on was…”
“Me,” Caroline answered.
“You. You get pregnant and maybe Dominic doesn’t sell his shares. You have a baby and I have to share the company. I don’t like to share. The plan was to get you out of the way first, but, like I said, Denny ruined all that. If you had gone home and not come back, I could have spared you. I’m not a monster, Caroline. I’ve already gotten everything I want. But then Steven said you were both back, and well, you need to die. Sorry.” Anne shrugged as if she truly were.
“Steven is down at police headquarters right now. They know Dominic didn’t kill Denny. You’ve lost. You can’t possibly hope to avoid being caught.”
“Not if Dominic comes home and kills his wife and the FBI agent with her in a fit of rage because he truly is a twisted psychopath. I’ve heard prison can do that to a man. Then he kills himself and we’re back to square one. You’re a mystery writer, Caroline. You know how it’s done. You need evidence. You can’t arrest anyone without it. There is no proof that Steven killed anyone. And there is no proof that I did. Maybe people will have their suspicions, but there won’t be anything they can do about it. We’re going to go upstairs and wait for Dominic to come home and when he does, this is all finally going to play out. Lucky for me Daddy is at this moment taking a woman I set him up with-one who, coincidentally, looks very much like me-out on the town where a number of security cameras are sure to provide me with a solid alibi.” Anne shook the gun in her hand, indicating that Caroline should walk. “Go on. Let’s just get this over with.”
Yes. Over. Caroline took a deep breath and started to walk as if she were heading back into the house. Then at the last second she turned and threw herself at Anne.
Caroline had momentum and the element of surprise on her side. Both women plunged deep into the dark water.
“I have to talk to Steven.” Dominic told Mark. He must have conveyed his panic to the detective because Mark nodded his head once and escorted him back to the interrogation room.
Steven was still sitting there, looking as if his world had just crumbled around him. He might have seemed exceptionally guilty, too, but Dominic knew he wasn’t.
“Steven.”
The man turned around with a jerk and stared at Dominic. “I saw it happen. It was at that stupid Halloween party she threw last year. She wanted you. I could practically smell it on her. Then I saw her lead you down the hall to one of the back bedrooms and I couldn’t make myself follow you because I knew I would lose her.”
“I’m sorry you saw that. I didn’t know.” Dominic walked over and sat across from him. “Nothing happened.”
“I know. She was so furious when she rejoined the party. Said it was because the caterer messed up, but I knew. You had turned her down. She doesn’t handle no very well.”
Dominic closed his eyes. “You know, don’t you?”
Steven nodded and dropped his head between his hands. He chuckled hysterically for a minute and Dominic rested a hand on his shoulder to calm him. “Don’t you see? This is so like her. She’s so intense. Everything at full speed. Even her anger. Her revenge.”
“Where is she now?” Mark wanted to know.
“I left her at home. I told her you were back. That you’d been arrested and I had to come down and see what I could do. She said she would wait by the phone.” Steven’s breath caught in his throat. “She slept with Denny. She slept with him just to make all this happen.”
“Call her,” Mark prompted. “Tell her you need her to come down here to verify your alibi. Tell her the police suspect you and you need her help.”
Steven pulled out his cell phone and gripped it tightly in his hand. He looked up at the two men watching him and whispered, “She’s my wife.”
“She’s a murderer,” Mark told him coldly. “Make the call or we go and pick her up in a squad car.”
Steven hit a button and held the phone to his ear. “No answer at home.”
“Try her cell.”
“She never answers her cell. She said she’d be at home. Maybe she’s not answering.”
“I’m not taking that chance,” Dominic insisted. He turned to the detective. “I need to go to Caroline. Now.”
The two men looked at each other. Then immediately bolted into action.
“You sit tight. I’m going to send a uniform in here to wait with you,” Mark told Steven. Once that was done, Mark led the way out of the station and pointed to his car.
“I’m driving,” Dominic insisted.
Mark jingled the keys in his hands. “I’m driving. You’re about half gone with panic.”
“I swear to God if anything happens to her…” Dominic muttered as he threw himself into the passenger seat and silently urged the detective to move faster.
“Nora’s with her and she’ll be armed. And even if she weren’t, I think I would still put my money on her.”
Nora rolled on to her back and groaned. Her head felt as if it were going to explode. For a moment, she wondered if maybe it had. No, that was silly. If it had exploded, she’d be dead. And dead people didn’t groan. Which she did again.
Think, she told herself. But that hurt.
All she really wanted to do was close her eyes and try to escape the pain, but there was the niggling anxiety in the back of her mind that wouldn’t let her rest. A feeling of danger and an urgency to move spurred her on.
Move where, though? Where was she?
Dominic’s house. She was at Dominic’s house with Caroline.
Caroline. Where was Caroline? Had she hit her? No. There was someone else in the house. Oh, God.
“Caroline.” She knew her voice couldn’t be more than a whisper, but suddenly she realized that the urgency she was feeling was related to Caroline. She had to make contact. She crawled for while along the living room heading for the stairs that would take her down to the next level. Caroline had gone swimming. She should be in the pool.
That was confirmed by the sound of a very loud splash.
The water engulfed them both instantly. But because she knew where she was going, Caroline was able to adapt more quickly. She kicked away from the tangle that was Anne and felt something solid brush past her thigh.
The gun! Anne had dropped it and it was sinking. Caroline kicked her legs powerfully, pushing herself to the bottom of the pool. She brushed her hands over the tiles but with the underwater light turned off, she could see nothing.
Needing air, she rose to the surface. Only the glint of the moonlight peeking through the passing clouds offered any light inside the glass room. She couldn’t see much, but she could hear Anne breathing.
“You bitch!”
Caroline remained motionless as the woman floundered about struggling with her clothes. Instead of bothering to reply Caroline dove again and with fluid strokes moved farther away from her. Once more, she kicked her way to the bottom of the pool, holding her breath as long as possible in her desperate search for the gun. She heard a muted sound and felt a hand close around her ankle. She kicked sharply and dislodged the hand, then kicked again, angling her body to the side to change her direction.
As she surfaced, the ragged sound of her breathing gave Caroline’s position away. Anne turned dramatically in her direction but she didn’t move as a cloud obscuring the moon plunged the room into darkness.
Anne chuckled. “Marco,” she sang as if waiting for the answering call,
Caroline needed that gun. The pool was large and the gun could be anywhere, but the most likely place was not too far from where they had both fallen into the water. Which meant she needed to get behind where Anne was standing.
“I’m here, Anne.”
Instantly the woman lunged in her direction. Caroline sank deep and could feel the movement of the water above her. When they surfaced, Anne was on the other side of the pool.
Without a sound Caroline let herself slide back under the water. Her foot brushed a solid object and she twisted
