A Breath Away Read online

  Logan nodded, then began combing the bushes while Grady headed toward the paramedics carrying the body to the ambulance. The man’s face was bloody, his clothes smeared with dirt, his broken femur jutting through his ragged pants; it had been severed in two places. His jeans were still damp, indicating he’d probably been there since the night before, but the EMT would give them a better idea of the exact time of death. The fetid odor of lost body fluids hung in the air as Grady checked the corpse for indications of a struggle. A small contusion lacerated the back of his head. If the man had fallen face-first, how had he hit the back of his head? Unless he’d been struck before falling.

  Grady frowned, disturbed by his own train of thought. Maybe he’d fallen, then rolled over.

  The paramedics loaded the stretcher and the ambulance roared off. Grady had to call his father, tell him they’d found Darlene’s killer.

  No, he couldn’t yet. Not until he was sure. Not until he’d checked out the man’s death. Not until he’d notified the next of kin.

  He stalked to the woods to search the area. As soon as he finished, he’d visit the coroner’s office for a full report, then make that call. Even worse, he had to tell the surviving family that their loved one had taken his own life.

  And that he had confessed to a murder.

  * * *

  VIOLET CHECKED HER rearview mirror. Yes, someone was following her. Was on her tail. She wound through the side streets, reminding herself that she shouldn’t lead a stranger to her house, then turned right on another side street. Nervous now, she wove through a nearby neighborhood, turned and headed back in the opposite direction. The sedan slowed, then swung into a drive. She sighed in relief. If whoever it was had been following her, he’d realized she was onto him.

  Relaxing slightly, she headed back toward her cottage, then veered onto Palm Walkway. The inside of the cottage seemed dark as she parked and exited her car. Crickets chirped in the background. A bird cawed above.

  Weary now, she climbed the small steps to the stoop, grateful to be home. When she stepped inside, the house was too quiet. “Grammy?”

  Her grandmother was sitting in the wooden chair, pale and listless, the phone clutched in one hand.

  “Grammy, what is it?”

  Her grandmother’s blank gaze showed no sign of response.

  “Mrs. Baker…” A man’s voice called over the line. “Mrs. Baker…are you still there?”

  Violet pried the receiver from her grandmother’s fingers and laid it on the counter. “Grammy.” Violet gently shook her. “What’s wrong? Please talk to me.”

  “No,” her grandmother rasped, in a voice so low Violet could barely discern it. “No, it’s not true.”

  “Mrs. Baker,” the man shouted from the phone, “are you all right?”

  Her grandmother’s face went ashen, and she was trembling. No, she wasn’t all right.

  Violet grabbed the handset. “This is Mrs. Baker’s granddaughter, Violet. Who is this and what did you say to upset her?”

  “Violet?” Shock tinged the man’s deep voice.

  “Yes, who is this?”

  “Sheriff Monroe.” He hesitated, his voice husky. “Grady.”

  “Grady?” Darlene’s brother?

  “I’m sorry…I had to give your grandmother some bad news.” His breath whistled out. “Violet, your father is dead.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  GRADY GRITTED HIS TEETH. He’d never cared for Jed Baker. And when Violet had first left town, years ago, he’d halfway blamed her for Darlene’s death. Hell, he’d been a stupid adolescent at the time, battling his own guilt. Using her as the scapegoat had been easy. She was the reason his sister had rushed across the hollow alone. She hadn’t been able to tell them where to find Darlene.

  But she had been only eight years old.

  He stifled the sympathy he felt for her now. If her father had killed Darlene, then he deserved to die, although suicide wasn’t nearly severe enough punishment. And if Violet and her grandmother had known her father was guilty and hadn’t told…

  But what if the coroner did find evidence of foul play? What if his own dad had learned that Baker killed Darlene, and had gone back to finish their fight?

  No, that train of thought was too dangerous.

  She was so quiet he wondered if she’d fainted. And how old was the grandmother now—eighty? Ninety? “Violet?”

  “Y-yes,” she said in a choked voice. “How…how did you track us down here?”

