

"I thought you were partners."

"We didn't start out that way. He hired me as a result of a mix-up about what job I was interviewing for. They weren't supposed to send me up to see him." Beth leaned back on the sofa, forgetting her dinner in her lap as she relived that day.

Beth had run up the stairs of the posh office building north of San Diego, late for her appointment. She hadn't counted on needing to take a taxi, and she'd have to pay for another taxi after her interview, so she couldn't afford to eat until she got home. She paused on the third floor landing. Her knee had begun bothering her, so she climbed the last two flights more slowly.

On the fifth floor, in the human resource office of Dan Palmer, she started to explain that she had an interview with Gail Halpern, but a woman interrupted and told her to go up to the sixth floor.

"Check in with Mr. Palmer's secretary. He's interviewing now. One floor up. Hurry, you're late."

Beth returned to the stairs. On the sixth floor she checked in with Mr. Palmer's secretary, who glanced over a sheet of paper on her desk and shook her head. "You're not on my list--"

"There must be--"

"--but I'm sure he'll want to see you." The woman smiled at Beth and added her name to the list. "Have a seat over there."

Beth wondered why she wasn't on the list, but took a seat as directed, too nervous to do more than glance at the others who waited. They were all women, mostly her age, some younger. Some sat, some stood, and others milled around the room. Beth took out her knitting and let the gentle back and forth rhythm of the activity settle her nerves.

She viewed being granted this interview as nothing short of a miracle, owed mostly to Manuelo Gomez, who kept saying he'd guarantee Beth a lifetime job at his restaurant if only he wasn't about sell the place and retire. His college-student daughter had helped him draft a letter of recommendation in impeccable English.

Beth suspected that letter had served as a glowing distraction, and that no one had looked closely at her application, particularly at the line where she admitted being convicted of a felony and having a parole officer.

This was the first interview she'd had in two years for a job with the potential of paying more than minimum wage. She'd admired Dan Palmer's clothing designs for years. The idea of working for him, even as a bookkeeper's assistant, had been no more than a fantasy until now.

"What's it goin' to be?" a lilting voice with a Southern accent said.

Beth looked at the exquisite young woman seated beside her. The woman possessed fine-grained skin and incredible eyes. "Let me guess." She pursed her full lips and placed two fingers under her delicate chin. "A stockin' cap?" she said with a little laugh.

Beth smiled. "A vest."

"Looks like lace."

"Yes, knitted lace."

"Gosh, don't you stop knittin' even to talk? Hold it up."

Beth paused and held up what would be the left front of the vest.

"Oh sure, I see it now. I'm Kate." Beth introduced herself. "Where'd you learn to knit lace? Your grandma?"

"From an old friend." She'd also learned long ago not to tell people she'd had a nanny.

Kate's attention shifted as a man crossed from the inner office to the secretary's desk. Kate sat up straight and whispered behind her hand, "There he is."

The man looked around at each of the women who waited, appraising them. His gaze landed on Kate, then Beth, and she returned his look steadily. His face was young for his age, with brilliant, summer-sky-blue eyes. He wore a crisp tailored suit that appeared just pressed, and his sandy blonde hair looked freshly trimmed. He spoke to the secretary. Then he returned to the inner office.

"He should be in our line of work," Kate said.

Beth puzzled over that. "Why is he interviewing us himself?"

"He hand-picks all his models."

"Models?" Beth stopped knitting and gaped at her. "But we're here for a bookkeeping job."

Kate smiled. "Honey, I'm no bookkeeper, and if you are, you're in the wrong place. Might as well stay though. It's a safe bet this pays better, and he gawked at you longer than he did anyone else."

Beth stuffed her knitting into her bag and started for the door, knees wobbly. She'd wasted a full day off work on this interview, had spent far too much money to get here from LA by bus and by taxi, and now she was not only late, but in the wrong place. This was a disaster!

"Ms. Gray?" The secretary stood and put her hand out as Beth passed her desk. "Mr. Palmer would like to see you first. You can go right in."

Beth froze and stared at the woman.

"You are Elizabeth Gray, aren't you?"

"There's been a mistake. I was sent to the wrong place."

The woman smiled. "He thinks you're in the right place, and he owns the company. Go on in."

Wouldn't anyone listen? Beth realized she'd have to explain the error to the man himself. It was her only hope of rectifying the situation. Who else could excuse her being so late for the legitimate interview? She squared her shoulders and went in. "Mr. Palmer."

"Close the door and have a seat," he said from somewhere she couldn't see. She closed the door, then spotted him hunched over a large drafting table in a corner, with his back to the wide window. "I'll be just a moment."

She sat in the chair in front of the expansive desk and waited. She considered resuming her knitting, but decided he might take it the wrong way. She fidgeted. She looked out the window behind his desk, and glimpsed a cloud of color so intense it brought her to her feet. "Oh!" she uttered and crossed to the window, lost in the view.

Feathery trees, filled with deep lavender blossoms, their color somehow reflected on the grass beneath, held her gaze until she realized the reflections were in fact a carpet of fallen blooms. "What are they?" she murmured, awestruck.

Dan Palmer came over and stood beside her.

"Those trees. What are they called, do you know?" She pointed to the landscaped grounds of the building across the street. "The lavender ones."

"Jacarandas."

"Jacarandas," she breathed, still staring out the window. Then she felt his gaze intent on her. "I'm sorry." She turned and headed back to her chair.

"Stop," he said. "Turn around, slowly." He gave her that appraising look again.

"Mr. Palmer, there's been a mistake."

"No matter. How old are you?" He studied her face.

"Twenty-five."

"Hmm." He frowned, but moved closer. "Have you ever worn your hair longer?"

"No."

"Let's have a look at your pictures." He held out his hand, then glimpsed her knitting bag and his frown deepened.

"I'm not a model," Beth said quickly. "I'm here to interview for a bookkeeping assistant's job. I was sent up here by mistake."

"That can be remedied." He reached for the phone. "I'll let them know where you are. We can do this without a portfolio. After all, we have you, don't we? It's just nice to see what the camera does."

"But I don't want to model for you."

He put down the phone and sat on the edge of his desk, facing her. He looked amused. "Sure I can't change your mind about that?"

"Mr. Palmer, you don't want me to model for you. Honestly, it wouldn't work." His ads were seen everywhere. Someone would recognize her. That wouldn't sell clothes, it would raise a scandal.

"Your life's ambition is to be a bookkeeper's assistant?"

"Actually it's--"

"To be a chief bookkeeper?" He chuckled and waved her to the chair.

Her life's ambitions had died an agonizing death, long ago. She was working on basic survival now, like paying for rent and groceries. She looked around his office. It was sensitively arranged. He was an artist, who understood subtlety. She resumed her seat and glimpsed bolts of fabric on a big table near a dress form in another corner. She longed to sit here, invisible, and simply watch him at work. Instead he watched her.

"Elizabeth." Dan Palmer sat behind his desk. "Are you ever called Liz?"

"No."

"Why do you want to be a bookkeeper?"

"It pays better than what I've been doing, and I'm a good worker. I have experience. I learn--"

"As a bookkeeper? Where?" He leaned back and folded his arms.

"My father's medical practice, and the inn that's been in my family for generations."

"Where's that?"

She told him about Wilder, the Lodge, and her father. Then she told him about every job she'd held in the past two years, her current employment, the business courses she'd taken, the computer classes. She left out prison and the parole officer, hoping he wouldn't notice the lapse of six years in her chronology. He'd learn about that soon enough. She wanted to impress him. She wanted him to send her down to accounting instead of back to LA to wait tables and sew elastic on underwear.

When she fell silent, he held her gaze. "What is it you really want to do, Liz? If you could do anything."

She hesitated a second, chewing her lip. It wasn't good to tell an interviewer you really didn't like the job you were interviewing for. But she'd already done that, she realized. He was supposed to be interviewing models, and was instead wasting his time talking to her.

"I have no formal training in design, but I love clothing. It's the reason I applied here. It's difficult to explain. I've always loved clothes, and creating something for myself is far more intriguing than buying off the rack. I mean--"

"I never could explain it myself, except by doing it." He leaned forward and cracked a grin. "Who are your favorite designers?"

She listed her favorite artists, dead and alive. There were no clothing designers among them, she realized, and she finally added, smiling, "I love Missoni. Of course I respect your work a great deal. That's why I'm here."

"What would you change, about mine?"

She hesitated, then said carefully, "I would add something less formal to the collection. Women want something they can relax in, something they can wear to shop and take the kids to soccer practice, and still feel beautiful."

"And what have you done?"

"Done?"

"What have you designed? This isn't a passing whimsy I take it, this interest in clothing?"

She stood and showed him the clothes on her back, the skirt of floral-patterned Japanese silk in a deep rose hue, the unstructured olive green silk broadcloth jacket. She removed the jacket to show him her hand-knit shell.

