smallest of heartbeats, Eugenia Haversmith Cahill had realized that she was about to meet her maker, that she was facing her own demise. Even so, the old bitch probably hadn’t expected it to happen so quickly. She probably thought that there would be a way to talk, bully, or buy her way out of it.
Too bad.
Grinning to herself, she turned on the defroster, forcing warm air to blast on the interior of the glass and evaporate the condensation as she gazed through the windshield at the glowing taillights of the sporty little BMW zipping along in front of her. In and out of traffic he wove, his engine whining. Go for it, you idiot, she thought. You get the ticket.
She remembered the old woman’s horror as she’d been pitched over the railing. Oh, Eugenia had fought and screamed, but she hadn’t been able to save herself. Her small body had slammed into the hard marble floor, the crunch of bones a sickening, satisfying thud.
Now she flipped on the radio and hummed along to an old song by Sheryl Crow. Staying within the speed limit, she headed over the bridge spanning the night-darkened waters of the bay, following a steady stream of taillights into Oakland.
Still feeling a bit paranoid, she checked her rearview mirror more than once, making certain she wasn’t being followed.
She couldn’t get caught. Not yet. Not when there was so much to do, so much to accomplish. Squinting against the headlights reflecting in her mirror, she saw nothing out of the ordinary, no red and blue strobe lights announcing a police cruiser pursuing her.
For God’s sake, no one’s tailing you! No one knows what you did.
Relax!
You got away with it! And the cops…they’re morons.
Remember that.
Once on the east side of the bay, she headed north toward Berkeley and calmed a little. She quit holding the steering wheel in a death grip and wasn’t quite as jangled, nor as afraid, nor as high. She exhaled a calming breath as she drove through the suburbs toward Wildcat Canyon, where the dense population gave way to little bungalows and quiet, treelined streets. One more time, just before turning down the road to her little rental house, she rechecked her mirrors. To be safe, she made a couple of quick right turns, watching behind her. Then, satisfied that she was safe from pursuit, she doubled back into an alley behind the two-bedroom cottage she’d leased under a fake name. She remembered handing the leasing agent her fake ID, biting her lip with anxiety, sure that when it was checked the agent would discover the Oregon driver’s license was a fraud. Instead, with a few quick clicks on a computer keyboard to double-check the credit report and job history of Elyse Hammersly, recently of Gresham, Oregon, and acceptance of a cashier’s check, she, as Elyse, had been handed the keys. Wonderful! Now she liked to think of herself as Elyse. Why, she was Elyse. Why not? It was perfect!
Chuckling to herself, she pulled into the drive. The bungalow had the basic floor plan of post–World War II, with two small bedrooms, single bath, a living area, walk-through dining room, tiny kitchen, and stairs that led to the most important feature of the house: a basement. With special amenities.
The basement was where this house, nearly identical to every other one on the block, got interesting. And perfect for what she needed.
Now, however, she had to face her new guest.
Marla Amhurst Cahill.
Or, as she liked to think of the woman she’d helped spring: Marla the Missing, or Marla the Escapee. Not that she would ever admit as much to her prickly new roommate.
The weeks before the actual breakout had been nerve-wracking, and they’d communicated through several different parties. Never once had she visited Marla in prison. Never had she called. The people who had relayed messages had known nothing of their plot, nor had they known her name. Elyse felt her anonymity was secure. Just for good luck, though, she crossed her fingers and braced herself for the confrontation she knew was brewing.
Though they’d planned this prison break for over two years, and it had gone off without a hitch, Marla, as ever, wasn’t satisfied.
Sometimes Elyse wondered if it was worth it.
Of course it is! Millions are at stake! Remember that!
Slinging the strap of her purse over her shoulder, she climbed out of the car and locked it. Nervous as a cat, she glanced this way and that, peering at the corners of the garage, the garbage can, and the long, sweeping porch, half expecting an ambush of FBI agents with badges flashing and guns pointed at her heart.
Don’t freak out! You made it.
She dashed up the overgrown cement walk to the back porch, where a now-leafless clematis wound skeletally and ropelike over the eaves. She fiddled with her keys until she found the one she needed and slipped it into the deadbolt.
Click.
Key ring jingling with her case of nerves, she found a separate key for the second lock and had to twist and jiggle it a bit before the ancient deadbolt slid back with a scrape of metal on metal. Using her shoulder, she pushed the sticky door open to be greeted by the smells of must and dead air. She reminded herself to get some of those air-fresheners, as the cottage had been unoccupied for eight months. Maybe there was a way to convince Marla to get off her ass and break out the Lysol and a mop. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t done just that kind of work in the big house, but Marla was still paranoid, afraid someone might see her.
“I’m never going back,” she’d confided in Elyse. “Not ever. They’ll have to kill me.”
And Elyse believed her.
She locked the door behind her, pulled a white sack out of her purse, and dropped the leather bag on the landing. Up half a flight of stairs was the kitchen, where the leaky faucet dripped and an old-fashioned wall clock ticked off the seconds of its life. But she wasn’t interested in what lay upstairs. Instead she double-checked to make certain both locks were latched, then followed the creaking stairs downward into a musty basement that seemed forever damp. The ceilings were low enough that a tall man would have to duck beneath some of the beams, and she’d found more than one nest of spiders hiding in the dark corners of the joists for the floor above.
Her skin crawled despite the fact that the place was perfect for their purposes.
Walking past a rusted washer and dryer, she approached what appeared to be the far wall of the dank room. However, it was not as it seemed. During the course of the last half century, one of the bungalow’s owners had made a false wall in one corner of the basement, creating a space for a hidden wine cellar. All of which was odd, as the basement was too damp to create the right atmosphere for anything worth drinking.
But then, she wasn’t using the space to hide her special bottles of Pinot Gris or Chardonnay or Merlot.
The fake wall with its dusty shelves and hidden door was a perfect hiding spot, if not for cases of wine, then at least for an escapee from a minimum-security prison.
Careful not to make too much noise, just in case Marla was sleeping, she softly rapped on the back of the shelf. Marla was probably exhausted from the tension of planning and executing the escape.
Elyse waited a second, then pulled on a hidden lever. With a click, the latch unhooked, and she was able to push one section of the shelving into the small room.
She whispered, “Hey, I’m
