The Carter Legacy: 3 Book Box Set, page 99
‘Just be careful,’ he told her seriously. ‘There’s plenty of security and as much as I’m sure you’ll hate it, you have your own assigned bodyguard. If you feel something’s off, call me.’
‘Really?’ she replied dryly.
‘Just humor me.’
‘Go to work,’ she laughed as she dropped a light kiss on his lips and turned to head up the steps to the library.
He held on to her hand until the last possible moment, feeling as conflicted about letting her out of his sight as Katie had been about leaving Hailey. He watched her disappear through the doors and with a resigned shake of his head turned to head back to his car.
***
Katie stepped through the glass doors into the blessed cool air and stopped short at the sight of Cassandra, waiting patiently, a small knowing smile curving her lips.
‘Good morning Cassandra,’ Katie cleared her throat nonchalantly.
‘Katie,’ she replied, ‘Dex drop you off?’
‘You know he did,’ Katie’s mouth twitched.
‘Uh huh,’ Cass laughed. ‘Come on, I’ll introduce you to everyone.’
Katie smiled, following Cassandra up the second flight of steps and into the library itself.
‘You saw some of the main area when you were in a few weeks ago,’ Cass began. ‘I’ll give you a full tour of the library itself but I’m not going to put you in there. I have a better idea.’
‘Oh?’
‘Joss,’ Cass waved a younger woman over. She wore dark clothes and heavy boots, but her hair was bright electric blue and yellow.
‘Wow,’ Katie’s eyes widened, ‘I love the colors. It’s like Van Gogh’s Starry Night.’
‘Thanks,’ Joss beamed, ‘that’s exactly the look I was going for. You know, you’re the first person to pick up on it.’
‘Well this is Katie,’ Cass introduced them. ‘She’s going to be working with us temporarily but she’s actually a hair stylist.’
‘No shit,’ Joss studied her speculatively, ‘you any good with unicorn hair?’
‘I’m good with all colors,’ Katie replied modestly.
‘Good to know,’ Joss grinned, ‘welcome aboard. If you need anything just holler.’
‘I will,’ Katie nodded, ‘thanks.’
She followed Cass over to the main desk where an older woman sat in a wheelchair. Katie could see that a jagged scar ran from her temple up into her fine grey hair and across part of her scalp. The scar itself couldn’t have been that old as it was a slightly puckered, raised purple ridge of skin. Her gaze was sharp and intelligent, but the corner of her left eye and the side of her face drooped just ever so slightly, as if she’d had some sort of stroke.
‘Iris,’ Cass called to her, drawing her attention, ‘this is Katie.’
Iris glanced up and her expression hardened.
‘It’s nice to meet you,’ Katie held out her hand.
Her gaze dropped to the outstretched hand and her mouth tightened. She looked back up at Katie her eyes filled with mistrust.
Completely ignoring her, she turned to Cassandra and when she spoke her speech was slightly slurred.
‘That special order you placed just came in.’
‘Thanks,’ Cass replied with a sigh, knowing she wasn’t going to get anything more from Iris.
‘Come on,’ she led Katie away from the desk.
‘She doesn’t like me.’
‘No,’ Cass shook her head.
‘But she doesn’t know me,’ Katie replied in confusion.
‘Don’t take it personally, it’s not you exactly.’
Katie put her hand out, stopping Cass in her tracks and forcing her to face her.
‘What then?’
‘How much do you know about what happened these last six months, I mean with Jessica and how it all ended?’
‘Not much,’ she admitted, ‘I didn’t want to know. Dex turned up at my place and just told me she’d been shot and killed. I’ve heard a few things, you said she shot you.’
Cass nodded.
‘She did, although she wasn’t actually aiming for me.’
‘What?’
‘She was aiming for Jackson,’ Cass told her. ‘God,’ she ran her hand over her face, there’s so much you don’t know, but the highlighted version is she blamed me for our father’s death. She was obsessed with him.’
