Maybe she was imagining it all. Her hormones were so out of whack, and everything was falling apart. Including her relationship with James, despite her pregnancy.
It seemed everything was falling apart. But she couldn’t allow herself to go down that path. She had to stay positive.
If she could.
She tried to concentrate on the good news that Julia had shared with her. Julia had proven to Sophia that they were distant relatives to the Amhursts—big San Francisco money, and instead of the fortune being divided between a kabillion heirs, most of the estate was funneling down to James Cahill, since he had Amhurst blood. Yes, the twins and James were related, but not close enough to be weird or anything.
Over the course of several months, Julia suggested that the girls get a piece of the pie. After all, hadn’t they both suffered? Sophia was an only child whose parents were wrapped up in their own lives, their marriage brittle, their interest in their only child waning as she’d become a teenager. And Julia had ended up with younger siblings whom her parents had doted upon.
Hadn’t Sophia always felt that something was missing in her life? That missing something was Julia, and they’d hit it off famously, so when Julia started hatching her plan, Sophia had gone along with it: Get close to James Cahill. Real close. Marry him. Get what was due both of them. The goal was to walk down the aisle before he inherited his millions.
But Sophia had screwed up the plan.
She’d fallen in love with James and then gotten pregnant.
While he was falling for Rebecca Travers.
Everything was so messed up!
She unwrapped her now-cold tacos at the little table in the kitchen and considered telling James everything—to come clean with him.
How would he react? Would he throw his arms around her and embrace her, tell her that she and a baby were all he ever wanted in the world and nothing else mattered? “Oh, come on.” Even she couldn’t believe that fantasy. So, then, would he reject her and be horrified that she was a part of anything so horrid and underhanded and . . . oh, Lord.
And what about Julia? If Sophia dared tell James everything? Oh. God. Her insides turned to ice, and her heart nearly stopped. Julia would be upset. Angry, of course. But she wouldn’t completely lose it, would she? Yes, Julia was tunnel-visioned when it came to James and his fortune, but she wasn’t truly dangerous, surely not deadly.
Right?
Surely, Julia wouldn’t hurt anyone.
Or would she?
* * *
Things had been icy between Rivers and Mendoza ever since she’d let him know that she was on to his little bit of kleptomania. Or was there such a thing as a little kleptomania? Like being a little alcoholic? Rivers didn’t believe it. But he rationalized that his need to take things wasn’t to see if he could get away with it, or because he had a need all the time to filch things; it was because he thought those items could help him with the investigation.
As such, he needed to touch the gun. The murder weapon. To feel it in his hands. It had been fired into the water bath and tested, examined for prints and DNA, so, he figured, he was safe. So he was back at evidence, bullshitting with Neville Dash, wishing him a “Merry Christmas,” and finally holding the Glock that had been used to murder Willow Valente. He had to be careful, because of the cameras. As it was, there were going to be questions, but he didn’t worry about the consequences of what he was doing; he’d deal with all that afterward.
He held the pistol.
Tested its weight.
Closed his fingers over the butt and placed his index finger on the trigger.
With a jolt, the gun nearly flew from his hand, the recoil unexpected. The images in his brain scurried like cockroaches skittering away from light. But he caught sight of a hunter tracking Willow down, seeing her as wounded prey because of her limp, following her to her room, and waiting outside, anticipating, having difficulty tamping down the excitement of the kill.
I’m going to get you, and I’m going to do it with the gun you took from him, you little bitch. Just see how you like it.
Rivers felt the tingle of the killer’s excitement.
Using the pre-made key, one that had been stolen from Willow’s purse weeks earlier, the killer entered, spying the flickering television and the pathetic little bed, the pink, girlish pajamas with all the French symbols—as if she would ever go to Paris—and that stupid long black braid. Ugh.
You’ll never have him, and you won’t be able to talk even though I know you’re suspicious. You saw us exchanging the car, even though I was in the wig and the fat suit. You watched, and you suspect there is more than one Sophia, so, Willow, you little freak, “a-fucking-dieu.”
Again the recoil, and this time, he caught sight of a gloved hand wrapping Willow’s fingers around the gun as blood oozed from the little hole at her temple. Then the single thought that there was still someone standing in the killer’s way, someone who had to be dealt with.
The sister . . .
* * *
“You’re backing out?” Julia said, shocked, her eyes narrowing on her twin. She’d just gotten home from their yoga class, and Sophia had dropped the bomb that she wanted out of the plan.
No way. No effing way was Julia about to let that happen. Not after having worked on this intricate scheme for years, an idea she’d started sculpting the minute she’d found out that she was related to the Amhursts and, as such, the Cahills—a fortune whose size she couldn’t even imagine. And she could imagine a pretty damned big one. “Is that what you said?” And before Sophia could
