Take It to the Grave Part 5 of 6 Read online

  No one can run forever

  Sarah Taylor-Cox knows her glamorous life is about to come crashing down around her. Someone knows her secrets, and seems determined to tell. With every waking moment, her paranoia increases. And when the day of her beloved baby’s christening arrives, she can’t help but look at everyone through a haze of suspicion. Who hates her so much they are willing to destroy her?

  Maisey is becoming ever more worried about her sister, Sarah. They may have grown apart, but they still love each other. Then the sisters’ bond is tested further than ever before when Sarah shows Maisey a note she’s received: When the wind blows the cradle will rock.

  Part 5 of 6: A riveting new installment in this darkly compelling psychological thriller

  TAKE IT TO THE GRAVE

  (Part 5 of 6)

  Zoe Carter

  Also available from Zoe Carter

  and Harlequin

  WHEN SECRETS KILL

  Exonerated for the murder of her boss and mentor, reporter Lauren Riley takes over the Townsend Report—and uncovers the secrets buried under the idyllic facade of Thornwood Heights.

  Thankful her sister, an NYPD detective, came home to investigate and free her, Lauren is determined to start fresh. She has a bad history with the wrong men, making the wrong decisions, and this is her chance to begin again—to help others. Especially the strong, sexy Trevor Gallagher. The former soldier is desperate to find his sister—a young woman who has disappeared just like so many before her. Lauren is the only one who cares. Together they stand up to the powerful families and the police in Thornwood Heights. But when danger threatens Lauren, they realize secrets will kill...

  Available now!

  Contents

  Previously in Take It to the Grave

  Chapter 1: Maisey

  Chapter 2: Sarah

  Chapter 3: Maisey

  Chapter 4: Sarah

  Previously in TAKE IT TO THE GRAVE...

  Sarah Taylor-Cox and her younger sister, Maisey, know all about keeping secrets.

  But someone is determined to keep raking over the past, and now Maisey and Sarah are questioning every truth they know...

  Maisey

  I looked up as Bridget walked into the breakfast room. Yes, Sarah and Warwick had a breakfast room. A different room for every meal, pretty much, not counting when we eat outside on the terrace. This one was nice and bright, with the same floor-to-ceiling windows that graced the rest of the house, giving a stunning view down to the beach and to the sea beyond. It was the kind of room you’d see in a magazine, potted plants throughout, a couple sitting at the large table, separated by a zip code, the distinguished man reading the paper while the attractive woman read the latest country club newsletter, sipping coffee out of fine-bone china, with a matching coffeepot on the table. Well, I’ll be damned. I watched as Bridget set a tray on the table, and started to lift the stainless coffeemaker and several coffee cups onto the table. Fine porcelain china, of course. This was followed by a white patterned teapot with matching sugar and creamer. Very pretty.

  Sarah and Warwick walked in, as if on some sort of subtle cue from the staff that breakfast was ready to be served...or else the staff had an in-built sensor when it came to their employers. I watched as Warwick smiled as he held out a chair for Sarah and helped her subside in her seat, because apparently my sister couldn’t sit without assistance. My lips tightened. I wanted to—no, needed to—talk to my sister. Alone.

  Last night’s conversation had raised more questions for me. What the hell was going on? I hadn’t slept a wink. I’d heard some whimpering from Sarah and Warwick’s room, but it hadn’t lasted long. At least, I didn’t think so. I must have blacked out, because I remember blinking up at the ceiling as my awareness returned. But it wasn’t sleep. I knew that much.

  “Sorry to keep you waiting, Maisey. We had to go to the doctor to get something for Sarah.” Warwick took his seat and moved it even closer to his wife, gazing at her intently as he sat. He wore a collared, short-sleeved cotton shirt. The red-and-blue-checked shirt showed off his tanned arms, and suited his coloring. I couldn’t help remembering the way he’d held her arm at the picnic, the way he’d spoken to her. He may look as hot and gorgeous as a cologne model, but his shine was definitely beginning to dull for me, especially after seeing his reaction last night to the lullaby. How could he not see how freaked out Sarah had been?

