under cold running water. Despite her bloodied leg, she’d staggered across the rocks from her house, burst in from his deck and gone for his phone, not explaining, just calling Lou Beeler, then Doyle Alden. She hadn’t bothered with 911.
She told Beeler she was at Owen’s house because the phone line at hers had been cut, presumably before she’d arrived back from her trip up Cadillac Mountain.
Owen sat on a tall stool at the counter. He’d gotten out his first-aid kit. He tapped its plastic box. “You’re welcome to help yourself to whatever you need.”
“I don’t need anything. Thanks.” She glanced back at him, her color slightly improved since she’d called in the law and got the cold water running on her arm. “I didn’t even know anyone was in the house until I had a drywall saw slicing through my pants leg.”
“How do you know it was a drywall saw?”
“Because he dropped it in the entry on his mad dash out. I’m never going to live that one down.”
“You’re positive it was Mattie?”
“I am. Enough to question him, if not convict him. Assuming we can find him. He must have taken off on his bike. If my damn leg…” She scowled and turned back to the sink. “And my car keys. I could have followed him in my car.”
“I can take a look at your leg-”
“My leg’s fine.” Using her elbow, she shut off the faucet. “It’s a superficial wound. I don’t think he wanted to hurt me. I surprised him, and he wasn’t planning to stick around and explain himself.”
“Any idea what he was doing there?”
“It wasn’t to help me hang wallboard.” She raised up the dripping forearm and inspected her scratches. “Looks clean enough, don’t you think? Just a couple good scrapes. Kind of like a road rash. Stings a little.”
“I can wrap it for you. It’s hard to wrap your own arm.”
“It doesn’t need wrapping.”
“There are ice packs in the freezer,” Owen said.
“I don’t need ice.”
He flipped open the first-aid kit and lifted out a nonstick bandage, a roll of gauze, tape, scissors and antibiotic ointment, laying them on the counter. “You’re bleeding on my floor.”
“Oh. Yeah, I guess I am. Not much, though.”
“We’re wrapping your arm.”
She grinned at him. “I’m being difficult?”
“Not unless you try to shoot me. Otherwise you’re just someone who’s injured and doesn’t want to be.” He walked over to her and took her hand, turning her arm and taking a look at the injury. “You’ve got a couple of fairly deep scratches here.”
“They’re about a quarter-inch long. Big deal. I think I hit a nail from my gutting project.”
“Tetanus shots up to date?”
She nodded. “Doyle and Lou are going to land here any second. I don’t want them to see you patching me up.”
“Of course not.” He used a dish towel and dabbed at her arm, drying it as best he could. “Why are you so convinced it was Mattie?”
“He left an odor.”
“Do you think he’d been drinking?”
“I have no idea. If he was, it didn’t slow him down any. He had to move like a jackrabbit to get out of the house and out of sight.”
“Well, if I had you coming after me with a gun-”
“I had to get my gun. That created a small delay.” She winced as Owen applied the antibiotic ointment, then placed the bandage over it. “I didn’t take it up Cadillac with me.”
He wrapped gauze around her arm, covering the bandage, and secured it with tape, then glanced down at her right thigh. The bleeding there looked to have stopped. “You should go to the E.R. about your leg, at least.”
“I get worse cuts picking blackberries. If it starts looking infected, I’ll see a doctor.”
“You might need stitches.”
“I don’t need stitches.” She had a perceptible limp as she walked toward the deck door, then leaned against it and sighed at him. “This isn’t going to be my finest hour. You ever do anything stupid?”
“Me? Never.”
She laughed. “Oh, sure. Let’s see all your scars.” But color returned to her pale cheeks, and she made a face. “Umm. Forget I said that.”
“Sorry, Detective. I’m not letting that one go.” Owen walked over to her and slipped an arm around her waist. “I’ll drive you back to your place. Don’t argue.”
“I won’t-I don’t know how I made it across those rocks to get here as it is. Must be the pancakes I had for breakfast.”
“And for the record,” he said, half lifting her out to the deck, “you can see my scars anytime.”
He’d gone and done it now, Mattie thought, feeling terrible as he slipped through the iron gate on the border between Ellis’s gardens and the woods. Ellis was at the family estate on Somes Sound. Mattie had seized upon his absence to sneak down to Abigail’s house, hoping she wouldn’t be there-hoping he’d have the window of time he needed.
He’d taken what precautions he’d thought of. Cutting the phone line, hanging on to the drywall saw. He just couldn’t get out of there fast enough.
He crept along the fence, behind a swing that had been there since the Garrisons had owned the property. When he reached the shed he checked his trail for any footprints.
He’d just sliced open a cop. They’d all be looking for him now.
But he had his story ready. Doyle would believe him. Didn’t Doyle always believe him?
Mattie silenced the voices of doubt in his head and unlatched the shed door, stepping inside its crowded but ultra-neat single room of tools and garden supplies. Thankfully, he could relatch the door from the inside and wouldn’t have to leave it swinging open.
Sunlight angled through the small, paned windows, somehow making him feel more claustrophobic, more trapped.
He worked his way past bags of fertilizer, peat moss and dried cow manure to the back of the shed, where he pushed aside a stack of old wooden lobster pots and got down on his hands and knees.
Using his fists, he banged on the piece of plywood he himself had tacked onto the opening the chickens had used. It was bigger than necessary, really, for chickens, but that could help him in a pinch. The wood came free easily, but he left it leaned up against the hole. It was unlikely anyone would notice it, one way or the other, but he’d taken enough chances already.
If he had to, he could crawl out the tiny door and get into the woods, disappear.
He’d expected to have to disappear at some point, just not until he had his money. The whole ten grand. More. Damn it, Linc could spare it. He deserved to pay up for what he’d done. For the secrets he’d kept. The blackmail would help cleanse his soul.
Mattie shook his head. He couldn’t afford to let any doubts creep in, undermine him. Not now. Not when he’d gone past the point of no return.
He sat on the floor, his back against a lobster pot. Was it one of Will Browning’s old pots? Pa, Mattie used to call him. Ol’ Pa Browning. He was the Browning who’d lived a long life.
Ah, Pa.
“I’m trying,” Mattie whispered. “I’m trying hard.”
At least Pa Browning hadn’t lived to see his grandson murdered. A small blessing, at least.
Mattie didn’t know if he fell asleep, or if he’d simply gone into some kind of trance, but he became aware of the