‘I know,’ Katie agreed quietly, ‘she equated the abuse with love. She wouldn’t share him with anyone, not even me, and to be honest that was the only time I was grateful for her spiteful obsessive nature. She didn’t want to share his attention, so she would keep him all to herself and away from me. In her own selfish mean way, she actually saved me.’
‘Our family is all kinds of fucked up, isn’t it?’ Cass gave a small self-deprecating laugh.
‘To say the least,’ Katie also let loose a small chuckle.
‘Well I don’t need to tell you what Jess was like,’ Cass continued, ‘you lived it, but when she found out about me, she didn’t just want to kill me she wanted to make me suffer. So, she murdered people close to me and tried to frame me for their murders. She tried to kill Jackson because she wanted me to know the pain of losing someone I loved, but I stepped in front of him and took the bullet that was meant for him.’
‘Holy shit Cassandra,’ Katie breathed.
‘You know what it’s like to love someone so much you’d give your life for them, you feel that way about your daughter.’
Katie nodded.
‘Anyway,’ Cass breathed painfully as her mind was drawn back, ‘Jessica had come to New York under an alias and I gave her a job here.’
‘She worked here?’ Katie asked in surprise.
‘I had no idea who she was at the time, but during her campaign to make me suffer as much as possible she went after Iris, knowing what she meant to me.’
Katie’s eyes widened and her gaze snapped back to the old woman at the desk who was watching her with wary eyes.
‘She hurt Iris?’
‘She smashed in the back of Iris’s head with a hammer,’ Cass swallowed hard. ‘It was a miracle she survived, but the head injury she sustained has left her with permanent damage. Some of it she may still be able to overcome, but she will always have to live with disabilities now and for someone like Iris, who has always been fiercely independent, she’s struggling to adjust. She can’t see how amazing she is for just being rehabilitated this much. Just after the attack they thought she’d be permanently brain damaged, that she wouldn’t be able to swallow or speak. At one point they didn’t think she’d be able to breath on her own, but look at her now.’
She glanced over, her expression filled with love and pride.
‘She’s still frustrated she can’t walk, but she’s come so far. The problem is she looks at you and sees your twin, the one who hurt her. While deep down she may not blame you, she doesn’t trust you, doesn’t trust that you won’t be just like Jess.’
‘I’m not,’ Katie snapped.
‘I know that,’ Cass replied sympathetically, ‘but she doesn’t, and it will take her a while to look past everything that’s happened and really see you. Just give her a chance.’
‘Just how many people know who I really am?’
‘Just some of the staff,’ Cass told her. ‘They knew Jessica and it’s not hard to put two and two together, seeing as you’re twins. They would have figured it out anyway. I figured telling them upfront might make things a little easier.’
‘God,’ Katie breathed as they started walking again, ‘I feel terrible for what she did.’
‘I know, I don’t suppose telling you it’s not your fault is really going to make a difference, is it?’
‘No,’ Katie replied miserably, ‘but whether I like it or not, she was my twin and if I want to stay and make a life here, it means sooner or later I’m going to have to face all the people she’s hurt.’
‘Are you staying?’
‘I don’t know,’ Katie shook her head. ‘I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to, but there’s so much going on at the moment I just don’t know if that’s going to be possible.’
‘Well, we’ll just have to see what we can do about that.’
‘Where are we going anyway?’ Katie asked as they left the library, heading through a large archway into another building.
‘This is all completely new,’ Cass beamed. ‘What we’ve done here is extend into the next building to make a community space. We have several classrooms where we hold everything from AA meetings to Adult Literacy classes, but it’s the upper levels we’re heading to.’
They began climbing up another staircase and when they finally reached the top it opened out into a huge space with several kitchen stations, each set up and complete with preparation area and stove.
‘What’s this?’ Katie asked.
‘We hold cookery classes here, everything from bakery and desserts, to couples cookery. However, I have an idea I hope you might be interested in?’
‘Oh?’
‘Given how amazing the meal was that you cooked for us all the other night I’m going to go out on a limb and say you’re a good cook. We’re short an instructor right now and I’d like to add several classes, such as cooking on a budget, basic cooking and maybe something more advanced. It depends on where your strengths and weaknesses lie.’
