Chapter 64

SIXTY-FOUR

“No!” Josie pushed Bell aside and scrambled toward Noah. He was on his stomach, arms hanging from the edge. She dropped to her knees and leaned her head over as far as she dared. A long breath gushed from her lungs as she saw Noah’s hands looped through one of Juliet’s elbows. The zip ties binding her wrists gave him more traction, but Josie could see from the veins bulging in his forehead and the way he bared his teeth that he wasn’t going to be able to hold her for long. Juliet was completely limp, dead weight. Josie sprawled onto her stomach beside Noah and reached for the girl. Her arms weren’t as long as Noah’s. With a groan, he tried to lightly swing Juliet toward Josie. It cost him a few inches, his body sliding forward. Josie was too focused on grabbing onto Juliet’s shoulder to register the panic building inside her. With a hand hooked into Juliet’s armpit, she pulled with all her might. Sweat poured down her face. The toes of her boots dug into the stone and her knees pressed against it. Her abs pulled taut, using every ounce of strength she had to help Noah bring the girl back to safety.

They managed to raise Juliet’s body upward, pulling her arms across the stone floor so that the ledge was tucked under her armpits. Her chin dipped to her chest, almost touching the rocky surface. Then a large hand gripped the back of Josie’s neck and dragged her upright. Bell held her against his chest. The blade of the knife bit into her throat. Then came the warm trickle of blood. It pooled in the hollow of her throat. With both hands, she yanked at Bell’s forearm but he was too strong and she was too worried about Noah at their feet, trying to hold Juliet in place. There was no way he’d be able to pull her up entirely. Not without help.

Bell’s hot, rancid breath skated down her jaw. “What do you think you know?”

“Everything,” Josie said.

Noah’s legs trembled with the effort of keeping his body from sliding. The muscles of his forearms twitched as he tried to keep Juliet’s arms pinned in place. Josie’s heart was going so fast, it felt like there was no time at all between beats. Under normal circumstances, she would fight back against Bell, but hand-to-hand combat was messy and unpredictable. Josie couldn’t afford a single misstep. It could get one or all of them killed.

“Tell me,” Bell said.

Josie tried to steady her breath, willing her pulse to slow. She needed to think clearly over the adrenaline barreling through her veins, setting every cell on fire. “Let me help them,” she said.

The knife pinched the tender skin of her throat again. “No. You talk first. Maybe if you’re right, I’ll let one of them live.”

Josie nearly choked on the gasp that bubbled up from her throat. One of them. She’d cross that bridge when she came to it. Right now, Noah had mere minutes before he either lost his grip on Juliet Bowen or went over the side with her. Mentally, she gathered up all the panic running wild in her brain and stuffed it into a box. A very sturdy box. Then she shoved that box into the impenetrable vault inside her where she sent all the things that were too horrible for her mind and body to contain.

Good God, she hoped her theory was right.

“You didn’t kill the Cooks.”

A small bit of tension drained from Bell’s entire body. Josie could feel it from the loosening of the knife against her skin to the momentary weakening of his knees where they dug into the backs of her thighs.

Noah’s breathing was heavy and loud. Guttural noises rose from his throat. Not wanting to waste any more time, Josie forced out the narrative she’d constructed in her head only moments ago as fast as she could. “You didn’t kill them. You—you worked there more than at any other home in the neighborhood. They were like your family. You loved little Fel—Felicity and Miranda, too. Even though she was underage.”

Bell pushed against her back, shuffling their fused bodies closer to Noah and Juliet. His foot shot out, making contact with Noah’s side, just below the kidney. His body jerked. His grip on Juliet faltered. Josie screamed involuntarily, hating the desperate sound. She’d gotten that part wrong.

Trying again, she said, “No, no. You cared for Miranda. Like a sister. You weren’t the one bothering her. You only wanted to protect her. Something was happening in that house. Maybe you saw it or maybe she just told you, but Miranda was in danger. Her—her room. She was putting the furniture up against the door at night, wasn’t she? To keep someone out.”

Bell watched Noah squirm near his feet. Juliet’s body slid another couple of inches. “Who?”

