Chapter Thirty
The Harrington Cabin
It was early, still dark out, but Jill couldn’t seem to fall back asleep.
She was going to have to deal with Aly today. She was going to have to … do something. Bring Sam and Nate up here to talk to Grandma? Involve the detective? Of course, no crime had been committed.
Well, that she knew of. That was the problem.
She didn’t want to keep pressing, but she knew something had to break, some truth had to emerge.
Maybe Grandma spoke a few words now, but these secrets were keeping her locked in some kind of mental cage.
Maybe she was too afraid to break out of it, but Jill thought the only way to heal was to do exactly that.
Sometimes things had to break to mend.
She told herself this over and over again, because Grandma’s reaction to Sam finding the death certificate was just … a concern.
There was something bigger at stake here than Jill could possibly understand, but they couldn’t rewind time. They had to get to the bottom of it.
Right?
On a groan, irritated with her own indecision, Jill rolled over in bed. She reached for her phone on the nightstand and was unsurprised to find more texts and messages from Aly.
She blew out a breath. Time to face the music. She’d tried to give Grandma a role, a hand, a decision. Grandma refused.
So Jill needed to make this choice all on her own.
She read through the first three, kindly asking if she was okay, if there was anything Aly could do or bring. But the final text message—sent just a few minutes ago—had Jill sitting straight up in bed.
I know you’re still dealing with everything, but Sam and Cal are coming up to the cabin to talk to you about some things that have happened.
She typed out a response. Like now?
Yes.
Jill tossed the phone aside. She needed to get dressed. Tame her hair somehow. In a whirl, she traded her pajamas for outside clothes. The hair was unfixable this morning, so she just bundled it into a scrunchie on the top of her head as best she could.
When Jill hurried out of her room and down the hall, she noted Grandma’s bedroom door was still closed, so she was still asleep. Maybe that was good. Jill would have time to figure out how to handle … whatever this was.
God, what was it now?
Jill moved into the kitchen with half a mind to make a big pot of coffee for everyone, but before she could even start preparations, a knock sounded at the door.
On a sigh, she moved to the door, not wanting any more knocking to wake up Grandma. But, man, she wished she could have gotten some coffee in first.
“You made good…” Jill’s words trailed off as she opened the door—not to Cal or Sam but to a stranger standing on her porch.
Definitely a man she didn’t know.
Which was not good. No one should be up here. Not ever, and not at this hour.
Luckily, her reaction was to immediately shut the door.
Unluckily, this stranger managed to lunge forward before she could get it closed, and since she hadn’t been braced for his sudden movement forward, she stumbled back and onto her butt.
The man stepped inside. He was older. All white hair and wrinkles. Jill was pretty sure she’d never seen him in her life. What was happening?
“Where’s Glenda?” he demanded.
Jill scooted back away from the wild man, her mind scrambling, trying to figure out how to protect her grandmother. Their gun was in the little hall closet, but there was no way Jill could get in there and get it out. Even if she could, was she going to be brave enough to wield it?
She glanced at the closet door, the hall where her grandmother was asleep.
Yeah, she’d have to be brave enough. For anything and everything.
“I don’t know who you are,” Jill said, trying to find some center of calm.
She was the line of defense for Grandma, so she couldn’t possibly let this fear render her immobile. She didn’t get to her feet, but she held herself ready, scooting back away from the man, trying to think.
He was old. Maybe if she lunged, she could knock him down? He didn’t look frail, but he had to be at least twice her age. Surely, she could—
“Glenda!” he yelled.
Jill got to her feet, moved in between the man and the entrance to the hall.
“I don’t know who you are, but she’s not here.
You’re trespassing.” Her phone was in her bedroom and the landline, which might or might not be plugged in, was in the kitchen.
She could make a run for it and make it, but the chance of actually completing a call for help seemed slim.
But maybe with enough authority, she could keep control of whatever this was. “I’m calling the police.”
The man sneered. “Like hell you are.” He tried to push past her, but he telegraphed the move enough that she held firm.
She did stumble a few steps back when he gave her a hard shove, but only a few.
She didn’t move out of his way, and she pushed him right back, with as much force as she had.
Maybe if she kept pushing, she could get him to the door.
