“And you don’t think that was hypocritical of your mother, considering she fathered a child to another man and passed you off as Maxwell’s?”
“I do now. Back then, I didn’t know that. He didn’t know until she told him in a moment of spite when I was a kid. He still raised me as his. He did love me. Eloise said my mother made the excuse that she got pregnant to someone else because he hadn’t been able to impregnate her. Said she was convinced he couldn’t father a child. So when Clear gave birth to a girl with his eyes, it threw my mother’s claim out the window. Not that her claim in any way excused what she’d done anyway. If he’d loved my mother, maybe he’d have cared about her lies, but their marriage was a sham.”
“It’s not Kensey’s fault that she’s his biological child when you’re not,” said Blake, seeing straight to the heart of Joshua’s problem. “That’s one of the main reasons why you still hate her so much, isn’t it? Not because your parents’ relationship went to shit. No, it’s because she was his. Hearing you’re the ‘end result’ of an affair makes you feel dirty, doesn’t it? Worse, it makes you feel like her. Well I’m telling you now, Joshua, your fucking stunts end now.” Blake stabbed his finger at the desk to accentuate his point.
“Why do you think I’m investigating the vandalisms on my own time? I know I owe her. I won’t lie and say I’ll ever apologize to her—it wouldn’t mean anything to her even if I did—but I will back off.”
“I fucking know you will, Joshua. Because I won’t have it any other way.” Blake leaned forward. “Now, why don’t you tell me why you believe Maxwell wanted to be in her life?”
“He got real talkative when he was drunk. One time, he got to talking about Clear Lyons. Said that when he’d first heard she’d married Bale, Maxwell felt he was to blame. See, he’d known she was naïve and desperate to be loved, and he’d used that to play her. But when she married Bale—the most insane, fucked-up thing a person could ever do—he felt like he must have broken her. He knew what kind of life Kensey would have because of Clear’s marriage to Bale, and he hated it. If he weren’t so easily cowed by Eloise, he would have tried to get custody of Kensey.”
I sank into my chair. He had to be lying, right?
“When my uncle put Ricky’s name to the boy who’d turned up at her school, Maxwell went to his house and paid Ricky’s mother to have him seen by a doctor. He promised her an annual sum if she could keep her son away from Kensey, which she did. I thought it possible that she was no longer so successful.”
“And?” prodded Blake.
“She said she hasn’t seen Ricky since he lost his job a few months back. She begged me to find him; said he’d stopped taking his pills and she was scared about what he might do.”
“What he might do?” Blake echoed.
“She didn’t elaborate on what she meant by that. I asked if I could look at his room to see if there were any clues as to where he might have gone. There weren’t. But I can tell you that his obsession with Michael Bale hasn’t faded. He had scrapbooks full of news clippings, articles he’d printed from the internet, and drawings he’d done of Bale. It wasn’t something he’d done before going on his meds; the last article was dated four months ago.”
Fuck, that wasn’t good at all.
“Was there anything about Kensey in those scrapbooks?” asked Blake.
“Only passing comments within the clippings and articles about Bale’s life. But …”
Blake’s shoulders stiffened. “What?”
“I found letters.”
“Letters?”
“Three. They were signed, ‘Your Friend.’”
“What did these letters say?”
“The first one was all about how great they think Michael Bale is. They believe Ricky is truly Bale’s son and ‘heir’ to his ‘legacy.’” Joshua snickered with disgust. “They told Ricky that the meds he was taking were making him see a distorted reality. This person was basically encouraging him to cease taking the pills so he could ‘claim his heritage.’”
“Did this ‘Friend’ mention Kensey?”
“Not until the second letter. They said it wasn’t fair to Ricky that she had all of Bale’s attention. But they also said that she wasn’t a bad person, just didn’t appreciate or understand Bale the way Ricky did. ‘Friend’ also said they would ‘take care’ of her; Ricky should just concentrate on himself.”