“Simon,” Josie breathed. “It was Simon. He was the one obsessed with Miranda. There was only one witness who stated that you were the one with an unnatural fixation on her, making her uncomfortable. That witness was Simon. When you tried to tell the Cooks what was going on, he turned it around on you. They believed him over you because he was their son.”

A sheen of sweat covered Noah’s forearms. More unintelligible noises came from deep in his chest. Every part of his body shook. Juliet’s forehead rested against the ledge.

“The Cooks fired you because of what Simon said. Miranda corroborated your story, but they didn’t believe her.”

Bell kicked out at Noah again, this time making contact with his hip. Noah was too deep in concentration, trying to keep Juliet from plummeting to her death, to even register it.

“Okay, okay,” Josie said. “She wanted to corroborate your story, but she was too afraid of Simon. He—he threatened her. There was a bag in her room on the day of the murders. It was packed full of clothes and makeup. She was going to leave. You came back that day. First you tried again to convince the Cooks that Simon was a danger to Miranda. They still didn’t listen. You left and came back later, not to hurt anyone. You came back for Miranda. You were going to take her away from the house, but when you got there, everyone was already…dead.”

Bell’s arm was like a vise across her chest, almost cutting off her air. Panting, Josie forged ahead. “Except Simon. You went into the kitchen and found him stabbing little Felicity. His back was to you. He didn’t see you. You took the knife from him and stabbed him three times from behind. He—he fell onto Felicity. You thought she was already dead. You were—you were in shock. Scared. No one believed you when you told them the truth about Simon. Why would they believe you when it came to the murders? So you ran.”

His grip tightened on her, but she no longer felt the knife against her throat. Shoving her forward, he lifted a foot in Noah’s direction. Josie yanked at his forearm. “Please,” she screamed. “Please. Don’t.”

Instead of kicking, Bell planted his foot across one of Noah’s quaking calves and applied pressure. Noah hissed in pain.

“The knife! The knife!” Hysteria sent her voice up an octave. “The butcher block on the countertop was full. There weren’t any knives missing. Simon was a minor. He wouldn’t have been able to buy a hunting knife or anything like that, but no one would have stopped him from buying a kitchen knife. It had a sheath. A brown leather sheath. It was on his bed that day but no one noticed it. It was next to his iPod. It was way too big to be a cover for an iPod but no one ever bothered to look that closely. But most importantly, the knife itself—the DNA of all the Cooks and Miranda was found on the blade but only two people left DNA on the handle. You and Simon.”

Bell ground his heel into the back of Noah’s calf. Josie realized that he wasn’t struggling quite as much. He had gotten a better grip on Juliet. Was Bell still trying to hurt him or keep him in place?

“Why didn’t you tell everyone it was Simon?” That was the part that Josie couldn’t figure out. Why hadn’t Bell simply pointed a finger at Simon?

Against her back, she felt a low growl vibrate inside Bell’s chest. His foot came off Noah’s calf. He started to slide. Josie racked her brain, trying not to give in to the screaming, swirling tornado of panic bumping against the limits of her consciousness.

“Please,” she begged, watching as Juliet’s forehead slipped beneath the ledge. Words rushed from her mouth, so fast, she could barely keep them in order. “Wait. I know. I can think of it. Your—your mug shot! You tried to tell the police when you were arrested but they beat the shit out of you. It was Lampson, wasn’t it? He refused to take a statement where you named Simon Cook. You were his suspect. It was a slam dunk. He was—he was lazy like that and then Bowen! Bowen! He—he didn’t believe you. He said no one else would. You could use the ‘I walked in after the fact’ defense but accusing a boy whose family had just been slaughtered and admitting you’d stabbed him would be too damaging. Nobody would buy it, especially because you ran.”

As a defense attorney, Andrew Bowen was required to present whatever defense his client offered, regardless of its merit. Instead, he’d bullied a scared and vulnerable Bell, insisting he not accuse Simon at all.

“Bowen didn’t need much of a defense anyway because he could get the knife thrown out,” Josie continued.

Bell put his foot back on Noah’s leg. Josie’s entire body went weak with momentary relief. “If Bowen had believed you, presented the defense you gave him, and let the knife come into evidence, maybe Simon could have been charged. But he didn’t care about Simon or even who killed the Cooks. All he cared about was getting you acquitted because that was his job.”

