Undercover Christmas Page 23

  Vanessa turned slowly to glare at Lilly, her face twisted in rage.

  “Jabe lied to you, Vanessa,” Lilly said calmly. “He didn’t cut your sons out of his will. He was just angry and taking it out on you. Instead, he did what he’d promised Chase he would, amended his will to leave half of his estate to you, and the rest equally divided among his three sons. Too bad you won’t get your share now.”

  Lilly must have anticipated Vanessa’s next move. Just as Vanessa lunged at her, Lilly stepped into the secret passageway.

  Chase grabbed for Vanessa, but not quickly enough. Dayton jumped between them, shoving Chase aside. Chase stumbled back into a chair, righting himself just as Vanessa disappeared after Lilly into the walls of the house. Dayton sprang after them; the panel door closed before Chase could reach it

  He swore and turned to race from the library toward the other entrance under the stairs with Marni at his heels. Felicia hadn’t moved. She sat watching with a bored look on her face, her drink still in her hand.

  Marni rushed to the paneling and quickly opened the door under the stairs. Chase pulled the flashlight from his pocket and started up the steps. Marni followed. They’d gone only a few steps when a gunshot thundered above them and a scream echoed through the inner walls of the house. Another gunshot boomed. Then silence.

  Chase swore and pulled the .357 from his holster. “Stay right behind me.”

  They followed the stairway up, in the direction of a faint sound overhead, until they reached the attic. Marni wasn’t surprised to find the door open.

  The smell of old furniture and dust mingled with Lilly’s scent, gardenia. And Marni realized that Lilly hadn’t been wearing perfume in the library. So why did the attic smell of it? She felt a chill as they stepped deeper into the walls of antique furniture.

  The beam of Chase’s flashlight skittered across the floor, across the massive furniture, then back to a tallboy a few feet away. The light lingered on a corner of an old oak buffet. A piece of clothing had caught on the rough edge. The torn cloth was pale pink.

  Marni hung close to Chase as he stepped around the buffet and stopped abruptly. She heard him curse. Looking down, she saw Dayton Calloway lying sprawled on the floor in a pool of blood.

  “Oh God, Chase,” Marni cried.

  He pulled her to him for a moment, holding her with his free arm. “Do you hear that?” he whispered.

  Marni felt a chill as she listened. The tape recorder of the baby crying. Lilly’s baby. And Vanessa’s voice as she tried to soothe the child.

  Cautiously they stepped around Dayton, around the toppled armoire and edged their way toward the nursery. Marni could hear the sound of the baby crying softly and Vanessa’s voice growing more impatient Then another sound. The squeak of a rocker, rocking back and forth, back and forth. It made her blood run cold.

  The door to the nursery stood open. Marni could see Lilly sitting in the rocker by the window, holding something in her arms, crying softly. Where was the gun? And where was Vanessa?

  “Oh God,” Marni heard Chase say.

  Off to their right, sitting on the floor, her back against the wall, was Vanessa. She stared straight ahead, a look of horror on her face, her hands clutching her chest, blood seeping out through her fingers. Chase looked back at Lilly, still rocking, her gaze at the window.

  “She still has the gun,” Marni cried.

  “Stay here.” Chase bent to enter the room. Marni watched as he carefully neared the rocker. “It’s over, Lilly,” he said in the same tone he talked to the horses. Gentle. Soft. Caring. It brought tears to Marni’s eyes.

  Lilly looked up at him and smiled. “I took the will from the book and stitched it inside the doll,” she said, unfolding the blanket to reveal the worn rag doll.

  “Where is the gun, Lilly?” Chase asked.

  She glanced back past Chase, then raised her hand slowly to point at Marni. Marni frowned, momentarily confused. Then she felt two strong arms grab her from behind and felt the cold steel of the gun’s barrel against her temple.

  “You’re right, Chase,” Dayton said. “It’s over and you lose.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Chase turned slowly, feeling the weight of the gun in his hand, realization weighing down his heart. Dayton stood, the wound in his side still bleeding but a smile on his face and a pistol pointed at Marni’s head. Behind Chase Lilly continued to rock as if oblivious to what was happening. Or maybe she just didn’t care anymore. From in the crib came the sound of the baby again, whimpering softly.

