“As soon as I learned you’d be here,” Margaux continued, “I saw an opportunity to fix things, as it were. I won’t let ghosts from my past haunt my future. With everyone who might have known the truth attending the reunion, which I learned thanks to a little social media sleuthing and Christine’s penchant for oversharing including about people not online like you, I couldn’t resist my opportunity. I could come back and eliminate every obstacle.”
“Why?” Emma asked. “Liz cared about you.”
“All those years ago, Owen and I could have been something. I figured if your sister was out of the way, I’d have a chance. When I saw a moment to make my move, I took it. I overheard her and Owen make plans. I followed and then I ended the competition. Isn’t that what all successful people do?”
Ice slithered down Emma’s spine at the cruel, callous words. Liz was collateral damage. She’d had such a big heart. She’d truly cared for everyone, and taking Margaux under her wing had spelled her doom. Emma’s grief resurfaced, clogging her throat and filling her eyes with unshed tears. Everything she’d blocked out returned in a moment. The laughter, the smiles, the hopes, the dreams flooded Emma’s system. Her sister was stolen in her prime.
“Stop blubbering. You’ve done okay, and so have I. Of course, I had to make my way without him. How was I to know he’d mourn her for the rest of life, wasting away to nothing. I reinvented myself for the better. Everything has been perfect. Until I received my invitation and the note. I had my suspicions that he intended to get justice for her. I couldn’t let him take me down.”
“But we were your friends,” Emma murmured, uncurling her fingers and her toes.
“Were you really?” Margaux tapped a finger to her chin.
Emma accepted the solution with a hollow sense of relief. Her sister had been the first victim of a tortured soul. Emma would grieve and move on from the pain, if she got out alive.
First, she had to stall. Margaux radiated with a nervous, eager energy. She might never stop talking, if Emma started the conversation. “You came here with a plan.”
“Getting here was the real battle. I’m monitored and observed. I’m like Mr. Rochester’s first wife in Jane Eyre. My husband would gladly lock me in a soundproof attic. But he can’t,” Margaux sneered. “He needs me, my money, and my standing. He can’t hide me away. I came to show him that I’m not a liability but an asset in my own right. I cleaned up my mess, and now I’ll get a little more freedom.”
Her words sounded shaky and hesitant. Could the murderer be at risk somehow? Emma struggled to sort through the facts. “You shot Owen.”
“Yes, I was a little sloppy at the start. I stole the gun from a member of my husband’s security detail and then drove all the way here.”
Premeditation. The word would chill Emma’s bones in normal circumstances. She wasn’t sure she could react anymore.
“Hiding the rental car and sneaking back into the cabin the first night almost gave me away,” Margaux said. “If you’d have been there, you would have noticed. But Jennifer and Christine have always been too absorbed in their own little world to pay attention to those around them.”
Jennifer and Christine might not always be nice in the sense of surface level interactions but they were too kind to be real suspects. Emma didn’t share that tidbit with Margaux. Fighting to stay awake was difficult enough without wasting her energy on a pointless fight. “What happened with Owen? Did he confront you?”
“No. Who knows if he ever would have had the guts. I wasn’t going to waste my chance to eliminate problems. I stumbled across him. He was stalking you. Looking for a moment to pull you aside. I tried to take a shot at you but got him instead. I wasn’t too sad. I had a new plan. Get rid of both of you and slip out before the weekend really started. You got in your vehicle and I raced to mine. Another accident would be so easy.”
“It wasn’t?” Emma asked.
“You swerved when I accelerated. I pulled out my back-up plan and turned around. But I hadn’t counted on Owen playing the savior.”
Emma could hardly force herself to listen to the casual description of the life-or-death struggles. Stalling for time was her only play. Control drifted from her grasp. “No one heard a gun. I thought I heard thunder.”
“Again, I am so blessed.”
Emma’s eyelids slid shut. She battled with every ounce of strength she had to lift the heavy lids. The light distorted in her cloudy vision. She fought to keep her eyes open. “And the hospital?” she croaked.
“Which time?” Margaux cackled. “Everyone lives in a digital world now. They forget about the analog options. Using a sheet on a cart. Pulling a cord from a wall. Shooting an electrical panel. It’s easy to get around high tech security when the power goes out. Distract in one location and race to the other.”
“You worked alone?” Emma asked.
“I’ve always been fast and—in my experience—people only see what they want to believe. No one pushes hard for the truth when lies are so much simpler.”
Emma hated how foolish she had been. A tear slipped from the corner of her eye, and she blinked. Again, her body urged her to succumb to oblivion and rest.
“Shh, shh,” Margaux cooed. “Drift to sleep. It’ll be so much easier for you if you do. Trust me. Just like when I pulled a plug to lure the Thomases away from Owen’s bedside. I look out for others at the end. I’ll help you, too. Accidents happen all the time. Everyone will write this off, and you’ll be with your sister again.”
With a jerk, Emma was shoved to the floor. Her shoulder hit first, absorbing the impact. She shut her eyes and sucked in a sharp breath. The pain rooted her in reality, a blessing in the midst of so much terror. Because Emma would fight for herself, her sister, and for Daniel.
Daniel didn’t dare blink. Crouching low, he stuck close behind the two newcomers. If they moved or spoke, Daniel would know. Chad promised his help. But what did that mean? And how could he be reliable if he’d let his wife head out into the woods without security? Had she told him about the threatening note? Wouldn’t a caring spouse have interceded and offered more protection before she arrived? If he showed up with a bodyguard, why had he let his wife travel alone?
Philip moved with silence, grace, and speed. No twigs snapped under his boots or pine bough rustled as he brushed past. He had training to move with such stealth. As a bodyguard, a certain set of skills were to be expected. Daniel remained on edge around those with deadly force in their physical arsenal. He didn’t know what set of rules regulating its use. Not that the other man was a comfort for morality.
The enemy of my enemy is unreliable. Daniel wouldn’t put his trust in a smooth-talking politician. Judging by the man’s tailored athletic clothes and high-tech mode of transport to the island, Chad threw money around when a smile wouldn’t get his way. Each detail only added to Daniel’s unease, his instincts screaming at him. Because for all Chad exuded power, he couldn’t control his wife.