She strongly doubted her colleagues at the time would have gone back and reviewed the evidence with a view toward developing Simon as a suspect, but there was enough there to have supported Roger’s claims, had Bowen let him testify to them. Had the knife been admissible.

“Jo—Josie,” Noah choked.

She tugged at Bell’s forearm again. “Please. Help them. Or let me help them.”

“You forgot the most important part,” Bell whispered in her ear. “The reason we’re here.”

Josie didn’t want to expend any more mental energy playing Roger Bell’s game. She wanted to beg for the lives of her husband and Juliet Bowen but knew it would do no good. “Felicity. No, Jenna. You tracked her down to protect her.”

The arm around her chest let up, allowing her to draw a full breath, finally. She kept going. “You were afraid Simon would find her and probably you, too, and finish what he started. You felt obligated to watch over her since he was still out there. You fell in love with Sheila and Jenna.”

Bell’s arm fell to Josie’s waist, holding her so loosely now. She wondered if she could lunge forward, slip out of his grasp, and dive onto Noah’s quivering body in time. Bell’s voice was scratchy. “Jenna was everything to me. Everything that was good and pure and beautiful in the world. She was my second chance. My silver lining. A miracle. Then she died. A murder that took fifteen years to claim its victim.”

“Yes,” Josie said. “Her cardiac issues were from the stab wounds Simon inflicted, weren’t they? The heart muscle was too damaged, too weakened to survive long-term.”

Josie felt something hot and wet against her temple and realized that Bell was weeping. “Sheila tried to get her on the transplant list, but the wait was too long. I would rather have served a half dozen life terms in prison than watch my little girl waste away and die. He took her from me that day and every single person who showed up afterward let him.”

He released her, pushing her toward Noah as he lifted his foot. The knife clattered to the ground. Bell strode away from them, toward the opposite side of the plateau. Josie had no time to see what he would do next. She threw herself onto her stomach and started to haul Juliet Bowen back up onto the Overlook. Noah’s grip was weak, his arms shaking so badly, it was hard to believe he had any strength left in them. Once they’d pulled Juliet’s upper body to safety, Josie gently pushed Noah aside and dragged her the rest of the way.

Noah flipped onto his back and stared at the drone floating overhead, chest heaving. Josie pressed two fingers to Juliet’s throat, relieved to find a thready pulse. It was then that she noticed Roger staring at her from across the stone floor, his back to the darkness, heels kissing the abyss beyond.

“Roger, wait.”

A sad smile touched his lips. “Detective Quinn. Do you know how it feels to lose everything?”

Josie stood up, advancing on him. “I know what it feels like to lose someone you love.”

She should have known this was how he would end things. Deep down, she had known it.

He held up a hand, stopping her in her tracks. “You want to protect the innocent? Then protect the innocent. Don’t come after me.”

There was nothing she could do. In the time it would take to reach him, he’d be gone. “But…” she spluttered. “The last polaroid. You can’t—the plan, your game—it’s unfinished.”

“You found this place,” Bell said, a peace so palpable spreading across his face, Josie could feel its wave where she stood. Dammit. No matter what he’d lost, he should be held accountable for his crimes.

“No,” she said. “The polaroid you left in Juliet’s bed. The one taken inside my home.”

His calm expression faltered. Confusion flickered in his eyes. “I didn’t take a polaroid from inside your home.”

The fine hairs on Josie’s arms and the back of her neck rose. “Then who did?”

He shook his head.

“The older woman helping you,” Josie blurted. “Her?”

Again, that slow, morose shake of his head. “She’s innocent in all this. She just wanted to help me. She had no idea what I was doing.”

“Then who took the last polaroid?” Josie demanded. Her voice was getting high-pitched again.

He mumbled something to himself, but Josie couldn’t make it out. She stepped closer, now tempted to go after him, to try to drag him back to the center of the perch they were on and do whatever she had to do to get an answer. She opened her mouth to interrogate him further, but he spoke before she could get a word out.

“Losing everything you love feels like falling,” he said. “From a very great height.”

Then he crossed his arms over his chest and let his body fall.