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“Are you sure that you’re all right?”
The man’s voice went through my head like a serrated knife. I managed to lift my eyelids, which felt like they weighed about a hundred pounds. The bright light from the chandelier above shone directly onto my face, causing me to blink and refocus several times. After a minute, I realized that I was lying on my back in the Hilton foyer. My headache was ten times worse than any hangover I’d ever experienced in my life.
“Yes, yes.” Pam assured the man, but she remained out of my line of vision. “The blow from that stupid twit only grazed my head. Thank heavens you showed up when you did, or it could have been a lot worse.”
The voices drifted in from the kitchen. In a panic, I tried to lift myself from the floor but felt as weak as a newborn baby. I fell backwards, striking my head on the hardwood floor. My hands were tied together in front of me with several pieces of cloth. The cloth rubbed against the brace on my wrist, making the pain excruciating.
“You should have saved yourself the trouble and just put a bullet through her head,” the man said furiously.
His cold and indifferent tone turned my blood to icicles. My entire face still stung from the punch, and I guessed this man had been my assailant. And most likely, Kevin’s killer.
“I know,” Pam sighed heavily. “Remember, she was once my dearest friend, and probably my only one in college. It’s such a shame. She has four children that need her, but that can’t be helped. Will you do it, dear? You know that I can’t kill anyone.”
Holy Toledo. I knew that Pam hadn’t killed her husband, but that didn’t make me feel any better about the current situation. She’d obviously be an accessory to his murder.
In desperation, I started to roll my body in the direction of the front door while trying to ignore the throbbing pain in my head. I managed one complete roll before footsteps sounded and became heavier with each motion. A loud burst of laughter splintered through my ears.
“Well, Cindy,” Pam giggled, “you still have spunk. That’s one thing that I’ve always admired about you.”
Pam’s companion placed his shoe on my chest to stop me from moving. The sudden weight made it difficult for me to breathe. “Please,” I said in a strangled voice. “Don’t do this.”
The dark, cold eyes of Max Hilton stared down at me dispassionately while I began to gasp for air. With a sadistic smile, he removed his foot. “You should have left it alone, Mrs. York. Sounds like you’re always in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“You killed your father,” I said in between fits of coughing. “Why were you going to let your mother take the blame for it?”
Max scowled and ran a hand through his hair in frustration. “Do you really think I would do that to my mother? She’s the only parent who ever cared about me.”
I turned my head and locked eyes with Pam. She was holding a blue icepack against her head. When she readjusted it, I noticed part of the deep bloody gash that the vase had caused. She’d probably need stiches. Good. I wished I’d knocked her out permanently.
“Max is a good son, Cindy.” She stared at her eldest child with pride. “He had my best interest at heart. And no, he didn’t want me to take the blame. I chose to take it.”
The final piece of the puzzle fell into place. I thought back to the first day Jacques and I had come to see the house, and Pam had commented on the view of the pool from her bedroom balcony. “You saw him kill Kevin, didn’t you?”
“He didn’t mean it,” Pam said in desperation. “It was an accident.”
Max smiled fondly at her. “My mother wants to protect me, Mrs. York. She saw what happened, and she knows that it was no accident. I wanted my father dead, He deserved it.”
“He’s lying,” Pam sobbed. “Max, tell her the truth.”
Max swore under his breath. “Mom, what do you care what she thinks? She’s going to be dead in a few minutes anyway.”
“For goodness sake,” Pam sputtered. “You got in a fight with your father, and he fell into the pool. You didn’t mean for it to happen. Tell her, Max!”
“All right, Mom. If that’s what you want to believe.” Max rubbed the barrel of the gun under his chin. “My class let out early that afternoon, so I stopped home before going to Tammy’s. She was playing in a charity golf tournament the next day and asked if she could borrow mom’s clubs. I knew she kept them in the trunk of her car. Dad was in the backyard and yelled for me to come inside the fence. He was ticked off that mom had sent Denise home early and wanted me to play butler for the evening. I told him what he could do with his stupid party, and he slapped me across the face.”
“Max.” Pam put the icepack down and wrung her hands together in desperation.
