Cecilia had stood alone and defeated Gregory’s ghost and the terror that tainted her days and nights.
Cecilia had become the person her cousin, Kellen, had wanted her to be. At long last, she was worthy of the sacrifice Kellen had made.
She looked around. The world was flat here, a great plain of prairie dotted with farmhouses surrounded by mountains and covered by a grand, wide sky. A breeze whipped up and brought a crackling sound and the scent of something burning. That brought her to her feet. Behind her, the plane’s wheel was buried in a roadside ditch, the plane’s wing pointed toward the vanishing northern stars…and smoke curled from the engine.
A quarter mile away, a man stood on the porch of a farmhouse, filming the scene with his phone. She walked toward him, staggering from pain and shock. When she got close, she looked up at him—he was still filming—and she asked, “Where are we?”
“Montana.”
“Can you call 911? Because there’s a pilot on that plane and the plane’s about to explode.”
* * *
She spent one day in a small Montana hospital while they stabilized her, gave her oxygen and ascertained the hairline fractures in her sternum would heal with much pain, but no lasting effects. She was transferred to a moderately sized Montana hospital with a skilled orthopedic surgeon, who operated on her shattered finger. Her cast reached to her elbow, her fingertips were the only things showing and they were bruised and swollen, and learning to do anything with her left hand made every waking moment a challenge and sometimes a humiliation.
While she was recovering, she heard from everyone—Annie and Leo, who reported the resort had survived, Mr. Gilfilen, who reported he had survived, Birdie, who reported she had survived and that Mr. Lennex was a very nice man. Sheri Jean, who was aggravated that not only was Mara a villain, but her absence left a gap in the guest services lineup and how was Sheri Jean supposed to deal with that? Temo, whose sister was settling in nicely, and Adrian, who assured Kellen that the son of a bitch who had wanted to sell Regina had been shown a cliff that plunged into the ocean but had been allowed to limp away.
Nils Brooks did not call, but he did message to let her know Mara Philippi, aka the Librarian, was in federal custody without incident.
Max sent flowers but no word. After that kiss…well, she didn’t know what she wanted from him. She only knew they would have to talk and decisions would have to be made. Yes, she’d loved him once, but she’d made a new life apart from Max. Things had happened to her. No doubt things had happened to him. Could they find a neutral meeting ground? Did they even want to?
* * *
Now, two weeks later, the plane landed on the Yearning Sands airstrip and skidded toward the ocean. Just like the first time, it stopped short. The pilot lowered the stairs and Kellen limped her way out into a rare sunny day. The cold wind took her breath away, and clouds ripped across the sky, tearing like tissue paper.
A town car waited; Kellen slid inside the front passenger seat and smiled at the chauffeur. Wrapping her arms around Birdie’s neck, she hugged cautiously and was cautiously hugged in return. “They sent you.”
“I volunteered.”
Kellen teared up. Mitch had betrayed them. Mara had proved to be a killer. Birdie… Birdie was tried-and-true. “How do you feel?” Kellen asked.
“Pretty good.” She turned to show Kellen a face still disfigured with bruises and stitches and a droop that was possibly nerve damage. “I’m disillusioned about Mitch, but life can do that.”
“Tell me about it.” The week in the Montana hospital had returned Kellen to the most fragile of health, but Kellen didn’t care—she was alive. They were alive.
Birdie put the car in gear and started toward the resort.
Kellen turned on the seat heater, struggled out of her winter coat and settled back to watch the road as it wound through groves and over hills toward the resort. “I heard from Nils.”
“Which is more than we have,” Birdie said in exasperation. “When the government took Mara away, he disappeared in a hurry.”
“He’s got a job. An important job.” All Kellen’s doubts had been set at rest. Nils Brooks really was MFAA. “He said she’s in custody.”
Birdie hesitated. “I hope so. I hope she doesn’t escape. I don’t know why I think she can, but I do, and I’m more afraid of her than I ever was of anyone in Afghanistan.”
Kellen put her hand on Birdie’s shoulder. “I know. I used to think that gleam in her eyes was competitiveness. Now I think it’s ego and rabid lunacy.”
“Did you hear when the Feds went into her cottage to search for evidence, her bedroom closet was locked, and when they got it open, it was full of books?” Birdie glanced at Kellen. “I mean—books. First editions, autographed editions and part of a genuine Gutenberg Bible. The stash is worth millions.”
“She was illiterate and locked her books in a closet? Isn’t that symbolic?”
“And—” Birdie looked vaguely ill.
“What else?”
“Hands. Mummified.”
“Birdie.” Kellen pressed her back against the seat as if trying to get away from the vision. “That’s…”
“Yeah. It is.” Birdie took a breath. “There’s speculation she used a dehydrator.”
Kellen leaped to a horrifying conclusion. “Not a dehydrator in our kitchens!”
“No! At least, the chefs said no, but they’re buying new ones.”
“Ugh.” Kellen could only imagine the chefs tossing the resort’s commercial-sized dehydrators out the windows. “Mara is all things twisted and warped. Does anybody know who she really is?”
“You mean her background? No. She just appeared out of nowhere.”
