Ella came home that evening as she had every evening since her parents departed for the Gulf almost a week ago, but she would spend the night—again—with her aunt and uncle next door. She’d thought it overcautious on her father’s part, insisting that she not spend the nights alone at home while they were out of town. But to pacify him, she had finally agreed. She had always felt safe in the big house on East First Street, and despite the recent harassment, she still felt safe here. She owned a gun and knew how to use it. Her father had taught her as a teenager about the safe use of firearms. And the hunting dogs her father kept would wake the dead if an intruder came anywhere near the house during the night. But to make her parents happy, every night she trekked down the sidewalk and went next door to sleep at Aunt Cybil and Uncle Jeff Henry’s house. Then, each morning she returned home to shower and dress for the day.

But today had been an especially tiring day, and she longed to take a long soak in her bathtub and crawl into her own bed. Maybe she’d phone her aunt and tell her that she wasn’t going to stay over tonight. Surely just one night alone at home wouldn’t upset her father. Actually, there was no need for him to know.

Although she had encouraged her parents to get away for a week, she missed them. Perhaps being lonely for one’s parents at the ripe old age of thirty was a sure sign that you had no real life of your own. Nothing except work.

Ella hiked her briefcase under her arm, shoved back her shoulder bag, and inserted the key into the lock. After opening the front door, she stepped inside, flipped on the overhead light in the foyer and turned toward the spiral staircase. That was when she noticed the gilt-framed mirror over the eighteenth-century flame veneer commode. Large cracks spread out across the antique mirror from a circular break in the very center, as if a hard object had smashed into the glass. Or perhaps a fist. A big, strong fist.

A rumble of uneasiness spread through Ella’s body. Who had broken the mirror? And when had it happened? Ordering herself to remain calm, she backed toward the closed front door, her gaze traveling in a crescent, left, front, and right, then back again. The wide expanse of foyer in front of her that spanned the depth of the entire house lay in semidarkness, as did the dining room on the left, with only a soft glow of evening twilight coming through the windows. To her left, illumination from the streetlight directly outside blended with the fading sunlight and seeped through the sheer curtains into the room. Just enough light for Ella to see that no one lay in wait for her, unless they were hiding behind a large piece of furniture.

As she glanced into the living room, she noticed the fireplace. Above the Italian blue marble mantle, the portraits of her father’s parents had been defaced with hideous black X marks. A shocked cry caught in her throat. Then she noted, in quick succession, the overturned chairs, the broken vases and figurines, and the pillows tossed haphazardly over the floor, every one ripped apart. She stood frozen, unable to move as the enormity of the ransacking began to sink in. Someone had totally destroyed the living room.

Damn! Her gun was upstairs in her bedside table. Naturally, she couldn’t take it to work with her. And her father’s rack of hunting rifles was in the den, locked in a display case. What about Daddy’s handgun? The one he kept in his desk in the library? Forget about defending yourself if someone is in the house, she told herself. Your best course of action is to get out of here as quickly as possible.

Run, dammit, Ella, run! He could still be in the house. Her heartbeat thundered inside her head as her pulse raced at breakneck speed. Fear clutched her stomach, knotting it painfully. Bitter bile rose in her throat. The fright encasing her limbs melted suddenly. She ran toward the front door. Just as her hand touched the doorknob, the loud, ferocious yapping of her father’s hunting dogs in the kennel on the far side of the backyard startled her. Her briefcase dropped from under her arm and landed on the heart-of-pine foyer floor with a dull thud.

She struggled with the brass doorknob, her palms damp with sweat. It was as if her hands were covered with grease, preventing her from gripping the knob. Whoever had wreaked such havoc inside her home was undoubtedly still on the premises—in the yard. The dogs had either heard him, seen him, or sensed him. Was he running away? Or simply lying in wait?

Finally the doorknob turned. Ella flung open the door and rushed out into the humid summer night. Streaks of heat lighting flashed through the twilight sky. Ella ran down the herringbone brick sidewalk and out onto the street, glancing over her shoulder as she went. Expecting what? A demon to be chasing her? But there was no one.

She arrived on her aunt and uncle’s doorstep, out of breath, her chest aching, her nerves screaming. The moment Cybil opened the front door, Ella flung herself into her aunt’s arms.

“My God, Ella, what’s wrong?”

Breathless, panting, she tried to speak. “House. Break-in. Still there.”

Cybil cried out, “Jeff Henry!”

Ella slung her shoulder bag around, unzipped the side pouch, and rifled the contents, searching for her cell phone. “Have to call the police.”

Cybil clasped Ella’s shoulders and gave her a gentle shake.

“Calm down, darling girl. You’re safe.”