  “Lloyd Driver, the lawyer who handled your father’s papers.”

  “How…how did my father die?”

  Her whispered words echoed all the usual queries he’d expected. The hows and whys, the unanswered questions. “He left a suicide note.”

  “What? He killed himself?”

  “I’m just telling you what I found. I’m having the note analyzed to make certain it’s his handwriting.”

  “What does the note say? Did he give a reason?”

  The part he dreaded the most. Violet might love her father, but she’d also cared for Grady’s sister. He’d never forgotten the day he, his dad and the sheriff had driven to her house to inquire about Darlene. He’d heard Violet’s childish cries through the closed door. And the next day she’d been gone. Later, rumors spread that she was a spooky kid, that she claimed to hear voices in her head, that she might be schizophrenic.

  “Tell me,” she said, her voice growing stronger. “I want to know. I have to know.”

  He hesitated. “This can wait until you come back for the funeral. I assume you’ll want to bury him here. Or…maybe not.”

  “I…I don’t know.” Uncertainty laced her voice. “Just tell me what the note said.”

  He cleared his throat. “Violet—”

  “Please, Grady.”

  Her soft plea twisted his insides. She sounded so young and vulnerable. He pictured those big sky-blue eyes, the innocent little girl who used to tag along behind him with his sister. The scrawny kid Darlene had felt sorry for, because the other kids called her white trash.

  What did she look like now? Was she still homely? Did she still think about Darlene? Did she realize today was the anniversary of Darlene’s death?

  He didn’t care. He’d wanted revenge so long he wouldn’t let himself.

  “From the looks of things, he got drunk and threw himself off the ledge at Briar Ridge, but I’m waiting on an official autopsy report for cause of death. The note said he couldn’t live with the guilt any longer.” Grady inhaled a calming breath, aware that he was dropping another bombshell, then forced himself to spit it out. “Violet, your father confessed to killing Darlene.”

  * * *

  A HEARTBEAT OF SILENCE stretched between them. “What?” Violet clutched the table edge. “Did you tell my grandmother this?”

  “Yes. I’m sorry, she insisted.”

  Violet sank into the chair. Her father was not a killer. He wouldn’t have hurt Darlene. Not her best friend. Not the girl who’d defended her.

  Bits and pieces of that horrible last day rushed back. Her father’s fury when he realized she’d told the town about her connection to Darlene. The nervous way he’d stalked around the house, muttering under his breath that people would think she was a nutcase. That the devil had gotten her.

  A shudder gripped her. What did she really know about her father? That he’d dragged her to the car that dark cold night without even kissing her goodbye. That he’d sent her away without a backward glance because he thought she was possessed. That he hadn’t contacted her since. That he’d made her feel like some kind of freak.

  That he hadn’t told the Monroes where to find Darlene in time.

  She swallowed to make her voice work, but before she could speak, her grandmother clutched her chest.

  “Violet…”

  Panic slammed into her. “Grammy, what’s wrong?”

  Her grandmother doubled over in the kitchen chair, gasping for air.

  “Is she all right?”
Grady yelled.

  She was turning white. No, blue. “I have to call an ambulance!” Violet disconnected the phone and punched in 9-1-1, her heart racing.

  “Jed didn’t…do it,” her grandmother rasped. “Not a…k-killer.”

  Her frail body jerked, then she slumped against Violet.

  * * *

  WHAT THE HELL WAS happening? Grady hit Redial, his pulse clamoring, but the phone rang over and over. Was Mrs. Baker okay? Had the news killed her?

  He scrubbed a sweaty hand over his face and cursed. The scents of death and formaldehyde from the coroner’s office came back to him, his sister’s childlike face resurfacing. He’d never forget standing beside his father to identify her body. The image of Darlene’s glassy eyes. The cuts and scrapes. Dirt and mud and weeds had clung to her pale skin, the signs of rigor mortis already setting in. Signs he hadn’t understood at the time. Signs he’d recognized in other bodies since.