"Not exactly what you'd wear to soccer practice," he commented.

"I can sketch some of the other things I've made."

He directed her to sit at his drafting table and sketch her other clothes, including some ideas she hadn't fully developed yet. He was silent while she worked and while he looked through her quick, rough drawings. She did the talking, peering over his shoulder and pointing, describing fabrics and details, explaining where her ideas came from and how they evolved.

She was explaining how an Andy Goldsworthy photograph had inspired the yellow lace vest she was knitting, when he sighed deeply and she fell silent. He leaned back. "I haven't accomplished anything I set out to do this morning."

She stammered an apology.

"No, no," he said, "You've been delightful, but I do have those other women out there. I wish you'd reconsider modeling for me," he said wistfully. "In any case, interview's over. You're hired, that is if you want the job." He grinned.

"Just like that?"

He looked at his watch. "I've never taken this long to interview anyone else."

"I mean, you don't want to check my background?"

He shook his head, frowned and moved away from the drafting table, abandoning her sketches there. "Gail must've checked your references, or you wouldn't be here. If you have more ideas you'd like to show me, we can have dinner tonight." He turned to face her.

"I'm hired ... as a bookkeeping assistant?"

He sat down behind his desk and appeared to study her. She returned his look in silence, waiting for his answer.

"You don't want to have dinner with me?" He looked disappointed.

"Oh. That would be wonderful, Mr. Palmer, if you really want to see more of my work, but I have to catch a bus back to Los Angeles this afternoon."

"I see. You don't have a car?"

"No, and I'll need to find a place to live, and give notice at my other jobs." She smiled up at his thoughtful gaze.

"If you mean the job as the waitress and the one in the underwear factory, I'd give them about two minutes. I'll pay your moving expenses. Let me see if I can arrange for a car."

"For a bookkeeper's assistant?" She began to wonder about that dinner invitation. What was he offering, and in exchange for what? Was this going to get her in trouble again? "I don't have a driver's license."

He grinned and shook his head. "I like your style and your energy, Liz. You're breathtaking, if a bit unconventional. You sound sometimes as if you've been living in some kind of a dreamland instead of the real world, but I find that refreshing. I can't tell you how weary I am of design school graduates who want to make knock-offs of Chanel suits from the thirties and tell me how things are done on Seventh Avenue, as if I had no choice where I work. I'll teach you the business from the top down. That appears to be how you go about most things. Now, I don't want you to miss your bus. When can you start as my new assistant?"

He stood and offered his hand to cinch the deal. She still tried to fathom exactly what job she was being hired for. She couldn't get past the notion of him paying her moving expenses.

He paused with her hand in his and stared at the scars on her wrist, and she realized he wasn't going to look at her application.

"Mr. Palmer, there is something you need to know about me. It's the reason I can't model for you. When I was seventeen--"

He turned away. "You were a kid, though it sounds as if you didn't get much chance to act like one." He met her gaze again, his own sober. "Call me Dan. Take all the time you need to move, Liz, because once you're settled I'm going to work you as hard as your father did. You have talent and imagination, but you also have a lot to learn."

"A year later we married," Beth told Gabriel. "Two years after that we divorced."

Gabriel placed both their empty plates on the coffee table, leaned back and sipped his wine. "And now you're partners."

"Dan gave me half the business as a divorce settlement. I still don't know why he did it. If it wasn't for him, I'd still be waiting tables somewhere, and Mom would've lost the Lodge a long time ago. I owe Dan a lot."

They heard a car outside, and Gabriel went to the door. A moment later he led Duane and Sheriff Kendall into the living room, both in blue uniforms with darker jackets and hats, both wearing somber expressions.

Chapter 13

"Evening, Beth." Les looked at Beth's face and wished he'd listened to Duane. She wasn't a suspect this time, they should've waited until morning. Still, maybe this surprise visit would be the push it took to get her to leave and stay away. She wasn't safe to have around.

She straightened. The scared-kid look vanished. "Good evening, Sheriff, Duane." She nodded at each of them.

How did she get from one extreme to the other so fast, from the trapped look to that of the sophisticated woman of means? He shook his head, and focused on her chin. It wasn't much of a scrape, and only slightly bruised. Maybe she'd covered it with makeup.

She looked good, Les had to admit. She wore slim-fitting berry colored slacks, which sheathed her endless legs. Her beguiling, velvety chenille sweater outlined her breasts and showed a lot of neck and shoulder. His gaze fell on the bottle of wine and the candles.

"This doesn't look like a social call, Les," Gabriel said.

"We need more information from Beth about what happened yesterday. We called the Lodge, and Vicky said Beth was here. I hope we aren't interrupting anything," he said pointedly.

"We just finished dinner."

Les turned to Beth. "Duane needs a picture of that bruise, and we'd like to show your little girl the drawing you made of the doll."

She raised a hand to her chin.

"Abby's at the Lodge, with Rita," Gabriel said, moving to Beth's side.

"That can wait until tomorrow," Les said to Beth. "Duane needs to go over the scene with you and her anyway."

Beth appeared to study him for a few seconds.

Les went on, "We'll just get that picture, for the record."

She shot him a rueful smile, touching her chin again. "I did far worse to myself."

He glanced at the bandaged hand, then at her chin, and he couldn't help focusing on the sparkling studs in her earlobes. Diamonds?

After Duane took the Polaroid shots, Gabriel moved toward the front door, clearly intending for them to leave. Les hung back in the living room, looking at some photographs in a big, framed collage mat on the wall. There were pictures of Jay Handley, his wife Alison, Gabriel, his sister Kelly, Rita and Emily, Kelly's husband Dave, and their older son, and one of Beth as a girl. There was one of a grownup Beth too, with a baby.

"Is this your daughter?" Les said.

She moved to his side. "Yes, that's Abby. My mother must've given that to Jay."

"Do you have a recent picture of her?"

"In my purse. I'll get it." She paused. "Will you need to keep it?"

Les nodded. "For the file." He glanced at Duane, and shrugged. He wanted to see the kid. It would help him take this more seriously, now that he knew he should.

She brought the snapshot to him, he looked at it briefly, and passed it to Duane. "Thank you, Beth." He started for the door, then stopped so suddenly Duane bumped into him. "One more thing," he said, ignoring Duane's mumbled apology.

"Yes?" Beth said.

"Do you know if a report was filed with the Sheriff's Office, the time you were locked in that closet when you were three?"

She stared at him, eyes wide. Her mouth opened a little. The scared kid returned.

Gabriel came over and stood beside her with his hand on her shoulder. "Why are you asking about that?"

Les raised his hand. "Please, let her answer."

"I don't know," she said softly. "I don't remember it. Why?"

"I just learned about it myself. I was a deputy at the time, and I don't recall hearing of anything like that associated with the Lodge or the Grays. I can't find any record of a report. I wondered if you knew, since it appears there may be a connection between that and what happened yesterday." He moved toward the door again. "We'll ask your mother."

She followed him. "What connection?"

"Your mother recognized the doll."

She went white, instantly. "She ..." Her voice was a faint whisper. She blinked. "What do you mean?"

"She said it was a doll your father bought for your third birthday. It disappeared, when you disappeared that day, only it didn't turn up when you did. Your mother found it years later, after your father died, in his storeroom. She threw it away. Now apparently it's surfaced again."

"If Emily threw it away, how could it show up yesterday?" Gabriel said.

Les shrugged.

"What does it mean?" Beth said.

"That's what I'd like to know." Les turned and faced her. "A lot of people don't want you here, Beth. You and your little girl might be safer if you left."

She met his look head on. "This is my home. It's where I was born, and where I grew up. I have a right to be here now."

"It's also where Ollie Stevens was born. Rights don't change how people feel, Beth, and people worked up some powerful feelings about you killing him. I can't protect you from that."

"Sheriff Kendall, I came here to spend time with my mother, to let Abby know her grandmother. I've been staying away from town and anyone outside the family who might be offended by my presence. Someone is violating my rights and my daughter's rights, and I expect you to do something about it, to do your job. I've helped my mother pay her taxes in this county for several years now. You work for me, too."

Les felt himself mentally back away from her look. He nodded at her and Gabriel, meeting their eyes only briefly. "Good evening." He went out the door, leaving Duane to close it.

He walked down the gravel driveway, passing the white Mercedes on the passenger side. He stopped when he saw the word MURDERER scrawled along the side of the car, illuminated by the bright yard light. "Damn it all to hell!" Les turned from the infuriating red letters and glared at Duane. "What's the matter with her? Why doesn't she turn and run, like any sane person would if they knew everyone in town wanted them gone?"

Duane shrugged. "The way she sees it, they painted the wrong car."

"The hell you say!" Les strode to the Blazer. As soon as Duane closed the passenger-side door, Les put it in gear and the tires dug into the gravel.