Ella jerked her phone out of her purse, hit the instant emergency button, and placed the phone to her ear. As she listened to the ringing, her heartbeat slowed to a more normal rate. Here within the safety of her aunt’s home, she tried to free herself from the fear that had overwhelmed her in her own house.

The 911 operator answered and Ella told him who she was and what had happened. She was assured a police car was on its way. Cybil yelled a second time for her husband, then put her arm around Ella’s shoulder.

“Come on in the den with me. I’ll get us both a drink.”

Ella nodded agreement and allowed her aunt to guide her into the large antique-filled den that looked just as it had every summer of Ella’s childhood. She’d always suspected that very little had been altered in Uncle Jeff Henry’s lifetime. The sofa and chairs wore white cotton slipcovers for the summer, and the heavy winter drapes had been replaced with white dimity. Cabbage-rose wallpaper and a bold-print English Wilton carpet added color to the otherwise drab room.

Odd, Ella thought, what one noticed, what one’s mind was able to process even in the throes of near-panic. Of course, she wasn’t feeling quite as panicky as she had only a few minutes earlier.

“What in tarnation is all that screeching about?” Jeff Henry demanded as he stormed into the room. Wearing a satin smoking jacket and puffing on a pipe, he epitomized the lord-of-the-manor stereotype—an irate lord of the manor at the moment. When he saw Ella, his expression softened. “Is something wrong, my dear? You look quite pale.”

“Someone broke into the house…my house.” Ella patted her chest with her fingertips. “The living room has been ransacked, perhaps the entire house. I don’t know. I didn’t get any farther than the foyer before I ran.”

“Dear Lord!” Jeff Henry rushed to Ella’s side so that he and Cybil flanked their niece. “We must call Frank Nelson immediately.”

“I’ve already called nine-one-one,” Ella said.

“Yes, yes. Quite. But Frank should be notified. The break-in and destruction is no doubt the work of that hoodlum, Reed Conway. He’s a dangerous man. We all know that he should be behind bars. Thank God you didn’t encounter him. No telling what he might have done to you.”

Reed? Her uncle believed that Reed was the culprit? The thought hadn’t crossed her mind. But why should it? Only if she still believed him to be her stalker, the person bent on tormenting her, would she consider him a suspect.

“It isn’t fair to automatically condemn Reed Conway,” Ella said, and was surprised that she’d actually voiced her opinion aloud. “There’s no evidence linking him to anything that’s happened. Not the letters or the phone calls or the green garden snake in the roses.”

“Who else would it be?” Jeff Henry led Ella over to the sofa. “Do sit down, dear.”

“I’ll get you some brandy.” Cybil hurried to the makeshift bar set up on the antique tea caddy.

“Liquor—your aunt’s solution to everything,” Jeff Henry grumbled, then sat beside Ella. “All these problems started the very week that man was released from prison. He had sworn revenge against Webb. He’s a murderer, capable of anything. And I well remember what a cocky, ill-mannered hellion he was as a teenager. Take my word for it, he’s the person behind your harassment. And now this break-in.”

Cybil held a crystal goblet. “This should soothe your nerves.”

Ella grasped the glass, sniffed the liquor, and lifted the brandy to her lips. Mellow and rich. Expensive. Uncle Jeff Henry purchased only the best. A family trait for generations, or so she’d heard him say. Only the best for the Carlisles. But he had settled for second-best in a wife, Ella thought; then she shivered as the smooth brandy burned a trail down her throat and coated her stomach like a toasty-warm liquid blanket.

Jeff Henry rose to his feet. “I’ll contact Frank immediately. Then I’m getting in touch with Webb—”

Ella grabbed her uncle’s arm. “No, please, don’t call Daddy tonight. Let him and Mother have one more night on the Gulf. We’ll phone them tomorrow to let them know what happened.”

“Very well,” Jeff Henry agreed. “No need upsetting Carolyn at this point. She’ll be heartsick as it is, but by morning Frank should have Reed Conway in jail and that will put an end to all this craziness.”

Ella nodded, then glanced at her aunt. Cybil’s features hardened to a pinched, pained expression at the mention of her sister. The look passed as quickly as it had appeared. Only a woman who cared about a man would be jealous. Was it possible that despite her adulterous affairs, her aunt actually loved her husband?

Although Uncle Jeff Henry insisted that he could handle matters without her, Ella insisted on going with him when the police car arrived. Before the two officers got past the foyer, Frank Nelson showed up and began issuing orders. He warned Ella and Jeff Henry to stay outside out of harm’s way; then he followed his men into the house. Shortly thereafter another police car arrived and two uniformed officers—one man and one woman—began a search of the grounds. And all the while her daddy’s hounds kept baying as if they’d treed something.