  He and his father had waited all these years to learn the truth about Darlene’s killer. But now to discover he’d been living in their own town, that Violet’s father had murdered her. It was almost unbelievable….

  But why had Baker killed himself now, twenty years later? It wasn’t as if the case had been recently reopened. Unless the anniversary had finally driven Baker mad, as it threatened to do to Grady every year…

  Uncertainty nagged at him again. At age thirteen, he hadn’t known anything about the police investigation.

  But he had read the files since. Hell, he’d memorized them. Tonight he would review them again and see how the police had missed that Baker was the killer. Just as soon as he told his father. A stream of sweat dribbled down his chin.

  He hoped his dad didn’t already know….

  * * *

  VIOLET CLUNG TO HER grandmother’s hand on the ambulance ride to the hospital, as the minutes stretched out. For several seconds back at the cottage, she’d thought her Grammy had died. Then she’d jerked slightly, breathing again as if she refused to give up the fight. As if she knew she couldn’t leave this world, not yet. Her granddaughter needed her.

  In fact, Violet should have been there to take the phone call. She could have broken the news more gently. She should have protected her, just as she should have protected Darlene.

  Violet had tried so hard to atone for that day. She hadn’t celebrated a birthday since. And now she might lose the only person who’d been a constant in her life.

  The ambulance screeched up to the emergency room entrance. Paramedics jumped into action. A team of doctors and nurses met them at the door, shouting questions and her grandmother’s vital signs as they wheeled her through the ER.

  “Pulse sixty-five, weak and thready. Respiration thirty, shallow. BP eighty over fifty.”

  “Dr. Rothchild, cardiology. How long was she out?”

  “A couple of minutes.” The paramedic glanced at Violet for confirmation.

  Violet nodded, running behind, her heart in her throat. The EMTs opened a set of double doors and wheeled her grandmother toward an exam room. One of the nurses threw out a hand and stopped Violet from entering, then pointed to a waiting area with a few stiff chairs and an ancient coffee machine in the corner. “You’ll have to wait there, miss.”

  Violet grabbed her arm. “Please let me know as soon as you find out something.”

  The nurse offered a tight smile, her expression sympathetic. “I will. Why don’t you get a cup of coffee or something. It might be a while.”

  Violet’s stomach was too knotted for her to drink or eat anything. Instead she paced the waiting room, her shoes clicking on the tiles, the conversation with Grady Monroe reverberating in her head.

  Your father is dead. He left a suicide note. He confessed to murdering Darlene.

  She didn’t believe it. Why would he have killed Darlene?

  Frustration gnawed at her—it was too late to ask him.

  The finality of his death hit her, and a sob welled in her throat. Her father would never make that phone call she’d desperately wanted. Would never walk in the door and take her in his arms or beg her forgiveness for sending her away.

  He’d never tell her he loved her.

  At least when he was alive, she’d been able to hope that one day he’d reappear and admit the past twenty years had been a mistake. That he was sorry for shutting her out of his life.

  Her knees buckled, and she collapsed on the tattered vinyl sofa, the scents of antiseptic, and death washing over her. Her chest hurt from the pressure of holding back tears. Finally, she could fight them no longer. Sobs racked her as the hands of the wall clock ticked out the seconds, the minutes. Finally her sobs lessened, and anger replaced the pain. Violet stared at the gray walls, the stained coffee table overflowing with magazines. She was massaging her temples when she spotted the newspaper article on the missing Savannah woman.

  When Darlene had been in danger, Violet had felt so connected to her. And today she’d thought a stranger’s voice had whispered to her on her deathbed. If she had some crazy psychic ability, why hadn’t she ever felt a connection to her own father? Why hadn’t she known he was in danger or that he was contemplating suicide?

  Had he sent her away because he was afraid she might figure out the truth—that he’d killed Darlene?

  Violet dropped her head into her hands. The blood vessels in her temples seemed about to explode. She didn’t really believe he’d killed her friend, did she?

  “Miss Baker?”

  She jerked her head up and swiped at her eyes. “Yes?”

