The Perfect Bride

Chapter Fifteen

“Rosie.”

It was the answer Adam had somehow expected, but that still didn’t mean it made a damn bit of sense.

He stared at the bowed head of the defeated man before him in disbelief. “What are you telling me?” he demanded. “Rosie’s not your wife?”

“No,” Ed confirmed sadly. “She just got to telling people that and I went along with it. Was easier than fighting with her and it made her happy. God knows, there were few enough things that could do that.”

“Why would your sister tell people you were married?”

Ed sighed heavily. “Rosie always wanted to get married, ever since she was a little girl. Was always pretending to be walking down the aisle, talking about putting on that white dress, used to make me act like I was her groom and march around with her.” He grimaced. “When she was nineteen she got engaged to this fellow in the town where we grew up. She was finally going to get that wedding she’d been talking about all those years. Except in the end he ran off with somebody else. Stood her up at the altar. I’ll never forget what she looked like standing there when they told her he’d gone off with another woman. Like somebody’d ripped her heart out. I mean, that’s basically what the guy did.

“She never got over it. She...had some troubles after that, tried to kill herself, started lashing out at people. She wasn’t fit to be around people for a while. They took her away and put her in a home for a time. But after our folks died, I couldn’t afford to keep her there, so I brought her home to keep an eye on her myself. But Porter, the man she was supposed to marry, had come back with the woman he ran off with and they were living there. When Rosie came back things got ugly, and I had to get us out of town.”

Adam felt a flicker of disquiet thinking about just how “ugly” things must have gotten that they would have had to leave town.

“We started traveling around, looking for work where I could keep an eye on her and she could stay out of trouble. When we came here, it seemed perfect. Quiet. Out of the way. And when she saw that picture in the front hall of Mr. Sutton and his wife, she wanted to live here most of all. She told Mr. Sutton that we were married before I could say different, said she was humiliated having people know she was an old maid who needed her brother to take care of her. I didn’t know how to tell him the truth without having to explain why Rosie would say something like that. We needed the work and I didn’t want him to figure he wouldn’t want us around. So I went along with it and let everybody think we were married. It was easy enough. We have the same last name and all. And it made her happy.”

“What about you? Didn’t you ever want to get married yourself, have a family of your own?”

“I never had time to think much about it. I had to take care of her. And frankly, after hearing her talk about weddings and marriage all this time, it kind of put me off the whole thing.”

Adam supposed he couldn’t blame him for that, but there were a hell of a lot of other things he could. “You had to know it was a bad idea to have her here once we started having weddings.”

“I was hoping I could keep an eye on her well enough to keep her out of trouble. I was hoping it would be all right.”

“You should have told me the truth.”

“She’s my sister. I was just trying to do right by her.”

“What about the people she hurt? You obviously knew she was responsible for what happened to Courtney Miller.”

“I didn’t know for sure,” the man protested weakly.

“But you had to suspect. And when Jillian ‘fell’ down the stairs? Did you know Rosie pushed her? Or was that you, trying to ‘scare’ her?”

“I wouldn’t do that! I wasn’t trying to hurt anybody.”

“You were just willing to stand by and do nothing while Rosie did.” As the man had implied earlier, Adam could certainly relate to the instinct to do right by his sister. But what the man had done—what he’d apparently let Rosie get away with—was in no way justifiable, sibling loyalty be damned.

From the way the man wouldn’t look at him and didn’t bother trying to defend himself, he knew it, too.

But Ed wasn’t the real problem here. Knowing exactly how disturbed Rosie was, Adam was no longer sure Jillian could be safe as long as she wasn’t alone. He didn’t want Meredith anywhere near the woman, either.

A sense of foreboding suddenly filled him, every instinct going on alert.

“I need to find out where Rosie is. Now.”

* * *

JILLIAN STARED AT the woman in bewilderment. “What are you talking about?” she said weakly. Even her voice sounded faint. “Take care of me?”

Moving with an unmistakable sense of purpose, Rosie stalked toward her. “I can’t let you go ahead and get married, can I? Not when you don’t deserve it. Not when you’re nothing but a tramp.”

The words didn’t make any sense. None of this made any sense. “I don’t understand.”

Before Jillian could protest, the woman bent down and hooked her arm around Jillian’s back, hoisting her out of the chair and fully upright. Jillian couldn’t seem to get her legs under her. It didn’t seem to matter as Rosie practically carried her toward the door, Jillian’s feet barely touching the ground.

