In a way, in spite of what she’d done, I could sympathize with the injustice that had been done to her.
Beatrice drew in a deep breath. “But you came back. You shouldn’t have come back. I warned you in that phone call.” She took a step toward me. “You should have taken my warning and gone away.”
She was close now, so close that I could reach out and touch the gun. Her eyes were calm again, and very cold. The ice queen.
“You can go by yourself or I can shoot you,” she said in that soothing voice.
SLOAN WAS PRAYING as he took the stairs two at a time, then raced down the corridor to the open door of the bell tower. He stopped then. He’d seen the two of them just before he’d reached the house. The image would be forever burned on his brain—Brooke standing with her back to the low wall, and Beatrice with a gun in her hand.
The sick ball of fear had settled in his stomach then. He wasn’t going to reach them in time. And even if he did storm up those stairs, Beatrice would hear him coming. All she had to do was squeeze the trigger.
He took a step forward and saw the rope to the bell. Taking it into his hands, he prayed that it would work.
“I’LL JUMP BY MYSELF.” I’d said the words, but I couldn’t seem to move. In a minute, she was going to pull that trigger. It was all I could think of, and yet I couldn’t unfreeze.
The bell clanged—so loud that I could feel the vibrations on my skin. The noise shocked me out of my paralysis. Beatrice started, too. I prayed that my reflexes were faster as I dived at her, grabbing her gun hand with both of mine and shoving hard.
The gun went flying out of the tower. We both lost our footing and fell on the wall. For a moment we lay balanced precariously on it—teetering—I with the stones pressing into my back and Beatrice on top of me. I was sure that we were both going to go over.
Then she pulled herself off me and backed up several steps until she was against the opposite wall. I was still struggling for balance when she started toward me again. Then Hannibal leaped. He hit Beatrice midchest, and I heard her scream as she stumbled backward, hit the wall and toppled over.
Digging my fingers into the edge of the wall, I managed to get my balance. Then I had to sit down. Sloan found me on the floor of the bell tower with Hannibal on my lap when he burst through the door. He didn’t say a word. He just pulled Hannibal and me onto his lap.
We sat there for a long time.
21
WHEN THE STATE TROOPER, Lieutenant Brady, finally closed his notebook, Sloan rose. It was nearly noon, and he hadn’t had a break since the police had arrived on the scene and set up shop in the main parlor. He glanced down the length of the room to where Brooke was still being questioned by a female trooper. He’d been the one who’d insisted that the police use the parlor because he hadn’t wanted to let Brooke out of his sight. Evidently Hannibal felt the same way because the cat hadn’t left her side since they’d come down from the bell tower.
It would be a long time before he could get the image out of his mind of Beatrice holding that gun on her and knowing that he wasn’t going to make it in time. And he didn’t think he’d ever be rid of the sound of Beatrice screaming as she fell. He hadn’t reached the tower yet, and for those last few endless steps, he’d thought it had been Brooke who’d fallen. Even when he’d seen her sitting there with the cat, he hadn’t believed it. He’d had to touch her, hold her. And then he’d listened as she’d poured out everything Beatrice told her. When he’d learned that his father hadn’t abandoned him, Sloan couldn’t sort through the flood of feelings that moved through him. He’d simply held on to Brooke. It hadn’t been until the troopers had finally climbed the stairs that either one of them had moved.
Since then, he hadn’t had a chance to talk with her or with James for that matter. They’d all been caught up in a seemingly endless round of interrogations. As far as he knew, Austin and the Lintons were still being questioned in the kitchen wing. And he’d been told that the troopers had talked to James in his suite.
“How long before you’ll be through with Ms. Ashby?” Sloan asked.
“Hard to say. We’re taking her over her statement on what exactly happened in the tower in those last few minutes.”
“She’s told you what happened.” Impatience swirled through him. And anger. Ever since the fear and the shock and the relief had faded, a fury had been building inside of him.