  “Nice trick, huh?” Dayton said. “Thought I was dead.” He shook his head at his brother. “And Father thought you were the smart one, the special one.”

  “Is that what this is all about?” Chase demanded.

  “I got so sick of hearing about Chase, how wonderful he was, how worthless Hayes and I were,” Dayton said angrily.

  “Jabe was a fool. But Marni doesn’t have anything to do with this. Let her go. This is between you and me now.”

  Dayton laughed. “Marni has everything to do with it.”

  Chase had been so sure Lilly was the culprit “You were the one who tried to kill her. You hired Monte Decker.” The steady movement of the rocker almost drowned out the soft crying sound of a baby coming from the crib. “You tried to run Marni and me down earlier.”

  Dayton smiled. “That was foolish. This is so much better. Everyone will think it was Lilly, poor sick, drunk Lilly. Killed her whole family. Except for Dayton Calloway. Only wounded, he managed to get away and call for help. I’ll be a hero. A very rich hero.”

  Lord, Chase thought. The man had shot himself. Chase knew now exactly what he was dealing with. His fear level rocketed upward. He met Marni’s gaze, silently promising her he’d do whatever he had to, even if it meant giving his own life.

  She shook her head, tears flooding her eyes. “I love you,” she mouthed.

  “Drop the gun, Chase,” Dayton said angrily. “You’re just sappy enough to try something stupid.”

  “What do I have to lose?” Chase asked, holding tight to the .357 in his hand. “You plan to kill us all anyway. Maybe I’ll kill you before you kill me.”

  “Maybe,” Dayton said, looking a little worried. “But then you’ll have to see Marni’s brains blown all over this attic. If you drop the gun, I’ll kill you first and spare you that.”

  Yeah, Chase just bet he would. But still, he had little choice. He lowered the pistol to the floor, praying that Dayton would slip up and give him just one small chance. That’s all he’d need

  “Very good,” Dayton said. “Now kick the gun into the corner and come on out of there. You too Lilly.”

  Behind him, Chase heard the rocking stop and Lilly rise slowly from the chair. “You did this, didn’t you?” Lilly said, looking over at the crib. “To make me look crazy.”

  “You are crazy,” Dayton said. “You just didn’t know how crazy you were until I helped you find out. Crying over that rag doll, listening all the time to that tape with your dead baby crying on it.”

  Chase bent to come out of the room and Dayton stepped back, pulling Marni with him. Lilly followed, clutching the rag doll still wrapped in its blanket.

  “You should listen to the tape,” Lilly said to Marni. “I’m not the one who’s crazy. I wasn’t the one who killed my baby.”

  Lilly advanced on Dayton and Marni, the doll in her arms.

  “Get back, you stupid woman,” Dayton cried.

  Lilly didn’t seem to hear him. “See, Dayton,” she said as she pulled back the baby blanket. “See what you’ve done.”

  Chase watched Lilly, his pulse thundering in his ears. Lilly would either get them all killed or—

  Lilly grabbed the doll from the blanket with one hand, thrusting it into Dayton’s face at the same time she thrust with the other hand, the hand still hidden in the baby blanket.

  Dayton recoiled at the sight of the worn rag doll. But not quickly enough because he couldn’t drag Marni with
him. Lilly went in from the side, driving the knitting needles into his side. Dayton screamed.

  Chase sprung, throwing himself at the gun in Dayton’s hand. Dayton got off only one shot. But it went wild as Chase knocked the gun away. The sound thundered through the attic.

  Chase pushed Marni aside, driving his fist into Dayton’s face. Dayton fell back, the knitting needles still stuck in his side, agony in his features as he hit the floor hard. He reached for the gun lying between him and Vanessa but she reached it first. She lifted the gun, pointing it at Dayton.

  “You don’t understand. Mother,” Dayton cried. “If you went to prison for Father’s murder—The bad publicity. But if you were killed by Lilly—”

  The gun wavered in Vanessa’s hand as she stared at her son, her favorite son, the spoiled one. She let her arm drop. Marni quickly picked up the pistol and handed it to Chase.