  I opened my mouth to ask what they’d needed. The suggestion that my sister needed medical care roused my nurse’s curiosity, but Warwick interrupted.

  “Can I get you something, sweetheart? What about some tea?”

  Sarah just sat there, in her white lace-and-linen frock that looked just a little too snug to be comfortable, and Warwick poured her some tea, filling the very pretty porcelain cup close to the brim. Then, using the silver tongs on the tray, he picked up a slice of lemon and put it delicately into her tea. I looked at Sarah’s face, waiting to see how she responded to Warwick’s attentiveness.

  She didn’t.

  “Sarah, are you okay?” She looked totally zoned out, and I wanted to talk more about what we’d discussed last night. I wanted to talk about the emails. I wanted to talk about Frankie. God, I kept replaying that memory over and over in my mind: drinking from the glass, running to the pool and pulling Frankie out. I stared at the food in front of me. I couldn’t really stomach anything at the moment. I just—I needed Sarah to tell me what had really happened, to make sense of the jumble in my head.

  She stared at the table blankly, and my brows dipped. I tried to meet her gaze. The emptiness of her eyes worried me like nothing else could. My fingers played with the drop of the crisp white linen tablecloth, twisting the fabric below the level of the table.

  “Sarah?”

  Warwick gave her a gentle nudge, and Sarah lifted her eyes to meet mine.

  I’d seen that kind of blank stare before. My fingers tightened on the fabric. I’d first seen it on my mother as she’d subsided on the chaise longue, her body so bruised and battered. I’d seen it when Sarah had faced up to Peter after Caleb had left. It wasn’t so much what was in the eyes as what wasn’t. The resignation and despair was alarming to see, but it was the absence of hope that most concerned me. Scared me. Was it the emails that had this effect on her, or something else?

  “Sarah, is everything okay?” My gaze darted to Warwick. This probably wasn’t something I should start in front of him, especially if my suspicions were correct, but damn it, I couldn’t just sit there and ignore her strange behavior.

  “She’ll be fine,” Warwick said. “She’s exhausted, poor love, what with a baby who doesn’t sleep through the night, and the christening today, and the weather...” He waved his hand carelessly, then draped his arm along the back of Sarah’s chair. “We’re just making sure she gets all the care and attention she needs, isn’t that right, Sarah?”

  Sarah nodded slowly.

  Oh, man, she’s on something good.

  I had to agree with Lucy. Whatever the doctor had prescribed for her, it was strong.

  A baby. A party. The weather. What other vague excuses could he pack into one sentence?

  I smiled. “Well, perhaps I can sit with her out on the terrace for a little while this morning...” I desperately needed to talk to Sarah alone. I had initially shrugged off the emails—they just didn’t make sense, at the time. But when those Frankie flashbacks started, it all began to take on a more sinister meaning. Quite frankly, I was scared shitless. Someone knew. Someone knew, a
nd was toying with me. With Sarah. Which meant that my flashbacks were real.

  “Oh, I think she’ll be far too busy getting ready for the christening this afternoon,” Warwick stated, politely vetoing my attempt to talk to my sister alone. His smooth manipulation brought to mind another man who used separation and exclusion like a weapon.

  I remembered when we’d heard Peter had died. It wasn’t too long after the night Caleb had left. We’d heard Caleb had joined the army, and Peter had gone to visit him at the barracks. Of course, we were not permitted to go. It was as though Peter had this talent for choosing the most painful torment. I couldn’t see my mom, and I couldn’t see Caleb. For Sarah and me, it was us, and Peter, and nobody else. I think that was the way Peter liked it, for some reason.

  You need to eat.

  I don’t think I can stomach anything at the moment, Lucy.

  Eat, Maisey. You need your energy; you need to think clearly.