Had they? she wondered. No, of course not. The dogs were confined to the kennels, which were within a fenced area. Their howling chant unnerved Ella almost as much as the situation. And unbidden flashes of Reed Conway played inside her head: Reed running, chased by the police, hunted down, captured. And all the while he kept insisting he was innocent.

Ella shook her head in an effort to erase those horrific thoughts from her mind. She didn’t want Reed to be the culprit. She couldn’t bear the thought of him being her stalker. But she had suspected him, even if for only a moment, last week when she’d seen him mailing a plain white envelope. But she hadn’t received another letter. So there, she told herself, doesn’t that prove that it isn’t Reed?

By the time Frank Nelson rejoined them, Cybil had walked over from next door and stood several feet away beside the tall live-oak tree in the front yard. Wearing an above-the-knee black silk robe, she all but gave the chief of police a come-hither stare. Frank looked. What man wouldn’t? He cleared his throat.

“Evening, Cybil,” Frank said.

Cybil saluted him with the brandy snifter in her hand, then put the glass to her lips and drank slowly, seductively. Frank hurriedly turned his attention to Ella.

“There’s no one in the house,” Frank said. “My people are still searching the grounds and will do a thorough check of the neighborhood.” Frank turned to Ella. “I’m afraid several of the downstairs rooms were totally trashed. An act of senseless violence. The way things look, you’d think somebody just went completely berserk. From my experience, I’d say it’s someone who hates your family.”

“Find Reed Conway and you’ll have your man,” Jeff Henry said.

“We’ll check the house for any kind of evidence the intruder might have inadvertently left behind, including fingerprints,” Frank assured them. “And if Reed Conway—”

“If?” Jeff Henry’s face turned red. “Good God, man, who else would have done something so despicable?”

“I can’t arrest a man without evidence,” Frank said. “And I know that with Reed’s prison record and his publicly acknowledged hatred for Senator Porter, he’s the most likely suspect.”

“Even without any evidence, I’d think you could lean on the man a little, now couldn’t you, Frank?”

“I can speak to him,” Frank said. “Find out if he has an alibi for the approximate time of the break-in. Uh, by the way, Ella, why don’t y’all have a security system?”

“A security system?” Ella sighed. “To be honest, I don’t believe my parents thought a security system was necessary. After all, the crime rate in Spring Creek is very low and all the doors in the house have very secure locks. And as you know, everyone in my home carries a gun permit, even Viola.” Ella directed her gaze at Frank. “How did he break in?”

“Through the French doors that lead from the living room to the side porch,” Frank said. “Look, Ella, if I were you, I’d go on home with your uncle and then in the morning call your insurance agent. I assume y’all have coverage with Steve Williamson. I can even contact him for you, if you’d like.”

She nodded. Of course their insurance agent was Steve Williamson. Everyone who lived on East First Street, indeed almost everyone in her parents’ social circle, used the same doctor, dentist, and insurance agent. And their memberships were equally divided between two churches in town—the Presbyterian and the Methodist. There were a few Baptists and Episcopalians among her parents’ friends, but only a handful. Ella’s grandfather Porter had once been a partner in Williamson and Porter, the local insurance company now operated by Steven Williamson IV. Her father retained his father’s half ownership of the business, which added greatly to the Porters’ yearly income.

“You’ll let me know when you find the person who broke in and ransacked the house.” Ella gazed at the three-story structure that had been home to several generations of Porters.

“I certainly will,” Frank said. “I’ll even post a man to keep watch here tonight, until the pane in the French door is fixed. And I intend to speak to Senator Porter about having a security system installed after this.”

“Yes, you do that,” she said. “It’s obvious to me now that even here in Spring Creek decent citizens aren’t safe in their own homes.”

Her uncle draped his arm around her shoulders and escorted her up the sidewalk. Ella wanted to scream at the injustice of it all. She’d been on the bench for only a short period of time, but she had presided over numerous criminal cases. She saw the dregs of local society and heard their excuses for committing crimes ranging from marijuana possession to child molestation. It wasn’t as if she were some naive innocent who wasn’t aware of what went on in the world, even in a rural county like Bryant. But seldom did bad things happen to people in her social realm. For the most part, her parents and their peers seemed immune to the woes that plagued ordinary people. She supposed that, as their child, she, too, had subconsciously felt that she was protected.

But you aren’t their child, she reminded herself. Not their biological child. Ella didn’t spend much time worrying about who her natural parents were or why her mother had chosen to give her up for adoption. When she’d been in her late teens, she’d considered looking into the possibility of finding out more about the woman and man who had created her. But Carolyn had assured her that her natural parents had been “our kind.”