  From inside the nursery, he could hear the baby crying loudly now on the tape. Then Vanessa’s angry voice. “All we need is another bastard in the family.” The baby’s crying stopped abruptly. The tape ended.

  Epilogue

  Christmas Eve One year later

  Marni smiled as snow began to fall the moment they turned onto the road to the farm.

  “You’re going to get your white Christmas,” Chase said as he reached across the seat to squeeze Marni’s hand. “I know how you love Christmas.”

  Had it only been a year ago that she’d made a Christmas wish on a star in this same winter sky? She glanced at Chase, realizing she’d gotten more than she could have ever wished for.

  “Oh, Chase, I can hardly wait.” She took his hand and placed it on her swollen stomach. “Feel that?” she asked and saw his eyes widen. “That’s your son.”

  He smiled at his wife, his gaze filled with love. “Our son.” In the car seat behind them, their daughter let out a cry of delight as she spied the falling snow. “Jingle Bells” came on the radio and Chase began to sing along to Laramie Burton Calloway’s delight. She clapped her hands, laughing at the faces her daddy made at her in the rearview mirror.

  Ahead, the bright Christmas lights of the large old farmhouse glittered brightly. Marni felt her heart race with excitement and sheer happiness at the sight. So much had happened in the past year, but they were finally coming home for Christmas. It didn’t seem possible that so much good could come out of so much pain.

  Elise had given birth to a beautiful baby girl, Elizabeth Marni Calloway, in early February, just days after Hayes’s divorce was final. By Valentine’s Day, Elise and Hayes were married. Hayes doted on both mother and daughter.

  Lilly had spent some time in a private hospital out of state, then had enrolled in business school. The last Marni heard from her, she was thinking of opening her own business. A knitting shop. She’d met a man in her weekly therapy group. Like her, he’d lost a child.

  Monte Decker had confessed that Dayton hired him to run down Jabe Calloway and later to lure Chase away from Marni on the night of the Christmas Stroll. Dayton swore he’d only wanted Monte to frighten his father—not hurt him. As for Marni, Dayton finally admitted that he’d been behind Marni’s accidents, including the knife attack outside Burton’s. It hadn’t been anything personal, he’d said. He just couldn’t let her give birth to the first grandchild of Jabe Calloway.

  From the beginning, he’d planned to implicate Lilly. He knew she often hid in the tiny room off the attic, mourning the loss of her baby. He’d made it into a nursery after Marni arrived at Calloway Ranch looking seven months pregnant and claiming to be carrying Chase’s baby.

  Dayton had bragged that the tape recorder in the crib had been a stroke of genius. He’d stumbled across the tapes in Lilly’s room and realized that right after her baby was born she’d left a tape recorder going in the nursery at night, afraid for her child since the family had found out the baby wasn’t a real Calloway.

  Her paranoia had paid off for Dayton. Once he’d started playing the tapes, Lilly had gotten much worse, believing Vanessa had killed her baby. The truth was, the baby had died of sudden infant death syndrome. But Lilly had convinced herself Vanessa was to blame. That obsession only made Lilly look all the more guilty of Dayton’s crimes.

  Dayton had hired Monte Decker because he knew of Monte’s relationship with Lilly. Monte hadn’t known Dayton was planning to frame Lilly. It had been Monte who’d told Lilly that Elise had an identical twin named Marni McCumber. When Hayes left the hospital, Lilly had known he’d gone to meet Elise and that the woman she knew had to be Marni.

  Shooting his mother that night in the attic had been an accident, Dayton claimed. Dayton still felt bad about it, he said.

  After he’d pleaded guilty, the judge sentenced him to forty years without parole at Deer Lodge, the Montana state prison. The last Marni heard, he was making horsehair key chains and still blaming what had happened to him on bad luck.

  Vanessa died the night of the shooting. The blood on her scarf turned out to be Jabe’s just as Lilly had said. Lilly’s testimony convinced the sheriff to change Jabe Calloway’s death from suicide to murder.

