“Tell me Raven’s alive,” he warned without moving.
Her eyebrows rose slightly. “Why don’t you come see for yourself.” She chuckled and waved the gun.
“If you shoot me, everyone will hear it,” he said, still not moving.
“We’ll simply tell them you attacked us.” She turned her head slightly, and he noticed a dark bruise on her cheek. He hoped that Raven was the one who had given the mark to her.
Then her words hit him.
“We?” he asked, feeling his stomach roll. If it was just Heather, there might be a chance he could overpower her. But if there were two…
“She likes to go into hiding.” Heather’s face twisted slightly. “So, I take over and do what needs to be done.”
What was she talking about? She? Heather? Then he stilled and realized he was no longer talking to Heather. Whoever it was standing in front of him wasn’t the sexy brunette that always flirted with him. Instead, it was the murderer pointing the gun at his chest. The gun waved towards the stairs. “Down the stairs or you won’t see the bitch again.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you,” he reiterated, still trying to understand it all.
“Fine by us.” Heather shrugged. “But if you want to see that bitch alive”—she glanced down at her watch and smiled— “you have about five minutes left before she suffocates.”
Cade jerked towards her, but she held up the gun and then motioned with it towards the stairs.
“Tut, tut, do you honestly think you could search this entire place in that short of time?”
He turned and walked fast, taking the stairs quickly, ignoring the pain in his ankle as he went.
“Where?” he barked out. When she motioned with the gun towards a door, he pushed through it quickly. He couldn’t remember being in this part of the resort before. It looked old, untouched by all the changes and upgrades. Which meant chances were good that no one had been down here in a while.
There were shelves and shelves of bottled wine and unopened bottles of hard liquor and soda machine syrups. The entire room was no bigger than his closet.
“Where is she?” he growled out.
Heather smiled. “Aren’t you going to ask us why?”
“Why?” He continued to scan the room in search of Raven.
“Why we killed old Joe, snooping Rachelle, and gossip Kim.” She laughed, the deep sound reverberating in the small space. “Not to mention the worst party throwers on the face of the planet, controlling Steve and his dumb wife, stupid, gullible Amy.” He lost what she was saying. Who were Steve and Amy? Then he stilled when he heard the next name. “As well as the boy who wouldn’t give us the time of day, until I roofied him at a party.” Another laugh. “Cheating Reggie.” Her smile grew. “That was a fun night. Until he threatened to tell on us.” Cade’s eyes grew at the knowledge that his brother had basically been raped by this girl more than ten years ago. “That’s right. Now you’re catching up.” Heather’s eyes practically glowed with mischief, and he could see more of the madness within. Could tell for sure that this was no longer the woman he’d seen around town. The girl he remembered from school. This was something darker. Something full of evil. Full of hate.
“You. You’re the one who set the fire?” he asked.
“Ding, ding, ding.” She laughed as the gun wavered. “I was stuck. The bitch somehow locked me away until she needed me again, when the original bitch returned and brought old Joe back into town. Delivered him right into our hands.”
For the first time since running into her, he watched as worry flashed in her eyes. As if Heather, the real Heather, was trying to break free.
“She thought she’d gotten rid of our past. That he’d walked away. Then he came back and threatened to expose our little high school enterprise.”
“Enterprise?” he asked.
She laughed. “Since our parents wouldn’t pay for all the things we liked, we had to make money somehow. So, I was born.” He remembered the grainy image of the redhead and Colin causing him to recoil at the memory. “I kept her safe and did what had to be done. I always have and always will.”
“You… and Colin, as well as Joseph?” he asked.
“Just a few of our clients that kept her in the style she liked. In what she deserved.” She shrugged. Cade thought about the other people she’d murdered.
“Why the fire?” he asked.
“You were long gone by then, but they had the audacity to throw us the worst party ever. People were talking about it, making fun of her. Gossiping.” Her voice rose to an almost scream and he got a glimpse into her ugliness.
“So, you set the fire?” He shook his head. “That doesn’t add up.”
“She hated it. Hated them all. Everyone needed to burn.” A slow smile twisted her lips. “Here’s a little tidbit that no one else knows. Both of her parents were already dead when the house burned up.” She laughed again. “I knew all about Raven and Reggie’s plans to meet at midnight for her birthday. Of course, her parents, being the perfect people they were, would have the perfect party once again for Raven. So, we followed the two lovers out there, held in our rage and laughs as they quarreled over poor ol’ Reggie’s infidelities. It was too perfect when Raven threw the candle down. We finally had a way out of this hellhole. A way to get rid of everyone we hated. Everyone who had betrayed us. Controlled us. Used us.”
He wanted to glance at his watch. Surely more than five minutes had passed by now. Was Raven still alive? Had Heather just been lying about the time?
“We never expected the bitch to live,” Heather said with a sigh. “But even that worked out to my benefit. There was someone to blame. Misdirection. Until she returned.”
“Where is Raven?” he asked forcefully.
“Don’t you want to hear about ol’ Joe?” She tilted her head slightly. “He was easy. We’d planned it out for a while. A little flirting with the repairmen working on the elevators. He showed me how to turn the power to the elevator on and wait for ol’ Joe to step in, then off they went, halfway up. We hadn’t expected it to be so perfect.” She waved the gun. “A knock over the head was easy enough with this when he was trying to climb out of the stuck thing. Then, after turning the power back on and disabling the security controls on the outdated elevator”—she laughed and swiped her finger across her throat— “the doors did the rest. All I had to do was hit the button.” She shrugged and laughed again. “It was perfect seeing his blood all over Raven. We enjoyed watching her slip and slide and fall into it. Very funny.”
He felt his anger grow and understood that there wasn’t anything he could do to stop her from telling him everything.
“Do you want to hear all about Rachelle?” she asked cheerfully. “You see, Rachelle and our mother had been besties.” She rolled her eyes as she crossed her arm over her chest, propping up her gun arm as if she were tired of holding the thing pointed at his chest. “She suspected about us. Somehow, she knew. Then she found the Polaroids we’d kept and well… intuitively knew it was us. She confronted us, accused us of killing old Joe and of needing counseling because of the photos.” Heather’s laugh turned higher. “She thought we’d been raped by ol” Joe. Then she started to demand that we go get help.” She laughed, the gun shaking with her movement. “Like there is any help for us. So…” She smiled. “We took some of the pesticides they keep stored in the supply room across the hallway and asked her to meet us for some tea to discuss it. After I slipped a little into her cup, that is. Simple as that.”