Playing Dead_ A Novel of Suspense - Allison Brennan [54]
Find Oliver or find Frank Lowe.
I can face death if I know, in my heart, that you believe in my innocence. Until then, I’m in hiding. The police aren’t going to reopen this case without clear evidence I’m innocent. Even then, I don’t know what’s going to happen. But I have to fight. This is my last chance. This is my stand.
Consider this, Claire Beth, because I have thought of it every day and every night for the last fifteen years. When you came home that day and heard your mother with a man, they were alive and in the bedroom. Twenty minutes later, I came in and they were dead, killed with the revolver I kept in my nightstand drawer. You know I never carried my .357 with me. I always kept that gun in my drawer. I taught you to use that gun. I taught your mother how to use that gun. It never left the house.
If you believe that, believe that I didn’t premeditate murder, then you know that I am innocent.
What continues to haunt me every day of my life is that I know you almost died that day. I know I didn’t kill anyone, but my gun was used. That tells me that the killer spent time in the house. He took my revolver, and hid. Waiting for the right time to kill Taverton and your mother. Taverton was the target. I’m certain of that.
You’re a grown woman. A beautiful, smart woman. You work for one of the best security companies in the country. Help me. You’re my only hope. Be careful! Someone framed me and if they know you’re looking into the case, your life is on the line. I would never put you in danger if I could avoid it, but you’re my only chance.
I love you.
Claire read the note three times. She’d ignored him, pretended he didn’t exist. It was much easier to think that he was guilty and she was doing the best she could.
Her father’s written plea was far more compelling than his restraint at trial. She felt emotion in this letter. Fifteen years earlier, he had seemed to exist on autopilot.
Oliver was dead. Where was Frank Lowe? How could she prove her father was innocent?
“Working late?”
She jumped and pivoted in her chair. Mitch sat up in her bed watching her.
“I didn’t mean to wake you,” she said.
“It’s nearly three. You need sleep, sweetheart.” He patted the spot next to him.
She refolded the letter and put it under her keyboard, turned off the monitor, and went back to her bedroom. She slid between the sheets and Mitch took her into his arms.
“You’re tense.”
“I’m an insomniac.”
He kissed her neck and pulled her to him so their bodies were spooned together. She snuggled against him, not wanting him to know anything was wrong. Showing Mitch the letter would risk his freedom and safety. Claire wouldn’t do that.
She couldn’t do that to the man she was falling in love with.
FIFTEEN
Guilt washed over Mitch as he rifled carefully through Claire’s desk.
She’d left before seven—took a quick shower and asked him to lock the door when he left. She said she had an appointment in Davis.
Davis. While her appointment could be innocent, related to her job with Rogan-Caruso, it was an odd coincidence that Oliver Maddox had lived and gone to school in Davis.
Mitch’s gut said there was something else going on. She’d been deeply upset and preoccupied when she’d come back to bed at three in the morning. What had happened?
He found nothing about her father. No day book, no messages, nothing. On her computer monitor was a bright green sticky note with CLAIRE written across it. He didn’t know what had gone with that note. It was not her handwriting.
He booted up her computer and first checked her e-mail. Nothing in the last forty-eight hours struck him as suspicious—most was work-related. He checked her browser history. It automatically erased every twenty-four hours, and Mitch didn’t have the technical skills to retrieve her old e-mails and web history from the hard drive. But what he saw gave him pause. Last night she spent time on the UC Davis website, including a page with Professor Don Collier’s class schedule. Collier was Maddox’s advisor. He’d been interviewed as part