It was a knowledge no child should ever have to grasp. The weight of it was terrible. The fear it inspired had been with her day and night-that the world could be tipped upside down in a heartbeat. Everything she knew, everything she loved could be snatched away from her without warning.
Knowing that made her want to hang on with both hands to everything that was dear to her-her dolls, the kittens old mama cat had hidden in the boat house, Daddy's tie pin, Savannah. Most especially she wanted to hang on to Savannah-the person who loved her most after Daddy, the person who kept her from being alone.
"I love you, Sister," she said, quivering inside at the desperation in her voice. "I'll always love you."
"I know, Baby," Savannah murmured, kissing the top of her head. "We'll always have each other. That's all that matters."
Laurel sat down on the bottom step, dazed and weak, her stunned gaze locked on the small pendant that dangled from her fist. And the feeling she had feared so badly all those years ago crept over her and into her, spreading through her like ink, opening her heart like a chasm that grew wider by the second.
The sister who had loved her, protected her, defined her world, was gone. And it didn't matter that she was thirty, or that there were other people in her life now who mattered. In that moment, as she sat there on the step, she was ten years old all over again, and she was alone. Her world had turned upside down, and the most precious thing in it had been snatched away, leaving nothing behind but a small heart of gold.
"I want to see her."
They sat in the parlor at Belle Rivière, Kenner, Danjermond, Laurel, and Caroline. An incongruous scene. The parlor with its soft pink walls and quietly elegant furnishings, a place of serenity and comfort, filled with brittle tension and people who had gathered to talk of a brutal, heinous crime. Men for whom this death was a part of their business, and family who couldn't reconcile the idea of one of their own being torn from their lives.
The sound of Mama Pearl weeping drifted in from the kitchen, breaking the silence that hung as Kenner and Danjermond exchanged a look. Laurel set her jaw and rose from the camelback sofa to pace.
Caroline sat at the other end of the sofa. Her aura of power and control had been snuffed out, doused by a tidal wave of shock and grief, leaving her powerless. A queen who had suddenly been stripped of her potency. For the first time since her brother had died she seemed completely at a loss, so stunned by the news that she wasn't even sure this was really happening. But of course it was. Savannah had been found murdered. That was the terrible reality.
Lifting a crumpled tissue to her eyes, Caroline looked up at Laurel, who paced the width of the Brussels carpet like a soldier, shoulders back, chin up. She had been this way when her daddy had died, as well, full of stubborn denial and anger. Ten years old, demanding she be taken to him, insisting that he wasn't dead.
She could remember too clearly the rage, the fear, the heartbreak, Vivian telling the girls to cry softly into their hankies like little ladies. Caroline had gone up to Savannah's room with them, and they had all lain on the bed and sobbed their hearts out together.
"I want to see her," Laurel said again.
Caroline caught her eye and shook her head sadly, reproachfully. "Laurel, darlin', don't…"
Laurel jerked away, clinging to her stubbornness like a life preserver. After her initial reaction to the news Kenner had brought, she had slammed the door on her grief, bottling it up, saving it for later. For now, she had to hang tough, she had to keep her head… or lose her mind altogether.
Kenner rose from the armchair, restless, unnerved by what he'd seen this morning out on Pony Bayou. If he lived to be a hundred, his sleep would forever be plagued by Annie Gerrard and Savannah Chandler, their bodies carved up like biology experiments, rotted and bloated by the effects of death and the merciless southern sun.
"I don't think that would be a very good idea," he murmured.
Laurel wheeled on him, ears pinned, eyes flashing fire. "You didn't think she was in any danger, either. You didn't think she would be anyplace but in bed with one of a hundred men," she said bitterly, stalking him across the carpet. Toe to toe with him, she glared up into his lean, hard face and narrow eyes. "Pardon me if I don't have a whole helluva lot of faith in what you think, Sheriff."
He glanced away from her, unable to meet the accusation in her eyes. His gaze landed on a graceful side table that held framed photographs of the Chandler girls, Savannah's senior year high school picture catching his eye. He had a daughter nearly that age.
"Next of kin has to make a positive ID," Laurel said, grasping hold of practicality for an excuse. She wasn't feeling practical. Desperation was like a wild thing inside her. She had to see her sister now, sooner than now. Maybe someone had made a mistake. Maybe it wasn't really her. Maybe Savannah wasn't really dead. God, she couldn't be dead. They had parted so angrily, left so many things unsaid. It just couldn't be true-
"We already have an ID, Laurel," Danjermond said, his smooth, low voice penetrating her thoughts. He sat in Caroline's throne, his masculine grace perfectly at home draped over rose damask. He met her gaze evenly. "Your stepfather came down to the funeral parlor."
He could just as well have slapped her. The idea of Ross Leighton's being the first of them to see Savannah appalled her. The bastard had dealt Savannah enough degradation in her life. He shouldn't have been allowed anywhere near her in her death. Fresh hot tears welled in Laurel's eyes, and she turned her back on the district attorney.
"Sheriff Kenner and I realize the grief you've been dealt, Laurel," he said, "but time is of the essence here if we're to catch your sister's murderer. We need to talk about this necklace you found. You were a prosecutor. You understand, don't you, Laurel?"
Yes, she understood. Business. Danjermond and Kenner would take her sister's death and boil it down to facts and figures. It was their job. It had been her job once too.
"The necklace was Savannah's," she said flatly. "She never took it off. This morning it was in my pocketbook."
"Do you have any idea how it might have gotten there?"
"I expect someone put it in there, but I didn't see it happen."
"You think the killer put it there?"
Killer. Her stomach churned at the word, sending sour bile up the back of her throat. She choked it down and snatched a quick, hard breath, rubbing a hand at the base of her throat. "No one else would have gotten it off Savannah. It meant the world to her. She would never have willingly taken it off."
Danjermond rose and came around to face her, his hands in the pockets of his gray trousers. His expression was one she had seen in the courtroom a hundred times, a look she had honed to perfection herself-subtle disbelief, designed to rattle a witness. "You think the murderer took it off her and somehow slipped it into your handbag without your knowledge-for what purpose?"
The rush of anger was welcome. It distracted her, focused her attention on something she could affect the outcome of-an argument. She went to the Sheraton table and with jerky, angry movements, dug through the purse she had left there, tossing out Kleenex, Life Savers, a tampon. In one handful she scooped out the heart-shaped earring and the butterfly necklace and dumped them on a silver tray, then swung around to face Danjermond again. "For the same reason he made certain I found these."
The idea shook her to the core. A murderer, a psychopath had singled her out to send his trophies to. Why? To taunt, to challenge? She didn't want the challenge. She hadn't come here to be sucked into something twisted and sinister. The thought that someone was trying to do that made her want to cut and run as far as she could go, as fast as she could get there.