Полная версия
Silent Witness
Ryan had to resist putting his arms around her.
He settled for lightly tipping his chin up so he could look straight into those soft brown eyes. “It’s going to be all right.”
She nodded, but her eyes betrayed her fright. He was startled by a suddenly overwhelming need to protect her at all costs. More than that, he realized he wanted to draw her close and kiss those trembling lips. His gaze must have dropped to her lips, but instead of pulling away from his touch, her mouth seemed to part slightly with anticipation.
Then she suddenly did pull back as they heard a noise in the hall. And without much more warning than that, they were back to business.
Before turning away, she hesitated as if she wanted to say something more. Then she headed for the door.
“Good night, then,” he said, but all she gave him in return was a quick nod. And then she was gone.
The moment was over.
LEONA KARR
SILENT WITNESS
To Leslie Pitz and Angela Hart, with thanks for their help,
encouragement and love.
Contents
About the Author
Cast of Characters
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
A native of Colorado, Leona Karr lives near the front range of the Rocky Mountains. She delights in being close to craggy cliffs, dramatic peaks and hidden valleys. It is no surprise, then, that she chooses this setting for many of her books. She has been on the Waldenbooks bestseller list and received many awards as a multipublished author of novels of romantic suspense, gothic, historical romance, time travel and mystery.
Books by Leona Karr
HARLEQUIN INTRIGUE
574—INNOCENT WITNESS
623—THE MYSTERIOUS TWIN
672—LOST IDENTITY
724—SEMIAUTOMATIC MARRIAGE
792—A DANGEROUS INHERITANCE
840—SHADOWS ON THE LAKE
900—STONEVIEW ESTATE
949—CHARMED
973—SHADOW MOUNTAIN
1056—SILENT WITNESS
Don’t miss any of our special offers. Write to us at the following address for information on our newest releases.
Harlequin Reader Service
U.S.: 3010 Walden Ave., P.O. Box 1325, Buffalo, NY 14269 Canadian: P.O. Box 609, Fort Erie, Ont. L2A 5X3
CAST OF CHARACTERS
Marian Richards—Director of the summer program for deaf children.
Ryan Darnell—Detective at Rock Creek Police Department.
Scotty Tanner—The eleven-year-old rebellious boy attending the summer program who may have witnessed a murder.
Alva Wentworth—Wealthy elderly owner of Wentworth mansion and estate.
Ruth Tilman—Officious personal secretary to Alva Wentworth.
Henry Ziller—Cantankerous caretaker of Wentworth estate.
Victor Blaise—Henry’s nephew is both transient and dangerous.
Toby Bower—Forensic detective at Rock Creek Crime Laboratory.
Arthur Kennedy—The Denver lawyer hired to oversee the summer program may have come with his own agenda.
Nancy Collins and Ron Harman—Teachers involved with the summer program.
Bertha Higgins—Motherly nurse who helps children in the summer program.
Elsie Mullens—Wentworth estate cook, who is both outgoing and friendly.
Joyce Phillips—Is Ryan’s attractive ex trying to stir up trouble?
Prologue
Hidden in a thick drift of pine and cedar trees, Scotty Tanner didn’t hear the shot inside the mountain cabin even though a sharp gunfire report echoed loudly from the house. A chatter of blue jays in a nearby ponderosa pine went unheard as he waited and watched. Nothing but stillness dominated the deaf eleven-year-old boy’s world.
Scotty was spending the summer with a dozen other hearing-impaired children in a privately sponsored rehabilitation program held on a large mountain estate near Rock Creek, Colorado. He’d only been there for a week and had managed to duck out of most of the scheduled activities. He was patting himself on the back for slipping away right after lunch to investigate the mountain surroundings on his own.
About a half mile downstream from the large main house and outbuildings, he’d discovered a small cabin built near a swift-flowing mountain stream.
As he slowly moved out of the trees, his eyes darted in every direction.
No sign of anyone living in the place. No telling what kind of loot was waiting inside.
His heart jumped a beat as he boldly walked up the front steps. Shuffling nervously, he knocked on the door. He was glad he was good at reading lips and was ready with a lie about needing a drink of water if anyone opened it.
He’d lost his hearing a couple of years ago when he was running with a gang of older guys and had been experimenting with homemade bombs. One of them had gone off prematurely, injuring both his ears. Things had gone from bad to worse after that. He’d been made a ward of the court and the authorities took him away from his drug-addicted mother. Hating the close supervision and boring daily routines of foster care, he intended to make the most of this summer program for disadvantaged hearing-impaired kids. He’d go his own way and get some kicks this summer any way he could.
When no one responded to his knock, Scotty tried the door. Locked. Maybe he’d have more luck with a back door. A narrow deck circled the cabin and he quickly made his way around to a rear door flanked by two windows.
