Expecting to Die

Husband shooting blanks . . .
Oh, God.
No. No reason to follow that line of thinking. Terri Tufts was a bitter ex, and
bitter exes said a lot of bitter, untrue things.
But she did ask, “Is Mr. Tufts excited about the baby?” The pressure
decreased slightly and she took a breath. I cannot be going into labor. I. Can.
Not.
“I don’t know.”
Pescoli’s cell phone chirped and she saw that Luke was on the line. Great. The
last thing she needed was to deal with her ex, but ignoring Luke never seemed to
work.
“Hi,” she answered shortly.
“Have you heard?” he demanded, and she could tell that he was driving, could
hear the rush of traffic noise in the background. And he was mad as hell; she
recognized his fury in the timbre of his voice.
“Have I heard what?”
“About the show?” He was practically shouting. “That Bianca’s out and that
bimbo Lara Haas is in? That she claims she was attacked by a Big Foot? Jesus
Christ, that has to be a setup!”
“A setup?”

---

“Are you playing dumb? Lara’s attack was obviously staged. Fake!” Then, he
must’ve turned his head away from the phone as his voice was suddenly muted,
though she heard him yell, “Way to go, asshole. Cut me off, will ya?” Then his
voice was stronger again, when he returned. “I’m driving.”
“I figured.”
Back on topic, his voice clear again, he said, “I don’t believe for a second that
she lost her phone up there at Reservoir Point when they were filming and then
she didn’t notice it for a couple of hours or so, long enough for the crew to shut
down? No way. I’m telling you, that girl has been angling for a starring role in
Big Foot Territory: Montana! from the get-go. She was targeting Bianca, trying
to figure out how to become the star, and she did it.” Again, his voice became
muted, but she still heard, “Holy shit, asshole! Get off the road! That part
belongs to Bianca! Hold on a sec. I’ve got to turn. Oh, shit!” She heard what
sounded like the phone being dropped.
She wondered where he was heading in such a state, and a cold certainty
settled in the pit of her stomach.
“That was Dad?” Bianca asked, twisting on the couch to look at her.
“Yeah, but I lost him. . . .” Her voice trailed off when headlights flashed
through the trees as a vehicle came speeding down the lane. Lucky’s vintage
Chevy was kicking up a trail of dust. “Oh, wait.” she said, clicking off the
phone. “I think I just found him.”
Oh, joy.
* * *
“Gotcha!” Alvarez muttered, double-checking the lab results. No doubt about
it. Kywin Bell was the father of Destiny Rose Montclaire’s unborn child. “You
snakey, little lying bastard,” she said as she grabbed her keys and sidearm from
her locker, then headed into the warm Montana night.
Destiny Rose’s self-appointed “protector,” and one of the people Destiny had
texted on the night she died, had been lying to everyone. All that complaining
about being harassed by the police, and whining about wanting a lawyer was to
cover his own lying ass.
“Too late,” she said as she climbed into the warm interior of her Outback,
rolled down the windows, backed out of her parking space, and drove out of the
lot. The sun was hanging low in the sky, just about to settle over the western
ridge of mountains, dusk quickly approaching. Squinting, she pulled her
sunglasses from the console, slipped them over her eyes, and, at the traffic light,
dialed Pescoli.

---

Her partner didn’t pick up, so she left a quick voice mail about arresting
Kywin Bell, then kept driving. It was finally all coming together. Kywin had
been seeing Destiny behind Donny Justison’s back, or maybe even to his
knowledge as Donny and Destiny had broken up because of Veronica Palmero.
Or for whatever reason. And oops, Destiny gets pregnant. Maybe she didn’t even
know which of the boys she’d slept with could be the father. Not important. So
she’d contacted them both, along with Lindsay Cronin, and then met Donny . . .
at his house. “Nuh-uh,” she said to herself as she wound her way through the
city streets to Franklin Bell’s house. Destiny had gone to the reservoir. So had
she met Donny there? Or Kywin? Or both? Had Donny killed her in a fit of
rage? Or had Kywin, “her protector” and lover, strangled the life out of the
mother of his child?
Alvarez decided to force the truth out of Kywin first. Because he was the only
person who had been contacted by both Lindsay Cronin and Destiny Rose
Montclaire, the two dead girls. Alvarez had double-checked the phone records,
and though Lindsay had conversations with a lot of her classmates, Kywin Bell’s
number was one of the most frequent. Sometimes their conversations lasted half
an hour. Yeah, he knew something, and Alvarez was betting he knew a lot.
“Time to find out,” she said, cutting the engine, making sure her sidearm was
ready, and tossing off her shades. A feeling of satisfaction stole over her as she
strode up the cracked cement walkway to the front porch, where the scraggly
gray cat was curled into one of the metal lawn chairs. At the sight of her, it
climbed to its feet, took the time to hiss in her direction, then hopped to the worn
floorboards and slunk into the near-dead shrubbery.
The door was open, only a screen door in place, and from the dark interior she
heard muted conversation—no, more likely a television and maybe the sizzle of
something being cooked, bacon frying, she guessed from the smell emanating
through the rusted mesh. A bluish glow was visible down a short hallway, a TV
at the back of the house.
She pounded on the frame of the screen door, then waited.
Nothing. But Franklin’s dusty Suburban, with all of its windows rolled down,
was parked in the driveway. Unfortunately, Kywin’s jacked-up truck wasn’t in
sight, which didn’t bode well.
She rapped again and this time heard a grunt, then a deep voice yelling, “I’m
coming! Hell. What now?” Floorboards creaked as Franklin Bell, all six-four
and three-hundred-plus pounds of him, lumbered from the back of the house to
the front.
“For shit’s sake,” he said when he spied Alvarez. He was unshaven, his
trucker’s cap squarely in place. “You’re Pescoli’s partner. What the hell do you

---

want?” His gaze swept the porch and dry lawn as if searching for the other
detective.
“To talk to Kywin?”
“Again? Didn’t you already do that? More’n once.”
“New information. I need to speak to him.”
“He ain’t here. Neither of my boys are.”
“Where is he?”
“Don’t know,” he retorted with satisfaction.
“When do you expect him back?”
He shrugged. “He’s a damned adult. Comes and goes as he pleases.”
“And he’s the father of Destiny Rose Montclaire’s unborn baby,” she said.
“Lab tests confirm it, so I need to talk to him ASAP. If he’s involved in her
death, he’s looking at double homicide.”
“You’re bullshitting me—”
“DNA doesn’t lie.” She cut him off. Franklin’s usually florid face drained of
color. “Your boy’s up to his eyeballs in this.” She stepped closer to the rusted
screens, showing him she wasn’t intimidated. “Kywin was in contact with
Destiny on the night she died, and again with Lindsay Cronin a little while
before she had her ‘accident’ up on Horsebrier Ridge. So, if you hear from him,
let him know that I’m looking for him, and I need to talk to him ASAP.”
“Get the fuck off my property!” he growled as the smell of burning meat
wafted through the house.
“Just give him the message.”
“Didn’t you hear me? Leave!” And with that, he grabbed hold of the edge of
the open door and slammed it so hard that it rattled the screen as it shut. The cat,
watching from the shadows of a near-dead juniper, glowered at Alvarez as she
crossed the yard and slid behind the wheel of her Subaru. She didn’t start the car
immediately. First, she called the station and put in a request for a BOLO,
ordering all law enforcement officers to be on the lookout for Kywin Bell’s
Dodge pickup. No way was Destiny Rose’s baby daddy and possible murderer
going to slip through her fingers.

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