He ignored her plea. “If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s being slapped in the face. He’s done it to me all my life, and I told myself he wasn’t going to do it again.” Max’s cheeks turned crimson. “That’s when I told him to get out. ‘Leave us alone. Go live with your sleaze of a girlfriend and leave us in peace.’”
Pam gripped the railing tightly between her hands and continued to sob.
“He deserved it, Mom. You know he did.” Max stared down at me dispassionately. “Did you know that Katie’s only two years older than me? How could he treat my mother like that?”
My head and heart were both pounding frantically. “What happened then?”
“Dad picked up a chair and threw it at me. He told me that I wasn’t getting another dime for school or anything else. I could carry a homeless sign on the side of the road, for all he cared. Then I hit him in the head with the club. He fell into the pool and didn’t move.” Max had a faraway look in his eyes. “Mom came down to the pool, all upset. She was so drunk that I was afraid she’d fall in too. She was crying hysterically, saying that you would be back any minute to show the house, and told me to get out of here.”
I looked at Pam. “And that’s when you put the club back in the trunk of your car. Because you didn’t want Max to take the blame.”
Tears were running down Pam’s face, and she didn’t reply. I would have felt sorry for her, if she wasn’t about to let her son kill me.
“I won’t let you go to prison, sweetheart. You have your whole life ahead of you. I know you didn’t mean to do it,” she cried. “And that’s why I’m going to prison instead.”
“No one’s going to prison,” Max insisted. “You’re leaving the country tonight, Mom. You can make a new start. In time, Nate and I will join you.”
“Does Nate know what really happened to his father?” It was ironic, because Max seemed so calm and collected while his brother had been angry and unforgiving. From past experience, I’d learned that many killers never showed their true colors until they were pushed just so far.
Pam shook her head. “Nate thinks that Katie did it. That’s why I asked you to talk to her. Max thought she’d be arrested, especially when the police found out Kevin recently named her in his insurance policy.”
“You shouldn’t have asked her to help, Mom.” Max stared at me in contempt. “She almost ruined everything.”
“I thought she’d focus on Katie as the killer,” Pam said desperately.
“Then you decided to back out of the contract when I asked about Kevin’s ring,” I finished. “You were worried that I was getting too close to the truth.”
Pam hiccupped back a sob and nodded.
Max pointed the gun at my head. “Mom told me years ago that the ring was worth a lot of money. So, I jumped in the pool and took it off his finger. Hey, what was I supposed to do? I’m in my last year of school, and I need tuition. Besides, I didn’t think anyone would miss it.”
The thought of Max taking the ring off his father’s lifeless finger made me ill. “So, you took it to The Pawn King but decided not to sell it there.”
He looked surprised. “Yeah, that’s right. The owner only offered me ten grand, and I knew he was trying to hustle me. So, I was going to find an auction to take it to instead. But when Mom told me that you were asking about the ring, I knew we’d have to get rid of you. That’s why I followed you to the office that night.”
I’d suspected that Max had been the one to throw the Molotov cocktail through the window, but to hear him admit it made my entire body shiver with fear.
Max glanced at the grandfather clock. “We’re wasting time. Mom, can you grab a blanket out of the hallway? We’re going to have to smuggle her body into the trunk of my car.”
Pam stood there motionless. “I don’t know about this.”
Relief soared through me. Was it possible that Pam would go against her son’s wishes? Sure, we weren’t close any more, but we’d been best friends at one time. That must mean something to her. She couldn’t turn her back on me and leave me at the mercy of her son. It simply wasn’t possible.
Max clicked off the safety on the gun. “Mom, she has to go. Don’t you realize that?”
“Yes, I know,” she agreed. “Can you wait until I’ve left the room, dear? You know how delicate my stomach is.”
I couldn’t believe my ears. They were carrying on a conversation about my life as if I wasn’t even there, and Pam’s main concern was her digestive system. “You can’t be serious,” I sputtered. “Pam, we were best friends! We would have done anything for each other.”
Pam stared down at me sadly. “You’re right. I would have done anything for you. You were like the sister I never had. But things have changed, Cindy. I’ve changed. I need to think about my family first.”
“So that’s it?” I asked in disbelief. “You’re going to stand there and let your son kill me? Don’t you even have a conscience anymore?”
She glared at me with contempt. “For God’s sake, he’s my son. Our children always need to come first, before anyone else. Don’t you understand?”
