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“Oh, shut up,” she said aloud.
By the time the first raindrops fell, she’d logged in three laps around the perimeter of the park and she was beginning to breathe a little harder. Her blood was definitely pumping and she slowed to walk off a calf cramp that threatened as she veered into the interior of the park again, only to stop at the tiered fountain. Sweat was running down her back and she felt the heat in her face, the drizzles of perspiration in her hair. Leaning over, hands on her knees, she took several deep breaths only to straighten and find herself alone in the park aside from a solitary dark figure.
Gone were the dog walkers and stroller pushers or other joggers. No, in this cloudburst, she and the man in black were alone.
Her heart clutched and a sense of panic bloomed for a second as the stranger, an Ichabod Crane figure dressed in black, stared at her from beneath the wide brim of his hat, his eyes hidden.
Every muscle in her body tensed.
It was so dark now, even with the streetlights casting off an eerie hue.
It’s nothing, she told herself, but, with one final glance at him over her shoulder, took off and sprinted home.
He’s just a guy in the park, Nikki. Sure, he’s alone. Big deal. So are you.
Nonetheless, she raced as if her life depended upon it and as the rain began in earnest, fat drops falling hard enough to splash and run on the pavement, she rounded the huge old mansion she now owned, and taking the key from the chain on her neck, unlocked the back door.
Once inside, she threw the dead bolt and leaned against the door, gasping for breath, trying to force the frantic images of confinement and darkness from her brain.
You’re okay. You’re okay. You ARE O—
Something brushed her leg.
She jumped, letting out a short scream before recognizing her cat attempting to mosey through a series of figure eights around her legs. “For the love of God, Jennings, you scared the crap out of me!”
When had she become such a wimp?
But she knew . . . trapped in a coffin, listening to dirt being tossed over her, feeling the horror of a dead body beneath her . . . in that moment her confidence and take-the-world-by-the-throat attitude had crumbled.
She’d been fighting hard to reclaim it ever since.
She was safe now, she told herself, as she checked the door to see that it was locked a second time, then a third and finished a perimeter check of the house before downing a glass of water at the kitchen sink, where her window looked out over a private garden. Rinsing her glass, she sneaked a glance at the gate. Still latched.
Good!
Kicking off her shoes, she gathered herself and walked through her bedroom to the bath and saw her wedding dress wrapped in its plastic bag, hanging from a hook on the closet door. Her heart tightened a bit and she ignored the thought that she was marrying Reed for security’s sake.
That wasn’t true, she knew, peeling off her sweatshirt. She loved Reed. Wildly. Madly. And yet . . .
“Oh, get over yourself.” In the shower she relaxed a bit and once the hot spray had cleaned her body and cleared her mind, she felt better. There was no dark sinister madman after her any longer. She loved Reed and they were going to get married. Her bank account was low, but she could sustain herself a few more months . . . so all she had to do was come up with a dynamite story for her publisher.
“Piece of cake,” she said as she twisted off the taps and wrapped her head in a towel. “Piece of damned cake.”
In twenty minutes she was back at her desk, a power bar half eaten, a Diet Coke at her side. She was scanning the newsfeed on her computer when she saw the breaking news report run beneath the screen. Blondell O’Henry to be released from prison.
“What?” she said aloud, disbelieving.
Blondell had already spent years behind bars, a woman who was charged and convicted of killing her own daughter, Amity, and, as it turned out, her unborn grandchild. Blondell’s two other children had been wounded in the vicious attack.
Nikki’s heart pounded as she remembered all too clearly the vicious, heinous crime. Her mouth turned to dust, because Amity O’Henry had been her best friend back then and Nikki knew, deep in her heart, that she, too, was responsible for the girl’s death.
“Oh, Jesus,” she whispered, wondering if the report were true. In her mind’s eye, she saw the image of Amity, who at seventeen was as smart, as beautiful and as enigmatic as her mother. Thick, auburn hair framing a perfect heart-shaped face, wide, intelligent eyes, lips that were sexy and innocent at the same time and legs that wouldn’t quit, Amity O’Henry had the same naughty streak as her mother.
And she’d died because of it.
Nikki tried to find a more in-depth article, to check the validity of the story.
She’d never really told the truth about the night Amity had been killed at the cabin in the woods. Never admitted everything she knew and she’d buried that guilt deep. But maybe now, she’d have her chance. Maybe now, she could make right a very deep and festering wrong.