  Felicia Calloway fled the state and the scandal. The last Marni heard, she’d changed her name and was dating a computer business tycoon.

  With Jabe’s will from inside Lilly’s rag doll, Hayes and Chase inherited the entire Calloway estate. Hayes moved back to the ranch and took over for his father. At one point he thought about tearing down the house, but when he and Elise got married, she talked him out of it.

  “Wait until you see what I can do with this place,” she’d told him. Hayes and Elise and their baby girl brought happiness to the old house, something it had never known. Elise replaced the darkness inside with light and brought all the original antiques down from the attic. And with her dramatic style, she threw parties that brought laughter into the house, chasing away the ghosts.

  Last year, Chase and Marni arrived at the farm just as the sun came up on Christmas Day, just in time to watch the kids open their presents.

  The happy clamor of the McCumber clan helped ease the horror they’d both just lived through.

  Later that day, after the family had scattered, Marni had found Chase standing before the Christmas tree. She’d come up behind him and put her cheek against his back as she wrapped her arms around him.

  “Are you all right?” she’d asked softly.

  She felt him nod.

  “There’s two things I need to ask you,” he said, turning around to face her.

  She held her breath.

  “I never thought I’d ever say these words but, Marni, you’ve made me realize how much was missing from my life,” he said quietly. “I can’t imagine life without you now. Nor do I want to.” He took her hands in his, his blue-eyed gaze searched her face. “Will you marry me?”

  “Oh, Chase,” she cried, throwing herself into his arms. “I can’t imagine my life without you, either.”

  He laughed and held her tightly to him. “I was hoping you’d say that. But does that mean yes?”

  “Yes, oh yes,” she cried, pulling back to look into his face. “But you said you had two questions to ask me.”

  He nodded. “I couldn’t ask you to marry me unless I was ready to have a baby, Marni. You and babies, they just seem to go together. I can’t wait to get you pregnant.”

  She laughed. “Chase, you’ve made my every Christmas wish come true.”

  “Except one,” he said solemnly. “There’s one more wish I’d like to grant you, Marni McCumber.”

  She’d looked into his handsome face, her heart pounding. Could he mean what she thought he did? Her eyes filled with tears. “You don’t mean—”

  “What would you say to us adopting Raine’s baby?”

  Marni had burst into tears, amazing for a woman who seldom used to cry before. “Oh, Chase,” was all she got out. Her Christmas wish had come true beyond her wildest dreams.

  Now, as Chase pulled up in front of the farmhouse, Marni saw the Chr
istmas-tree lights blinking at the front window. She got out of the car to the sound of Christmas carols as the front door burst open and her family spilled out onto the porch to welcome them.

  Marni blamed her tears on hormones as she watched Chase lift their daughter from her car seat, and the three of them headed into the welcoming arms of the McCumber family.

  Finally, Chase had found a home and a family. And Marni had found a happiness and contentment she’d never dreamed possible. She smiled as she thought of all the Christmases they would spend in this old farmhouse.

  But just as she started up the walk, something caught her eye. She looked upward, catching the glitter of stars poking through the clouds and snowfall. Tears filled her eyes as she thought of her father. For years as a young girl her only Christmas wish was that her father could be with them for Christmas.

  Now Marni gazed up at the stars shining through a break in the clouds. Snowflakes tumbled down, touching her face lightly. And she knew he’d always been there, every Christmas. Just as he was this one.

  “Are you all right?” Chase asked from the porch, concern in his voice.

  Marni shifted her gaze to her husband and daughter. Her hand went to the son she’d give birth to before the new year. “Oh, yes,” she said, smiling as she walked up the steps to join them. “Oh, yes.”

  eISBN 978-14592-6862-3

  UNDERCOVER CHRISTMAS

  Copyright © 1997 by Barbara Johnson Smith

  All rights reserved Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontanrio, Canada M3B 3K9.

  All characters in this book have no existence outside the imagination of the author and have no relation whatsoever to anyone bearing the same name or names. They are not even distantly inspired by any individual known or unknown to the author, and all incidents are pure invention.