Curious, and more than a little surprised, Karen maneuvered through all the junk littering the floor in order to get a closer look. But she stopped before she reached it. There, sticking out behind some shelves not far from the shovel, was a black ski mask.
Without Skye’s reassuring presence, Sheridan knew it was going to be too difficult to go back to her uncle’s house. Just thinking of being alone there reminded her of the way the floor had creaked right before she’d turned to see a man wearing a ski mask standing in her kitchen. Obviously, she’d been unrealistic when she’d told Skye she wouldn’t move. Gun or no gun, she’d already changed her mind.
But where was she going to go? To Cain’s? Or to a motel?
She knew which place she preferred, but she wasn’t at all sure Cain would be pleased to see her. He’d left the funeral early, and she and everyone else had seen his tie hanging on a tree as they came out of the church. She didn’t know what that signified, but she had a feeling it wasn’t good.
Her cell phone rang. She dug it out of her purse, then glanced at the LED screen, frowning when she saw it was her parents. They’d definitely have an opinion on where she should stay….
Using the hands-free device she’d bought when she purchased her new charger, she punched the Talk button. “Hello?”
“There you are,” her mother said. “Where’ve you been?”
“What do you mean?” It wasn’t as if she hadn’t kept in touch. She’d called her family twice in the past three days, just to let them know she was safe.
“We’ve been trying to reach you all day. Your sister just had her baby.”
“That’s wonderful! How’s the new mom?”
“Great. She was only in labor for eight hours. And you should see little Evangeline. She’s so beautiful.”
“How much does she weigh?”
“Nine pounds—can you believe it?”
“That’s a big baby.”
“They should’ve induced a week ago. I tried to tell her doctor, but he refused to listen to me.”
Sheridan wanted to get her mother off that particular tangent. “But the baby’s healthy?”
“Perfect. She’s got a head of dark hair, just like you did when you were born.”
Sheridan felt a twinge of envy. At twenty-four, her sister was married and already had a baby. And here she was at twenty-eight, fighting ra**sts and murderers—hardly conducive to family life.
“I’m thrilled for Leanne. How did Kyle handle the whole coaching experience?”
“He turned green and nearly passed out when they asked him to cut the umbilical cord. So I got to do it,” her mother said proudly.
“Good for you!”
“How are things in Whiterock?”
Since her day had been spent attending a funeral and putting her best friend on a plane, Sheridan thought things could be better. But she didn’t want to ruin her mother’s excitement. “Fine,” she said quickly.
“Do you have any leads on the man who attacked you?”
“A few,” she hedged.
“You’re not staying with that Cain Granger, are you?”
That Cain Granger? The way her mother referred to Cain irritated her, but she preferred to avoid an argument. And because she hadn’t decided what she was going to do, Sheridan told her mother what she wanted to hear. “No.”
“That’s good. Because an old friend called just before I left for the hospital this morning and had the nerve to imply you’re sexually involved with Cain—and that you were when you were younger, too. Can you believe it? I told her she must have you mixed up with someone else.”
Sheridan caught her breath, wondering how to respond. Fortunately, she didn’t have to. Her parents were still basking in the afterglow of their first grandchild’s birth. Someone said something in the background, which distracted her mother. Then her father came on the phone.
“How’s my girl?” he asked.
“Hanging in there. You?”
“We’ve had a bit of excitement today.”
“That’s what I hear. How are the in-laws behaving?”
He lowered his voice. “Leanne is ready to strangle Kyle’s mother. But his dad’s okay.”
“What’s wrong with his mother?”
“She’s a bit…overpowering.”
“In what way?”
“She’s rearranged the furniture twice. All the comfortable chairs are in the living room now, where you can’t see the TV. And she reorganized the cupboards. Leanne can’t find a damn thing.”
“Sounds like fun.”
“Marriage is a give-and-take,” he said with a sigh and Sheridan smiled because she knew he was thinking of his own mother-in-law.
“Give Leanne my love.”
“You’re coming here soon, aren’t you?”
“As soon as I can.”
“I’ll tell her,” he said.
Sheridan was still smiling when she hung up, but she sobered as soon as she spotted the turnoff to Cain’s place. What was she going to do?
She told herself to drive right by and get a room at the motel. But she slowed and put on her blinker anyway.
Karen couldn’t have said how long she stood there, staring at the ski mask. She was trying to convince herself it was merely a coincidence that she’d found this…this thing in John’s workroom. But she couldn’t. Her mind was throwing up questions—questions she was almost afraid to answer. Where was he the night of Sheridan’s attack? Were they together?
Now that she took the time to think about it, she remembered him telling her he had to work late. She’d stopped by to bring him a coffee and discovered his station wagon parked out front. But he wasn’t around. When she’d mentioned her visit the following morning, he’d told her he’d gone for a walk. Then he’d launched into all the other stuff that’d happened later, with Robert crashing into the garden shed and Owen coming over to check out Robert’s injuries.
She picked up the mask, noticed some dots of reddish black, now dried and crusty, around the cutouts for the eyes, nose and mouth and immediately dropped it. Blood spatter?
Her stomach churned as she looked at the shovel. What did these things mean? Sheridan had been beaten by a man who’d started to dig her grave, a man wearing a ski mask. But that man couldn’t have been John.
Could it? What reason would John have for hurting anyone, especially Sheridan? Logic suggested she’d been attacked to keep her from sharing anything she might’ve remembered about Jason’s murder. That was what the police believed. There’d been a story about it in the paper. But John was convinced he knew who’d killed Jason, and he definitely wanted Cain to be caught. Sometimes it was all he talked about.