"That business about the doll upset you," Gabriel said, beckoning Beth back to the sofa. "And Les Kendall. Why'd he have to come here tonight?"

"It wasn't him."

Gabriel chuckled. "I liked what you said, about him working for you. The look on his face was priceless."

"I shouldn't have spoken to him that way." She sat beside him and he moved closer, putting his arm around her.

"What was it like for you, in prison?"

Why was Gabriel bringing that up? She'd talked about it to Peter, but he'd never treated it like anything out of the ordinary. After all, it was the first thing Peter had known about her.

"It was humiliating, demoralizing, depressing, and wasteful. I tried to make the best of it. I spent my energy on keeping my mind occupied, convincing myself I still had a future."

"You weren't afraid?"

She met his look. "Everyone was afraid. I was there for murder. Some people must've been afraid of me."

Gabriel huffed. "Your mom told me you worked on a business degree."

"I didn't complete it. I didn't think it would matter if the only job I could get was waiting tables and, as it turned out, with Dan it didn't matter either. When Dan decided he couldn't live with me, he gave me half his business, like he was paying off an expensive whore."

"That's bullshit, Beth. He must've thought you could hold up your end of the deal. He wouldn't have risked half his business otherwise, would he?"

He touched her shoulder, pressed her closer, and kissed her lightly on the lips. Then he drew back and studied her face.

"Gabriel, I'm not thinking straight right now. I need some time to think, to clear my mind." She realized she was thinking about Peter and fell silent.

"You used to call me Gable."

She met his searching look.

"I can give you time, Beth, if that's what you need."

She could only look at him, cautious.

"If I'd been here, instead of in New Zealand, would you have attempted suicide?"

"I can't answer that, Gable. I felt ... lost." Beth stood up. "I really should get back. It's past Abby's bedtime--"

"Beth." He stood beside her. "I'd like to spend Saturday with you and Abby."

"We have plans for Saturday. Maybe next week sometime."

He took a moment to answer, his expression clouded. "I want to see you as often as I can while you're here." He moved closer. The lamplight in his eyes made them look like pools of water. She could recall a time when she'd wanted to dive in and lose herself in him.

"I want to try this again." He tilted his head and kissed her, long and deeply.

It would've been simple if all she could think of was Peter when he did that. It would've been easy to stop if she didn't feel anything, but she did. This had been her most cherished dream, at seventeen. This man, Gabriel, whom she'd known all her life, but never known as a woman. She abandoned herself to the feeling of being wrapped in his arms, possessed by his lips.

She pulled away, eventually, and Gabriel took something out of his pocket. His mother's ring, a garnet rose with emerald leaves, set in a filigreed band of antique gold. Beth had worn it when she was sixteen, seventeen--a lifetime ago--until the night she'd handed it to her mother for safekeeping. The last time she'd worn it was the night Ollie Stevens was killed.

"I want you to think about wearing this again, Beth."

She gaped at the ring, and then at him.

"I said think about it. That's all. I don't expect you to answer me now. Just give me a chance to get close to you again." He kissed her again, releasing a low moan, and he left her feeling breathless, her body wanting to go places she wasn't sure her heart could follow.

She felt like a fraud not explaining about Peter. She really should, and she didn't. More secrets.

She remembered too vividly, falling into the lake wearing the heavy gold ring, which had fit her finger too loosely. Submerged in the cold water, she'd felt it slip and had curled her fingers to hold it. She'd filled with rage not only for the watch her father had given her, but also for this ring, which had nearly been lost. She'd told Ollie she hated him and if he came near her again she'd kill him.

"Don't waste your breath. I got your love note," Ollie sneered, and Owen and Vicky laughed behind him while Gabriel's sister Kelly helped Beth out of the cold water. Less than twelve hours later she'd found Ollie lying in a meadow in the moonlight, dead.

The memory chilled her. She backed away from Gabriel.

When Beth arrived at the Lodge, it was still lit up, but inside it was quiet. She went straight to her room and found a note on her door from Rita, saying Abby was sleeping in Rita's room.

Sleep eluded Beth until the early morning hours, when she dozed fitfully, only to waken shortly after dawn. She dressed in running clothes and crept down the stairs.

Minutes later, she dashed out into the first rays of sunlight. The clear morning air filled her lungs, and her legs carried her in long strides along the lake road. Her confusion left her. She moved and breathed, stretching her legs as far and as fast as they'd go. The shadow of her fear didn't snap at her heels out here. It couldn't move fast enough. It lived in tight, airless, hidden places, not out here in the open and the light. The landscape swept past her, the road raced beneath her feet, the trees soared above her head. She felt unfettered and truly alive.

Peter approached the turn to the Handley ranch and spotted Gabriel seated on his porch drinking from a mug. Peter parked in front of the house and got out.

"Morning," Gabriel called. "What brings you here so early?"

Peter climbed the porch steps. "I was in the neighborhood; I used to stop by and visit your dad."

Gabriel nodded. "Coffee?"

"I'd love some."

Gabriel brought him a cup and returned to the wicker love seat. Peter sat in the chair arranged at a right angle to Gabriel's. "Sun feels good."

"Yeah."

"How's Nora doing these days? She still selling computers for that outfit in Auburn?"

"Yep. Works out of her dad's house now."

Peter hesitated, wondering if he was about to go too far. "I heard a rumor you two are getting married."

Gabriel shifted in his seat, and the wicker creaked. He didn't look happy. "Things are up in the air right now, with Nora and me. See, Beth and I used to be engaged, and Nora's not too thrilled about Beth's visit." He looked into Peter's eyes. "She was here, last night, for dinner."

"Nora?"

"No. Beth."

Peter glanced away and sipped his coffee.

"We had a visit from the sheriff."

Peter leaned forward. "Les came to see Beth, here?"

Gabriel nodded. "It upset her more than she let on. I think something happened to her, in prison. She's ... more subdued." He frowned at his coffee cup. "She's changed."

"Of course she's changed," Peter said impatiently.

Gabriel narrowed his eyes at Peter. "You don't even know her."

"Not the way you do, but we're friends."

"Yeah? Well you need to understand one thing about Beth. She didn't kill Ollie Stevens."

Peter waited for more. Gabriel looked thoughtful for a moment, sipping his coffee. Then he leaned forward, and spoke slowly.

"She wrote me a letter right after her dad died. His death was sudden, and it hit her real hard, but one thing she said she wouldn't miss was hunting with him. She would've done almost anything to please him, but she hated hunting, and he insisted she do it. It made her physically sick to kill an animal. She was a good shot, but she got so she'd miss on purpose, and he'd get angry because he knew it was deliberate.

"It doesn't mean anything, I guess, to anyone but me. I mean, it's not as if liking to hunt means you'll become a murderer. I do my share of hunting. But she wasn't a kid who didn't understand what a gun would do to someone, and she wouldn't shoot someone, even someone she thought was tormenting her. If her life was in danger, maybe, but she knew Ollie was just a prankster. She wouldn't kill him."

"Did she ever tell you she didn't do it?"

"She didn't have to. I know she didn't." Gabriel looked angry, focused on some invisible foe. "Nobody who really knew her could believe she killed Ollie."

"Why would her father make her hunt, if he knew she hated it so much?"

"It was part of his twisted idea of what it took to run the Lodge. He did a lot of things nobody understood, and nobody ever questioned him."

"Sounds like he wasn't your favorite person."

"He wasn't. I didn't understand why he couldn't just relax and let Beth be herself. It was like he loved a perfect translation of her that only existed in his mind. He molded her, or tried to, and she made sure she fit that mold when she was around him, for all her rebellious spirit when he was out of sight. He was her idol, and she lived to please him. She was vivacious around him, even winsome, most of the time. That was her, that was Beth. But if he yelled at her, she'd suddenly act like a different girl. Thoroughly abashed, even a little cowed. Almost like she feared she'd lose his love somehow. She never acted that way with anyone else.

"Now that I think of it, though, that's the way she acts now, like her father is angry and she doesn't know how to appease him."

Peter couldn't forget Sylvia telling him Beth's father didn't want her to remember.

"Do you think he abused her?"

"Not physically," Gabriel said quickly. "At least, she never mentioned anything that sounded like physical abuse to me, and I think she would've. Like I said, she used to tell me everything."

Beth stepped out of the shower and into her fleece robe, then removed the plastic bag she'd used to protect the dressing on her cut hand.

At a knock on the hall door she called, "Come in."

Peter entered, carrying his medical bag, and stopped when his gaze fell on her robe.

"I thought you were Rita, bringing Abby back," she said. "You're here early, aren't you?"

"It's not that early."

She glanced at the clock. "So it's not. I must've taken a longer run than I realized, or a longer shower."

"You went running alone?" He looked alarmed.

"I'm okay, Peter. What time do you want to get started tomorrow?" She began to comb her hair.

He met her gaze.

