Barclay ignored me. He glanced at his deputy. “You’ve seen what’s in the pool, right?”
Hallam spoke carefully. “Sheriff, it did not seem to me that Mr. Moore was likely to have been responsible for . . . what’s out there. He took me straight to it. He did not present as the perp.”
“That’s a judgment call, Deputy. And as such my department, thankfully. The evidence actually suggests that Mr. Moore spent a portion of the afternoon out there by the pool, doing what you’ve seen.”
“Don’t listen to him,” Emily told Hallam. “That’s not what happened. You know it. There’s nowhere near enough blood out there, for a start.”
“Rob, are you going to take that woman’s weapon, or what?”
Emily took another couple of paces back, lifting her arm to point the gun. “Don’t even try it.”
“Deputy, now.”
Hallam turned reluctantly toward Emily and unsnapped his holster. “Ma’am—you heard the sheriff. I’m going to need to have that weapon. Please.”
There was a quiet click as Emily did something to the gun, fumbling the action because of her injured hand. From the way Hallam stiffened, I assumed the sound meant something significant. Never having held a gun in my life, I couldn’t be sure.
Emily’s gaze was calm and steady. “Seriously, Deputy. Not another step or I’ll put a bullet in your boss. Everyone be very still.”
Hallam was caught halfway across the sitting room, hand on his holster, not knowing what to do. He looked at the sheriff. Barclay said nothing, did nothing. I saw Emily judging the angle and distance from where she stood to the front door. The cops blocked her path, Hallam in particular. There was no way she could make it to the outside world. At least not via that route.
She backed up a little farther. I did, too. To cover this, I acted as if I was trying to calm things down.
“Emily—just be cool. Let’s explain everything to the sheriff. He’s a cop. He can help us.”
“Are you kidding? He’s part of this,” she said. “He must be. You told me the police helped frame Hunter, right? He told you that.”
I couldn’t tell whether she’d realized what I was doing—but we kept moving backward anyway, slowly.
“That was twenty years ago. Doesn’t mean the sheriff’s still part of it. He’s a cop, for god’s sake.”
Hallam tried to regain some kind of control. “Sir, stay where you are.”
Emily spoke over him. “Bullshit. They were always going to need a pet cop, to smooth over anybody who got riled at their life being screwed around—and to bury any illegalities along the way. If you’re going to play those kinds of games, you have to own the board, the whole island. That includes its sheriff.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Barclay said. “But like Mr. Moore says—let’s talk this thing out. That’s the sensible route forward.”
“Screw you. Did you really leave your back door open, Bill? Or do you think maybe this guy has keys?”
She put a little bit of extra weight on the words back door. I thought about it, hard.
Could I have left the back door unlocked? If the answer was yes, we could maybe get through it fast enough to escape across the backyard and over into the neighbor’s. If the door wasn’t open, we’d be screwed, cornered in the kitchen with nowhere to go.
I took another step backward, glanced through the kitchen. The back door was shut, of course, or we would have noticed it before. The key was in place, in the lock under the handle. But was it locked? I tried to imagine how long it would take to run to the end of the kitchen. The lock was stiff. Steph had asked me to oil the thing more times than I could remember, but updating Facebook and plotting my rise in realty had taken precedence. Even if it wasn’t locked, would we really be able to get to it in time? How likely would Hallam be to shoot?
Emily kept needling. “I’ve got keys, after all—and this guy is being paid from the same source.”
Barclay said, “Deputy, are you going to disarm this woman or what?”
I moved to put myself in Hallam’s line of fire, between him and Emily. I saw her take the chance to steal a look sideways, try to gauge the probability of getting to the back door. I decided I’d take my cue from her. She’d be more likely to get the decision right.
Hallam finally pulled his gun out, but irresolutely. “Sheriff, I can’t get to her without—”
“Do they have an actual leash for you, Sheriff?” Emily asked. “A real one? Or is it just money? You got a bigger house than you should? Take longer vacations? Keep a hot young woman in an apartment up in Saint Pete?”
“I don’t think you’re in a position to judge me. Or anything else, from what I hear.”
Emily laughed jaggedly. “That didn’t sound like denial. I helped them play the game, sure. I didn’t agree to cover up a murder. But you did that once before, and now you’re about to do it again, right? You get an actual bonus for that? How much?”
“I won’t be covering up your crimes, no.”
“My crimes? Screw you.”
“I spoke this afternoon to a local actor by the name of Daniel Bauman.”
“Interesting. Is that why he’s not picking up the phone? ‘Spoke’ how hard to him, exactly? He another loose end that you’ve been hired to tidy up?”
“You’re a very paranoid young woman. Mr. Bauman is alive and well. He claims that you hired him to impersonate David Warner, and I believe him. I further believe this is evidence that you were involved in the latter’s death. And by extension, that of Hazel Wilkins.”
“What? You’re dreaming, asshole. You know I had nothing to do with those.”
Emily’s voice was too tight, too low. She needed to be focused on getting out, not getting pulled into a toe-to-toe with Barclay.
Two more baby steps had got me to the point where I could dodge right and take my chances with the back door. She’d be in the way of any fire, would operate as a shield for me. But I couldn’t do that.
“I don’t know that at all,” Barclay said. His voice rolled on and on like an unstoppable tide of unreason. “I do know you were involved in violations of prisoners’ rights while you were stationed in—”
“No!” Emily shouted. “Whoever told you that, they lied. I stole, yes. I whacked a guy who deserved it—he was a rapist and an asshole. But I did none of that other shit. They put that on me to get me out.”
“Emily,” I said desperately. “Ignore him.”
The sheriff had shoved his hand right into her emotional guts and grabbed her, however, and Emily abruptly started to walk back into the living room. The gun was pointing straight at Barclay’s head, but it was wavering. “Fucks like you,” she snarled. “It’s fucks like you that have ruined my entire fucking life.”
“Emily,” I shouted. She wasn’t listening.
Hallam finally assumed the shooter’s position. “Ma’am, step back. Right now.”
She kept walking.
“Ma’am, do not advance any farther.”
I moved quickly, threw my arm in front of her, trying to stop her. She was stronger than me, though, and hard to hold back. Her entire body was shaking. Her eyes were drawing down on Barclay like he was everyone who’d ever done her wrong. She kept her left arm rigid over my shoulder, the gun still pointing at the sheriff’s head.
“Emily,” I said, low, a whisper. “Listen to me. Please. Don’t do this.”