It was locked. Now what? What about a window? Both of them were locked, too, but he was able to remove one of the screens.
He hurriedly found a rock big enough to use as a sledge and used it to shatter the window glass. Carefully and swiftly, he removed the jagged shards and then hoisted himself through the opening into a small kitchen.
Inside, he hunched down in a waiting position, motionless and animal alert for any sign of danger. In the enveloping silence, he knew he had to depend entirely on sight to alert him. There would be no sounds to tell him what lay ahead, behind or beyond his peripheral vision.
Scotty could feel the skin on his neck prickling. He was alone in his silent world—or was he? Was some second sense warning him? As he fought the temptation to turn and bolt out the window, an inner voice mocked him. You turning into some yellow-bellied coward?
Straightening up and clenching his fists, he walked into the center of the kitchen and looked around. He opened some of the cupboards but didn’t see anything of interest. He couldn’t believe his luck when he spied an ashtray on the table with three long cigarette butts. He’d been dying for a smoke. He carefully put the butts in the pocket of his shirt and looked around for some matches but didn’t see any.
Then a portable radio sitting on the counter caught his attention. For a moment he forgot his deafness and reached for it. Then the truth stabbed him! Never again would he hear rap music blaring out of a radio station.
With childish fury and frustration, he lifted the radio over his head and threw it on the floor. Then, with a vicious kick he sent it sailing across the room.
It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair!
He knocked over two chairs, swept the counters clean, spilling objects all over the floor. Then stepping over the shattered and broken clutter, he left the kitchen through a doorway that opened into a front living room. Pressing up against one wall, he waited until he was satisfied that it was as empty as the kitchen.
Boldly he moved forward to see what he might find that was worth lifting. If he was lucky, he might even find a full pack of cigarettes and a lighter.
He had just taken a few steps into the room and was looking around, when he froze with sudden terror. Lying on the floor in front of the fireplace was the crumpled body of a man. His chest was bloody and his dead eyes stared straight at Scotty.
In that paralyzing moment, a shadow flickered across the front window, warning Scotty that someone was outside near the front door.
Frantically, he bolted back to the kitchen and pushed himself out the broken window. As he scrambled to his feet, he felt vibrations on the deck boards, warning him that someone was coming around the house.
He ran as fast as he could for the nearby cover of trees, not knowing if someone right behind him might be yelling, “Stop or I’ll shoot!”
Chapter One
As Marian Richards entered a large reception room in the Wentworth mansion, a hum of childish voices greeted her. The spacious, high-ceilinged room had been turned into an activity center, and as director of a summer program for disadvantaged hearing-impaired children, Marian was learning the hard way that the mountain estate with its imposing three-storied mansion had never been meant for a dozen eight-to twelve-year-old youngsters.
The property belonged to Alva Wentworth, a widow in her late seventies who was in a local nursing home. Located near one of the state’s popular tourist areas in southern Colorado the estate was worth a fortune and ripe for development. Countless investors had tried to persuade the wealthy widow to sell the estate but she had stubbornly held on to it. Her only heir had been a grandson, Stanley, whom she’d disinherited when she’d discovered a series of illegal maneuvers of his to get his hands on her money before she died. Everyone was amazed when she agreed to let the Colorado Foundation for Disadvantaged Children use the mansion and grounds for a children’s summer program.
Marian was determined that everything would go smoothly under her leadership. She’d been assistant director at a private school for the hearing impaired when she heard about the summer program and quickly applied for the position. She was delighted and slightly surprised when she was offered the job even though she was the youngest applicant, only thirty years old and still working on a doctorate in social services. She was determined that all would go smoothly, because this experience would be a professional stepping stone to the position of director at one of Colorado’s larger institutions.
Her first challenge had been to evaluate recommended children for the program. After considerable debate with teachers and social workers, she had chosen six boys and six girls of various ages and problems. She’d met with some negative reaction when she’d chosen Scotty Tanner, an eleven-year-old who had both hearing and emotional problems. Even his foster parents had warned her that the boy didn’t do well in groups.
As Marian entered the activity room, she looked around for Scotty but didn’t see the slender boy with unruly blond hair and snapping blue eyes. He usually dominated the Ping-Pong table, furiously venting his anger upon the small ball. Already Marian had learned that Scotty was constantly warring against the acceptance of his deafness and striking out at anything and everybody. He seemed intent upon isolating himself beyond what a hearing loss would create.
Uneasiness began to stir as she walked over to Rob Harman, a middle-aged physical-education teacher who had raised a deaf son and spent his summers working with the handicapped. He was easygoing and patient but at the same time firm enough to maintain control.
Marian had a staff of five people, counting herself, and was pleased they’d developed a summer curriculum that was both instructive and recreational.
“I don’t see Scotty in the room, Rob. Do you know where he is?”