‘I see.’
‘What do you think?’ Cass asked nervously.
‘I’d love to.’
‘Thank God,’ Cass let out a breath, ‘I wasn’t sure you’d want to.’
‘Are you kidding? I love to cook and I certainly know how to cook on a budget.’
‘Fantastic,’ Cass clapped her hands together. ‘So, there are recipe books, pads, pencils, if you want to have a look through and think about what you’re going to make. As you can see there are ten stations. If we double everyone up and get them to work in pairs we can take classes of up to twenty. It will be a six-week course of one night a week, so you can arrange your lesson plans accordingly. Once you have them finished pass them to me for approval. I have a local market that we’ll place the orders with and they’ll deliver the ingredients the afternoon of the scheduled lesson.’
‘Okay no problem.’ Katie nodded.
‘There’s someone else I’d like to introduce you to,’ Cass moved across classroom, weaving between the cooking stations until she reached a blonde woman who had been cleaning one of the counters.
Katie had noticed her when she first entered the room but not paid much attention. Now that she was standing in front of her she could see she was of average height, and in her jeans and tank top she could see the woman was incredibly toned. Her short mop of blond hair was shaved at one side, with the rest of her hair flicked over to the other side.
‘Katie, this is Grace,’ she introduced them.
‘It’s nice to meet you,’ Katie held out her hand.
‘You too,’ Grace shook her hand firmly.
‘She’s your bodyguard,’ Cass grinned.
‘What?’
‘I’ll leave you two to get to know each other,’ she gave a little wave and turned toward the door.
Katie turned back to the woman called Grace and studied her carefully.
‘You’re my bodyguard?’
‘Yep,’ she grinned, ‘don’t look like much do I? Then again, I bet people underestimate you too, don’t they?’
‘I guess they do,’ Katie murmured thoughtfully. ‘Sorry, I don’t know, I suppose I just assumed it would be some tall grim-faced dude in a suit, with no sense of humor.’
‘Yeah well, Dex knew that would drive you crazy so he called me in instead. He had this crazy idea we might get on well.’
‘You know Dex?’
‘We’ve met a few times,’ she nodded, ‘I like him, he’s a good man, a good cop. When he needed someone to watch your back he looked me up. Figured it would be more comfortable for you to have someone you can hang out with who can also kick ass.’
Katie laughed out loud.
‘That man just keeps surprising me.’
‘That’s a good thing,’ Grace smiled, revealing little dimples in her cheeks.
‘How’d you end up a bodyguard then?’
Grace turned slightly canting her body more toward Katie, so she could see the details of the tattoo on her shoulder. It was an eagle with a banner and the letters USMC.
‘United States Marine Corps’ Katie replied in surprise, ‘you’re a Marine?’
‘Was,’ she nodded, ‘loved the Corps with all my heart, best time of my life.’
‘What happened?’ she shook her head, ‘sorry that was rude. Of course you don’t have to answer that.’
‘It’s okay,’ she shrugged, ‘my mom got sick.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Katie murmured.
‘Yeah,’ Grace frowned, ‘not much anyone can do about it. Neurological disorder which has caused early onset dementia; she can’t be left on her own anymore and I couldn’t take care of her while I was stationed overseas.’
‘You gave up the Corps to look after your mom?’
Grace shrugged.
‘I loved the Corps, but I love my mom more. I don’t want to look back when she’s gone and wish I’d spent more time with her. She still has lucid periods, so I want to make as many memories with her while I can.’
‘You should,’ Katie nodded, ‘I didn’t get that chance.’
‘No?’
‘Cancer,’ Katie told her, ‘I was only a kid when my mom died.’
‘Sorry to hear that.’
‘It is what it is,’ she shrugged.
‘I hear you got a kid of your own?’
‘Yeah,’ Katie smiled, ‘Hailey, she’s seven.’
‘Well you just light up when you talk about her, don’t you?’
‘It’s the mommy gene,’ Katie laughed, ‘you’re pretty much handed it from the moment you get pregnant.’