But her going on the aggressive seemed to … change something. Where he’d been dismissive before, like it was totally in his right to burst into her house and demand to see her grandmother, his attention—cold and mean—was now fully on her.
“You’ll not touch me again,” he said in a kind of authoritative voice that had her blinking.
Like she was somehow in the wrong here. When he was standing in her home uninvited. Trying to track down her grandmother.
She shook her head, moving through the shock and confusion and what the hell. She needed him out so she could lock the door and call the cops.
She was about to move to shove him again—she was almost certain with enough shoves she could at least get him out the door. Lock it, get her gun, call the police. She could—
But he feinted at the last moment, and all her momentum went forward instead of into him. With his added push, and a trip, she went sprawling onto the floor. She managed to narrowly avoid slamming her head into the rug.
Shock rang through her. Confusion still the predominant emotion, except … he wanted Grandma, whoever he was, and that wasn’t happening. Even if her bones rattled from the impact with the ground. She rolled over.
He loomed over her, tall and surprisingly strong and sturdy for his age, but he was just some random old man, and she could get to the gun in the closet. If she were smart about this, she could still stop whatever the hell it was.
He started to reach for something inside his coat. “Touch me again, and I—”
“Enough.” It was Glenda’s voice—surprisingly clear and firm.
She stood behind the man now, and she did not appear at all surprised to see this man in her cabin. Or Jill on the floor.
She was … dressed. Her coat and boots were on. She even had a pair of gloves in her hands.
The man’s eyes narrowed, and he took a step toward Glenda. In an impulsive reaction, Jill did lunge forward. But she’d never been in a fight. She didn’t know anything about defending herself, so when the man kicked out and made contact with her face, she wasn’t ready for the blow.
She fell back, pain exploding across her cheek. She might have cried out as her hands flew up to her face, but even in the pain and shock, she knew she couldn’t live there. She had to find a way to stop this.
She dropped her hands from her face as the man moved for Grandma.
“You broke the promise, Glenda.”
Grandma shook her head. She didn’t cower, even as the man towered above her. “No.”
“People are asking me about Charles. You broke your promise.”
Jill held a hand to her throbbing cheek while the two people faced off. Charles? Who was Charles? Why was Grandma acting like this was normal? Like this stranger in their house was okay?
“We’ll go,” Glenda said, pointing out the back door. “You. Me. We’ll deal with it away from here. That’s what you want, isn’t it?” Her voice was getting creakier as she spoke, more strangled, but she spoke.
“Yeah, we’ll go.” He glanced down at Jill as if considering. “She’ll stay here,” he said. “Or…”
“No ors,” Grandma all but whispered. “She’ll stay here. Won’t you?” Grandma met her gaze. Pleading in the light green depths.
But … stay here? Just let this man go off with her grandmother to who knew where for who knew why?
“Are you insane? I won’t.” She scrambled to her feet.
Her face might throb, but she’d live. She’d be damned if she’d let this man go somewhere with her grandmother, even if Grandma was the one suggesting it.
“I won’t stay. Grandma. What the hell is going on?”
Before Grandma could answer, she heard something behind her. Relief swamped her as she looked over her shoulder at the now open front door.
It was Cal.
Cal would save them. He’d know how and—
Without thinking the impulse through, she turned to move toward him. She was jerked back by her shirt. She fought it off, but the surprise of it put her at an imbalanced disadvantage. Particularly when a surprisingly strong arm came around her neck, jerking her backward and into the man.
He might look old, but he clearly took care of himself. She couldn’t struggle out of his grasp, and she immediately stopped struggling when she felt cool metal press to her temple.
She froze, because out of the corner of her eye she could see it was a gun.
Her mind went completely blank.
*
Cal stopped on a dime.
He could take Everly, no doubt, in any kind of one-on-one physical fight, but the gun complicated things. Because he’d have to get to Mr. Everly before the man pulled the trigger.
Cal couldn’t take that chance with it pressed up against Jill’s temple.
He was still completely lost on how this all centered back around Mr. Everly, but he knew well enough in a dangerous situation a person couldn’t always take the time to parse out the whys.
Not until guns pointed at heads were out of the picture.
He couldn’t bring himself to meet Jill’s wide, terrified gaze. It twisted in him like too many terrors to count, and he had to be calm. In control.