Dead Past

all I have left.”
    “Catherine, don’t do this. Dr. Fallon’s not the bad guy here.” It was Archie Donahue.
    “Archie,” said Diane, “I was so hoping you weren’t part of this.”
    “I know you were. I came to see you today to explain,” he said. “Catherine’s my sister. Kimberlyn was her daughter, my niece. She was the girl who was pregnant. We didn’t know, but the baby would have been Catherine’s only grandchild.” He stopped and almost cried from the pain. “That was her hair you looked at. That was our Kimberlyn’s hair.”
    “I am so sorry,” said Diane.
    “Catherine, let’s get out of the cold. Let’s talk,” said Archie. “Please.”
    “Get up,” Catherine said.
    “The police are coming,” said Diane.
    “No, they aren’t,” said Archie. “I knew you’d call for back up. I used my partner’s car number and cancelled it. They’ll figure it out sooner or later, but it’ll be too late.”
    Too late for what, wondered Diane. Archie helped her up off the ground and led her toward the adjacent house, the one that was empty because of renovations from the fire damage. So, this was where they had been hiding out.
    Inside the house was barely warmer than the outside. The only lights were from the glow of lanterns. Catherine pushed Diane down in a chair.
    “It’s not too late to stop this,” said Diane.
    “I don’t want to stop it,” said Catherine. “I want that son of a bitch to know what he’s done. I want him to sit down in that burned-out shell that my baby died in and know what he did to her.”
    “You think he was involved in the meth lab?” said Diane.
    “I know he was,” said Archie. “McNair and his cousin Eric were up to their necks in the business. His wife doesn’t have money. Catherine lives next door to them. She knows the wife,” said Archie. “McNair was in Adler’s pocket. Adler isn’t clean. Why do you think he gutted the drug unit?”
    “I know this is hard . . . ,” said Diane.
    Catherine slapped Diane across the face. “You don’t know anything,” she spat at her. “You don’t know anything.”
    “Catherine!” said Archie.
    Diane looked into her hate-filled eyes. “I know exactly. Someone worse than Adler and McNair killed my daughter, so don’t you dare tell me that I don’t know.”
    Catherine was taken aback. She stared at Diane, stunned. For a moment Diane saw the humanity come back into her face.
    “Then how can you try to stop me?” she whispered.
    “You can’t let yourself become like them,” said Diane.
    “I’m not like them. How can you compare what I’m doing with what they did? I’m just getting rid of what you people can’t. Archie told me what you people talked about. How you can only pick up the pieces.”
    “Blake Stanton wasn’t a part of the meth lab,” said Diane.
    “I tried to tell her,” said Archie. Diane could see tears in his eyes. “I tried to tell her.”
    “Why did he try to hijack your car? I heard about that.” Catherine’s gaze darted toward Archie.
    “Because he was stealing from my museum and he thought I knew about it. Like your daughter, he just happened to be at the party. He was completely innocent of the meth lab crimes. And he has a mother just like you who is in unbearable pain because someone killed her baby,” said Diane.
    Diane saw it in her eyes, the sudden flash of guilt. She is the one who killed Stanton. And Archie killed McNair. McNair was probably guilty, but Stanton didn’t have anything to do with her daughter’s death.
    “No, you’re lying,” she said.
    But Diane knew Catherine believed her.
    “If he . . .”
    There was a pop, like a lightbulb being stepped on, and Catherine stopped talking and stared; a dot of red dripped in the center of her forehead and she fell to the floor.
    “What?” said Archie.
    Another lightbulb bursting, and he went down, too, the back of his head blown out.

Chapter 54

    Diane stared at the two dead bodies for a second before she dove from the chair and skidded across the linoleum. Get away from the windows, her brain told her. She crawled across to the door into another room. It was a dining room that opened onto a deck. She saw a shadow on the deck from the moonlight. She crawled on her belly from the dining room into the carpeted living room.
    What is this, she thought? Payback for McNair or Stanton? Drug dealers looking for revenge? SWAT team? Adler loose from his bonds? She crawled across the floor looking for a place