Full Exposure(7)
Author: Tracy Wolff

Again tears threatened and again Serena beat them back. Sandra’s picture slowly faded, only to be replaced by the photos Jack had brought. He was wily and good at his job; instead of packing up the whole file for the parole board to see, he had packed the three most gruesome of the set. No reason to desensitize the board to the crime. Sandra’s mutilated body swam before her eyes and Serena’s stomach revolted. She barely made it to the trash can in time.

“It’s okay. Ssshh, it’s all right.” Jack’s hand stroked her back soothingly as Serena fought for control. When the dry heaves finally stopped, she stood slowly, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

“Here, take this.” Jack handed her a bottle of water and Serena rinsed her mouth gratefully.

“Thank you.” When she spoke her voice wasn’t back to normal, but it was audible and nearly steady. She took a few more steadying breaths, relieved that the crushing chest pain had eased slightly.

Jack nodded, placed a hand at the small of her back and guided her toward his car. “Let’s get out of here.” He too was aware of Damien’s imminent release, just as he knew the LaFleurs would be here to pick him up in style. Damien’s younger brother, Michael was already here—though he hadn’t said a word throughout the proceedings, he had sat in the back of the room watching everything. She remembered him and his unnatural stillness from school, from a time when they could be—if not friends, then at least not enemies.

He’d smiled at her when she’d first arrived, but she hadn’t been able to smile back—not when his very presence at the parole hearing reinforced everything she already knew. The LaFleurs had bought Damien’s sentence and now they were buying his freedom. Michael hadn’t shown any reaction at all when his brother’s parole had been granted. Not even a flicker of his eyelashes or a quirk of his lips betrayed any surprise he might be feeling. But then again, why should he have been surprised? The outcome had been a guaranteed certainty before any of them had set so much as one foot in the room.

Serena followed Jack to his car and settled into the passenger seat, grateful for the blast of cooling air that hit her face within seconds. They drove in silence for a while before she finally worked up the energy to speak. “I’m sorry.”

He snorted. “For what?” Stopped at a red light he turned to her, clasped her hand in his and looked straight into her eyes. “I’m sorry. I never should have brought you here. But I thought, if they could see you, then maybe …” His voice trailed off.

“Then maybe the money wouldn’t matter?” Serena asked bitterly. “I didn’t realize you were an idealist.”

His mouth tightened, but he said nothing. What could he say, Serena wondered. Nothing would make it okay that her sister’s r**ist and murderer would soon be wandering free—years before his full joke of a sentence had been served.

The rest of the two-hour ride was accomplished in near silence. Jack tried, more than once, to start a conversation, but Serena could think of nothing to say. She stared out the window, regrets beating at her as she eyed the threatening sky. It looked like another thunderstorm was due—she couldn’t think of a better day for it.

After Jack had dropped her off at her Baton Rouge condo—against his better judgment—Serena wandered aimlessly around for a few minutes, unable to sit. If she kept moving she wouldn’t have to dwell, wouldn’t have time to think about Damien getting on with his life in a way Sandra never could.

The phone rang, but she couldn’t handle talking to anyone right now. What was there to say? Her mother had refused to go to the parole hearing, saying that it would only stir up bad memories. Was that all her twin sister was? A bad memory? And Mom wondered why Serena had so little to say to her these days. If it was her, calling to see how things had gone, she could wait and hear it on TV. At the moment, Serena didn’t feel up to breaking the bad news.

Her answering machine clicked on and she half-listened, expecting to hear her mother’s voice. Shocked that she’d managed to break away from husband number six—or was it seven—long enough to make a phone call. A high-pitched giggle came over the line—one that definitely didn’t belong to her mother—and chilled her blood. Not now, she wanted to scream. She couldn’t deal with him too, not on top of everything else. She had to give the guy credit, though. If he wanted to shake her up, now was the time to do it. It seemed the creep had an impeccable sense of timing as well as a twisted sense of humor.

“Are you there?” His voice was muffled, but no less frightening because of it. “Are you listening to me right now? Wondering if you should pick up the phone?” He laughed again, the sound grating on her already taut nerves. “I’m glad you’re back home again. Back where I can see you and smell you and touch you. Back where you can remember. You remember, don’t you? You remember even now?”

She crossed to the phone, her hand hesitating over the handset. Remember what?

“I do. I remember everything,” the disembodied voice hissed. “And I bet you do too. Remember, my darling. Remember and dream of me.”

The machine clicked off and she moved to erase the message, as she had the previous ones. But something stopped her, some sense of self-preservation long forgotten. She wasn’t ready to go to the police, wasn’t ready to even contemplate it—but she should keep the evidence, in case she ever changed her mind. Not that the police could do much, except tell her it was some random, crazy guy. After all, Louisiana was full of crazies. Look at Damien LaFleur.

With that incredibly depressing thought in the front of her mind, Serena wandered into her darkroom. Maybe she could work through the devastation, get the hearing out of her head. But after a few minutes of puttering with her chemicals, she gave up. For the first time in a number of years, the darkroom felt oppressive, disturbing. A sense of doom permeated the silence of the empty apartment, closing in on her and making work impossible.

Another shiver of fear shot through her and she gave up. It was stupid to think she could stay here, stupider to make herself when she was jumping at shadows.

Grabbing the suitcase she had unpacked just the day before, she yanked clothes out of her closet and threw them in without so much as a second glance. Moving quickly, she added her toiletries case, blow dryer and a couple pairs of shoes. What had she been thinking coming back here today? She should have known better. While she’d planned to return to Kevin’s bayou tomorrow, after the storm had passed and she’d gained some perspective, she couldn’t sit here fighting old and new demons for one second longer.

