Born To Die (Alvarez & Pescoli)

The receptionist lifted her brows. “O . . . kay.” She pressed a button on the sleek phone and, with more than a tinge of skepticism in her voice, relayed the message. “Yes . . . here in the lobby . . . of course, Mr. Johnson.” She eyed Kacey with new respect, saying, “He’ll see you now. I’ll show you to his office.” She climbed off her desk chair, opened up a portion of the counter that swung inward, then led Kacey down several hallways, past glass doors, and around a final corner to an office with large walnut double doors that were standing open, as if waiting.

Kacey felt an ache of dread in her heart as she followed Miss Jamison inside.

Gerald Johnson sat at his desk, his shirt sleeves rolled over tanned arms, his eyes on the doorway, his silver hair combed smoothly away from his face.

“Mr. Johnson, this is Miss Lambert,” the pixielike receptionist said.

He climbed to his feet. “Thanks, Roxie. Please, close the doors as you leave.”

The receptionist did as she was bid, and Johnson, about six feet tall, still square-shouldered, his silver hair just beginning to thin, turned all his attention on the daughter he’d never met. He didn’t bother smiling, just said, “Hello, Acacia. I’ve been expecting you.”

His hands were tight on the steering wheel, his heart was pounding triple time, and sweat was dampening his shirt despite the snow he saw falling outside the window as he drove, pushing the speed limit, his Lexus flying over the road.

She knew!

That bitch understood.

She’d realized the maggot who had spawned her was Gerald Johnson, and now they were having a showdown.

He should have killed her sooner!

All of his work ... about to be destroyed.

All of his planning, how careful he’d been, about to be exposed.

Taking several calming breaths, he told himself that this was just another small challenge, a bump in the road. He could handle this, he could.

He blinked his eyes.

But he didn’t let up on the accelerator as he passed a long, nearly empty van marked ST. BARTHOLOMEW’S HOSPITAL heading the opposite way, toward Grizzly Falls.

Within minutes he was forced to slow for traffic as he guided his Lexus through the streets of Missoula.

Pull it together, he told himself as he stepped on the brakes and waited at a light for a woman on a cell phone who barely noticed the waiting traffic as she crossed to the far side, where a storefront, decorated with mannequins dressed in red and green for the season, beckoned.

Inside his driving gloves, his hands were clammy, and nervous sweat dampened his shirt though the temperature in the car read only sixty-seven degrees and outside snow was beginning to stick in earnest on the roads again.

Glancing into the rearview mirror, he saw no car hanging back, as if following him, no sinister driver hiding behind aviator shades. Nor was there anyone in a long trench coat leaning on a lamppost while observing him, no man on a park bench ostensibly reading a newspaper, while, in fact, surveying his every move.

Of course not!

That was just the stuff of movies!

He counted his heartbeats and punched the accelerator the second the light turned green.

The rest of the drive was excruciatingly slow, while his thoughts were flying through his head a mile a minute. Short, sharp bits of mental movies of those he called his siblings, of those who were now dead, and of the bitch who was currently hell-bent on destroying it all.

Forcing a calm he didn’t feel, he drove the Lexus into the parking lot of his father’s business and spotted her car parked near the administration building.

His stomach clenched, and he had to remind himself that all was not lost.

Yet.

CHAPTER 28

“ You were expecting me?” Kacey stared at the man who, if only by the chance of genetics, was her father. Hadn’t Maribelle said Gerald Johnson didn’t know about her? Then again, hadn’t her mother been known to lie? To keep secrets? “So you know I’m your biological daughter? I thought it was all a big secret.”

“Is that what Maribelle said?” He almost seemed amused as he waved her into the large office with its oversized desk, floor-to-ceiling windows, and a sit