“Your father has all the information about their medical records and education and backgrounds,” Carolyn had said. “Your biological parents weren’t married, and your mother—your first mother—decided it was best to allow a married couple to raise you. The adoption was handled privately, between her and us. Milton Leamon took care of everything for us. We never met the woman…your other mother.”

“Was money exchanged?” Ella had asked, wondering if her natural mother had sold her.

“If you’re asking if we bought you—if we paid your mother—the answer is no.”

Cybil joined Ella and Jeff Henry on their trek back to the Carlisle house. The moment they went inside, Jeff Henry gave his wife a disapproving glance, his gaze fixed on the empty brandy snifter in her hand.

“Why don’t you go on up and take a bath and get ready for bed,” Jeff Henry told Ella. “You must be exhausted after all that’s happened.”

“Thanks. I think I will.” She kissed her uncle’s cheek, then went to her aunt and gave her a hug.

Cybil reciprocated. “I’m so glad you’re all right, darling girl.”

Practically running up the stairs, Ella left her aunt and uncle, whose voices carried so that she could hear their quarrel until she rushed into the bedroom and closed the door behind her. Even when she’d been a child, she had been aware of her aunt and uncle’s arguments and had even asked her mother about them.

“You and Daddy don’t ever argue,” Ella had said. “Why do Aunt Cybil and Uncle Jeff Henry fuss at each other all the time?”

“Your father and I love each other and don’t have anything to argue about,” Carolyn had explained. “Unfortunately, your aunt and uncle aren’t always nice to each other and sometimes they hurt each other’s feelings. That’s when they get into a fuss. If they loved each other…”

Ella remembered that odd, distant look in her mother’s eyes when she had allowed her train of thought to wander off. Ella had always wondered why her aunt and uncle had married if they didn’t love each other. She had sworn then and there that she would never marry for any other reason, that she wanted a love like her parents had. Of course, since then she had come to realize that even her parents’ marriage wasn’t perfect. But despite everything, they still loved each other.

Didn’t they?

Cybil paced the floor in her bedroom. The grandfather clock on the landing in the center of the divided staircase chimed eleven o’clock. She gazed down into the dark amber liquid as she swirled the brandy in her glass. This was her third drink. No, maybe it was her fourth. Whichever, she’d had enough so that she felt very little pain. Actually, she felt very little of anything. And that was the way she liked it. If Ella weren’t here, she’d call Briley Joe and ask him to meet her at the motel over on River Road, which was on the other side of Smithville, the closest town to Spring Creek. But she wouldn’t leave, not on the off chance her niece might need her.

Her niece. Ella. The person she loved more dearly than anyone on earth.

Cybil downed the last of the brandy, set the glass on the bedside table, and then headed for the door. After opening the door, she secured the belt of her robe with unsteady fingers as she made her way down the hall. She eased open the door to Ella’s room. Her niece lay curled in a ball, fast asleep, her hair spread out on the pale pink pillowcase like black silk. Moonlight washed the room with transparent gold.

Cybil tiptoed into the room, which they had called Ella’s room since the first time Ella had spent the night with them. She’d been two years old and by night’s end had wound up in bed with Cybil, who had stayed awake the rest of the night just looking at the precious child. Having Ella was the closest she would ever come to motherhood.

Cybil stood at the foot of the bed and stared at her niece. If she could have given Jeff Henry a child, would he have loved her? She would never know, of course. There had never been even the slightest possibility for them.

What do you think of me, Ella, my darling girl? Cybil asked silently. That I’m a drunk and a slut? Are you as ashamed of me as Carolyn is? As Jeff Henry is? You’ve never said, never implied that you were. I didn’t want to disappoint you. Truly I didn’t. I foolishly thought that you’d never have to know what a terrible person I am.

Cybil sensed someone else’s presence. She glanced sidelong at the shadow hovering in the doorway. She took one last look at Ella and quietly walked out of the room, passing her husband, who eased the door shut.

“Is she all right?” Jeff Henry asked.

“Yes, she’s sleeping like a baby.” Cybil staggered awkwardly down the hall.

Jeff Henry came up beside her and slipped his hand beneath her elbow. She looked right at him. Tears welled up in her eyes.

“She should have been ours,” Cybil said, her voice a slurred whisper.

“Yes, you’re right. She should have been ours.”

Jeff Henry assisted Cybil to her room, helped her off with her robe and then into bed. She lay there naked, her husband only a few feet away. She held open her arms to him, inviting him. She could barely make out his face through the sheen of tears in her eyes. When she blinked the tears away, she noted the melancholy expression on his face.

He leaned over and kissed her forehead. “Get some sleep.” Then he turned and walked out of the room.

Cybil flung herself over onto her stomach, grabbed her pillow, and buried her face in its softness. Sobs racked her body as she cried herself to sleep.