Like me. Kellen shrugged the thought away. “She corrupted Mitch. I swear he was our man until she got her claws in him.”
The car swerved as Birdie half turned toward Kellen. “You can’t blame her for Mitch!”
“I guess not. I just feel less stupid about trusting him if I have her to blame.”
“He tried to kill us. He almost succeeded. For money and maybe for sex with her? I feel for his family, but he hurt me and he hurt you. He was responsible for his actions, and I don’t mourn him.” Birdie was angry, vehement.
“Okay. You don’t have to.” As badly as Birdie had been injured, Kellen didn’t blame her a bit.
Birdie asked, “Guess what else? Guess what washed in on the beach the day after they took Mara away?”
“If you tell me more artifacts, I’ll tell you I don’t give a damn.”
Birdie grinned and shook her head. “Guess again.”
“My God.” This time Kellen knew she had guessed right. “Priscilla’s body?”
“In the plastic container,” Birdie affirmed. “She didn’t have any family, so she’s buried in the Cape Charade cemetery. Annie and Leo paid for the gravestone. We all chipped in for some nice flowers. She deserved that.”
“What about her ring?”
“We put that in the coffin with her.”
“Good. Good. I hope she knows the good she did by stashing that ring in her shoe. I’m glad she’s at rest, and I hope she’s at peace.”
“Amen,” Birdie said.
They fell silent. The miles rolled past. Kellen kept stumbling on the memories she had recovered along the way. Nils was gone from the resort. Maybe Max was gone, too? But she didn’t want to ask—it revealed more than she wanted, so instead she said, “Are Annie and Leo back?”
“Got here last week.” Birdie was a little too terse.
“They’re upset?”
“What do you think? It’s Annie’s resort. She feels like she left it to be destroyed.” Birdie glanced at Kellen. “You saved it.”
“You saved it, too.”
“Leo says I have a job for the rest of my life. I’d be more flatt
ered if I thought they could ever find someone to take my place.”
Kellen chuckled. “You’re irreplaceable. But should you be back on the job? You look tired and as if you’re in pain.”
“Other than driving you to the resort, I’m not doing much. As soon as all the kinks have been worked out, I’m going on vacation someplace warm.”
“I thought we were going on vacation together.” Then, “What kinks?”
Birdie drove carefully around the curves. “Things are changing at the resort, you know. Mr. Gilfilen’s injuries have left him with limited mobility, so he can’t manage security anymore. A replacement must be found.”
Kellen had already thought of this. “I’ll do it. I’d rather be in charge of security than be broadsided by another management crisis involving a missing shipment of nail polish with a name like Orgasm.”
Birdie made a doubtful sound. “When all is said and done, I don’t know that you as the head of security is such a good idea.”
Kellen’s attention swerved toward Birdie. “When what’s said and done?”
Something was out of whack in this conversation. Birdie kept glancing at Kellen, smiling and frowning, then smiling again, and every once in a while, she shook her head.
It must have to do with Max. Taking the bull by the horns, Kellen asked, “Where’s Max? Is he still here? Is he going to take over security?”
“Max is at the resort. No, I don’t think he’s considered a permanent position at Yearning Sands.”
“Oh. Well, that would be too much to…” Kellen caught her first glimpse of Yearning Sands, of the stone castle-like edifice that grew out of the sand and scrub, that faced storms and murders, that had accepted the passage of time with such grace. Home. Kellen’s friends were here, and here she felt at home.
She was glad to be home.
“I knew Max before.” Saying the words made Kellen feel light-headed.
“I know,” Birdie said.
“He…told you?”
“It was a surprise.”
“Does everybody know?”
“Pretty much. Kind of.” Birdie verbally squirmed. “Yes. But he didn’t blab anything! Things just…got around.”
Kellen’s return got more complicated all the time. “When I knew Max before,” she said again, “he lived on the East Coast. I did a little more research on him—” very little, looking him up online made her feel like a Peeping Tom “—and now he lives in Oregon full-time.”
“That’s not too far. That’ll make things easier.”
That was odd. “What things?”
Birdie tried to say something. Tried again.
“What’s happening?” Kellen persisted.
In a voice vibrant with worry and encouragement, Birdie said, “Sweetheart. Your life is about to change.”
47
Nothing about this was making sense. “Birdie, you’re scaring me.”
“Don’t be scared. Be excited.” Birdie pulled the town car under the portico.
Russell opened the front door, and Carson Lennex and Max stepped out, Carson in slacks and a sweater, Max in his trademark dark suit and blue tie.
Carson walked around the front of the car, opened the door for Birdie and helped her out.
Even in his sixties, even with bruising and burns, he was straight and tall and movie-star handsome.
Birdie was not yet thirty, dark-skinned, bony, with bandages on four knuckles and swelling that unevenly reshaped her face.
Yet as they stood together, they smiled at each other, and they looked so sweet.
Max stood, legs braced, hand crossed behind his back, waiting outside the hotel door. He looked good. Strong. Stable. Stern. He came to the car, opened the passenger door, offered his hand.
