“I never thought that—”
“Of course you did. You all did. Then there was Richard. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing that—” Her voice broke. She wiped her hand across her eyes.
Slowly Miranda set the typewriter down on the bench. “Knowing what, Annie?” she asked softly. “How badly he hurt you? How alone you really were?”
A shudder racked Annie’s body.
“He hurt us both,” said Miranda. “Every woman he ever touched. Every woman who ever loved him. He hurt us all.”
“Not the way he hurt me!” Annie cried. The echo of her pain seemed to reverberate endlessly against those stark walls. “Five years of my life, Miranda. That’s what I gave him. Five years of secrets. I was forty-two when we met. I still had time for a baby. A few short years left. I kept hoping, waiting for him to make up his mind. To leave Evelyn.” She wiped her eyes again, smearing a streak of mascara and tears across her cheek. “Now it’s too late for me. It was my last chance and he took it from me. He stole it from me. And then he ended it.” She shook her head, laughing through her tears. “He said he was only trying to be kind. That he didn’t want me to waste any more years on him. Then he said the thing that hurt me most of all. He said, ‘It was just your fantasy, Annie. I never really loved you the way you thought I did.’” The look she gave Miranda was the gaze of a tortured animal’s. “Five years, and he tells me that. What he didn’t tell me was the truth. He’d found someone younger. You.” There was no hostility, no anger in her voice, only quiet resignation. “I never blamed you, Miranda. You didn’t know. You were just another victim. He would have left you, the way he left us all.”
“You’re right, Annie. We were all his victims.”
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Miranda.” Annie slid her hand into her jacket pocket. “But someone has to suffer for it.” Slowly she withdrew the gun.
Miranda stared at the barrel, now pointed at her chest. She wanted to argue, to plead, anything to make Annie lower the gun. But her voice had frozen in her throat. She could only stare at the black circle of the barrel and wonder if she would feel the bullet.
“Come, Miranda. Let’s go.”
Miranda shook her head. “Where—where are we going?”
Annie opened the door and gestured for Miranda to move first. “Up the stairs. To the roof.”
* * *
No one was home.
Chase circled around Annie’s house to the garage and found that the car was gone. Miranda must have returned, then left again. He was standing in the driveway, wondering where to look next, when he heard the phone ringing inside the house. He ran up the porch steps and into the living room to answer the call.
It was Lorne Tibbetts. “Is Miranda there?” he asked.
“No, I’m looking for her.”
“What about Annie Berenger?”
“Not here, either.”
“Okay,” said Lorne. “I want you to leave the house, Chase. Do it right now.”
Chase was stunned by the unexpected command. He said, “I’m waiting for Miranda to show up.”
He heard Lorne turn and say something to Ellis. Then, “Look, we got evidence snowballing down here. If Annie Berenger shows up first, you keep things nice and casual, okay? Don’t rattle her. Just calmly leave the house. Ellis is on his way over.”
“What the hell’s going on?”
“We think we know who M is. And it’s not Jill Vickery. Now get out of there.” Lorne hung up.
If it isn’t Jill Vickery...
Chase went to the end table and opened the drawer. Annie’s gun was missing.
He slammed the drawer shut.
Where are you, Miranda?
The next thought sent him running outside to his car. There might still be time to find them. He’d missed Miranda by only five, maybe ten minutes. They couldn’t have gone far, not yet. If he circled around town, kept his eyes open, he might be able to find her car.
If they were still in the area.
I can’t lose you. Now that we can prove your innocence. Now that we have a chance together.
He swung the car around. With tires screeching, he raced back toward town.
* * *
“Go on. Up the last flight.”
Miranda paused, her foot on the next step. “Please, Annie...”
“Keep moving.”
Miranda turned to face her. They were already on the third-floor landing. One more flight and then the door to the roof. Once she’d marveled at the beauty of this stairwell, at the carved mahogany banister, the gleaming wood finish. Now it had become a spiral death trap. She gripped the railing, drawing strength from the unyielding support of solid wood.
“Why are you doing this?” she asked.
“Go on. Go!”
“We were friends once—”
“Until Richard.”
“But I didn’t know! I had no idea you were in love with him! If only you’d told me.”
“I never told anyone. I couldn’t. It was his idea, you see. Keep it quiet, keep it our little secret. He said he wanted to protect me.”
Then I’m the only one left who knows, thought Miranda. The only one still alive.
“Move,” said Annie. “Up the stairs.”
Miranda didn’t budge. She looked Annie in the eye. Quietly she said, “Why don’t you just shoot me now? Right here. If that’s what you’re going to do anyway.”
“It’s your choice.” Calmly Annie raised the gun. “I’m not afraid of killing. They say that it’s hardest the first time you do it. And you know what? It wasn’t really hard at all. All I had to do was think about how much he hurt me. The knife seemed to move all by itself. I was just a witness.”
“I’m not Richard. I never meant to hurt you.”
“But you will, Miranda. You know the truth.”
“So do the police. They found that letter, Annie. The last one you wrote.”