“There are things that Beatrice Caulfield told her that we have to follow up on.” Brady spoke in a mild tone. “We’d like to make sure Ms. Caulfield didn’t have an accomplice.”
Sloan frowned. “You think her son may have been in on it with her? Or Doc Carter?”
“Not necessarily. We’re just trying to eliminate those possibilities.” Brady’s tone was mild. “There were a lot of people who might have wanted to eliminate Cameron McKenzie. It’s unfortunate that no one chose to report the attack on her five weeks ago.”
“Yes, it is, isn’t it?” Sloan murmured.
Brady glanced at his watch. “We may be able to wrap it up in another half hour or so.”
Satisfied that Brooke would be busy for a while yet, Sloan said, “I’ll be back.” Then he left the room and strode down the corridor to James’s suite. He wanted to check on the old man, and there were things he needed to say to him.
Sloan entered the room without knocking. James was sitting in his massive chair. Only this time he wasn’t behind his desk. The old man had moved the chair and angled it so that he was staring out at his domain—the stables and the land beyond.
James turned. “How is she?”
Sloan strode forward. “She’s fine—or at least she will be. But it’s no thanks to you. You sat there on that throne of yours, pulling strings the way you always do. Hiding Cameron away and luring into your game a daughter you’d never met. You damn near got her killed.”
“Yes. Yes, I did.”
Damn him. The old man’s simple admission had more of his anger fading, but Sloan wasn’t finished. “Why? Why couldn’t you have just told the police when Cameron was attacked? Why this elaborate charade?”
James leaned forward then. “Do you think the police would have found the truth? Do you think they could have kept Cameron safe from another attack?”
Knowing what they knew now about Beatrice, Sloan had to admit he had a point.
Shaking his head, James sighed. “I decided to bring Brooke here because I thought her appearance on the scene would stir things up and bring everything to a head. I never expected that she would come here impersonating Cameron. And I never dreamed that Beatrice would…My God, I never suspected that my sister was capable of…” James raised a hand and dropped it. “She murdered three times. She murdered my wife, Sarah, and your father—a man who was my best friend. Then she murdered Elizabeth. And for what?”
Sloan narrowed his eyes. His anger still hadn’t run its course, but the look in James’s eyes, a mixture of shock and sorrow, had him banking it. He put out his hand and gripped James’s arm. “From what Brooke has told me, she murdered three times because she felt she had a right to inherit at least half of this estate, and the only reason why she wasn’t allowed to was because she wasn’t a man. You might want to give that some thought before you perpetuate the problem.”
James’s chin lifted. “What are you saying?”
“You know exactly what I’m saying. You manipulated Cameron into marrying me in order to get half her inheritance. I don’t imagine she’s any happier with that than Beatrice was when she didn’t inherit anything.”
James rose from his chair. “If you’re saying that Cameron, that a daughter of mine would turn into a crazed killer…”
Sloan’s brows rose. “Don’t you dare twist my words, old man. I’m not saying that at all. I’m merely saying that you’d better think long and hard about what you’re doing with your kingdom. And remember, you’ve got a second daughter who isn’t nearly as predictable as Cameron.”
“True.”
To Sloan’s astonishment, James smiled, then broke into a loud bellowing laugh that filled the room. He stared as James lowered himself back into his chair. When he finally stopped laughing, James said, “Cameron said much the same thing to me on the phone a few moments ago.” He dug a slip of paper out of his pocket and handed it to Sloan. “She wants to talk to you.”
Sloan glanced down at the paper and then back at James. “I’m not going to marry her.”
Something came into James’s eyes then, something Sloan couldn’t quite read.
“I figured that.”
A suspicion formed in the back of Sloan’s mind but before he could give voice to it, James said, “Go ahead and call Cameron. If it makes you feel any better, she’s already told me she’s not marrying you, either. And she’s in perfect agreement with you on how much blame I should be shouldering for all of this.”
Reaching for his cell phone, Sloan moved through one of the open doors to the patio outside of James’s suite, then punched in the number.