“Not your fault! Ha! Mother told me how you seduced him. How did it feel to be seduced by his daughter, sweet Pamela?”
“I’ve been a greater fool before and no doubt will be again. But there’s no need for a gun.”
“Tell him that,” Diane said, waving the gun at Mason.
“What is she talking about, Lou?”
“She killed Richard and Angela. Now she’s trying to decide whether to kill us.”
Pamela stepped toward her. “Diane?”
“You’re a pathetic whore. You stole my father. Over there, on the couch, where I can see both of you,” Diane commanded, directing them with the gun.
Pamela complied, clutching a pillow in her lap.
“How did you know about the gun?” Mason asked.
“Pamela told me. She told me everything.”
“Including that Sullivan was HIV positive?”
“That was rich. It renewed my faith in God.”
“But threatened your inheritance. AIDS is a very expensive way to die. But if you killed Sullivan, you’d get your money and your revenge.”
“It was a good deal for both of us. We’d both stop suffering.”
“So you told Sullivan that you had access to experimental drugs through the gay community and, as the loving daughter, you wanted to help him.”
“I told you he trusted me.”
“And you let him shoot himself up with saline until you were ready to give him the fatal dose of insulin.”
“My, my. You have done your job, Mason.”
“The nursing home doesn’t seem real careful about its drugs. Lucky break that your grandfather ended up there.”
“It didn’t matter. I would have found something to give him.”
“How did you get him to inject himself?”
“The day before the retreat, I told him I had something new, very powerful. He begged me for it. I made him wait until Saturday night at the lake.”
“And you just watched him kill himself.”
“It was a dream come true.”
“You might have gotten away with it if you hadn’t killed Angela too. How did she find out about you?”
“The wiretap on Sullivan’s phone. She tried to blackmail me for a share of my inheritance.”
“So you went to her apartment. But how did you do it?”
“It was easy. I stabbed her in the neck with a dose of insulin. It’s very quick that way.”
“And left the suicide note on her computer.”
“I thought it was a nice touch.”
“Actually, it was stupid. Angela didn’t know Sullivan was HIV positive. Other than his doctor, you and Pamela were the only ones who knew. Too many bodies, Diane. You can’t cover all your tracks.”
“I can try. After I shoot you, I’m going to help sweet Pamela put the gun in her mouth. A messy murder- suicide should at least muddy the waters.”
Diane began walking toward them as Mason stood up.
“Sit down!” she screamed.
There was no way out. She was too far away to try and disarm her, but she was close enough to shoot them both. Mason decided to at least put some distance between him and Pamela.
“Sit down!” she screamed again as he moved toward the desk.
“Diane,” Pamela replied wearily, “the gun isn’t loaded.”
Diane and Mason stopped in their tracks. “What?” he yelled at Pamela. “Were you waiting for a sign from God to tell me?”
“I wanted to know everything,” Pamela said. “There have been too many lies. She wouldn’t tell the truth if she thought the gun wasn’t loaded.”
Diane threw the gun at Pamela, striking her on the shoulder, and charged her, screaming. They rolled on the floor in a tangle of arms and legs, knocking over the butler’s table. Mason pulled them apart, but not before Diane raked Pamela’s face with her nails, opening ugly wounds. Mason held Diane with her arm twisted behind her back until her breathing steadied, while Pamela called 911.
Diane sat in the wingback chair while they waited for the police. The doorbell rang and Pamela left to answer it. Mason had his back to Diane as he listened to the recording of their conversation, turning around just as Pamela and the cops came in the room.
They all stared at Diane. She was holding the ornamental letter opener that had fallen on the floor during her wrestling match with Pamela. Diane waited until she had their full attention before plunging the letter opener into her neck.
CHAPTER EIGHTY
Diane punctured her jugular vein. The cops did what they could and the paramedics did more. She lived long enough to be pronounced dead in the emergency room.
The clouds were breaking up when Pamela and Mason left the hospital. It had been two weeks since he had identified Sullivan’s body at the lake. For the first time, the air was clear.
Pamela thanked him for the ride, for everything, she said. Mason promised to check in on her, but it was a promise neither of them wanted him to keep. It’s too hard to become friends after you’ve been stripped naked.
Mason believed that Pamela must have suspected Diane. At least that she was Sullivan’s daughter. Yet she allowed their relationship to become dangerously intimate. Perhaps had even encouraged it.
He’d read that some people stay in abusive relationships because they think they deserve it. Maybe Pamela knew what she was doing with Diane-punishing herself for taking Sullivan from Diane and her mother. He couldn’t wait for Jerry Springer to do a show on women who sleep with their stepdaughters who kill their husbands to get even with their fathers for abandoning them.
Sunday evening, Mason met Kelly at the airport. Other friends and lovers streamed past them, embracing one another, grabbing luggage, moving on. Mason and Kelly stood for a moment, holding hands, measuring where they were. She clutched him briefly, brushed his lips, and said she was glad he was all right. The intensity of the last two weeks had locked them together. Both sensed that the grip of those days was loosening. They had a quiet dinner, dancing small steps around the future.
“Blues is buying a bar,” he told her. “It comes complete with office space upstairs. I’m thinking about becoming his first tenant.”
“That’s great. Really great. You’ll be happier on your own.”
Mason knew that she was talking as much about herself as about him. She’d buried her partner, exhumed his memory, and had to bury him again. Another part of her had been lost when her cabin burned.
After dinner, they drove to the Plaza and parked in front of their fountain. The top was down on the TR6. The air was close, thick with humidity. Bugs danced in the fountain’s spray. Cars filled with teenagers sauntered past, rap and rock bellowing from open windows. Mason and Kelly smiled ruefully at each other, realizing that the magic had been in the moment, not the fountain, and the moment had passed.
Mason read her thoughts. “Nick was dirty, Kelly. That was about him, not about you.”
She sighed deeply, rubbed her hands in her lap, and nodded. “I didn’t see it,” she said. “That is about me.” A thin tear leaked from the corner of her eye. Mason reached to wipe it away. She took his hand. “The cabin was my hiding place, Lou. I hid everything there, including my feelings for Nick, for you, and for myself. I’ve got to rebuild before I can decide what I want.”
Mason dropped her at her hotel. Kelly stepped from the car, leaned back in, and kissed him. He watched her walk away until she disappeared through the revolving door.
The next day, he returned Vernon’s Bible to him. He was unchanged. A new nurse was caring for him and told