Annie shook her head. “They arrested Jill tonight. But you’re still the one they’ll blame. Because they’ll find the typewriter in your car. What a clever girl you’ll seem, making up all those letters, planting them in the cottage. Throwing suspicion on poor innocent Jill. But then the guilt caught up with you. You got depressed. You knew jail was inevitable. So you chose the easy way out. You climbed to the roof of the newspaper building. And you jumped.”
“I won’t do it.”
Annie gripped the gun with both hands and pointed it at Miranda’s chest. “Then you’ll die here. I had to kill you, you see. I found you planting the typewriter in Jill’s office. You had a gun. You ordered me into the stairwell. I tried to grab the gun and it went off. A tidy end for everyone involved.” Slowly she cocked back the pistol hammer. “Or would you rather it be the roof?”
I have to buy time, thought Miranda. Have to wait for a chance, any chance, to escape.
She turned and gazed up at the last flight of stairs.
“Go on,” said Annie.
Miranda began to climb.
Fourteen steps, each one a fleeting eternity. Fourteen lifetimes, passing, gone. Frantically she tried to visualize the roof, the layout, the avenues of escape. She’d been up there only once, when the news staff had gathered for a group photo. She recalled a flat stretch of asphalt, punctuated by three chimneys, a heating duct, a transformer shed. Four stories down—that would be the drop. Would it kill her? Or was it just high enough to leave her crippled on the sidewalk, a helpless mound of broken bones, to be dispatched with a few blows by Annie?
The door to the roof loomed just above. If she could just get through that door and barricade it, she might be able to buy time, to scream for help.
Only a few steps more.
She stumbled and fell forward, catching herself on the stairs.
/>
“Get up,” said Annie.
“My ankle—”
“I said, get up!”
Miranda sat on the step and reached down to massage her foot. “I think I sprained it.”
Annie took a step closer. “Then crawl if you have to! But get up those stairs!”
Miranda, her back braced firmly against the step, her legs wound up tight, calmly kept rubbing her ankle. And all the time she thought, Closer, Annie. Come closer....
Annie moved up another step. She was standing just below Miranda now, the gun frighteningly close. “I can’t wait. Your time’s run out.” She raised the gun to Miranda’s face.
That’s when Miranda raised her foot—in a vicious, straight-out kick that thudded right into Annie’s stomach. It sent Annie toppling backward down the stairs, to sprawl on the third-floor landing. But even as she fell she never released the gun. There was no opportunity to wrestle away the weapon. Annie was already rising to her knees, gun in hand. Her aim swept up toward her prey.
Miranda yanked open the rooftop door and dashed through just as Annie fired. She heard the bullet splinter the door, felt wood chips fly, sting her face. There was no latch, no way to bolt the door shut. So little time, so little time! Fourteen steps and Annie would be on the roof.
Miranda glanced wildly about her, could make out in the darkness the silhouette of chimneys, crates, other unidentifiable shapes.
Footsteps thudded up the stairs.
In panic Miranda took off into the shadows and slipped behind a transformer shed. She heard the door fly open, heard it bang shut again.
Then she heard Annie’s voice, calling through the darkness. “There’s nowhere to run, Miranda. Nowhere to go but straight down. Wherever you are, I’ll find you....”
* * *
Chase spotted it from a block away: Miranda’s old Dodge, parked in front of the Herald building. He pulled up behind it and climbed out. A glance through the window told him the car was unoccupied. Miranda—or whoever had driven it here—must be in the building.
He rattled the front door to the Herald. It was locked. Through the glass he saw a lamp burning on one of the desks. Someone had to be inside. He banged on the door and called, “Miranda?” There was no answer.
He rattled the door again, then started around to the back of the building. There had to be another way in, an unlocked window or a loading door. He had circled the corner and was moving down one of the alleys when he heard it. Gunfire.
It came from somewhere inside the building.
“Miranda?” he yelled.
He wasted no more time searching for unlocked entrances. He grabbed a trash can from the alley, carried it around to the front of the building and hurled it through the window. Glass shattered, flying like hail across the desks inside. He kicked in the last jagged fragments, scrambled over the sill and dropped onto a carpet littered with razorlike shards. At once he was running past the desks, moving straight for the back of the building. With every step he took he grew more terrified of what he might find. Images of Miranda raced through his head. He shoved through the first door and confronted the deserted print shop. Newspapers—the next issue—were bundled and stacked against the walls. No Miranda.
He turned, moved down the hall to the women’s lounge. Again, that surge of terror as he pushed through the door.
Again, no Miranda.
He turned and headed straight into the women’s rest room, pushing open stall doors. No one there.
Ditto for the men’s room.
Where the hell had that gunshot come from?
He ran back into the hall and started up the stairwell. Two more floors to search. Offices on the second floor, storage and news file rooms on the third. Somewhere up there he’d find her.
Just let me find you alive.
* * *
Miranda hugged the side of the transformer shed and listened for the sound of footsteps. Except for the hammering of her own heart she heard nothing, not even the softest crunch of shoes on asphalt. Where is she? Which way is she moving?
Quickly Miranda glanced to either side of her. Her eyes had began to adjust to the darkness. She could make out, to the left, a jumble of crates. Right beside them were the handrails of a fire escape. A way off the roof! If she could just make it to that edge, without being seen.
