‘Sam!’ Bella breathes. ‘I can’t believe you’re really here. Are you here? Are you alive?’
‘Oh, I’m alive.’ He laughs.
She rushes toward him, then stops short.
It isn’t Sam’s laugh.
And that isn’t Sam’s face, though it looks like him, so much like him that Bella can’t seem to breathe.
Or maybe that’s because he’s holding a gun, aiming it at her.
‘S …’ His name strangles in her throat. No. He isn’t Sam.
And she’d known, of course she’d known, that it couldn’t be real; that he couldn’t be alive. But her life is disintegrating around her, and she’d needed him so badly; needed to let herself believe in magic, just this once; needed …
But Sam had been so long ago. Sam is gone.
And Drew’s words, not Sam’s, come back to her now.
‘If ever there was a woman who didn’t need rescuing, it’s you.’
She takes a deep breath and forces herself to look him in the eye, this stranger who somehow looks so very much, and yet so very little, like the man she’d loved.
‘Who are you?’
‘You haven’t figured it out yet, have you? I can’t say I’m surprised she didn’t tell you.’
She?
Her thoughts race.
She …
In Bella’s back pocket, her phone vibrates with a call, and a puzzle piece drops into place.
‘Millicent?’
Something flickers in his gaze, and she knows she’d guessed correctly.
‘Of course she told me.’
She’d been about to, anyway.
‘What did she tell you?’
Right before the call dropped, Millicent had mentioned …
‘She told me about Thierry.’ Not allowing herself to look at that gun, Bella keeps her voice steady, and her eyes focused on his.
Again, she sees a gleam of acknowledgement.
‘What about him?’
‘He’s Sam’s father and …’
Of course. That has to be it.
‘ … yours.’
Yes. That’s it.
Now it makes sense.
Sam hadn’t been an only child after all.
This man is his brother.
His half-brother.
Sam couldn’t have known he existed; if he had, he’d have told Bella. Sam, who was terrible at keeping secrets, would never have kept that from her.
Millicent had. She’d admitted she’d kept it from Bella, but …
Would she really have kept it from her son?
The man with the gun takes a step closer. ‘If you knew about me, why did you call me Sam? Why did you tell your boyfriend that you and your kid had seen him at O’Hare?’
So she had been overheard last night.
O’Hare.
Polly had flown here from Chicago. She does have something to do with this.
‘Why do you think?’ Bella asks. ‘I was baiting her.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Your friend Polly. I knew she was snooping around, eavesdropping.’
He says nothing to that, just takes another step toward Bella.
It takes every ounce of strength in her body to stand her ground.
‘I knew what she was after,’ she goes on. ‘What you were both after.’
‘Did you bring it?’
‘The money? You do know that it’s not in cash, don’t you?’
‘Of course it’s not in cash. And it would have been so much easier if you’d just left it where it was on your desk.’
So that he could steal it.
‘But what are you going to do with a check made out to me?’
‘You’re going to deposit it.’
‘What makes you think I’m going to do that?’
He merely smiles, and it’s an ugly, cruel smile.
‘I don’t understand.’
‘You’re going to take the check to the bank. You’re going to show them your ID, and you’re going to give them a deposit slip for that account. And when the check clears, you’re going to transfer the money to your other account.’
‘What other account?’
‘The one that’s linked to this one.’
‘There is no account linked to this one.’
‘Are you sure about that?’
Bella thinks of her laptop with the saved username and password for the bank that holds Max’s college fund.
Stupid. She’d been so, so stupid. Anyone with those credentials could have logged in and linked an account. Just as anyone could have seen her stack of unpaid bills and noted, based on the balances, that she’s long been mired in debt. Anyone could have grabbed a deposit slip – and her ID, she realizes, heart sinking as she remembers her wallet and tourmaline necklace sitting there in the Rose Room before she’d been cautious enough to lock the door.
How carefully would a busy downtown Buffalo bank branch check the ID of a woman depositing – not withdrawing – a huge check? Anyone with that ID and a passable disguise – perhaps just a wig – could probably pass herself off as Bella.
‘Now, if you’ll just hand over that check,’ says the man with the gun, ‘we can get on with things.’
‘You and Polly.’
‘Right. Me and Polly.’
Which, by his tone, isn’t her real name. Of course it isn’t. Not her name, not her credit card or her ID.
‘And that’s a rental car she’s driving. But how did she know in advance she’d get one with Massachusetts plates so that she’d have the right fake identity?’
He raises an eyebrow. ‘You really do notice the little details, don’t you, Bella Jordan?’
Yes. She does. Like the mocking emphasis on her last name.
‘I’m sure you can answer your own question,’ he says. ‘Think about it.’
‘You come prepared,’ she guesses. ‘Because you don’t just use one fake ID. You have a whole bunch to choose from, don’t you? Doesn’t she? And now mine is going to be part of that.’
‘You’re smart,’ he says. ‘But of course you are. My dear brother wouldn’t have married just anyone. He thought he deserved to get everything he ever wanted, didn’t he?’
Yes, Bella is smart. Smart enough to read between the lines and grasp where this stranger is coming from.
‘And you got nothing, right?’ she asks. ‘Not your father’s money, or his name, or even his love.’
‘Nothing but his DNA,’ he agrees.
‘He didn’t know you even existed.’ It’s another educated guess, and a correct one, apparently.
‘Nope,’ he says. ‘But them’s the breaks for guys like me. By the time I found the match in the database, my father was long dead, and so was … well, you know. Although I’m kind of surprised someone as smart as you believed some dead guy might be alive.’