  Lucy had a point. I reached for a bagel and slathered some cream cheese on it, then took a bite, chewing thoughtfully as I gazed at my vacant-eyed sister across the table. My stomach heaved, yet I still kept chewing. Peter had crashed his car on the way back from the barracks, and I still remembered that rainy afternoon when the police had knocked on our door. The two officers had stood there, wearing these dark rain slickers, the water dripping off the brims of their hats, their expressions so stern, so grim, and I’d been scared at first. The last time the police had visited, Frankie was a blanket-covered body in the backyard, and the officers had put my mother in the car and taken her away. But the fear had swiftly changed when they very gently explained why they were there. For the briefest of moments, I felt the sweetest relief. I’d wanted to hug them, the tall, uniformed men standing on our front porch. Peter was gone. No more beatings. No more eating rotten food or cleaning the kitchen floor at midnight until Peter was satisfied that it was spotless enough. For just a series of milliseconds, I thought that we’d be fine. I knew Sarah was still devastated over Caleb, but I felt with just the two of us, we’d make it through. We could be there for each other in a way that wasn’t possible before.

  Just the two of us, making it on our own.

  I managed to swallow the piece of bagel, and took another bite. Warwick continued to serve Sarah with attentiveness. I watched as he behaved so solicitously toward my sister. Anyone would think he cared deeply for his wife. From where I sat, it had a tinge of creepy to it.

  I almost snorted.

  “Do you need help with anything for the party, Sarah?” Maybe we could talk as we—I don’t know. What does a christening involve? Party favors? Balloons? I suspected that was all a little passé for Eleanor Taylor-Cox’s grandson. “I can help with...stuff. It will be fun, you and me.”

  Yeah, you and me. I sighed. At one point, I’d have given anything for that, for it just to be Sarah and me.

  And me. Don’t forget me. Remember, I was there when you needed her the most.

  Lucy was right. I don’t know how I would have managed after that night, if it weren’t for Lucy.

  The officers had asked us each to pack an overnight bag, and we went into emergency foster care. Emergency foster care became a little more permanent. Well, as far as foster care could be permanent. We shifted from home to home. Sometimes we were in a dorm situation with other girls who were seriously fucked up. Sometimes we were in an actual home. The first real “home” situation had been a shock to my system. I wasn’t so naive as to think we’d be adopted by a millionaire on Park Avenue, but still, the flickering light fittings, the crater in the back of the bedroom door that looked like the perfect size for a fist and the threadbare, scratchy blankets that I’d shivered under for weeks, Sarah doing her little zone-out trick...it was one of the loneliest, scariest times in my life. After that, things got a little patchy. Sarah wasn’t the only one zoning out. Then I found out it could get worse.

  When we learned Alice was going to be released from prison early for good behavior, I’d actually felt joy. Things were going to be okay. I somehow convinced myself that it would be like before, as though Peter and Frankie had been a story in some alternate universe, and that we could pick up from that time just after Dad died, and carry on in our own parallel timeline. I’d ignored the fact that Alice had found solace at the bottom of the bottle, that both Sarah and I had largely been abandoned by our mother during that period. No, this time it would be different. This time it would be better.

  Alice had come home, and I was devastated. This dry shell of a woman was not my mother. She rarely talked, and when she did, it was barely above a whisper. Her shoulders were hunched, and she’d been so pale, so thin. She couldn’t make eye contact with me or Sarah. She’d seemed defeated, that day on the chaise longue. Hurt. Miserable. Forlorn. Now, though, it was amplified. She’d vanished within herself, and the woman walking around our home was a stranger. A sad, quiet little waif whom I did not recognize.

  “I think everything is under control. My mother is organizing it. She’s got a lot of experience in this sort of thing.” Warwick smiled back at me across the table. I nodded, but couldn’t help staring at my sister.

  When Sarah was seventeen and I was fourteen, Sarah’d decided she’d had enough. My sister didn’t want to be in the same house as my mother, and I could understand to a certain extent—I mean, let’s face it, Mom wasn’t a tea party to be around. I remember her waiting for me to get home from school one day. She was leaning against the railing on the front porch, and she’d hugged me, told me she was moving to New York, and then she’d picked up an old suitcase she must have found at Goodwill, trudged down the steps and walked off into the sunset.