“He was here right after lunch but complained his stomach hurt. He asked to go back upstairs to his bunk but I sent him to the nurse. I decided Bertha could tell whether he was goldbricking or not.” Rob sighed. “He’s not the most sociable kid on the block.”
Marian nodded in agreement. “A real loner, for sure.”
The only time the boy seemed visible was when there was trouble of some kind, but she was willing to give Scotty some leeway. He’d been running the streets most of his life. No father in the picture and a mother strung out on drugs most of the time. Scotty might have ended up serving time in a juvenile facility if a homemade bomb hadn’t plunged him into deafness and made him a ward of the court.
“Maybe after a few weeks in the program we’ll see a change for the better,” Marian told Rob. She was encouraged because she’d seen one good sign already in his behavior. For some inexplicable reason, the tough, streetwise Scotty had appointed himself protector of Mindy Simpson, a small, shy eight-year-old girl who had been deaf since birth.
Scotty had met her in class for the hearing impaired which he’d been required to attend when he was turned over to the court. It was because of the dark-haired, curly-headed Mindy that Scotty had mastered any sign language at all. Unfortunately, he seemed only willing to try signing in order to communicate with the shy little girl. Most of the time he got along as best he could with lip-reading, defying all orders to practice communicating with any of the other students.
“I’ll check with the nurse,” Marian told Rob and then walked across the room to a table where several girls were involved in an activity of following directions. They were making Indian god’s eyes out of yarn and sticks. Because a field trip was planned to the nearby Mesa Verde Indian ruins, the teachers had decided to incorporate some of the activities, stories and art around an Indian theme.
Nancy Collins, a chubby, round-faced teacher in her early forties, was busily moving around the table, smiling, nodding and signing her approval. Marian had worked with Nancy before and was delighted when the outgoing, good-natured teacher had applied for the summer program. Together they had developed a program of activities to help hearing-impaired children develop language, speech and listening skills.
Marian stopped at Mindy’s chair and lightly touched the little girl on the shoulder to get her attention. As she looked up, her smiling eyes were a sparkling blue and full of life.
“I’m looking for Scotty,” Marian signed. “Do you know where he is?”
She shook her head and her fingers flitted like butterflies as she responded, “I haven’t seen him since lunch. Is he in trouble again?”
I hope not. Marian sighed silently as she nodded approval of the rather lopsided god’s eye that Mindy held up for her approval.
Even though a building uneasiness urged Marian to find Scotty as soon as possible, she took time to look at all the girls’ handiwork. Marian knew these children wanted so much to connect with other people that sometimes they were like puppies willing to do anything for a pat on the head.
“We’re going to make one to hang in your office,” Nancy told her with a grin. “It’ll keep all the problems away from your door.”
“What a lovely idea. The sooner the better.”
“What’s happening?”
“I feel as if I’m holding on to a dozen horses going in all directions,” Marian admitted. “New-job jitters, I guess.”
“Relax, everything’s under control,” Nancy assured her with her usual optimistic grin.
Marian gave her a grateful smile as she left the room and headed down the hall to a small sitting room that had been changed into a nursing station and dispensary.
Bertha Higgins was a large, motherly-looking woman in her fifties who was not only a registered nurse but also a certified teacher, trained in speech, auditory development, sign language and lip-reading. Marian had hired her because she was qualified to take turns relieving Nancy and Rob with the students so the two teachers might have some free time. When Bertha wasn’t tending to medical needs or handling a class, she took it upon herself to instruct individual students about specific health habits they were ignoring.
Marian knew Bertha had playfully threatened to wash Scotty’s ears and neck for him. Much to everyone’s surprise the boy had given her a big grin as if he wasn’t used to anyone paying that much attention to him.
Maybe he was just faking the stomachache so he could get Bertha’s attention again, Marian thought as she politely knocked on the door.
“Come in.”
The nurse had her back to the door, putting some medical supplies in a cabinet. When she turned around, she gave Marian a cheery smile as she said, “What can I do you for?”
“I’m looking for Scotty.”
“I haven’t seen him. Was he supposed to check in with me?”
“Well, Rob excused him and told him to see you because Scotty said he had a stomachache.”
Bertha chuckled. “The oldest ploy in the world. Better than a headache. I bet he knows every trick in the book, that one. He’s probably stretched out on his bunk waiting for dinnertime. I bet the kid’s been starved a lot of his life. He’ll put on a pound or two while he’s here.”
“Well, if he’s hiding out, I just might find a job or two that will help his appetite.” As she turned to leave, she said, “If he shows up, hold on to him.”
“Will do.”
Heading down the hall, Marian intended to go up to the second floor where the boys had assigned beds, but another youngster, Peter, came bounding down the center staircase just as she reached it.
Putting out her hand, she stopped him. Knowing the ten-year-old was a good lip-reader, she looked straight at him and carefully mouthed her words, slowly and evenly. “Peter, did you see Scotty upstairs?”