She needed to see him. Serena refused to question herself, refused to deal with why she so desperately wanted to be with Kevin. She only knew that if she stayed in her lonely apartment much longer she’d go insane. And the only other place she wanted to be right now was at Kevin’s, basking in the warmth and safety he offered without reservation.

Dragging her suitcase down to her car, she dropped it into the trunk and climbed behind the wheel seconds before the sky opened up. Ignoring the danger and the streets that were already beginning to fill with water, Serena negotiated her way onto the highway and headed toward the swamps.

Lightning slashed the sky and rain buffeted her car. The windshield wipers barely made a dent in the water pouring from the sky and it took all of Serena’s concentration just to keep the car on the road.

Despite the risk, she was absurdly grateful to the storm. She had dreaded the three-hour drive out to Kevin’s and the time it would give her to think. But the raging storm held all of her attention; it took all her strength and skill just to keep the car moving forward. There was nothing left over for thinking, even as the three-hour drive stretched to four and beyond.

The storm abated just as Serena pulled off the highway and onto the private bayou road that would take her to Kevin. She spotted his driveway amid the lush vegetation of the swamps and gratefully turned left, taking the winding, gravel-covered road up to his house.

* * *

“I don’t know where she went, Steve, and I don’t know why she’s not answering her cell phone.” Kevin thrust a hand through his hair, frustration and worry drumming through him. “She told me she was heading back to Baton Rouge for a few days to develop film. Maybe she’s too busy to answer the phone.”

“If it was you, I could understand that. But Serena doesn’t have a temperamental bone in her body, Kevin. Clients like her make up for having clients like you.”

Kevin snorted. “You knew what you were getting when you chased me down, so don’t give me your poor little agent routine. I was doing fine on my own.”

“You were getting scalped, selling your work for peanuts! That’s hardly fine.”

“Sure it is. I might not have been rich, but I was free to do whatever I wanted, unencumbered, with no monkey on my back demanding more and more from me. Seriously, Steve, I don’t know why I keep you around.”

“You keep me around because when I first met you, you could barely afford to pay for your materials, let alone have anything left over to feed yourself. If nothing else, I’ve given you the means to buy more Twinkies than any man will ever need.”

He inclined his head. “There is that.”

“Yes, there is. And it should make up for any aggravation my small interference causes you.”

“Small?” Kevin snorted. “World wars have caused less aggravation than you. But you’ve grown on me, so I guess I can’t fire you.”

“Be still my heart,” Steve replied drily.

Kevin glanced up in time to see a car turn onto the long road leading to the house. Frowning, he watched it creep up his muddy driveway, swerving numerous times to avoid potholes. Every time his mother came she complained about the driveway, asking when he was going to get it fixed. But he liked it—it kept all but the most determined people away from his door, doing more to guard his privacy than a two-hundred-pound Rottweiler ever could.

Whoever it was wasn’t noticeably discouraged by the unwelcoming road—something he would be more than happy to remedy. He was in a foul mood and definitely had no use for company. Taking his angst out on an unsuspecting tourist definitely had some appeal.

He’d been miserable since Serena left, anger and desire gnawing at his stomach, making it impossible to work, to sleep, to eat. He’d focused on the anger, ignored the desire, and spent his rage on physical activities. Which is why he now had enough firewood cut to last him through the next three winters, his kitchen and family room were freshly painted and in about three months, he’d have one hell of a garden. What he didn’t have, however, was one piece of work even close to decent.

Steve continued to prattle on the other end of the phone, but Kevin was beyond listening as he stared with narrow eyes at the car, preparing to toss the driver out on his ear. But as it came closer and closer to the house, he finally realized that the car creeping up the lane was a Volvo. A gray Volvo. Serena.

“I’ll talk to you later, Steve,” he interrupted, hanging up on his friend and agent without waiting for a response.

Tension he hadn’t known he was carrying eased slowly from his shoulders and the lead weight that had settled on his chest three days before suddenly disappeared, making it much easier to breathe. She’d come back. Wiping his suddenly sweaty palms—who would have believed it—on his ratty jeans, he headed down the porch steps to greet her.

The car had stopped a few yards away from his front door and Kevin crossed the distance easily, oblivious to the mud. He wrenched the car door open, desperate to see her, to touch her, whether she wanted him to or not. She’d had no business driving through the storm, and he would give her hell about it, but first he wanted to look at her. Just look.

He reached a hand in to help Serena out of the car—proper manners had been beaten into him by his mother and years later he was hard put to forget them—even with this stubborn, distant woman who had turned him inside out from the moment he’d first laid eyes on her.

Serena grasped his hands, allowed him to ease her from the car, and his first good look at her had his hands tightening on hers in alarm.

“Mon Dieu, bebe! Etes-vous blessé? Are you hurt? Did you have an accident?” His heart raced as he skimmed his hands over her lightly, looking for injuries. She looked like hell. Her face was drawn, her eyes sunken pools of misery, her body shaking like a leaf.

“I’m fine.” Her chin lifted at his snort of disbelief. “It was a long ride and the storm was bad.”

Momentarily distracted, Kevin answered, “You had no business driving up in a storm like this. You could have been killed. As it is, you look like death warmed over.”

If possible her pallor grew even more pronounced, and he cursed himself. She was obviously scared to death—he didn’t need to rub it in.