“You’re just like the last one,” Rosie muttered, her voice thickening with anger. “No, you’re worse. I saw the way she looked at Zack, with lust in her eyes. She was going to put on that beautiful white dress and marry someone when she was panting after somebody else. But at least she didn’t go to bed with him. Unlike you. You slept with Adam, and you still sat there, planning your wedding, preparing to marry one man when you had the stink of another on you. Whore.”

The woman’s insults didn’t even penetrate the haze clouding Jillian’s mind. The only thing that did was one stark fact. “You killed Courtney.”

“I had no choice, now did I?” Rosie said, with what almost sounded like pride. “I couldn’t let her desecrate the sanctity of marriage. I couldn’t let her make a mockery of those sacred vows she clearly didn’t respect. Neither of you deserve that ceremony. You don’t deserve those vows. I did. I saved myself. I never looked at another man. And I never got that beautiful wedding. I never got to be a bride, or a wife.”

“But you are married,” Jillian protested, trying to make sense of the woman’s rambling.

“Lies,” Rosie hissed practically in her ear. “It’s all lies. Lies so nobody would know my shame. I had to pretend Ed was my husband to keep anybody from knowing my disgrace. Knowing that I was living with my brother, that I didn’t have a husband and never had. I had to live this pale imitation of a real woman’s life, everybody thinking I had what I’d really been robbed of.”

Ed wasn’t her husband? This wasn’t making any sense, along with so many other things. For instance— “What are you going to do to me?”

“I’m afraid you’re going to take an unfortunate tumble down the basement stairs. They’re so steep, I’ve always been afraid someone would fall and break their neck. Sadly, it’s going to be you.”

“You can’t think you’ll get away with this.”

“Of course I will. Just like I did with the last one. Nobody figured out she didn’t die in an accident, and no one will with you, either.”

“I figured it out,” Jillian declared. A surge of fury rushed through her, piercing the fuzziness in her head and giving her a brief burst of strength. “I didn’t come here to get married. Courtney Miller was my best friend. I knew her death was no accident. I’ve told people back home about my investigation. If anything happens to me, they’ll know it was no accident.”

“But you didn’t know it was me, otherwise you would have been more suspicious and you wouldn’t have drunk the tea. That means no one else does, too.”

“Someone will come along now. They’ll see what you’re doing.”



“Everyone’s busy dealing with that tree. Ray and Zack are outside. Ed and Adam are all the way upstairs on the other side of the house. Grace went to check the other rooms in the west wing to make sure there weren’t any other problems that needed to be handled. And Meredith’s taking a nap.”

“They’ll still know it wasn’t an accident. They’ll find the drug in my bloodstream. They’ll know I didn’t just fall.”

“By the time anyone finds you, most of it should be out of your bloodstream. And I’ll leave some of the pills in your luggage so they’ll think the drugs were yours anyway. Too bad you took some before you decided to snoop.”

“But they’ll know Meredith was drugged, too.”

“Obviously you did that, to give yourself time to snoop. After all, the pills are yours.”



They’d made it to the dining room. Rosie tsked softly under her breath. “You’ve only given me one more reason why you have to die. Pretending to be a bride? You really have no shame, do you? No respect for what that means.”

Clearly there was not going to be any reasoning with the woman. She was completely insane. Jillian’s only chance was to fight back physically, not with mere words. She struggled to force her limbs into compliance. She got only the barest flicker of response. They felt numb, almost as if they were no longer attached to her body. Panic rose inside her the more she struggled to get any kind of reaction from them. She didn’t believe Adam would believe this was an accident or there was any way Rosie would get away with this. But that wouldn’t do Jillian any good if she was dead.

“That might actually make this work better,” Rosie muttered under her breath. “It’s going to look suspicious to have another bride die around here. But if you’re not really a bride then it won’t look so strange. Everyone already knows you’ve been poking your nose around here, going places you don’t belong. It only makes sense that you’d try to go down to the basement. These stairs are steep. Anybody would trip and fall on them. Too bad for you that you decided to sneak down there when everyone was busy with the storm.”

At this point Jillian suspected the woman was no longer trying to convince her. Rosie was simply talking to herself, her frenzied ramblings only deepening the impression that she’d gone that far over the edge.