He shook his head. “Nobody up there. I went to get this,” he told her in a flat but understandable tone as he held out a small electronic game. “You want to play?”
“Not now, Peter. Maybe later,” she answered.
He nodded to show he understood and then bounded down the hall toward the activity room.
Marian decided to check the kitchen, since Scotty had already been caught stealing food between meals. The cook, Elsie Mullens, had threatened him with a week’s dish-washing detail if he did it again and Marian had approved the promised punishment.
She liked the hefty, gray-haired cook who had been hired to prepare the meals. Once, Marian had heard Elsie on the phone arguing with a Denver dietician about the menus they had sent her to prepare. Elsie had spent most of her life cooking for ranchers and was used to preparing meals for hardworking men with healthy appetites and not finicky youngsters.
“Yeah, he was here,” Elsie replied when Marian asked her if she’d seen Scotty. “Hanging around, he was, waiting for me to turn my back. He’s got sticky fingers, that one. Lordy, he’s snitched more than one pastry right out from under my nose.” As she talked she vigorously patted flour on a bread board and wheeled a rolling pin over fresh dough. “I shooed him out of here fast like.”
“Do you know where he went?”
Elsie shrugged her solid shoulders. “He left by the back door.”
Marian mentally groaned. She knew it wasn’t Elsie’s duty to supervise the kids, but she wished the cook had stopped him. It wasn’t an easy job to supervise all the activities inside the house. One kid like Scotty could create a crisis in spite of their best efforts. Making certain none of the children wandered off was a number-one priority. She’d have to talk to Rob about not letting any of the children run around unsupervised, even for a few minutes.
“If the kid shows up again, I’ll sit him down till you come after him,” Elsie promised as if she’d read Marian’s mind.
“Yes, please do.” Marian thanked her and left quickly by the back door.
As she stood on the top step of the wide back porch and surveyed the surrounding foothills carpeted with thick drifts of evergreen trees, her chest tightened. She’d had enough experience in her hiking club to know how treacherous climbing slopes like those could be. A small city boy scrambling up the side of the rock-strewn slopes could easily lose his footing. Steep cliffs fell away to a swift-flowing mountain stream bordering one edge of the property, and in her mind’s eye, Marian unwittingly pictured Scotty tumbling into the current. He’d be swept downstream and—
Stop it!
Taking a deep breath, she stilled her rising apprehension and vivid imagination.
I can handle this!
She’d been telling herself that every time a crisis arose that demanded her attention and decision. The heavy responsibility of being in charge had come home to her the minute the busload of children had unloaded at the front door. Her intense week of preparation at the house to get ready seemed inadequate for the instant demands put upon her with their arrival.
Almost immediately, a myriad of unexpected problems challenged her on every level, none of which resembled those she’d experienced in her former administrative position at the day school. Scotty Tanner was one of those challenges. It was imperative that she get the belligerent boy under control without delay.
She left the porch and quickly made a circle walking around the stone mansion. No sign of him standing on the flagstone terrace nor on the wide-veranda front porch.
A large garage stood at the end of the driveway. She peeked in and saw a couple of cars and one pickup truck. Some old bicycles and garden equipment were stored there. No sign of Scotty.
Maybe the caretaker, Henry Ziller, had seen the boy snooping around. The older, rugged, sharp-tongued man lived in the apartment above the garage and it was clear he was less than pleased about having a dozen kids running all over the place.
She knew Henry had been with the Wentworth family since his youth and was very possessive about the property. Already there had been problems about letting the children play in certain places on the grounds and he’d raised a fuss about having any play equipment scattered about.
She quickly climbed the outside stairs to the small apartment and knocked on the door.
No response. A knot in her chest began to tighten. What now? There were a hundred places in the mansion alone where a small boy could hide and enjoy the uproar of people looking for him. She wanted to do her best to make sure Scotty wasn’t somewhere on the grounds or in the mansion before she organized an official search party. The uproar that would cause was something she couldn’t even bear to think about.
The only places left to look on the immediate property were a small barn and stable built a short distance from the back of the house and almost hidden by stands of cedar and pine trees. She knew horses had not been stabled there for several years but maybe Scotty was scouting these empty buildings like a hopeful pack rat.
As she headed across a green meadow in the direction of the buildings, she brushed back a strand of reddish-blond hair and shaded her eyes from the bright sunlight. At first she thought her eyes were betraying her when she glimpsed a shadowy movement in the trees. She stopped and shaded her eyes with her hands. A moment later, she glimpsed a small figure running into the stable.
Scotty! Thank heavens!
Was he trying to hide from her? At the moment, she didn’t know what kind of discipline was appropriate, but she was determined to make sure this kind of thing didn’t happen again. Even as she cautioned herself not to lose her temper, she knew she was way too uptight for any game of hide-and-seek.