She looked at his hand and flashed back to that moment on his porch in Pennsylvania. The shape of the palm, broad and square, the length of the fingers, long and blunt, the nimble thumb, the sweeping lines, the scar under the index finger. She put her hand in his and used his support to climb out. “Hi there.” Wow. Eloquent.
He looked into her face without smiling and without speaking.
She had wondered, with a rapidly beating heart, whether he’d take one look at her and sweep her off her feet in a massive reaffirmation of their passion.
She guessed not.
Really. Not.
She looked past him into the lobby.
People were standing around. Front desk staff, mostly, as they should be, but…why were the spa employees there? Why were the chefs lingering close? Temo and his sister and Adrian lurked by the concierge desk, too.
“What’s going on?” Kellen looked right at Max. “What’s wrong?”
Like Birdie, he tried to speak, then sighed. “Nothing’s wrong. But…let’s go in and up to Annie’s office.”
A brief moment of alarm made her ask, “Is it Annie? Did she…?”
“She’s fine, I swear.”
Russell rushed to hold the door for them.
What kind of surprise did the resort hold for her? Not a party welcoming her home, that was for sure. Because no matter what Birdie or Max said, some momentous thing had occurred, and it wasn’t a laughing matter.
Max put his hand at the small of her back and guided her inside.
She was pleased to see she was a little wrong about the party. A giant gold banner read “Welcome back, Kellen!”
But this wasn’t a cheering throng, not by any means. Sheri Jean, Frances, Destiny, Xander, Daisy, Ellen, the housekeepers, the guests: when they met her eyes, they smiled, but they watched her in silence. The atmosphere was claustrophobic with interest. Yes, they definitely knew about her and Max.
Kellen and Max climbed the stairs to Annie’s office. She glanced back at him; he kept taking a breath like he wanted to say something, then letting it out. And if he was happy to see her, he hid it well.
In the office, Annie and Leo waited in the seating area beside the fireplace; they were holding hands and looking anxious. Hammett rested beside them, his head on his paws, watching the scene with as much interest as the people below. “You’re looking one thousand percent better,” Annie called. “Welcome back!”
At last somebody had said it. “Thank you!”
An older woman, handsome and imperious, sat beside Annie in an easy chair, and a little girl, about six or seven, leaned against the arm. As Kellen walked in, the girl stared and smiled a smile that showed two missing front teeth. The child started hopping, first one foot, then the other. It was all too obvious she wanted to run toward them, but the older lady kept her tethered with a hand on her wrist.
Max sighed as he viewed the little gathering. “Could Kellen and I have a few moments alone with Rae? Mama? Annie and Leo?”
“Leo and I wanted Kellen to know she had support from us.” Annie turned her wheelchair and started for the door. “And we do support you, dear, no matter what you decide.”
The woman Max called mama stood, also. “She does not need support, Annie. No one here is against her.”
Kellen felt like the elephant in the room. But she was so sure she recognized the little girl, she couldn’t speak.
Had the child been a guest at the resort?
No, Kellen didn’t have a profile in her brain.
Leo and Hammett followed Annie, and Leo in a low, masculine conspiratorial voice said to Max, “It was her idea.”
Max nodded.
His mother leaned down and spoke to the little girl. To Rae.
Rae stopped hopping and stood very still, arms stiff at her sides, but she beamed at Kellen and Kellen had to smile back.
Max’s mother walked toward him but asked repressively, “Are you sure, Maximilian?”
“We need time to get matters cleared up,” Max said.
What things? Kellen wanted to ask
. What did they need to clear up? Who was the child?
Max pushed his relatives out of the room and shut the door behind them.
The profile Kellen was attempting to produce kept getting scrambled by that smile, that excitement, that blond hair, those dimples. “Who is she?” she asked Max.
“You don’t know?” His voice sounded as if it was coming up from a deep well.
“I swear I’ve never seen her before.” Kellen chuckled. “Except, well…she’s the spitting image of my cousin at that age.”
“Yes,” he said, which was a very odd answer.
“Funny that her name is Rae. That was my cousin’s middle name. What a coincidence that that little girl—” Kellen’s mind, her heart, her words, all stammered to a halt, yet her steps irrepressibly carried her toward the child. She couldn’t stop herself. She was on a collision course with fate, and with the year she couldn’t remember.
Max kept pace with Kellen and said quietly, “When you were shot, you were pregnant.”
The child couldn’t stand it any longer. She ran at Kellen full tilt, wrapped her arms around her hips and looked up at her. “Did you know that you’re my mama?”
I have three confessions:
I’ve got the scar of a gunshot on my forehead.
I don’t remember an entire year of my life. I still don’t remember, but I know what happened now. I had a baby, and that changes everything.
My name is Kellen Adams…and that’s half a lie.
* * * * *
Can’t get enough Kellen Adams?
Don’t miss the next book in Christina Dodd’s
pulse-pounding CAPE CHARADE series,
WHAT DOESN’T KILL ME,
coming soon from HQN Books.
Acknowledgments
The journey to create and write Dead Girl Running and the Cape Charade series has been by turns complex and challenging, funny and romantic, intricate and interesting. I couldn’t have done it without the advice and support of the publishing professionals at HQN.