Goosebumps rose on my arms as a chill blew through me. What the fuck?
“And the third letter?” Blake pushed.
“It seemed as if Ricky had argued that Kensey was a good person in his response to the previous letter, because ‘Friend’ was assuring him that she wouldn’t be a problem. Said they knew all her secrets, her hopes, her fears. Said she didn’t want Bale for a stepfather and would gladly step aside to make way for Ricky, the true heir, to come forward. ‘Friend’ added that they’d share her secrets with Ricky when the two finally met in person.”
Cursing under my breath, I rubbed at my nape. If what Joshua said was true, I was potentially dealing with two sick motherfuckers.
“I’m assuming you have those letters,” said Blake.
“I intend to have them dusted for prints.”
Blake held out his hand. “I’d like to see them.”
“You doubt me?”
“Do I have a reason to believe you without question?”
Sighing, Joshua pulled them out of his coat pocket. “You can’t take them out of the evidence bags.”
Blake read each of them through the plastic, one by one, and then slid them across the desk. “There’s no return address. How did Ricky know where to send his own letters?”
“My best guess is that ‘Friend’ included his address on a separate slip of paper or something.”
“If you find prints, I want to know about it.”
Tucking the letters back in his pocket, Joshua rose. “I’ll contact you if there’s anything to pass on.”
Standing, Blake followed him to the door. “Oh, one more thing.” The moment Joshua turned, Blake slammed his fist into his jaw. Joshua staggered backwards with a grunt of pain and then cursed under his breath. “That’s for grabbing my woman by the throat and trying to shove her against a wall,” said Blake. “If it weren’t for how cooperative you’re being, that would have been a fuck of a lot worse.”
Rubbing his jaw, Joshua gave a curt nod and then left.
I turned off the camera feed on Blake’s phone and waited in silence for him to come for me. I didn’t have to wait more than a minute. He gestured at Greg to leave the room. Casting me a brief, sympathetic smile, Greg walked out and left us alone.
I looked up at Blake and said, “Well, that was … Fuck.” I weakly flapped my arms, at a loss for what to say. What to think.
Blake squatted in front of me. “It sounds to me as if someone is using Ricky. Why, I don’t know.”
“How would they know if I was a bad person or not? How would they know my fears and hopes and secrets?”
“Either it’s someone who knows you or someone who thinks they know you because they’ve studied you. Either way, I’m thinking you’ve had two people messing with you all this time.”
“But the person who called me that night in the basement admitted to everything.”
“Everything? Think back. From what I remember, you said the caller admitted that he was in your apartment and videoed you in the shower. He even referred to the pictures you received of me. Did he mention the story?”
I shoved a hand through my hair. “No, I mentioned the story, but he never responded.”
“And he said he didn’t want you dead, right? But you think that Smith, the author of that story, does.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You’re thinking one of them wrote the story and the other did the rest?”
“Most of the rest, yes.” He rubbed my thighs. “When your old apartment and car was trashed, I figured Smith was lashing out because he couldn’t reach you, but I was surprised by the am
ount of damage. Until then, he’d been very controlled. Careful. Operated under the radar of the authorities. If Ricky’s off his meds, the one thing he won’t be is controlled. I think he did all that damage. I think he’s Smith and he wrote the story not just to scare you, but because he’s spent a long time fantasizing about your death. And I wouldn’t be shocked to find out that he was also the guy who held you at knifepoint but just didn’t have the balls to follow through with what he wanted to do.”
I took a shaky breath. “Okay, let’s say you’re right and someone manipulated him into coming after me. Why would they do that if they don’t want me dead?”
“I don’t think they wanted Ricky to come after you. I think he’s serving some other purpose to them. I read the letters he wrote to Ricky. He was adamant that no harm needed to come to you; that you were no obstacle for Ricky.”
“Yeah, but ‘Friend’ also said he’d ‘take care’ of me.”