They finally reached the kitchen, Rosie pushing through the revolving door. Jillian immediately spotted the open door Rosie began guiding her to.

The doorway to the basement.

It stood black and empty. Waiting for her.

Frantically, Jillian tried harder to get her limbs to move. She felt the faintest, tiniest trace of response in her arms and legs. She worked harder, trying to build her strength, trying not to give her efforts away. Maybe the woman would think she’d finally passed out, maybe she would lower her guard. Jillian needed her to, needed every advantage she could get. She might have only one chance to strike, only one shot to fight the woman off.

She finally felt her muscles begin to tighten, her strength gathering, wanting to lash out. She couldn’t do it too soon. She needed just the right moment. She would need every last bit of strength, even if she wondered if there was really any way she could fight the woman off, any way she could prevent her from throwing her down those stairs...

The door came ever closer. Jillian’s terror climbed with each step that brought them nearer.

This was it. She had to do it. She’d have to use whatever strength she had. The door was only ten feet away.

Then five.

Three—

“Rosie, stop!”

Adam. Jillian recognized the voice immediately, joy and relief and excitement exploding inside her in a giddy rush. He was here. He’d found her.

Her body tensing in shock, Rosie whirled around, pulling Jillian with her, in front of her—

So she no longer faced the basement door.

Rosie’s hold relaxed the slightest bit.

Now.

Adrenaline surging, Jillian jerked her leg up and stomped hard on Rosie’s foot. At the same moment, she threw her elbows back, driving them hard into the woman’s gut, propelling herself forward.

With a screech, Rosie’s hold loosened entirely, releasing her.

Jillian tumbled forward, the floor rushing toward her. Her legs flying upward, she kicked out to ward the woman off further, making contact one more time.

She landed hard on her belly, her arms and legs crashing against the floor. Cringing at the pain, she automatically tried to scramble onto her hands and knees, knowing she had to get away, knowing Rosie was still coming after her. Terrified, she managed to turn her head back toward the woman.

Or where Rosie should have been.

Jillian froze, her heart thudding in her ears, shock ricocheting through her.

Rosie wasn’t there.

The doorway stood empty, gaping with darkness.

Then Jillian heard it, an eternity later, the crack at the bottom of the stairs, the terrible snap, the noise so ugly and horrifying there was no mistaking what it was.

Jillian closed her eyes, bile rising in her throat in horror. No other sound came from the bottom of the stairs.

It was what Rosie had intended for her. Instead, she’d been the one to take that tumble into the basement.

“Jillian!”

And then Adam was there, reaching for her. He gently turned her over onto her back, leaning over her once more. “Are you okay?”

“I think so,” she managed to say. “Just...drowsy. Meredith?”

“She’s out cold, but I think just sleeping. I need to check on her again.”

“Go,” she murmured.

“I’m not leaving you here,” he said. In one fluid motion, he had her back in his arms. A place, she had to admit, where it felt very good to be.

Holding her close to his chest, he rose to his feet. “Wait,” she said when he would have turned away. “I need to see.” Had to know for sure.

He paused, allowing her to glance back. Down the stairs.

Rosie lay at the bottom, her head twisted at an unnatural, impossible angle, her eyes staring blankly upward.

“All right,” Jillian murmured, already glancing away. She took no pleasure from the sight, only the confirmation that the woman wasn’t a threat anymore—and never would be again.

Adam began to turn away again. As he did, she finally saw the person standing behind him.

Ed loomed in the doorway, his large body stiff and menacing.

Jillian tensed in alarm, opening her mouth to call out a warning to Adam.

From the way Adam froze she realized he must have seen him.

His eyes pinned beyond them, Ed slowly moved toward them, his heavily lined face sagging with grief and, most of all, weariness. Adam stepped to the side, and Ed passed them as if they weren’t even there. They both watched as he came to a stop at the basement door. Slowly sinking onto the top step, he sat there, staring silently down at the bottom.

After a moment, Adam turned and started toward the door out of the kitchen. Jillian wondered if they should just leave Ed there, if he was still a threat, even as something told her he wasn’t. Either way, she couldn’t manage to find the words.

Feeling so damnably weak, there was nothing she could do but let Adam hold her to him and carry her from the room. It was enough. More than enough. Relief gradually replacing the adrenaline pumping through her system, she closed her eyes, listening to the sound of his heart pounding, soaking in the strength of his body around her, safe in the knowledge that the long nightmare was finally over.