Brittany and Jessica gave Lizzy a hug and headed for Kitally’s car.
“We didn’t hang the mobile or the pictures,” Kitally explained, “because the walls are still wet and you should probably wait for Tommy. He said he would come by next week to help.” She gave Lizzy a hug, told her to take care of herself, and then made her way to the car.
Hayley stood at Lizzy’s side. “I really don’t like the idea of you living here in the boonies,” Hayley said, “without a gun to protect yourself.”
“I still have my gun. I just want to get used to keeping it locked up where it belongs. I can’t keep it in a drawer after this baby is born.”
“I get that. But you and I both know Bennett is going to find out where you live. When that happens, you need to be armed and ready.”
“He’ll be out of commission for a while longer,” Lizzy told her. “What about Owen Dunham and Donald Holmes?”
“What about them?”
“I haven’t been able to locate either one of them. What if they decide to seek revenge against you and Kitally?”
“It’s not going to happen.”
“How do you know?”
“I just know,” Hayley said. “Let it go, and stop worrying. It’s not good for the baby.”
Lizzy gazed out toward the pond. She refused to believe Hayley had stepped over the line. Instead, she thought about all the barbecues and parties they would have here on her property. She would get a kayak and have someone set up a horseshoe pit. It was easy to let her imagination get away from her because in her mind’s eye, they were all here, even Jared.
Two hours after the girls had left, Lizzy stepped back, screwdriver in her hand, and wiped her brow. She took a good long look at the baby’s room. They had painted the room a beautiful powder blue. On one of the walls, Hayley had painted a tree with two shades of green leaves and a bluebird singing on a branch. She was a talented young woman. The room was perfect.
Although Lizzy had promised them she would wait for Tommy to build the mobile that attached to the crib, she’d only managed to hold off for an hour. After they all left the house, Lizzy found the tools she needed, and finished the job herself.
She wasn’t an invalid—she was pregnant.
Setting up the mobile had taken fifteen minutes.
She set the screwdriver on the dresser. Her feet sank into plush carpet as she walked to the crib. Reaching inside, she brushed her fingertips over the cotton blanket. She wound up the mobile next. Smiled when the whimsical music began to play and the tiny knit animals went around and around.
Back at the dresser, she opened the top drawers, which were filled with nighties and soft cotton T-shirts. When she looked up, she caught a glimpse of her reflection in the mirror. She’d been eating good and taking better care of herself since she learned she was pregnant. Her face was filling out again. Her cheekbones were less prominent, and the haunted expression was finally disappearing. She laid the palms of her hands on her growing belly, felt her baby kick, not once, but twice. It was still hard for her to believe Jared’s baby was growing inside her.
She picked up the photo Jessica had snuck into the room as a surprise before they all left. She knew it was Jessica because she was the one who had run back into the house at the last minute, telling everyone she’d forgotten her cell phone. The picture was of Lizzy and Jared, taken a few years ago on an exceptionally beautiful day with nothing but blue skies in the background. They were holding hands, both smiling. Jessica had taken the picture without their knowledge.
A lump caught in her throat.
She was having their baby. A baby made in love. Their child would grow up hearing stories about his or her daddy. How brave his or her daddy was. How handsome, too.
“What a touching moment.”
Her head snapped up.
A sickening jolt of awareness lit up her insides. Wayne Bennett was standing in the doorway of the baby’s room. He wore a boot on his bad leg, but apparently he no longer needed crutches. He’d lost a considerable amount of weight. His face was a mess.
“You honestly thought you could do what you did and all would be forgiven? I thought you were smarter than that, Lizzy Gardner.”
She put the picture down, her fingers feeling around the top of the dresser for the screwdriver.
Where the hell is it?
She found it. With screwdriver in hand, she took a slow backward step toward the crib, her gaze never leaving the man in the doorway. “How did you find me?”
He tried to flash his trademark grin, but his upper lip was twisted because of a thick keloid scar that now ran across his face; his attempt to smile failed miserably. The scar ran diagonally across his face, starting at his lip and across his nose and one eye, ending at his hairline.
“I have my ways,” he said as he stepped closer. “And you must have known I never overlook unfinished business.”
“Was Miriam Walters unfinished business?”
“What do you think?”
“What did you do with her body?”
“The same thing I’m going to do with yours. Nobody will ever find you. Just think—you’ll be sparing your friends and family the price of an expensive coffin.” His eyes lit up. “And if there is an afterlife, you and Jared will be together again.” He looked at the crib beside her. “All three of you, in fact. How sweet it will be. I have a place ready for you—a nice, deep grave beneath rich, dark soil.”
He took another step toward her.
She jabbed the screwdriver in the shrinking space between them.
He chuckled. “Put that away. You’ll just hurt yourself.”
Another step toward her. He pulled a knife from his pocket and opened its short blade.
Pinned in the corner between the crib and the wall with a lousy screwdriver for a weapon, Lizzy had no illusions about her chances. Still, there was nothing for her to do but strike first. Just as he began to take his last closing step, Lizzy swept the tangled, glittering mobile hard into his face with one hand and drove the screwdriver into his arm with the other, ramming him with her shoulder as he bellowed and running past him before he could inflict any damage of his own.
The bellowing went silent as she raced for the front door. Whether the silence was good or bad she didn’t know, but she had her answer as she fought to free the door of its chain and felt a sharp, searing pain between her shoulder blades. His knife went deep. Her hands fell away from the chain and went flat against the door. An immense whoosh of breath left her as she felt him pull the knife from her flesh.
Bennett released a long satisfied sigh, like a lover might, and then she felt him begin to move again.
Her baby. She must save the baby. Dropping and wheeling, she pushed herself from the door and rolled to one side as he struck again. The blade struck hard, impaling the wood.
She found her feet and staggered away, her body already growing numb.
A weapon. She needed a weapon.
Gun and holster had been locked away. She’d made the mistake of thinking her life could be a simple one, but she’d been wrong. Evil never dies. Zachary Tucker’s words.
She could hear Bennett on her heels again.
As she passed the decorative cabinet in her living area, she grabbed the heavy iron statue—an elephant, its thick trunk reaching for the sky, a sign of good luck—and pivoted hard on her heels, swinging the elephant with every ounce of strength she could summon and making contact with Bennett’s left shoulder, lifting a grunt from him and sending him staggering back, an expression of surprise on his face.
The heavy cut glass vase came next, but that one he ducked.
She ran past the couch, down the hallway, and to her bedroom. She planned to lock the door, call 911—but Bennett’s reactions were faster than hers. He cut between a chair and the coffee table, dived for her, and stabbed her leg with his knife, bringing her to the ground with him.