“Maybe he meant it literally. Think about it, baby. Think of the things he’s done—watching you, warning you away from me, wanting you to know he can get close to you. Maybe, in his own twisted way, he thinks he’s looking after you. Maybe he sees himself as some sort of protector. I don’t know why he’d involve Ricky, since it doesn’t strike me that he’d be at all useful. It could be that he just wanted to use Ricky as a scapegoat. But it could be that something bigger is going on and we just can’t see what it is yet.”
With a groan, I let my head flop forward. “I’m so tired of going backwards and forwards in my head, trying to figure out what’s going on.”
Gripping my chin between his thumb and forefinger, Blake lifted my face to his. “Why didn’t you tell me that Joshua once grabbed you?”
“I forgot all about it, to be honest. He’s not someone I like to think about. I don’t think about anyone in his family, if I can help it.”
Blake pursed his lips. “You thought Maxwell refused to acknowledge you as his kid just to be cruel. But if he hadn’t believed he could father a child, he might well have been convinced that you weren’t his until after you were born. We can’t know for sure that it’s true, but I don’t see why Joshua would lie about it.”
“Doesn’t matter now, does it? Maxwell’s dead.” And I really didn’t want to think on any of it right then.
No doubt sensing that, since he read me so well, Blake gave my neck a gentle, supportive squeeze and then pulled me to my feet. “There’s something you need to consider. Just because Joshua found those letters doesn’t mean he didn’t write them.”
“If it was him who wrote them, surely he wouldn’t have showed them to you.”
“He knows I consider him a suspect. Maybe he thought that showing me the letters he’d allegedly found would make me think the blame lay with someone else. He could have gone to Ricky’s house to get them, covering his ass.” At my frown, Blake added, “He said Eloise told him the truth on her deathbed a year ago. What has Joshua always done to you without fail?”
“Took out his anger on me.”
Blake nodded. “Who wouldn’t be angry to hear they’d been lied to all their life? To hear that their father wasn’t their real father? He’s always blamed you and your mother for everything that went wrong in his parents’ relationship. Then he finds out from Eloise that those problems had already been there—Clear had simply got caught up in their mess; she was a victim. And you, the person he’s looked down on and despised all his life, actually has more of a claim to his father than he does.”
“Biologically, maybe. But Maxwell was never my father.”
“He wanted to be.”
“He didn’t want it bad enough, though, did he?” If he had, he’d have told his mother and wife to go fuck themselves. Okay, sure, it probably wasn’t that simple, but I didn’t feel in the mood to be understanding.
Blake brushed my hair away from my face. “Some people just aren’t strong, baby. They cower to people like Eloise partly because they’re cowards and partly because it’s actually comfortable to have someone else make their decisions for them; they’re too weak and co-dependent to stand up and be counted or run their own lives. They need the approval and praise of others and seek out people like your mother, who are easy to manipulate into worshipping them.”
Well, Maxwell had certainly succeeded with Clear. She’d once thought he was her soul mate, if there was such a thing. “Like I said, it doesn’t matter now. He’s dead.” I slipped my arms around Blake’s waist. “I don’t know whether to tell Clear. It would matter to her, but it would also shake everything she believes. It’s never a good thing when her world is rocked.”
Blake pursed his lips. “Hearing this wouldn’t help her. She’d be angry at Maxwell and Eloise, and she’d want closure. But they’re dead, so she’d have to live without it. Take some time to think about it. If you decide you need to tell her, maybe you could do it at a later date, when she isn’t preoccupied with worry for you.”
I nodded. This definitely wasn’t something she’d be able to deal with right now. I wasn’t doing too well with it myself. I rested my forehead on Blake’s chest and closed my eyes. My thoughts were swirling, and I honestly felt like my head might explode.
“Stop it.”
My brow pinched. “Stop what?”
“You think I don’t know what’s going through your head right now? You think I don’t know that you can’t help but compare the actions of Maxwell to the actions of Bale?”