‘I’ll have to take your word for it,’ Grace replied in amusement. ‘So, you bake mom cookies then?’
‘Another prerequisite for having a kid.’
‘Then I think we’re gonna get on just fine,’ Grace grinned.
***
Joshua Carnell hustled inside his apartment and slammed the door shut behind him. Shooting the deadbolt he pulled off his baseball cap and glasses, tossing them down negligently on the nearby table.
He scratched absently at the scab along his jawline, the result of the cheap glue he’d used to attach a fake beard. Not his finest hour, but a lesson learned. Not realizing he’d set the wound bleeding again, he headed over to his desk and fired up his laptop.
Ignoring the flashing red light on his answerphone he retrieved the memory card from his camera. He knew damn well the twenty missed calls would all be from his editor. Damn, but why couldn’t the man just be a little more patient? He was close to something big; he could feel it in his gut. The story, when he broke it, would not only completely vindicate him at the paper, but make his career. He’d have his choice of assignment after this. His name would forever be synonymous with his exposure of the corruption of the most elite of New York society, exposing decades of decadence, blackmail and murder.
Slotting the memory card into his laptop he began to scroll through the pictures, picking the ones he wanted and sending them to the printer.
The stillness of the room was broken by the sound of the printer cranking out several photographs. Feeling a sly trickling sliding down his skin, he wiped the thin trail of blood absently from his chin with the cuff of his sleeve as he picked up the pictures and turned to face the wall of his living room.
His couch had been pushed out of the way to allow for a massive evidence map. The plain walls were covered with scraps of paper, newspaper clippings, and photographs all joined together with different colored lengths of string.
He took the first photo and pinned it to the wall, his gaze narrowing as he studied it. It showed the woman who’d piqued his curiosity, wrapped around the oldest Dexter son no less. He’d watched them that morning standing outside the library. The intimate body language and the steamy lip lock he’d witnessed, oh hell yes there was definitely something going on between those two, before adding into the equation that Dexter was, by all accounts, the best friend of Jackson Evans, the younger Carter girl’s fiancé. It was all too closely connected, if he could just work out how all the pieces fitted together.
He took a piece of blue string and wrapped it around the pin. Securing the lip lock picture to the wall, he ran a line between that picture and one of Dex and Jackson standing outside Jackson’s hotel, both of them were wearing hard hats and staring up at the scaffolding as it was erected outside the front facade.
Joshua grabbed a marker and scribbled the name Katie underneath the picture, circling it and drawing a rough arrow pointing to Katie’s face. He’d heard her called that name twice, first by Cassandra Carter then by Detective Dexter. Now if he could just figure out who she really was and how she fitted into this story.
His gaze tracked across to the picture pinned to the wall next to the newest one. It was the picture of Katie and Cassandra meeting at an all-night diner in Queens, close to where Cassandra lived. The picture showed them huddled together over the table as Katie passed her an envelope. His fingers twitched involuntarily, he would’ve loved to have known what was in that letter.
Shaking his head, he followed the piece of green string from that picture to a photo of a lawyer named Rhys Fletcher meeting with Cassandra outside his offices. He was a lawyer, who’d also managed to get the charges against Irina Evans, Cassandra’s future mother in law, dropped. The string then stretched across to a photo of Fletcher stepping out of the Police Precinct where Dexter was based, arm in arm with the mysterious Katie.
He took a step back to study the wider view of his wall. It was like a spider’s web of deceit and lies.
There were newspaper clippings of Philip Carter, Carson Evans, Adele Evans, the murders, the scandals; it was all there with photographs of Dexter, Jackson, Parker, Chloe, Cassandra and then finally Katie. She was the missing part of this puzzle; he could feel it. If he could just figure out the connection.
His eyes grazed over a photograph of Chloe taken at a particular angle and suddenly he sucked in a breath. He pulled out a picture of Chloe and one of Cassandra and put them either side of a close up of Katie. How the hell had he missed the obvious resemblance between them? Was that it? Were they related somehow?