"I didn't sleep with him, Peter," she said quickly.

He looked away, then met her gaze again. "I didn't ask. We'll leave right after breakfast. This time I provide lunch. That is, if you don't catch yours."

"Do I need to bring gear, or bait?"

"No, I'll have everything you need. I only fish with flies. If you release a fish caught with bait, it's less likely to survive."

She studied his face. "And that matters to you?"

He lifted his eyebrows. "Yes." He gestured for her to sit on the bed, then pulled the chair beside the dresser over and sat on it. He removed the dressing completely from her hand, checked her sutures, and then replaced the dressing with a fresh, slightly less elaborate one.

"Leigh's friend has verified that the printing on the note isn't yours," he told her. "Leigh wants other samples to compare it to."

"How? I mean, who will be willing to give them to me?" She realized she'd been twisting the corner of the bedspread with her free hand. She smoothed it. "I'm staying, Peter."

Now it was his turn to look surprised.

"I did a lot of thinking last night," she continued, "after I got back from Gabriel's. I imagined picking up where I left off in San Diego. I felt like I would die if I did that. I want to stay. I can't tell anyone yet, because there's so much I'm not sure of; but I need to claim what was stolen from me, to stop running from shadows. Now, with what Leigh's friend says about the note, I can begin to have hope. This person who keeps terrorizing me has power over me because he knows what frightens me. But now I know something that frightens him. Me. My presence here terrifies him. I can feel it."

Peter looked disturbed by her words, but said nothing.

"Peter, the sheriff told me my mother recognized that doll. He said my parents may not have reported finding me locked in that closet." Beth took a deep breath. "I can barely stand to look at a cop anymore, but it's the first thing I'd do if Abby turned up missing, or if someone abused her that way. When I try to think of a reason they didn't, my mind locks up." She lifted her gaze to meet his.

"Let me help you then."

On her way out of her room, several minutes later, Beth met Jack in the hallway.

"I have to say, Beth, I missed you last night at dinner. I hadn't realized how dull it's been around here all these years without you."

She was never certain how to take Jack anymore.

He stretched his long body against the wall just outside her door, touching the upper doorframe with one hand. "Duane and the sheriff will be here this afternoon. You may begin to wish you'd stayed away."

"But not you. You enjoy the excitement, right?"

Jack grinned. "Right." He sobered again at once. "Cornell's coming to stay for a couple of weeks. Mom asked him to, since Matt won't be here next week. Mom figures Cornell will make you feel safe. Will he?" Beth didn't answer. "Does Matt? Do these new locks on your door?"

She met the challenge in his eyes, but said nothing.

"I told Mom I don't think you've felt safe since you were three years old. Whoever it was, they screwed with your mind. I mean, look--" He pointed at her bandaged hand, then he grasped her other arm, pushed up the sleeve of her sweater and traced the scars on her wrist. "Look at the lengths to which you'll go to escape, when you're trapped."

She pulled her arm away.

"I wonder what it was like for you to be locked up for six years, to have no way out and to never feel safe, once, in all that time. I wonder how many times you wakened the other inmates with your nightmares, and I wonder how they treated you, the prettiest girl on the cell-block."

She turned and closed her door harder than she intended. "What's your point, Jack?"

"You're not going to feel safe as long as you're here. This isn't a vacation. From what I can see, it isn't even healthy for you. So why come back? Why stay?"

She moved toward the stairs, unwilling to meet his gaze again. "Look at it as a gift, Jack, from me to you. Free entertainment. Hours and hours of it."

His laughter followed her. "Gee, Beth. I didn't know you cared."

At lunch, Beth learned that a picnic was planned for Sunday, which was Mother's Day. Matt, Duane and Art were going to smoke turkeys, and Emily had invited Gabriel and his sister, Kelly. Sarah planned to play some tennis.

"Beth, do you still play?" Matt asked. "I have an extra racket you can use."

"You'll never prove anything by letting her slaughter you at tennis," Jack said.

Beth glanced at her cut hand, which was back in the sling where it hurt less. "I play right-handed."

"You could try playing left-handed," Matt said. He continued to watch her. "Have you ever tried? Just because Dad thought you had to play right-handed doesn't mean you have to keep doing it. You're grown up now. You get to decide."

She squirmed at the memory of her father insisting she do everything right-handed. She'd forgotten why she played that way.

"Tennis makes Mommy's knee sore," Abby chimed.

"Besides, you guys will be busy cooking," Rita reminded Matt.

The back door opened, and Duane and Sheriff Kendall entered. Beth got up to offer them coffee.

"Let me do that." The sheriff took the mug from Beth and filled it himself. "Don't let us interrupt your meal."

"I'm finished," Beth told him. "Would you like a sandwich?"

"No, thanks. Whenever you and Abby are ready, we can check out that shed."

The shed door swung on its hinges, banging in the gusty breeze. Broken glass crunched under Beth's boots while she described to the sheriff what had happened Wednesday. When she finished she walked several feet away from the shed to wait, while the sheriff and Duane heard Abby's account. Matt stayed behind with Abby.

Beth needed to forget about the shed. She faced the lake, and closed her eyes for a few seconds to focus on the breeze blowing her hair, the chill of it on her face. Trees whispered all around, their voices rising and falling, mingling in a soothing chorus.

"They could've come from the campground," Peter said behind her.

He stood several feet away, with one hand against a tree. Beth wasn't sure how long she'd stood here with the sound of voices faint in the distance. She hadn't heard his footsteps.

He moved closer and pointed through the trees northwest of the shed. "They wouldn't have to go far from the road to get here from the campground, and there's a clear trail. They could've hung out in the trees, returned to collect the doll and the lock, and taken off again without being seen from the Lodge or the lake."

"How would they know to expect us?"

"You sit for a few hours getting your portrait done, and if you're the kind of person who likes to run and can't stand to be confined, you're not likely to want a ride back. They know you, they knew what you were doing at Leigh's, and they knew about Abby's fascination with that shed."

"Someone in my family." She shivered. She'd mentioned her plan to sit for Leigh, at dinner, the evening before she and Abby were locked in the shed.

He moved closer. "Unfortunately, it makes the most sense. You know it wasn't Rita, Matt or Faith. That leaves you a few people to trust."

"And it wasn't you."

He shook his head. "I was with a patient when Faith paged me. Duane already asked, and he's probably checked by now."

"I wasn't asking, Peter."

The others filed out of the shed and Abby ran over to Beth.

Sheriff Kendall came out last, grinning. "That's a bright little gal you've got there."

Peter presented his theory about the campground, and Matt agreed with him.

"Let's check that gate," the sheriff said. Matt started off beside Duane, toward the campground. Sheriff Kendall looked uneasily at Beth and Abby. "No need for you to come, but you shouldn't be out here on your own."

"I'll walk back with them," Peter said.

The sheriff nodded, his gaze on Beth. "Remind Emily that I still need to talk to her." He turned and followed Duane.

"Bye, Sheriff!" Abby waved at them.

"Cute kid," Les said.

Duane gave him a look, and Les would've remarked how the kid couldn't help who her mother was, but Matt was standing right beside Duane, and Les hadn't missed Matt's reformed attitude toward his sister.

Duane grinned casually. "Takes after her mother." He kept walking.

Les paused to look back at the three who walked through the trees toward the Lodge. Beth and Peter each held one of Abby's hands. Abby swung her arms between them and skipped to keep up with their longer strides. As Les watched, Abby broke the hand link and ran ahead. Peter moved over beside Beth and placed his hand on her back. Les saw, even at this distance, the welcome in her look and in her posture. It was like watching an electric spark jump a gap.

"I'll be damned." Les turned to Duane and Matt, but they'd moved on toward the campground.

Les shook his head, walking fast to catch up with the two younger men.

They reached the campground entrance, and found the chain link gate, which led from the Lodge road to the campground, hanging open. The padlock and chain used to keep it secured were missing.

They returned and entered the Lodge through the front. Les stared at the painting of a purple-flowered tree in the lobby. He backed away to get a better look. It was awash with bright sunlight breaking through a silver sky, the shimmering green of new growth, and those flowers. The deep, rich brown of the tree trunk was the only sedate thing about the painting, and even that threatened splendor. How was that possible?

"Beth painted that," Duane said behind him.

"You don't say," Les breathed.

"I told you she was an artist."

Les cleared his throat and dragged his attention from the painting. "Guess so."

Matt returned. "Mom says she'll meet you in the dining room."

It was a long time since Les had been here, but he remembered the way, through the long hallway to the left of the front desk, past the restrooms on the right and the big dining hall on the left. The hall wound past the industrial-strength kitchen with its pantries and walk-in freezer, the stairs, and the laundry room. The family room was tucked away at the end of the hall, at the back of the Lodge. The smaller dining room lay between it and the kitchen.

