Presumed Guilty

He smiled. “Don’t tell your brother.”

“It’s not that he’s a bad musician. He’s just…loud.” She leaned against one of the posts and looked up at the sky, at the first stars winking in the gathering darkness. “Think you could do me a favor?” she asked.

“What’s that?”

“When Mom gets home, will you talk to her? About the Herald.”

“What about it?”

“Well, with all that’s come up — about Jill Vickery, I mean — it’s beginning to look like we’ll need a strong hand on the helm. We all know Dad groomed Phillip to be the designated heir. And he’s a bright kid — I’m not putting him down or anything. But the fact is, Phillip’s just not that interested.”

“He hasn’t said much about it, one way or the other.”

“Oh, he won’t say anything. He’ll never admit the truth. That he’s not crazy about the job.” She paused, then said with steel in her voice, “But I am.”

Chase frowned at his niece. Not yet twenty, and she had the look of a woman who knew exactly what she wanted in life. “You think you have what it takes?”

“It’s in my blood! I’ve been involved from the time I could put pen to paper. Or fingers to keyboard. I know how that office works. I can write, edit, lay out ads, drive the damn delivery truck. I can run that paper. Phillip can’t.”

Chase remembered Cassie’s term papers, the ones he’d glanced through at the cottage. They weren’t just the chewing up and spitting out of textbook facts, but thoughtful, critical analyses.

“I think you’d do a terrific job,” he said. “I’ll talk to your mother.”

“Thanks, Uncle Chase. I’ll remember to mention your name when I get my Pulitzer.” Grinning, she turned to go back into the house.

“Cassie?”

“Yes?”

“What do you think of Jill Vickery?”

Cassie frowned at the change of subject. “You mean as a managing editor? She was okay. Considering what she got paid, we were lucky to keep her.”

“I mean, on a personal level.”

“Well, that’s hard to say. You never really get to know Jill. She’s like a closed book. I never had any idea about that stuff in San Diego.”

“Do you think she had an affair with your father?”

Cassie shrugged. “Didn’t they all?”

“Do you think she was hurt by it?”

Cassie thought this over for a moment. “I think, if she was, she got over it. Jill’s a tough cookie. That’s the way I’d like to be.” She turned and went into the house.

Phillip was still playing Rachmaninoff.

Chase stood and watched the last glow of sunset fade from the sea. He thought about Jill Vickery, about Miranda, about all the women Richard had hurt, including his own wife, Evelyn.

We’re lousy, we Tremain men, he thought. We use women, then we hurt them.

Am I any different?

In frustration he slapped the porch railing. Yes, I am. I would be. If only I could trust her.

Phillip’s pounding on the piano had become unbearable.

Chase left the porch, walked down the steps and headed for his car.

He would talk to her one last time. He would look her in the eye and ask her if she was guilty. Tonight he would get his answer. Tonight he would decide, once and for all, if Miranda Wood was telling the truth.

No one answered Annie’s front door.

The lights were on inside, and Chase could hear the TV. He rang the bell, knocked, called out Miranda’s name. Still there was no answer. At last he tried the knob and found the door was unlocked. He poked his head inside.

“Miranda? Annie?”

The living room was deserted. A basketball game, unwatched, was playing out its last minute on the TV. A pair of Annie’s socks lay draped over the back of the sofa. Everything seemed perfectly normal, yet not quite right. He stood there for a moment, as though expecting the former occupants of the room to magically reappear and confront him.

The basketball game went into its fifteen-second countdown. A last-ditch throw, across the court. Basket. The crowd cheered.

Chase crossed the room, into the kitchen, and halted.

Here things were definitely not right. A chair lay toppled on its side. On the floor a saucer lay upside down. Though the kitchen window was wide open, an odor hung in the room, something vaguely sharp, medicinal.

Quickly he searched the rest of the house. He found neither Miranda nor Annie.

With growing panic he hurried outside and glanced up and down the street. Except for the far-off barking of a dog, the evening was still.

No, not quite. Was that the sound of a car engine running? If seemed muffled or distant. He circled around the house and saw a small detached garage in back. The door was shut. The sound of the car engine, though still muffled, seemed closer.

He started toward the garage. Then, out of the corner of his eye, he sighted a flicker of movement. He turned just in time to spy a shadow slipping away, blending into the darkness.

This time, you bastard, Chase thought, you don’t get away from me.

Chase sprinted off in pursuit.

He heard his quarry dodge left, toward a thick hedge of bushes. Chase, too, veered left, scrambled over a low stone wall and broke into a sprint.

The fleeing shadow burst through the hedge and made a sharp right, into a neighboring yard littered with garden tools. Chase, intent on capture, didn’t notice his quarry had swept up a rake. It came flying at him through the darkness.

Chase ducked. Tines first, it flew over his head, then clattered into a wheelbarrow behind him. Chase leaped back to his feet.

His quarry grabbed a pickax, flung it.

Again Chase dodged. He heard the whoosh of air as the lethal weapon looped past. By the time he’d recovered his balance the figure was off and running again, toward a stand of trees.

He’ll be lost in the shadows! thought Chase. He mustered a final burst of speed, drew within reach. His quarry was tired. He could hear the other man’s ragged breaths. Chase launched himself forward, grabbed a handful of shirt and held on.

His quarry, instead of trying to pull free, spun around and charged like a bull.

Chase was flung backward, into a tree. The shock lasted only an instant. Rage, not pain, was his first response. Shoving away from the tree, he flung himself at his attacker. Both men fell off balance, went skidding across the wet leaves. The attacker punched, and the blow caught Chase in the belly. With a new strength born of fury, Chase slammed his fist blindly at the squirming shadow. The man groaned, tried to lash out. Chase hit him again. And again.

The man went limp.

Chase rolled away from the body. For a moment he sat there, catching his breath, wincing at the pain in his knuckles. The other man was still alive — he could hear him breathing. Chase grabbed the inert figure by the legs and dragged him across the leaf-strewn lawn, toward a faint pool of light from a distant porch lamp. There he knelt to see who his prisoner was. In disbelief he stared at the face, now revealed.

It was Noah DeBolt. Evelyn’s father.