  Literally, Lucy said inside my mind. The sun was setting as she strode off down the street. Man, just look at her now.

  I lifted the coffee cup to my lips, sipped from it, before placing it ever so gently back on its saucer. It clinked. My hands were shaking. I clenched my fingers for a moment.

  Don’t lose it, Maisey. Your sister might be off with the fairies, but you’ve got to hold it together. We have to find out the truth.

  But—I need Sarah for that.

  She’s already cracking under the pressure, Maisey.

  She’s cracking under the pressure? What about me? I killed my brother.

  I held the napkin to my mouth as my stomach heaved. I can’t do this. I can’t play happy families knowing what I know.

  That’s the problem, though. You don’t know. Frankie wasn’t in the water for very long, remember? What really happened?

  I swallowed past the lump in my throat.

  After Sarah left, I’d discovered just what the other side of lonely looked like. The darker side, the one colored with desolation and abandonment. Before, I’d always had Sarah. Whatever happened, she was still there. Mom could go off on one of her benders, but Sarah was still there, still connected, still noticing. When we moved into Peter’s home, and he’d feed us that stinking, rotten refuse from the garbage bin, or lock us in our rooms, I always knew Sarah was there with me. She knew what I was going through, like nobody else on this god-forsaken planet did. When Frankie died, she was there, fixing it for me. Taking care of me. When Sarah was with me, I actually existed.

  Warwick lifted a croissant to Sarah’s lips, and I watched as my sister bit into it obediently. I frowned. Did she see me? Did she know where she was? Did she know I was here?

  When my sister left me, I ceased to exist. Oh, I was there, just not as far as anyone else was concerned.

  I turned the cup on the saucer until the handle faced the opposite direction, just to hear the slight grate of the porcelain, to reassure myself I wasn’t fading from existence again.

  My fingers trembled, and the cup tinkled on the saucer base. This must be a result of the emails. I was stunned to learn Sarah was receiving them, too.

  When I’d read the fir
st one in Thailand, I’d thought it was some goofy chain email, some sort of spam, and had disregarded it. It was the same day I’d received Sarah’s email about the christening, so I didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about it at all. Same with the second one. I mean, who is “Truth Seeker”?

  That last one, though, had caught my attention, and sent a shock through my system.

  No one can run forever.

  Who knew? Who else knew? My mind kept skittering over the memory. Alice by the pool. Sarah upstairs in her bedroom. Me in the kitchen. Who else knew I’d killed my brother? My eyes itched, and I blinked back tears. I needed answers. Truth Seeker? Yeah, well, I wanted answers, too. Like how I could do that. What was so wrong with me, so black inside me, that I could do that to a child?

  It takes a long time for someone to drown, though, doesn’t it? Lucy’s voice inside my head was intrusive, annoying. Come on, Maisey, face it. It’s not adding up.

  My eyes flicked back to Sarah. I was desperate for her to meet my gaze, to register that I was there. Instead I got Warwick smiling at me.

  I don’t like him. Lucy’s words were clipped.

  He’s just looking out for her.

  He’s like Peter.

  I shook my head, and Warwick noticed the movement, raised his eyebrow. I smiled innocently as I reached for more bagel. He didn’t need to know about Lucy.

  Nobody needs to know about me. What are we going to do about this guy? Sarah needs to tell us what she knows about Frankie. It’s tearing you apart, not knowing.

  I toyed with the bagel. I really didn’t want anything to eat; my gut was having another one of its hoedowns. “So, Warwick, do you and Sarah have any plans for the rest of the summer, or are you back at work?”

  I needed to feel the uncomfortable silence. Warwick nodded, satisfied I was prepared to leave Sarah alone.

  “I can work from anywhere, so I don’t need to go into the office for a while. I could take the whole summer off, if I wanted to.”