Duane closed the door to the kitchen. Les was already seated at the satin-finished walnut table when his glance fell on the portrait of Abby. "Beth did that?"

"Yeah. There's another of Emily, in the family room. That's Beth's work too." Duane pointed to a still life of a bowl of lemons. It made Les's mouth water.

Duane fetched him coffee, then opened the sideboard and pulled out a couple of plastic laminated place mats. He placed one in front of Les. It must be as old as Duane and had a Disney illustration of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

"It's an antique," Duane said.

"The table or the place mat?"

"The table. Dates back to the Gold Rush."

Emily came in and sat at the end of the table. "If you want to discuss what happened to Beth," she said, "I'd like her to be present.

Les thought a minute, then he nodded. "I've a feeling some of your answers are going to raise questions I'll want to ask Beth. Deputy?"

Duane left, and returned a moment later with Beth. If Les had thought a moment earlier that Emily dominated the room, now he was certain her daughter's presence dominated his attention, in a wholly different way. Les worked on not looking at her. He asked Emily to describe the events of the morning Beth had turned up missing.

"Sheriff Kendall, that was almost thirty years ago," Emily protested.

"Yes, but I've a hunch you remember it clearly, Emily. The doll Beth and Abby found in the bike-shed connects to what happened back then, however indirectly. I have no report on file of the incident, so I need your help. Start with the date."

Emily still balked.

"It was her birthday, I understand?"

Emily sighed, nodded and told him the date.

"When did you notice she was missing?"

"When I woke up, and she wasn't there."

"Wasn't in her bed?"

"She wasn't in our room. She nearly always came in and wakened us, by jumping onto our bed, laughing. Every morning, from the time she stopped sleeping in a crib."

Emily was smiling, then the smile vanished. "I thought she must be sick, so I went looking for her. She wasn't in her bed."

"What time did you wake up?"

"Probably before six."

"Then what?"

"I wakened Lauren and the children, and we searched for her. Lauren had us each check a different part of the Lodge, and outside. When you're worried about a child, you imagine the worst. I was afraid she'd wandered down to the lake. I'd always been afraid of the children drowning in the lake. I became frantic."

"Who found her?"

"Lauren. He'd sent Jack and Cornell upstairs, but when I started to get panicky, he sent Cornell down to sit with me, along with Sarah and Holly, and he and Jack searched the upstairs rooms together. He found her in the fourth floor room next to the tower, in a linen closet."

"What time was that? Do you know?"

"It was at least nine-thirty or ten when he found her. It must've been, because all the guests had eaten breakfast by then, and Faith had to take over in the kitchen for lunch because the cook quit, angry that we'd had his helpers out looking for a lost child when he was serving breakfast to twenty or thirty guests. I have to say, I was happy to see him go. Faith was a godsend."

"What shape was Beth in when they found her?"

Emily looked lost. Beth looked worse. Her face had turned a pale off-gray, and she was perspiring. She stared at her hands.

But if she couldn't remember ... or did she remember? Les tried to think what Nora could remember from when she was three. Then he realized some part of Beth's mind must remember. This was the cause of her claustrophobia. This was the event that had eventually driven her to kill Ollie Stevens. She kept staring at her hands. At what? The bandage?

Les's mouth felt dry. He looked at the painting of the lemons to see if it would work its magic again. It did.

Paints like an angel.

Emily finally spoke, slowly. "Beth was in shock, Lauren said. She didn't speak for hours, except to whimper, and then she was hoarse. She'd strained her voice, screaming. She was screaming when Lauren found her."

Out of the corner of his eye, Les saw Beth give a little jerk. Her face was pale. She inhaled deeply as she met his gaze.

"Just a minute, Emily," Les said. "Do you mind sitting through this, Beth? If you'd rather not, I understand."

"I want to--" She closed her eyes for a second. "No, that's not true, but I need to hear it. We never talked about this. I'm fine." Her eyes slid their focus to her mother.

"Her voice was hoarse from screaming," Les prompted. "What else?"

"She wanted to be held continuously. I stayed with her day and night. She wouldn't stay alone in her room for a long time after that, even with a night-light. If we left her alone, she'd scream. She'd panic. And then there were the nightmares and the claustrophobia."

"What about that day, Emily. What did your husband find that day? Didn't he examine her?"

Emily stared at him. Then she looked down at her hands, just as Beth had done earlier. Only this wasn't habit or mannerism. Emily was recalling something.

"She had a cut and a bruise on her mouth. And ... she'd scraped her fingers raw. Her father thought she'd tried to scratch her way out." Emily was in tears, and Beth looked dazed.

"Anything else?"

Emily shook her head.

"And the doll?"

"Yes, the doll was missing. We didn't notice until three days later, when Beth was finally able to open her birthday presents. The doll Lauren had purchased for her was missing."

"But her other presents were still there? Where were they kept?"

"After she went to sleep, the night before her birthday, we'd piled them on a table in her room so she'd see them when she woke up. It was what we did for all the children on their birthdays."

"Could she have wakened and done something with the doll?"

"No. Beth wanted to show us everything, and she usually slept straight through till morning, until that day." Emily glanced at Beth.

"What about the other kids?"

"They knew those were Beth's presents. They were all fond of her."

Les raised his eyebrows.

Emily turned a cool look on him. "My family may not get along now, but they did at that time. Our children were taught to be loving toward each other. That was important to their father and to me."

"How old were the other kids?"

"Cornell was ten. Sarah was nine. Jack was eight. Holly was four-and-a-half. Abby's age."

"Could Holly have been interested in that doll, and have been young enough to consider taking it not much of a crime?"

Emily sighed. "What does it matter?"

"I'm trying to come up with an explanation for that doll turning up in your husband's office years later. Maybe he found it among the other kids' things and didn't want to upset you with it. Stuck it in his storeroom and forgot about it."

"No, you don't understand. It wasn't stuck away in some back corner of the storeroom. It was out in plain view, the first thing I saw when I opened the door, as if he'd put it there the day he died."

"All right, back to that morning. At what point did you call the sheriff?"

Emily stared at him.

"Did you call the sheriff, Emily?"

Beth leaned her mouth against her left hand, eyes still lowered. She had long, slender, graceful fingers, recently manicured. Perfect hands, except for the cuts she'd inflicted on herself, breaking that window. Les glanced at the bandaged hand in the sling.

He realized with a jolt, looking at her cut hand, that Beth was still trying to claw her way out of that closet, nearly thirty years later. It had driven her to murder at seventeen, attempted suicide at eighteen, and still she tried to claw her way out. If she would break a window with her bare hand, what would she do next? He wondered whether hearing this interview would help her, or drive her on to her next act of desperation.

"No. We didn't call the sheriff," Emily finally said.

"Why not?"

Emily looked at Beth. Was it apology Les saw in her eyes? Beth rested her forehead against her hand, and didn't look at her mother.

"I'm not sure," Emily said.

"Would it be easier to answer if Beth wasn't in the room?"

"I am answering the question."

"Did you discuss it?"

"Yes. I wanted to call right away. My baby was missing! Lauren kept assuring me we'd find her, that we just had to keep looking."

"After he found her, did you still want to call?"

"Yes, but he said it would upset Beth more."

Duane shifted in his chair and it creaked.

"So it was your husband's decision not to report it?"

"He was thinking of Beth. She was very special to him."

Beth went from her chair to the door in one motion, then fumbled with the doorknob. A small gasp escaped her. She tried again, opened the door and rushed out.

Chapter 14

Beth stood on the boat landing looking out over the lake, which ordinarily would have soothed her.

"Beth?" Duane said.

Go away. Thinking it didn't make it happen, and she didn't have the heart to say it.

Then he was beside her, the blue of his uniform visible in her peripheral vision. He leaned forward to peer at her face. "You okay?"

"No." She hadn't been okay since she was three years old. Jack was right about that.

Silence, for the count of five. "Is there anything I can do?"

"Just--" Go away. She closed her eyes. She'd almost said it. "No."

Duane put his hand on her back, and her anger and shock dissolved into tears. He said nothing for a full minute while she released the tears she wouldn't in front of her mother and the sheriff. After that minute was up, she sniffed and willed the tears to dry up. Enough was enough.

"Don't take this the wrong way, Beth. I'm not trying to run you off, but wouldn't it be easier for you if you left? This can't be doing you any good."

"You don't understand. This follows me everywhere. The only place I can lay it to rest is here."

She sniffed again, pulled herself together, and looked at him. He was about her height, his pale blue eyes so different from Peter's as to seem another color.

"What if it can't be laid to rest until you are?"

His words, gently as they were spoken, shocked her and she stared at his brown mustache, which she'd once thought would never grow in properly. Now it was thick and neatly trimmed. She considered only for a second. "If it can't, then that will happen here too."

He straightened and backed away a little. "It's that important to you?"

"Hasn't anything ever been that important to you, Duane?"