  “Your grandmother is resting now,” Dr. Rothchild said. “She had a mild stroke.”

  “But she’s alive?”

  “Yes.”

  Violet stood on wobbly legs. “Can I see her?”

  “For just a moment. She’s being moved to ICU.”

  And her prognosis? She couldn’t bring herself to ask.

  The doctor jammed his hands in the pockets of his lab coat. “We can release her in a few days, but she’ll need lots of rest and physical therapy. You can follow me.”

  Violet moved on autopilot as they walked to the ICU unit. Seconds later, she hesitated in the doorway, gathering the courage she feared might fail her.

  Tubes and needles pierced various parts of her grandmother’s thin body. The bleep of a heart monitor sounded over the murmur of nurses’ voices and the clink of metal. Violet slowly inched her way to the hospital bed and lifted her grandmother’s hand in her own. Her skin felt cold and clammy. She was so frail.

  “Hang in there, Grammy,” Violet whispered. “You can’t leave me, too.” Another tear slid down her cheek.

  Her grandmother’s eyes fluttered open. She tried to speak, but she’d lost her speech and mobility. Panicked looking, she waved a finger. Realizing she wanted something to write with, Violet dug a pen and paper from her purse.

  Her grandmother struggled, but finally managed to write, “Take me home.”

  “I will, Gram,” she said softly, “just as soon as the doctor releases you.”

  “No.” She urged Violet closer, then scribbled, “Back to Crow’s Landing, to see Neesie. Have to see my family one more time before I meet the master.”

  Neesie was her grandmother’s sister. They hadn’t seen her since Grammy had stolen away with Violet that dark, cold night. “You’re not dying, Grammy,” Violet said in a choked voice, “you’re going to be okay.”

  “Please,” she wrote, “prove your daddy didn’t kill that little girl.”

  Anguish tightened Violet’s throat at the thought of returning to Crow’s Landing. At the mere idea of seeing her father’s face again. Of burying him. She couldn’t deny her grandmother’s plea, though.

  But how could she face the town now that everyone believed she was a murderer’s daughter?

  CHAPTER FIVE

  BY THE TIME VIOLET stumbled into the cabin on Tybee Island, she was drained and dizzy with fatigue. Still shell-shocked, she flipped on the overhead light and stared at the
vinyl chair where her grandmother had nearly died. The horrible trembling began all over again, stirring pain deep in her soul. She had to gain control.

  Or she would never be able to face the people back in Crow’s Landing.

  The echo of Grady Monroe’s voice over the phone line seared through her like a hot poker. Had she heard condemnation in his tone? Did he think she’d known what her father had done? Rather, what her father had confessed to doing in that note?

  No. Her grandmother didn’t believe her father was a killer, and she had never lied to Violet or led her wrong. Besides, even though her father had shut her out of his life, she sensed he wasn’t evil.

  Would she be able to prove her father’s innocence if she returned to her hometown?

  “Please, Violet, you have to go…. The hospital will transport me to the facility near there. Go on to Crow’s Landing.”

  Knowing she needed sleep before she began the long drive to Tennessee, she heated a cup of Earl Grey tea and sipped it. She couldn’t remember when she’d last eaten, but the thought of food still repulsed her. After some sleep, she’d get her affairs in order and inform her employees at Strictly Southern that she’d be away for a few days.

  Shadows claimed the earth-toned walls of the cabin as she crossed the den to her bedroom. The scent of her grandmother’s gardenia lotion sweetened the air, reminding Violet of her absence. The handmade quilt Grammy had stitched, using different fabric scraps from Violet’s childhood dresses, lay draped across her antique bed. Hugging the quilt to her as if she was hugging her grandmother, Violet crawled beneath the covers, praying the tea and quilt would finally warm her.

  But as she closed her eyes, the image of Darlene’s frightened eyes flashed before her, the terrifying plea for help screeching through her head. Another twenty-year-old picture resurfaced with vivid clarity—of her father dragging her to their old station wagon, shoving her inside, then wheeling away from her as she pleaded with him to find Darlene.