Where was Annie?
She had to risk a look. She crouched down and slowly inched toward the corner. What she saw made her pull back at once in panic.
Annie was moving straight toward the transformer shed.
Miranda’s instinct told her to run, to attempt a final dash for freedom. Logic told her she’d never make it. Annie was already too close.
In desperation she scrabbled for a few bits of gravel near her feet. She flung it high overhead, aiming blindly for the opposite end of the roof. She heard it clatter somewhere off in the darkness.
For a few terrifying seconds she listened for sounds—any sounds. Nothing.
Again she edged around the corner of the transformer. Annie was following the sound, toward the opposite edge of the roof, stalking slowly toward one of the chimneys. A few steps farther. One more...
Now was her chance—her only one! Miranda ran.
Her footsteps sounded like drumbeats across the asphalt roof. Even before she reached the fire escape she heard the first gunshot, heard the whine of the bullet as it hurtled past. No time to think, only move! She scrambled for the fire escape, swung her leg over onto the first metal rung.
Another gunshot exploded.
The bullet’s impact was like a punch in the shoulder. Its force sent her toppling sideways, over the roof’s edge. She caught a dizzying view of the night sky, then felt herself falling, falling. Instinctively she reach up, clawed blindly for a handhold. As she tumbled over the edge of the fire escape landing, her left hand closed around cold steel—the railing. Even as her legs slipped away, dangling beneath her like deadweights, her grip held. She tried to reach up with the other arm but it wouldn’t seem to obey her commands. She could only raise it to shoulder height, and then her hand closed only weakly around the outside edge of the landing. For a second she clung there, her feet hanging uselessly. Then she managed to brace one foot against the brick face of the building. Still alive, still here! she thought. If I can just pull myself over the rail—get back onto the landing...
The flicker of a shadow moving just above made her freeze. Slowly she lifted her gaze and stared into the gun barrel. Annie was standing at the roof’s edge, aiming directly at Miranda’s head.
“Now,” said Annie softly. “Let go of the fire escape.”
“No. No—”
“Just open your fingers. Lean back. A fast and easy way to die.”
“It won’t work. They’ll find out! They’ll know you did it!”
“Jump, Miranda. Jump.”
Miranda stared down at the ground. It was so far away, so very far.
Annie swung one leg over the roof’s edge, aimed her heel at Miranda’s hand gripping the rail and stamped down.
Miranda screamed. Still she held on.
Annie raised her heel, stamped again, then again, each blow crushing Miranda’s left hand.
The pain was unbearable. Miranda’s grip loosened. She lost her foothold, was left dangling free. Her left hand, throbbing in agony, could stand the abuse no longer. Her right hand, already weak and growing numb from the bullet wound, didn’t have the strength to hold her weight. She gazed up in despair as Annie raised her heel and prepared to stamp down one last time.
The blow never fell.
Instead, Annie’s body was jerked up and backward, like a puppet whose strings have been yanked all at once. She let out an unearthly screech of rage, of disbelief. And then there was a thud as her body, hurled aside, slammed onto t
he rooftop.
An instant later Chase appeared at the roof’s edge. He leaned over and grabbed her left wrist. “Take my other hand! Take it!” he yelled.
Bracing her feet against the brick wall, Miranda managed to raise her right arm. “I can’t...can’t reach you....”
“Come on, Miranda!” He leaned farther, his body stretching over the edge. “You have to do it! I need both your hands! Just reach up, that’s all! I’ll grab it, darling. Please!”
Darling. That single word, one she’d never heard before on his lips, seemed to spark some new source of strength deep inside her. She took a breath and strained toward the heavens. That’s as far as I can go, she thought in despair. No farther.
That’s when his hand closed around her wrist. At once she was held in a grip so tight she never feared, even for an instant, that she would fall. He dragged her up and up, over the roof’s edge.
Only then did her strength give out. She had no need of it now, not when Chase was here to lend her his. She tumbled into his arms.
No tree had ever felt so solid, so unbendable. Nothing, no one could hurt her in the fortress of those arms. He said, “My God, Miranda, I thought—”
Instantly he fell silent.
A pistol hammer clicked back.
They both spun around to see Annie standing a few feet away. She wobbled on unsteady legs. With both hands she clutched the gun.
“It’s too late, Annie,” said Chase. “The police know. They have your final letter. They know you killed Richard. Even now they’re looking for you. It’s over.”
Annie slowly lowered the gun. “I know,” she whispered. She took a deep breath and looked up at the sky. “I loved you,” she said to the heavens. “Damn you, Richard. I loved you!” she screamed.
Then she raised the gun, put the barrel in her mouth and calmly pulled the trigger.
Fifteen
This time the ministrations of cranky Dr. Steiner were insufficient. Only a hospital—and a surgeon—would do. An emergency ferry run was ordered and Miranda was loaded aboard the Jenny B with Dr. Steiner in attendance. The hospital in Bass Harbor was alerted to an incoming patient: gunshot wound to the right shoulder, patient conscious and oriented, blood pressure stable, bleeding under control. The Jenny B pulled away from the dock with two passengers, a crew of three and a corpse.