"Once upon a time--" He shook his head. "Josh is, and maybe Holly if she'd ever let--" He turned, placed both his hands on the railing and looked at the lake. "I suppose if I go on wearing this badge, something else will come along."

"Maybe Holly, if she'd ever let--what?"

He looked at her. "If she'd ever let go of resenting you, then maybe I could love her the way I want to. You and Gabriel. She was dying to see him hook up with someone else. Almost anyone but you would've done. At one time, she wanted nothing more than to hook up with him herself, but all she ever was to him was your sister. She thinks you ruined his life, and maybe she thinks that ruined hers. She won't let go of hating you."

"Gabriel doesn't appear to be a ruined man."

"That's what I keep telling her. Hell, he's got more money now than we'll ever see, and he's never hurt for either friends or female--" He broke off, then said, "So what if he's single? Lots of people stay single all their lives, and maybe he would've wound up that way no matter what. Wouldn't be the life for me, but he seems happy enough."

She smiled at him. "You like being married?"

"Yeah. You didn't?"

"I liked it just fine. He didn't. Or he did, but not with me, or ... something."

"Any chance you and Gabriel will wind up back together?"

"Ask me a question I can answer."

He turned his whole body and grinned at her. "Now you sound like Peter."

She smiled silently.

"At least now you don't look about to jump in." He patted her shoulder. "I'll wait on the steps for you. You shouldn't go out alone, until we figure this out."

"I'll come in now."

Les and Emily sat in the dining room in virtual silence. Les sipped his coffee, keeping it on the place mat when he wasn't drinking. He'd attempted casual conversation, to no avail. He didn't think Emily Gray ever had a casual conversation.

Beth entered with Duane and returned to her seat without a glance at her mother. Duane sat between Beth and her mother this time. Les slid Duane's yellow pad and pencil over to him.

"I'm sorry I ran out that way," Beth said.

"We all needed a break." Les almost told her she wasn't a prisoner here, but thought better of it. "Feel free to run out any time you need to." He tried to put some lightness into his words, but she only blinked at him, her eyes so dark they appeared black.

He turned to Emily, who gazed longingly at her daughter. Les was certain he'd feel like a heel later, for possibly managing to split this family even further apart, but he had a job to do. "You said there were twenty to thirty guests here that day, Emily. How many employees?"

"At least ten, full-time."

"I'll want to look at your records, if you have them, of guests and employees. Were any friends or relatives visiting at the time?"

"You're going to investigate that now?" Beth said. "Isn't there a statute of limitations or something?"

"It relates to the assault on you two days ago. Would you rather I not look into that?"

"Of course I want you to look into that. It's just--"

"As you reminded me last night, it's what I'm paid to do. I wouldn't want anyone to think I don't do my job. Do you have any memory of that day, of being locked in that closet?"

Beth shook her head. "Only in nightmares."

"Have you ever seen a face in those nightmares?"

"No, just a shadow in the dark, speaking in a whisper. Nothing I would recognize. It's like a child's nightmare. I'm not sure how to explain it, but there's no recognizable person."

"What does the shadow say?"

"I can never remember when I wake up. It scares me, though. Whatever it says is frightening, threatening. When the shadow goes away and leaves me in that dark place, I wake up screaming or crying."

"Is the voice male or female?"

"I don't know, all I remember is a whispering voice." She lifted her shoulders. "It's a dream."

Les suspected it was more than a dream, and now he was curious, and getting even further off track. "How long have you been having that dream?"

"Ever since I can remember."

"How often?"

She glanced at her mother, then brushed perspiration off her upper lip. "Right now, almost every night. That's just in the past several months though." She wore a haunted look. "They used to be less frequent."

Les shifted in his chair, feeling uneasy. "Okay. Those records, Emily. Do you still have them?"

"Possibly. Lauren kept things like that. I'll look for them. I want to help with this, Les, anyway I can. Perhaps Beth can help me look for them tomorrow."

"I won't be here tomorrow," Beth said. "Abby and I are going fishing with Peter."

"With Peter?" Emily looked about to protest, and then fell silent.

"With Peter," Beth said, with an edge to her tone.

"That's a good idea, Beth," Les said. "Have someone with you when you go out. Try not to give this aggressor another chance."

"I don't plan to give them another chance," Beth said.

Something in her tone made Les think twice about her words. He could only hope she meant she wouldn't let them catch her alone again. He nodded. "Next week will be soon enough, Emily. Now, I wonder if you'd show me the closet she was found in, before I leave."

Emily's mouth opened, then she nodded silently. Beth wore a horrified look.

Les knew the answer before he asked, "Would you mind coming with us, to see if you remember anything there, Beth?"

She shook her head slowly. Her voice came out hushed and breathless. "I don't think I can do that."

The door Emily led them to was the last one on the left at the west end of the hallway, the brightest end this late in the afternoon. Even so, it seemed dim.

She unlocked a door, then flicked on a light switch. The windows were covered with heavy drapes and sheltered from the afternoon sun by the roof of the outer gallery and the looming tower. Emily walked straight into the bathroom and pointed to the bottom section of a small, built-in cabinet, with a hardwood door and old-fashioned hardware. The brass bolt was spring loaded so it would latch when the door closed. Les turned the knob on the latch a couple of times. The bolt sprang home with a solid thunk.

"Wow," Les said. "No way she could get out of that, was there?" He opened the door and looked at the space inside.

Why did they keep calling this a closet? A three-year-old would barely fit, and no one would get a child Abby's size in there without doing her serious injury. He found a pattern of pinholes in the top board, which formed the shelf of the cabinet above. "Lucky she didn't suffocate."

"It's incredibly sturdy," Emily said. "They built things that way, in this house." She looked at the bathroom walls and shuddered.

"Was she small for her age?"

"No." Her voice shook with strong emotion. Les guessed anger, or fear, or grief. All three. She'd lost a child that day. The child who'd come out of that small, dark prison had been forever changed.

Years later, he'd helped put her in another prison. He pushed away from that thought as soon as it rose in his mind, threatening to play an ugly game with him.

Les had seen enough. He couldn't get out of the room fast enough, and he understood perfectly Beth's reluctance to enter it. He didn't think he'd ever want to again. He led the way out, and Emily locked the door behind them.

"Do all the rooms have cabinets like that?"

"Only these on the fourth floor. They were still in use by the family and staff when the place was renovated in ... oh, the late thirties or early forties. Lauren knew the history far better than I. So does Beth, for that matter. The rooms on the lower floors are more modern."

"Emily, when your husband examined Beth, did he find any evidence of sexual abuse?"

Emily kept her eyes lowered and was silent for a minute. "I don't know." She raised her eyes. "You see, I don't think he would have told me, if he did."

"Why wouldn't he tell you?"

Emily lowered her eyes again. "Because I wouldn't have wanted to live here with my children after that. You see ..." she began again, but didn't finish.

He waited.

Finally she met his gaze. "Lauren knew that. He wouldn't have told me." She turned abruptly and led the way to the stairs.

They descended the stairs in silence. Les thanked Emily again. He and Duane retrieved their hats and jackets from the kitchen. Some of the other family members were there, including Beth.

"You folks have a good evening." Les said, and wondered if that was possible.

Beth and her mother faced one another across the kitchen after the sheriff left. The others in the room watched, silent. Beth stood near the outside door, her mother near the hall.

"What did they talk about this time?" Matt asked.

Beth glanced at him for only a second, then held her mother's gaze as she spoke. "Old, unfinished business."

She looked at Abby, who returned her gaze, her eyes wide with worry. Too much worry for someone so young. Beth suddenly felt exhausted. This was affecting Abby, and it shouldn't. It had to end.

"Beth, I need to talk to you about this," Emily said. "Privately."

Beth turned and went out the back door. She waited on the porch until she heard Emily close the door, then continued down the steps, slowing her pace until Emily caught up. Then she faced her.

"Why in private, Mom? Did I do something I should be ashamed of when I was three years old? Is there something disgraceful about trying to dig my way out of that dark place when someone shut me in? Or do you want to talk in private because you never bothered to do a damned thing about it?"

"I don't want to discuss it in front of Abby. We don't need another child in this family traumatized by this miserable thing that happened to you."

"You don't think this has already affected her? The nightmares, the doors and windows I never want closed? My refusal to ride in an airplane or an elevator? Even a car, sometimes. What do you think she witnessed Wednesday afternoon? Do you think that was a trip to the park for her? When I did this to myself?" Beth held up her right hand. "I was convicted of murder as a result of what happened to me that day, and you don't think she's affected?"

"Beth, please, let me--"

"You can't tell me the one thing I want to hear, Mom. I want to know why, and you can't tell me that, can you? Dad was the only one who knew, and he's gone."

"No one knows why, Beth. Your father didn't know."

"He knew who did it."