Some dead guy …
Sam.
He’d put his DNA into a database after he got sick, looking for not a long-lost sibling, but a hereditary marker for his disease.
‘We need to know,’ he’d told Bella. ‘For Max’s sake.’
The test came back after he was gone. Bella had logged into the database only to confirm that Sam carried no telltale marker that would explain his terminal illness, not bothering to scan the other information, like genetic matches to distant relatives.
It hadn’t mattered. Nothing mattered, but that Sam had died.
‘Now, let’s take care of business. I’d like the check, please. Polly is waiting. And she doesn’t like to wait.’
He’s going to take it, and then he’s going to kill her, and dump her body where no one will find her until long after that money has been deposited into, and transferred from, her bank account. Probably to an offshore one that will be difficult, if not impossible, to trace.
It’s her own fault. She’s the one who’d suggested meeting in this remote spot. She’s the one who’d snuck out without telling anyone where she was going.
Grange and Misty might actually be looking for her by now, but how likely is it that they’d think to search here?
Certainly not in time to save her life.
Oh, Drew was so wrong. She does need rescuing. But he’s not going to be the one to do it. Nor is Luther. Nor Sam.
Stay strong.
I’m trying, Sam. I’m trying.
But all the strength she can muster would be no match for a loaded gun. There’s no way out of this without a rescuer.
Or a miracle. And there are no miracles.
Dead is dead, even here in Lily Dale.
‘I need the check,’ he says again, gesturing with the gun like a pointer finger. ‘Right now.’
‘Well, I need my necklace right now.’
‘What makes you think I have it?’
‘Either you do, or Polly does. I want it.’
‘Because your dead husband left it for you? A gift from beyond the grave?’
Her heart lurches. She isn’t just terrified. She’s furious. How dare he talk about Sam in that mocking tone?
She lifts her chin and holds his gaze. ‘I’m not giving you the check until you give me the necklace.’
‘Oh? You want to trade?’
‘Yes.’
Sure. They’ll swap, and then he’ll let her go home to her son and her life.
But Valley View can’t be home, not anymore. Nothing is going to be the same. This whole new life she’s built for herself, and Max – it’s being taken away.
She feels her rage mount. White-hot rage. Dangerous, reckless rage.
‘If you don’t have the necklace, then you’d better get Polly to bring it to me,’ she hears herself say.
‘Oh, I’ve got it. It’s right here in my pocket.’
The hand that’s not holding the gun disappears into his pocket and pulls out her tourmaline necklace.
With a gasp, Bella reaches for it.
He laughs, dangling it beyond her grasp.
‘Come and get it,’ he taunts her.
She takes a step closer to him. Closer to the gun.
It’s the last thing she should do; the only thing she can do.
‘What’s the matter? Are you scared?’
‘Of you?’ It’s her turn to laugh, a shrill, hollow burst of hysteria that almost, almost drowns out a rustling, thrashing sound.
It’s coming from behind her, back on the trail, as if someone, some hero, is rushing in to rescue her.
But that doesn’t happen in real life.
No, in real life, you have to save your own.
Bella hurls herself at the man with the gun – the man with the necklace, her necklace.
She catches him off guard, knocking him off balance.
He’s falling backward.
Bella, too, is falling. Falling forward, falling on top of him.
She reaches for the gun, but it’s gone, and the necklace is gone, and his hands are empty now. They clamp her arms, twisting her, shoving her.
Now she’s on her back, and his full weight is on top of her.
She manages a scream before his hands are around her throat, cutting off her voice … her air …
You don’t need rescuing, Bella …
You have to save yourself.
Save your life.
Don’t let him take it away.
Fight! Fight!
She tries, but she can’t fight; can’t breathe.
This is how she’s going to die.
She thinks of Max, and of Drew, Millicent, Luther, Odelia, Misty …
Please be there for him, she begs them all, as darkness begins to block out the milky sun overhead, and it’s because her eyes are closing, and because she can’t breathe …
Please never let him forget how much his mom loved him. And his dad …
Oh, Sam.
Is she going to see him again? Is he waiting for her?
She listens for his voice, or even for the wind chimes, but she hears only a roaring in her ears.
And then somehow the hands are gone, and his crushing weight is off her.
She’s gasping.
Choking.
Gulping air.
Breathing.
Thrusting herself up on her elbows, she spots the gun, lying on the ground in arm’s reach. Spots her would-be killer, pinned beneath her ferocious rescuer.
It isn’t Drew, or Luther, or Sam.
No, it’s a foxhound with pleading eyes and a nose that can sniff out a bad guy – or Bella – from miles away. A hero who’s spent the last few days in a basket filled with Bella’s clothing; her scent.
She grabs the gun. It’s heavy, and shaky in her grasp. She steadies it with one hand, grabbing her phone from her pocket with the other, and dialing just three digits.
The call connects immediately.
‘9-1-1. What is your emergency?’
‘I need—’
Her voice cracks in her throat, which aches from those fierce hands doing their best to choke the life out of her.
But he hadn’t. Bella Jordan had saved herself … with a little help from a hero, she thinks, as her gaze falls on the enormous dog pinning her attacker to the ground.
Nearby, something glints in a sudden burst of sunshine.
It’s her tourmaline necklace.
‘Are you there?’ the operator is asking. ‘Hello? What is your emergency, ma’am?’
She clears her throat and finds her voice, now clear as the patch of sky that’s emerged from behind the clouds. ‘My name is Bella Jordan, and I’m at the Stump and I need help.’