No, I didn’t understand. How did that give Max the right to kill me? “What about my children? They need their mother. If you let Max kill me, how can you possibly live with yourself?”
“Quit stalling,” Max growled. “And stop making my mother feel bad. She’s been through enough without the guilt trip you’re trying to lay on her.”
This was insane. There was no other explanation. Kevin Hilton had been hit in the head with a golfclub and left to drown in his pool. The rest of his family were going off the deep end, so to speak.
Pam hung her head and refused to look at me. “I don’t have any choice. I’m sorry, Cindy.”
A knock sounded on the front door. Pam and Max exchanged panicked glances. “Who can that be?” she whispered.
“Take her upstairs to your room,” Max instructed his mother. “If she gives you any trouble, just knock her over the head with a liquor bottle. Then we’ll finish her off later. In the meantime, I’ll get rid of whoever’s out front.”
Pam jerked me to my feet roughly. She pushed me towards the staircase while Max crept towards the front door. As he flattened himself against the wall, a briefcase crashed through one of the windows. Pam and I both screamed simultaneously, and Max fired several rounds from the gun. Pam sank onto the floor and covered her head with her arms while I managed to grab a decanter off the table and raised it between my tied hands. Max turned his head and saw me. He laughed and moved in my direction, keeping the gun pointed at my chest.
“Put it down or you die,” he said angrily.
Having no choice, I started to lower the bottle when Jacque leaped through the open window, pistol in hand. Distracted, Max whirled around to confront him. I managed to throw the bottle in Max’s direction, and it connected with his head, knocking him to the floor. In a last desperate attempt to help her son, Pam rose to her feet and flew at me like a lion defending her cub, her fingernails scratching and tearing my face. I managed to push her away before Jacques fired his gun at the ceiling, causing the chandelier to fall on top of her. Pam let out a loud “Oof” and lay still.
Jacques hurried towards me and helped me untie my hands. There was perspiration trickling down the sides of his face. “Are you all right, love?”
I was too shocked to speak for a minute. “I can’t believe what just happened here.”
He puffed out his chest with pride. “Don’t I make a darn good superhero?”
“The best,” I assured him as he cut the cloth around my wrists with a penknife.
“The police will be here any minute.” Jacques took the cloth and used it to bind Max’s wrists together. The man was breathing but not moving. “I’m not taking any chances with this guy.”
I stared at my friend in amazement. “How the heck did you know?”
He gave me a wry grin. “That you were in trouble? Very simple, dear. I parked my car across the street. You’d told me that no one was home, so when I saw Max’s car in the driveway, I knew something was wrong. I snuck around back and tried the gate, which was unlocked. I saw him and Pam talking in the kitchen. Then I spotted the gun in his hand and knew I had to do something right away, so I phoned the police. Officer Brooks called me back and said that he was only a couple of miles away. That’s when I decided to make my move.”
He paused for breath, and the sounds of sirens could be heard approaching. A minute later, Officer Brooks burst through the front door, gun drawn, with another police officer that I guessed was his partner. They lowered their guns when they saw Jacques and me standing there. Officer Brooks’ eyes quickly shifted to Pam lying under the chandelier and Max flat on his back with his hands tied in front of him.
“Are you both all right?” Officer Brooks asked.
Jacques gave him a triumphant smile. “We’re fine, thanks.”
Officer Brooks knelt beside Max, while his partner went to Pam. “Where’d you get the gun, Mr. Forte?” he asked.
Jacques looked so smug that I almost expected him to spin the pistol around his finger like they did in the old western movies. “The gun belongs to me. And don’t worry, it’s registered.”
Officer Brooks seemed satisfied with his explanation. “Better get an ambulance out here,” he told his partner. They lifted the chandelier off Pam, who had been knocked unconscious from the blow. “And an EMT. We’ll need both of you to follow us down to the station so that we can get statements about what happened.”
Jacques placed an arm around my shoulders and led me outside. “Well, dear, I guess that settles it.”
I shot him a confused look. “Settles what?”
An unmistakable twinkle shone in Jacques’ green eyes. “There’s no doubt about it. Four years might have gone by, but we’ve still got it going on, Sherlock.”