Emily stared at her for a second. "That's absurd, of course he didn't. He wanted to protect you from further harm. He was overcome with relief when he found you that morning, but you were obviously in no shape to risk any mishandling by the sheriff."

"Mishandling? Dad never allowed me to talk about it. He made me feel abandoned in my own home, left me to deal with something on my own that I couldn't. I call that mishandling. The only reason I can think of for it, is that he knew who did it and wanted to protect them."

Emily's face went cold. "I won't listen to this." She walked away toward the Lodge.

"He told me not to dwell on my nightmares," Beth called after her. "He said it wasn't healthy, like I had some shameful sickness I should hide. He drugged me and he told me to forget!"

Her mother kept walking.

Beth clasped her arms in front of her and stood in the warm afternoon sunlight and shivered.

She was still standing there when Matt came out.

Nora placed a plateful of food under Les's nose. "You're back to your normal work hours today. Why the late night last night?"

"I'm helping Duane with a case."

She sat down. "Something big?"

"I hope not."

"You don't usually help Duane unless it's something big. Come on, Dad, I need a distraction. You used to love to talk about work, whether I wanted to hear it or not."

"What do you remember from when you were three years old?" he finally asked her. "Anything?"

"Let's see. Most of my early memories are from when I was four or older. There was one time, though, I remember going out on a boat in the ocean, and Mom getting seasick. Mom says that happened when I was three and a half. I don't know why I remember that. I think I was scared."

"Scared?"

"I'd never seen Mom get sick before. What does this have to do with work?"

He sighed. "Early on the morning of Beth Gray's third birthday, someone locked her in a cabinet in an unused room of the Lodge. She was trapped there for at least three hours. She scraped her fingers raw, trying to get out. Her mother told me this. Beth doesn't remember it, except in nightmares she's had ever since."

Nora stared at him, a frown slowly creasing her forehead as he spoke.

"You asked, Nora," he added with a tilt of his head.

"Yes, I did." Her voice sounded hollow. She resumed eating without another word, still frowning.

"Want to hear more?"

She pushed her plate away. "Okay. All the gruesome details."

"Someone locked Beth in a shed with her four-year-old daughter Wednesday afternoon. They lured the little girl in there with a doll, then shoved Beth to the floor and locked them both in.

Les went on to tell everything he knew so far. When he mentioned Beth's scraped fingers the second time, Nora looked at her hands, just the way Emily had when she told the story.

"It's hard to believe Holly came from that family," Nora said. "It's a wonder she's as normal as she is."

"Now, you know better than to repeat this."

"Yes, Dad."

"Duane didn't know about Beth being locked in that cabinet when she was three." Les refused to call it a closet. "Does Holly know?"

"She's never mentioned it." Nora pulled her plate closer and pushed the food around with her fork.

"Have you seen her paintings?"

"Whose paintings?"

"Beth's. She paints. She's good, too. I was impressed, and you know me and artwork. Total strangers. They've got a few hanging up at the Lodge."

Nora looked up. "Beth's paintings?"

"Did she paint when she was a kid? Do you remember?"

"No."

"Did she have any particular mannerism that stands out in your mind?"

Nora wrinkled her eyebrows. "She laughed a lot. She always seemed happy, and she had an infectious laugh. But that's not what you mean."

He shook his head.

"She kept her hands immaculately manicured, and she got in trouble for filing her nails in class."

Les chuckled.

"I know, it seems frivolous. That's the only thing the teachers got after her for, even her own mother. She was a perfect student. Let's see. Sometimes, when she was serious, she'd--" Nora looked at her own hands, then covered her face with them. "Dad! What are you trying to do, make me feel sorry for her?"

"She does remember," he said. "A part of her remembers seeing her fingers messed up like that. And she has nightmares, and she's claustrophobic."

"You've been a cop too long. It's affected your mind."

"Did you ever believe those rumors about her sleeping around?"

"Why? Did she make a pass at you?"

"Of course not," he said impatiently. "Just answer the question."

Nora's eyes smoldered. "I wasn't aware I was being interrogated. Look, I don't know anything about Beth. She was two years behind me."

"Her sister was your best friend, and you remember her looking at her hands. Holly was interested in Gabriel too, right? So were you, even back then. Come on, I know how you kids were. Boy crazy, girl crazy. He was always with Beth. What was she like? I need help with this, Nora."

"I'm not exactly unbiased."

"No one around here is. That's the problem. Forget Gabriel for the moment. Tell me what you remember about Beth before the murder, when you were kids."

Nora shrugged. "I guess she was fun."

"Fun?"

"Yeah. Enthusiastic, you know? If she hadn't been so great looking that she made the rest of us feel like dorks, I think she would've had more friends. We couldn't help it, though, being envious. Her dad used to buy Beth special gifts, favor her over her sisters, stuff like that. She always had the greatest clothes, and looked like she belonged in a magazine."

"Still does."

"Secretly, I wanted to go shopping with Beth and have her help me pick out some new outfits."

"All that talk about her being promiscuous, was it just talk?"

"Gabriel thinks she was lonely and just covered it up. He knew her better than I did."

"I'm not asking if she was lonely, Nora."

"I saw her talking to the boys, hanging out with them, laughing with them. And did they love it! They ate up any attention from her they could get. But that wasn't necessarily flirting. Then of course the girls hated her because the boys paid attention to her. Sheesh! I wouldn't be a teenager again for anything. We were awful!"

"I thought Beth was popular in school. She was Homecoming Queen, right?"

Nora had a far off look. "She wasn't just pretty, she was beautiful, you know? I wonder now if she was even aware of it. We assumed things that weren't necessarily true. I think she was only interested in Gabriel. The other boys were just friends."

Nora carried her plate to the sink and scraped it into the disposal. She turned around, looking miserable. "I don't want to feel sorry for her. She killed someone! I want her to leave, so Gabriel will stop feeling he owes her something. This face, this body and this personality cannot compete with hers." She leaned on the counter. "Is the little girl okay?"

"Abby's okay."

Nora drooped, standing there by the sink.

Les stood and reached out his arms to hug her. "Honey, your face, your body, your mind and your warm, loving nature are great assets. If Gabriel can't see that, you'd better start looking for a fellow with better eyesight."

"Oh Dad, I really blew it the other night." She sniffed and straightened. "I gave his ring back and I told him I didn't want to see him until Beth is out of his system for good. That will never happen, I can't expect it to. But I don't understand how he can go back to her, just like that. Holly told me Beth had dinner at his place last night."

The phone rang and Nora went to answer it. "It's Peter, for you, Dad." She handed him the phone, went to the fridge and took out two beers. She twisted the top off one and placed it in front of Les, then opened the other for herself.

"Yeah." Les nodded his thanks for the beer.

"Les, I have a quick question," Peter said. "I need to know how you identified Oliver Stevens' body."

Les sat up straight. "Why would you want to know that?"

"I'm following a hunch. Did you use dental records? Medical records?"

"We used both, but that was just a formality. He wasn't some drifter from out of town. He was born here."

"He was an identical twin, Les. How did you know which twin was killed? Surely you had to verify that, when he'd been murdered. What did the dental records tell you?"

"That was a long time ago." Les recalled, too clearly, but he wasn't about to discuss it with Peter Lloyd over the phone. The dental records had been a jumbled puzzle, because the twins liked to switch places, and they'd seen a different dentist each time. There hadn't been a complete set of dental records that were definitely Owen's or definitely Oliver's.

"What about hand or foot prints from his birth records?"

"They weren't taken the year he was born. Those are usually lousy prints anyway."

"So how do you know the dead twin was Oliver?"

"His father and brother said so. What is this, Peter? Has someone been filling your head--"

"Beth, if she's the someone you're referring to, hasn't said anything about how you identified the body. She probably doesn't know, does she?"

"I wouldn't know what she knows." Les took a long swallow of his beer, and glanced at Nora, who sat across from him, listening. "I'm sure the defense attorney had access to that information. He never questioned it in court."

"Any chance I can get a look at the autopsy report?"

"What possible good can that do anyone now?"

"Call it professional curiosity."

Les breathed a long sigh. He owed the doctor more than a few favors. "Come see me in my office, one day next week during business hours."

He hung up. Nora sat drinking her beer, watching him. He sat down and stared at his. "What the hell?" he muttered.

What the hell was Peter up to? Did he think Owen was the murdered twin and Ollie was still alive? It was ludicrous. Ollie was dead. He had to be. Tom Stevens would've known his own son. Owen would've--

"Shit!"

"That's not your usual reaction to Peter," Nora said.

"Huh?"

"Shit. That's not--oh, never mind. I can see you're miles from here."

"Sorry, honey." He stood up. "I'll be at the office for a while."

"Dad, it's Friday night. You just got home--" She clapped a hand over her mouth. "God, I sound like Mom."

He focused on the beer in Nora's hand. "When did you start drinking beer?"

