Charlie could feel time running out. “Did you kill your sister?”
Lacey slowed at the next doorway to meet Charlie’s gaze. “I would never have hurt Lindy. Never.” Her voice broke. “It was him. Patrick Gregory Shafer. He had told her that he was in love with her. I tried to warn her. She didn’t know anything about men. That night I met him out in the woods. He thought I was Lindy. I told him I didn’t love him and that I never wanted to see him again. I did it for her own good.” Tears filled Lacey’s eyes. “How was I to know that he could come back that night when he heard Lindy screaming for you to let her back in?”
Charlie felt her heart drop. She remembered what Shep had told her. “But Lindy had to know about the key hidden at the back door.”
As they passed through another doorway, she saw that they had entered the kitchen. It was empty with breakfast over and lunch still hours away except for several prep cooks who took off the moment they spotted the gun.
“I didn’t have time to put the key back,” Lacey said. “By the time I looked out the basement window and saw them arguing, it was too late. I couldn’t get to her in time.”
The words shocked her. “You saw Greg kill her?”
“He didn’t know there were two of us. He didn’t know.” The words came out on a ragged breath. “I just wanted him to leave Lindy alone. She couldn’t have a boyfriend. Why couldn’t she see that?” Her voice broke. “I didn’t know he was going to kill her. He thought she was the one who’d said all those awful words to him. He didn’t know about me. Not until he saw me walk into his wedding and shoot him. He looked like he’d seen a ghost. But then he knew. That second when I pulled the trigger. He knew the mistake he’d made killing Lindy.”
Charlie felt the grip on her arm loosen. She saw her chance as Lacey pulled her past hanging racks of pots and pans and large stoves...past where the two prep cooks had been working. Charlie spotted the knife lying next to a chopped pile of veggies. Pretending to stumble, she brushed the edge of the large metal table and surreptitiously grabbed the blade’s handle. Just as quickly, she broke free of Lacey’s grip, shoved her and the barrel of the pistol away from her head and drove the knife into Lacey’s side.
A shot went wild, pinging off the wall behind Charlie’s head.
Lacey looked down at the knife protruding from her side and aimed the gun this time.
Charlie had only a second to reach for one of the cast iron skillets hanging next to her. She swung it as hard and fast as she could. The heavy skillet struck Lacey’s arm and the gun broke from her grasp, flying through the air to skitter across the floor away from them.
Before Charlie could swing the skillet again, Lacey struck her in the chest with her fist, knocking her back. The blow reminded her of the one that had struck her in the shoulder blades up on the ski hill.
Charlie crashed into one of the tables full of pots and pans and went down, the cookware clattering around her as everything hit the floor.
She watched breathless as Lacey pulled the knife blade from her side, dropped it and went after the gun.
* * *
SHEP HAD raced down the hallway where he’d last seen Charlie and Lacey. He followed the sound of hurrying footfalls through a maze of hallways. He tried to make sense of what he’d just seen.
Lacey had shot Greg. Or did she know him as Patrick? There was no doubt that she knew who he was. Otherwise why shoot him? But then again, why shoot him at all, especially on his wedding day? Shep could think of only one reason she would do that. It was all tied to whatever had happened the night Lindy was murdered all those years ago. Tied to why Lacey had come back.
But now Lacey had Charlie. He knew how she had felt about Charlie all those years ago, how she’d tormented her. More recently, Lacey had tried to scare her. Or was it warn her? Either way she had a gun and Charlie. He thought of the destroyed doll and didn’t even want to contemplate on what malicious feelings Lacey still harbored against Charlie.
He’d gotten turned around a couple of times and for a few moments, he’d thought he’d lost them for good. He didn’t hear the echo of footfalls ahead of him.
Then he heard a gunshot on the other side of a door.
Shep hit the door at a run and burst into a huge hotel kitchen. Lacey was raising the gun, aiming... He rushed forward, thinking only of stopping her at all costs. Before he could reach her, Charlie swung a large cast iron skillet, catching the wrist of Lacey’s gun hand. The gun went flying as Lacey shoved Charlie into a table, and Charlie went down in a shower of pots and pans.
Lacey saw him and went scrambling toward something on the floor. The gun.
He ran at her full bore, slammed into her and took them both to the floor. She grabbed the gun, tried to raise it. He shoved her harder to the floor and twisted the weapon from her grip, putting all of his weight on her to hold her down.
Behind them, he heard Charlie getting to her feet.
“Why?” she asked as she came over to Lacey. “Why stalk me if you were really after Greg?”
“You worked with him. I thought you knew,” Lacey said.
“I didn’t know,” Charlie said, sounding close to tears.
“You locked her out,” Lacey spat.
“The back door was open,” Shep said. “Greg came in after he killed your sister. He would have killed Charlie, too, if that policeman hadn’t come to the front when he did. Where were you? Hiding somewhere?”
Lacey made a sound like wounded animal and began to cry.
“You were the one who cut my hair,” Charlie said. “It was you. The doll—”
Lacey cut off her tears with a laugh as brittle as glass and just as sharp. “I cut your hair.” She chuckled. “When I told Cara... It was her idea to cut the doll’s hair. She always wondered about the doll her mother kept on the top shelf in her room and wouldn’t let her touch.” Lacey laughed. “My little sister.”
Two security officers came running in, guns drawn. Shep handed Lacey over to them and turned to find Charlie still holding the huge cast iron skillet. He took it from her and set it on one of the metal tables.
They could hear Lacey’s laughter echoing through the hotel. Charlie’s eyes filled as she stepped into his arms.
EPILOGUE
THAT FOLLOWING SUMMER, the wedding was small and held in a meadow alive with wildflowers. Shep would have married Charlie sooner, but by the time everything with Lacey was sorted out, he had to get back to school, back to his students, back to teaching. Charlie had needed time to come to grips with the past and look for another job closer to Stevensville, where he was.
The winter had been long, the spring even longer. It had been a time of healing. Shep talked to Charlie every day as she began to stitch her past and present together. She knew now that she wasn’t responsible for Lindy’s death. So many people were involved in what happened that night—Lacey at the forefront. Shep and Charlie told the police everything that Lacey had confessed to them.