“Let me begin by saying that I’m so very sorry for what happened to you on that terrible night ten months ago,” she said quietly. “In my own defense, I believed I was doing the right thing. It wasn’t until I saw thatvideo on the evening news that I realized I had been used by some very wicked people.”
“Kelbrook’s crew is good at using people,” Owen said.
“I’m aware of that now.” Rose clasped her hands together on the table. She did not take her gaze off Alice. “I know you can never forgive me, dear, but I swear I believed everything Mr. Twitchell told me. I had no reason to doubt that you were a very dangerous and unstable woman who had to be forcibly committed for your own good and the good of others. And before you ask, yes, he offered me a great deal of money if I agreed to cooperate.”
“But you didn’t take the payment, did you?” Owen asked.
Rose’s eyes widened. “How did you know that?” Then comprehension struck. “I see. You were able to get into my bank records. No, I didn’t take the money. I couldn’t, not after…after that young man was killed.” She turned back to Alice. “It would have been wrong. But please believe me, until that video was released two days ago, I was convinced that you had driven your husband to his death. I thought you truly were a deranged woman who was capable of using her talent to commit murder.”
“Is that why you agreed to let Kelbrook and his fixer use your hotel for the second kidnapping attempt earlier this week?” Owen asked.
“Yes.” Rose exhaled heavily and blinked back tears. “I thought I was doing the right thing. I was certain that you were an insane killer, Ms. Radstone. Twitchell said he would take care of everything. That all I had to do was disappear for a few days and when I returned, it would be as if nothing had happened here. He was right. Then I saw the video.”
“If you knew Alice was not responsible for the death of Travis Poole, why did you hire Sykes Security to grab her yesterday?” Owen asked.
He was relentless, Alice thought. She was starting to feel sorry for Rose, but Owen was leaning in, going for the jugular.
Rose stared at him, open-mouthed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do,” Owen said. “When you saw the video, you realized that Alice did not murder Poole because you recognized him in the video. He helped carry Alice out of the hotel room ten months ago. She was unconscious at the time. She couldn’t have murdered anyone. You knew Kelbrook’s fixer had lied to you. Used you. And yet after you learned the truth, you hired some rogue Guild men to kidnap Alice yourself.”
“No,” Rose said, anguished tears streaming down her face.
Alice yanked a napkin out of the holder and handed it to her. “When you contacted Sykes, you signed yourselfYourWorstNightmare. You meant it, didn’t you? But you weren’t thinking about me when you came up with that signature. You were targeting Kelbrook.”
“You don’t understand,” Rose sobbed.
“I think we do,” Owen said. “The goal was to grab Alice and use her to lure Kelbrook out of his fortress. You intended to hold her hostage and force him to come to you. Why?”
“I’m sorry,” Rose whispered. “I was desperate. I knew that unless I could draw Kelbrook here, I would never be able to get near him. You have to understand, Ms. Radstone, you were my last best hope for revenge.”
“I do understand,” Alice said. “There’s only one reason why a woman would go to such lengths. Travis Poole was your son, wasn’t he?”
“And Dunstan Kelbrook was his father,” Owen concluded.
Chapter Thirty-Two
A rush of certainty andsatisfaction stirred Owen’s senses. They were finally getting somewhere. Rose Ash had cracked. She was falling apart, dissolving in tears. The answers were pouring out.
He glanced at Alice and was startled to see that she had just put a hand ever so gently on Rose’s shoulder. He picked up a faint pulse of energy. Good. Ash deserved a little trip through a nightmare, and Alice deserved a taste of revenge.
But Rose was sobbing into the napkin—not traumatized by some inner vision. She wasn’t locked in a bad dream. Alice was comforting her. He suppressed a groan.You can take the teacher out of the Ballantine Academy, but you can’t take the Ballantine Academy out of the teacher.
For a time the only sounds in the kitchen were Rose’s sobs and the intensifying wind. He glanced at his watch and checked the weather. He and Alice and Sebastian needed to leave soon if they were going to beat the incoming storm.
“We don’t have a lot of time,” he said in an effort to move things along.
Rose hiccupped and wiped her nose. She sat back and looked at Alice.
“They used him,” she said. “Just like they used you. When they didn’t need him anymore, they murdered him.”
“It must have been a shock seeing him in the video.”
Rose crushed the napkin in her fingers. “I couldn’t believe it when I saw the watch. I gave it to him, you see. I knew there would come a time when Travis wanted to know about his father. I made up a story of star-crossed lovers. I told him his dad was a brilliant chemist and that he and I had been involved in a passionate affair. I said we were planning a full Covenant Marriage but that his father had been killed in a lab disaster. I gave Travis the watch and told him that his father would have been very proud of him.”
“But it was all a lie, wasn’t it?” Owen said. He ignored the sharp glare from Alice. “Well, not all of it. You did have an affair with Dunstan Kelbrook. When he got bored with the arrangement, he dismissed you from his life like any other employee who was no longer useful.”
“Stop it, Owen,” Alice said, her voice low and tight.
