No sooner do I say the words than Macy wallops him over the forehead and stuns him enough for him to take a few staggering steps back. But with one slick move he swipes the stone from her and knocks her over the temple with it, sending her flopping to the sand like a ragdoll.
“Macy!” I cry out as she lies motionless on the ground, no more than ten feet from me. “My sister.” I take a step forward and he sharpens that gun over me once again.
“Not so fast,” he pants. “I wouldn’t worry about your sister, Bizzy. You’ll be together soon enough.” Not until I’ve had my fill of her, of course. But I’ll give Bizzy a supernatural sendoff tonight. She can greet her sister upon arrival.
“You did it?” I shake my head in disbelief. “You’re the reason those girls disappeared?”
“What girls?” He cocks his head my way as if he was genuinely interested.
Lucky barks his way. He’s a liar, Bizzy. Don’t believe anything he says.
Archie aims the gun to Lucky for a moment.
“Bark again and I’ll kill you first.” If I were a better shot with a moving target, I would do it right now.
Good to know.
Fish traipses toward him like a cougar on the prowl, slow and determined.
Give me the okay, Bizzy. She roars. And I’ll feed his eyes to the creatures who live in the ocean.
“What did you do with them?” Each word puffs out with its own breath. “Anita Dolman, Embry Knight, and Shelly Grant. Did you kill them?”
My God, she does know. He shakes his head in disbelief.
“It’s not just me who knows,” I shout up over the roar of the ocean. “The Seaview Sheriff’s Department knows as well.”
His eyes flit toward the party for a moment as if he were considering this. We’re so far away, they’re but a speck in the night.
“That’s not true,” he riots back. “If it were true, they would have arrested me by now.”
“They’re coming to do just that. You killed Julian, didn’t you? He knew about the girls and he was going to turn you in after the show that night. That’s why you sabotaged those hinges, isn’t it?”
His weapon dips a notch.
My God, she knows it all.
“So what? All it took was the loosening of a few pins. That lid had jammed before during one of our private rehearsals, and I was the one who was there to rescue him. And it gave me a grand idea, didn’t it, Bizzy? But Julian Fletcher has had a target on his back for quite a while. And here I’ve only wanted him dead for a few simple weeks. Julian had a line of fathers and brothers of those girls he coerced into this den of depravity. He was no saint. And let’s get one thing straight, I didn’t want him dead.”
“No. But you needed him dead to silence him.”
“Was I too late?” He ticks his chin up a notch. “Is that how you put this together?”
“Julian didn’t tell me—not with words from his lips. I found that secret depository behind his bookshelf. That’s where he kept a file on someone he liked to refer to as TBM. That would be you, Archie. Care to guess what TBM stands for?”
“Bizzy!” Jasper’s voice roars from behind, and within a few seconds he’s standing by my side. “Whoa.” His hands float up. “Put the weapon down, Archie,” Jasper pushes out the words as he struggles to take in the scene with Macy lying motionless on the sand.
“Nice try, Detective.” Archie nods his way. “You first. Toss your weapon my way or your fiancée gets it.” She’s going to get it anyway, but why spoil the fun?
“Don’t do it,” I whisper.
Sherlock and Lucky growl as they slowly circle the madman with the gun. They look rabid and feral for the most part, and I’m betting they’re about to prove me right in both of those categories.
Jasper pulls his gun out and tosses it softly to the ground, close to where Macy lies, and the sand it displaces peppers her over the face.
Wake up, Macy.
I want to shout the words.
My God, if he’s killed my sister…
I try not to let my thoughts migrate in that morbid direction, but it’s too late. Grief consumes me, and I want nothing but to drop to my knees and help her.
Jasper takes a deep breath. “You killed Julian. I already know it. And you killed those girls. Where did you put them, Archie? You can do one good thing by giving those families some peace.”
My garden girls. He squeezes his eyes shut tight.
“Wait a minute.” I take a step forward, and Jasper places his hand in front of my chest in an effort to keep me from moving another inch. “Those pots you donated to the inn—the day you delivered them, you said they were your garden girls. You put them in those planters, didn’t you? The night Julian was killed—Zeke heard you arguing with him. Julian said that he didn’t want you adding another blonde to your garden girls collection. He knew. And he knew where you were putting them, too. And that’s why he was headed to the sheriff’s department after the show.” I gasp as another thought comes to me. “Some of the last words Julian spoke before he fell into the water that night—he said, ‘The answers you seek are often buried in your own backyard.’ He was taunting you with your garden girls collection.”
Archie gives a long blink. “Yes. And if I’m lucky, I’ll be adding to my garden collection tonight.”
Jasper takes a step forward, and the loud blast of a gun goes off—a third of the sound it would normally make, and that lets me know Archie came with a silencer at the ready.
Jasper flies backward before landing hard on the sand as a dark liquid blooms over his dress shirt.
“Jasper!” I fall next to him in a panic as the blood begins to pool.
So much blood.
So fast.
I