God, I hated that he read me so damn well.
“You had a father who was too weak to fight to be in your life. Your mother’s husband, on the other hand, has been there for you in whatever ways he could. Under normal circumstances, that would be something you could treasure; it would make up for what you missed with Maxwell, and you’d happily think of your stepfather as your real father. But it’s not normal circumstances. The man who considers himself your father and claims to love you is sitting on death row, and thinking of him as your real dad would bring you nothing but guilt.”
I squeezed my eyes tightly shut. “I loved him so much when I was a kid.” My voice cracked.
“Of course you did. I’ll bet he gave you every reason to love him. I’m guessing all his letters made you feel adored and special. I think you are special to him in whatever way a person can be special to someone like him. You can’t feel guilty for once loving him without question—what reason did you have to believe that you couldn’t?”
I swallowed hard. “When I was seven, the kids in the playground—Libby Williams was one of them—told me that they’d heard their parents saying he’d killed lots of women. I told Michael about it. He didn’t confirm or deny it, just said I’d hear lots of things about him and that not all of it would be true. It bugged him more that they’d also said I wasn’t his biological daughter. He told me that, no matter what I heard, I should never forget that he was my dad and that he loved me.”
Lifting my head, I met Blake’s eyes as I continued. “Clear said the kids lied. And because he hadn’t admitted to killing women and he’d said that I’d hear lies about him, I chose to believe that what the kids told me was untrue; that it was one of many lies I’d hear.”
Blake’s hands gently framed my face. “You were a child, Kensey. No child would find it simple to reconcile a dad who was so loving toward them with a person who’d murdered women. You believed what made more sense to you and, yes, what you wanted to believe. If we were talking about another child, would you blame them for that?”
“No,” I admitted quietly.
“But the guilt is still there, and you feel like there has to be something wrong with you if you could ever have loved him; the fact that he claims to love you only reinforces that belief. But there isn’t a damn thing wrong with you. I believed Liza loved me. I didn’t love her back, but I cared for the person she pretended to be. Does that mean there’s something wrong with me?”
I scowled. “No. She manipulated you and showed you what she thought would make you care f
or her.”
“Sound familiar?”
I gave him a withering look. “Shut up.”
“Because I’m making a valid point?”
“Yes.”
He kissed me gently. “There’s nothing wrong with you. Say it.”
“Only if you’ll say it too.” But his eyes dulled. I smiled weakly. “Not as simple as it sounds, is it?”
“No. But the difference between you and me is that I’m fucked up.”
I snorted. “You think I’m not messed up in my own special way? Don’t tell me the compulsive cleaning has escaped your attention, or that I often badly need to disappear into a fictional world and escape my own for just a while.”
“You channel your negative emotions into productive things. I always did the opposite.”
“That’s not true. Look at where you are today. Look at how successful you are and how much social and personal power you have. Climbing into rings and cages was just one way you channeled the anger and guilt. It wasn’t the only way you did it.”
Tightening his hold on me, Blake kissed me again. “I didn’t think of it that way.”
“Well, you should have done. I thought you were smart.”
His mouth curved. “I’m smarter than you.”
I gaped. “Hey!”
“You tried to fight the inevitable. Who does that?” He sucked my bottom lip. “You were always meant to be mine, Kensey. Never wanted anything or anyone as much as I want you. Knew the first time I had you that I’d have a big fucking problem giving you up. No, I’d known before that, it just hadn’t hit me until then. I’ll bet you took your sweet time working it out, didn’t you?”
“To be fair, you gave nothing away. I could never tell what you were thinking.”
“I can tell you right now what I was thinking, if you want.” His smile turned wicked. “But you should know in advance that a lot of it was X-rated.”
“In that case, do tell.”
Blake’s finger traced the outline of my mouth as I knelt in front of him, dressed in only the shirt he’d ordered me to unbutton, sucking his cock so hard my cheeks hollowed.