Still Lake - Anne Stuart [87]
“Maybe,” Doc said in a grim voice. “And maybe it was no accident.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. Who would want to hurt me?”
Doc just shook his head. “I’ll be back as soon as I can. Just keep an eye on Grace, will you? I don’t want to risk her wandering back down to the Whitten place. I don’t think she’d be safe.”
Sophie set the vase down on the kitchen table, her hands shaking slightly. “What are you saying? You think John Smith is trying to hurt us?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “All I know is that things have felt wrong, strange, ever since he moved in here. I don’t know what it is, but I’ve always had good instincts. And it just doesn’t feel right. Keep your mother safe, Sophie. I’d never forgive myself if something happened to her. Or you.”
Great, Sophie thought as he drove up the driveway. As if she weren’t paranoid enough, now Doc was imagining murderers lurking in the woodwork. Leaving her alone to worry about it.
She put dinner on the table, then went to her mother’s door and knocked softly. Not that Grace had shown much interest in food recently, but she couldn’t afford to miss meals.
“Dinnertime, Mama,” she called.
“Not hungry” came the voice from the other side of the door. She sounded like a cantankerous seven-year-old, and Sophie sighed. Just when it looked as if Marty might be improving, Grace was getting worse.
“You need to eat,” she said. “At least come out and keep me company.”
A long silence. “Are you alone?”
“Yes,” she said, startled. For a moment she’d sounded like the old Grace, rational and on top of things. “Even Marty’s gone out, and Doc took Rima home. Come on out and keep me company.”
The door opened a crack, revealing her mother standing there, her gray hair tangled, her clothes mismatched, an oddly lucid expression in her faded eyes. “Poor Rima,” she muttered obscurely. “What’s for supper?”
“Shepherd’s pie from the leftover roast lamb,” she said, following her mother back into the kitchen, only to come up short as Grace blocked the doorway.
“Where did those come from?” her mother asked in a trembling voice.
“I bought the lamb at Audley’s, Ma,” she said patiently. “You had some last night, and you liked it—”
“I mean the flowers,” she said sharply.
“They’re from Rima. Doc brought them out for me. They’re pretty, aren’t they? I thought that was so sweet of her, to think of us even while she’s having such a difficult time…”
“They’re not from Rima,” Grace said. “They’re from him!”
God give me patience, Sophie thought wearily. “Yes, Doc brought them in, but Rima sent them. Come and sit down, Ma. I’m sure the flowers were meant for all of us, not just me.”
“Oh, my God, maybe they were,” Grace said obscurely, distressed. “Sophie, I have to talk to you.” She took Sophie’s hands in her gnarled ones, and she looked deeply troubled.
“Of course, Mama. What’s worrying you?” Sophie kept her voice low and reassuring.
“Don’t talk to me like I’m an idiot!” Grace snapped. It was the first time she’d shown anger in months. “You have to trust me. I know I’m a dizzy old broad, but I’m not nearly as wafty as you think.”
“I don’t think you’re wafty.”
“Of course you do. That’s what I wanted you to think. I was hoping to keep you safe, but it’s too late. It’s gone too far. He’s going to kill you. He’s probably going to kill us all.”
“What are you talking about, Mama?” Shit, Doc was right about the delusions. Grace was having a dilly of a one.
“Doc. He’s a murderer. He kills women, Sophie. It wasn’t that boy they convicted, it was Doc who killed them. Killed them all. And he’s killed more than those three people.”
“Why would Doc kill people, Grace?” Sophie asked gently. “He’s a healer, and the kindest man alive.”
“I don’t know,” Grace said stubbornly. “I only know that he’ll try to kill you, and soon.”
“And how do you know that?”
“The flowers.”
Sophie wanted to burst into tears. How could her mother have gotten so deluded so quickly? “I’ll get rid of the flowers,” she said patiently. “Then we’ll have some supper and some hot tea, and then Doc will come back