Page 184 of Our Little Secret
Again he flinched, this time his lips flattening against his teeth.
“I know about her, and I’m not the only one. So no matter what happens tonight, no matter what you do to me, you’re already found out. It’s just a matter of time. Good thing you’re a patient man.”
He warned, “You leave Emme out of this.”
“Why, because you killed her?”
Get out. Don’t goad him! Appeal to his obsession for you. Pretend that you still care for him, that breaking up with him was a mistake.
But she couldn’t.
The man repulsed her.
And he wouldn’t believe it anyway.
She had to find some way to escape.
After she got his confession, the proof she needed to expose him. To stop him. Her heart thundered, her neck taut, every muscle tense.
“Kill Emme?” he repeated. “Is that what you think?”
“That’s what happened.”
He was shaking his head. “Emme fell overboard.”
“And you didn’t save her? Didn’t go to the police?” she challenged, so close to the fireplace that she felt the heat radiating from the coals. From the corner of her eye she saw the poker.
“No one would believe me.”
“Because you murdered your family? Because the police are still trying to figure out how to prove that you killed them and staged the accident? Killing them along with the driver of the log truck, a completely innocent man?”
Brooke, why the hell are you incensing him? Why? Run! He’s said enough for the police. Get out and run! Now!
“You’ve got it all wrong,” he said, his lips barely moving. “All wrong.”
“I don’t think so,” she said. “You already tried to kill me. I remember.”
“You’re the one who brought the gun,” he reminded her. “I found it, you know,” he said as she kept slowly moving toward the fireplace. “I’ve got it.”
“On your boat? Where the hell is theMedusa?”
“Dry dock,” he said. “I’d hoped you and I would sail off on it.”
“Are you kidding? After what you’ve done to me, to my family?”
He was so nuts. And so dangerous.
“It was all a game.”
“Not a game, Elijah,” she said, her pulse pounding in her eardrums.
“Gideon. Call me Gideon.”
“Murder isnota game, Elijah.” She reached the firebox and his eyes had followed her every move. “You’re a murderer and you’ve been living a lie all your adult life. And the walls are closing in. And just for the record, Ineverloved you. Never. I was just unhappy and you came along and I made the worst mistake of my life. I didn’t evenwantyou. I was just using you to fill a void, to get back at my cheating husband,” she said, realizing the truth. “I despise you.” She flung herself toward the poker.
“You bitch!” He leaped, the axe raised.
Hand on the poker, she whirled, ducking his blow and slamming the iron poker over the back of his head.