"When I was twenty-one. If I did it earlier than that, I'm not about to admit it to you."

Shortly before dinner, Matt glanced into the family room, looking for his mother. He'd heard Beth's side of what happened, earlier. Now he wanted to hear his mother's. Cornell stood just inside the door, visiting with Vicky and Jack. Peter and Leigh sat in the far corner, near the fireplace, with Beth and Abby.

"Anyone know where Mom is?" Matt asked.

"Upstairs," Vicky said with a cold glance in Beth's direction. "She looked upset, and she said we should eat without her."

"I should talk to her," Beth said, as she got up and approached the door.

Vicky moved to block her path. "Haven't you caused her enough misery?"

"Cut it out, Vicky," Matt said.

Vicky ignored him, focusing on Beth. "Everything you touch turns to disaster, every person you touch winds up miserable or dead. Haven't you caused the whole family enough embarrassment? Mom doesn't need you here, and she's trying to avoid you now, so why don't you just leave?"

Cornell stood a few feet behind Beth, looking stunned.

"Let me by, Vicky," Beth said calmly.

Matt tugged at Vicky's arm. "Let her by."

Vicky turned to glare at Matt, while Beth took a single step nearer the door, clearly in anticipation of Vicky moving out of the way.

Vicky yanked her arm from Matt's grasp with an exaggerated movement that sent her sideways into Beth. Vicky's upper arm or elbow, Matt couldn't see which, impacted Beth's injured hand and Beth released a gasp.

Vicky spun around. "Don't touch me, you bitch!" She hauled back and slapped Beth's face with a resounding smack. Beth wavered, off balance, wearing a stunned expression while Vicky raised her hand to strike her again. Matt grabbed Vicky's raised arm, more firmly this time, and dragged her out into the hallway.

"You're hurting me, Matt!" Vicky said, flushed with anger.

"You don't think you hurt Beth just now? If you're going to pick a fight, at least wait until her hand heals, so it's a fair one. What's the matter with--"

Abby released a howl of rage as she streaked across the room. She plunged into Vicky and attacked her with her fists. "Leave my Mommy alone!"

"Abby, no!" Beth lurched forward, still off balance. Jack steadied her. Then he grasped Abby, with her small fists flailing, and pulled her back to her mother's side. Jack held onto Abby until she realized she was no longer within range of Aunt Vicky and she stopped beating the air. Her face glowed with rage.

"Easy there, slugger. Fight's over." Jack grinned up at Beth. "You guys keep this up, I'm going to sell tickets at the door."

Beth's left cheek radiated the imprint of Vicky's hand.

Matt blazed at Vicky, "Are you happy now? Is that what you wanted?"

Rita came through the hallway past him, from the kitchen. "What's going on? What's wrong with Abby?"

"Aunt Vicky hit Mommy!" Abby's words sizzled with anger and her eyes shot sparks at Vicky. She turned and hugged Beth's legs. They were both shaking.

Beth took Abby by the hand and led her to the corner of the room. She sank into a chair near the fireplace. "You do not hit people, Abby."

Abby put up a spirited argument. Beth let her vent her anger, watching her with a weary expression. Everyone else filed into the dining room.

"I don't care what Aunt Vicky did," Beth told Abby. "You don't hit people, ever. When something like that happens, you stay as far away as possible."

Peter reluctantly migrated into the hallway, after the others. Faith stood in the kitchen doorway, wearing a dour expression and her coat. As he met her gaze, she moved out of sight. Sounds of a deadly quiet meal came from the dining room.

When Abby emerged from the family room, Peter moved to Beth's side before she reached the door, allowing Abby to escape. Beth called softly to her, but she was already in the dining room, and Peter blocked Beth's path.

"Is everyone determined to keep me in this room?" Beth said.

"Hold still, let me see. Abby's okay. Matt and Rita are in there."

"Ow." She drew back.

"Smarts, huh? You should ice this. How's your hand."

"She didn't hit me that hard."

"Don't defend her to me, I saw the whole thing." He frowned at her cheek, still flushed bright pink.

"There's nothing for you to do, Peter. No glass, no blood, no sewing. It's a simple slap on the face."

"Well I hope you weren't too hard on Abby. I'd like to give her a medal."

"Please don't let her hear you say that. I'd make her apologize, only I never require it unless it's heartfelt, and this wouldn't be."

"She was being young and--"

"Foolhardy?"

He met her gaze, then glanced behind him to ensure they were out of sight of the hallway. Cornell would come down those stairs any minute, perhaps Emily as well. "If this doesn't hurt, I'll stop doctoring you." He kissed her lightly on the lips.

"We ... have to go in to dinner," she said afterwards. She didn't sound enthusiastic, but she was smiling.

"I'm not hungry for dinner. Are you?"

She laughed softly and blushed and didn't argue. He kissed her again.

"You're incorrigible," she said when he released her lips. Her eyes were smoky and sweet.

"Incorrige me some more."

She laughed again. "A pun that has nothing to do with fishing."

"I'm after the biggest fish of my life, and I don't intend to let this one get away."

She stared hard at him for a few seconds, then kissed him in earnest. He pulled away and searched her eyes. "You really meant that," he said slowly. Then he knew he had to stop, or take this a lot of steps further in a hurry. He backed away and drew her toward the door.

Matt glanced up when they entered the dining room, then discreetly concentrated on his plate while they took seats side by side, under the scrutiny of six other pairs of eyes, including Cornell's. Emily was still absent.

Long, silent minutes later, Matt said, "How about a story?"

"Sounds good to me," Jack said. He rubbed his hands together and looked expectantly at the others. "Who's got one?"

Matt looked at Beth meaningfully.

She took a long breath and began. "For my third birthday, Dad bought me a doll dressed in pink organza."

Les walked into Owen's shop. The lights were on, loud music played, and the service bay door was wide open. The smell of dirty motor oil and grease, mingled with that of beer, met his nostrils. Duane was right. Whoever worked in this mess would've left more than a single smudge on a doll dressed in pink organza and white tulle. The garage had never been anywhere near this bad when Tom had been alive. He'd kept a neat shop.

Owen sat in front of a workbench in the near corner, with a beer in his hand. He looked as grimy as his garage. He bobbed his head forward and back like a big chicken, in time to the blaring music. A carburetor lay disassembled on the bench in front of him. When he saw Les, Owen jumped clear off his stool, reached for the power control on the stereo and switched it off.

"I'm not doing any repairs for a few days. I sprained my wrist." He pushed up his left sleeve to reveal an elastic bandage.

Les paused for a second, looking at that arm. "That's too bad, but I'm not here about a car, Owen."

"I didn't lock Beth Gray and her kid in any shed," Owen said at once. He returned to his stool and picked up his beer.

"Who said you did?"

"Matt thinks I did. He asked me about it, the other night. Didn't he repeat the whole conversation to you?"

"As I understand it, Matt was just being a friend."

"I don't need friends like him. That's the kind of thing that got my brother murdered. I don't want anything to do with those Grays. They're nothing but trouble. Murdering slut thinks she has a right to come back here."

"You haven't been up to the Lodge lately?"

"Hell no. Why would I go there?"

"Matt said you wanted to talk to Beth."

"Well I don't anymore."

"Why?"

"Let's just say Matt cured me of that. Lying son-of-a-bitch."

"What did Matt lie about?"

"He tried to tell me Beth didn't shoot my brother. Who did he think he was talking to? I was the eyewitness! He said she lied when she confessed, to get paroled."

"Makes some sense he'd think that, if he believes her innocent."

"Two weeks ago he didn't think she was innocent."

"Well look, Owen, just keep away from there, like you've been doing. Do you have someone who can vouch for where you were between three-thirty and five on Wednesday, in case there're any more questions raised?"

"Sure. Probably. I'll look through my receipts. I was working here all that day. Must've been a couple of customers here during that time."

"Go ahead and check, and let me know Monday. Have someone take a look at that arm. Dr. Lloyd's pretty good, and he's close by."

"Saw him today. Thanks, Sheriff."

"Have a good evening." Les walked away.

The left arm. Les began to have a sinking feeling. He'd started off his career as sheriff with a murder case resolved in the blink of an eye. Maybe it would end in a fizzle.

He drove to the county building and descended to the dusty basement where Duane and he had searched through files last night. This time he knew where to go. He'd been through this particular file hundreds of times through the years. The subject of this file had settled into his belly like a lead weight, off and on, demanding his attention.

Nothing new had ever surfaced. For more than fifteen years, Elizabeth Gray had remained the only conceivable suspect. She still was. Each time he went through the file he grew convinced of that again and came away feeling appeased. The lead weight lifted for a few weeks, a few months, before it dropped again, insinuating questions and doubts into his mind.

He read through the file again, tonight, hoping for that feeling of complacence to creep back to him, like an abashed house cat that had been out prowling for three nights in a row, and now hungered for human companionship. It never returned.