Fatal Distraction by Diane Capri

the rented truck.
    But he needed to see Helen when she found Oliver, to witness her anguish.
    Anxiety mounting, he waited.
    In less than a minute, his patience was rewarded. Helen found Oliver’s trail in the driveway and tracked him like an animal.
    He read her lips and imagined he could hear her calling over the clamor of the rescue workers. “Oliver! Oliver!” Her face was hidden from his view, but he watched her lean over Oliver, kiss him, feel the sticky blood and dent in the skull where his kicks had connected with Oliver’s temple.
    He watched a bit longer, knowing it had been worth it, believing deep in his bones that Helen had finally been destroyed. He had chosen well, and he’d won.
    He experienced relief almost as intense as his anxiety had been. He smiled. Now he could go.
    He turned and began his struggle to cover the distance to his truck, barely noticing the pain in his left ankle.
    He hadn’t expected Oliver to wake up or to see him. But it didn’t matter. Oliver would never survive.
    His work tonight had met his every expectation and more. He felt every inch the conqueror as he moved toward the next phase.

Chapter Ten
    Dentonville, Florida
    Thursday 10:15 p.m.
    VIVIAN’S WINK SENT AN IMMEDIATE, visceral charge across the table that struck Jess like a taser shot. At once she felt prickly hot and nauseated, as if electricity pulsed through her nervous system.
    Attempting to regain control, she swallowed the bile that rose in her throat. But Vivian simply continued with her card game, as if nothing had happened. A sudden hand on her shoulder nearly made Jess jump from the hard chair.
    â€œCan I talk to you?” It was Mike who had entered the diner and come up behind her. “Privately?”
    She glanced at Vivian, then back to Mike, unsure whether to press Vivian further first, and ultimately deciding against it. She rose on trembling legs and stepped aside with Mike, who kept his back to Vivian and his voice low.
    â€œThere’s been a fire at the governor’s ranch. They took Helen and her husband to Tampa Southern in the death chopper.”
    â€œA fire?” Jess repeated dumbly. “In the what?”
    â€œThe Medevac helicopter,” Mike said. “They don’t send the death chopper out unless the patient’s near dead already. That’s what my girlfriend said. She just called. She works at the hospital, in ICU. Thought you’d wanna know.”
    For the first time since she’d entered the diner, she glanced up at the clock. Almost eleven o’clock. Jess absorbed the information and struggled with her choices. Questions swarmed through her mind. How had it gotten to be so late already? Tommy Taylor was due to die in nineteen hours. But what if he really hadn’t killed Matthew Crawford? Could another killer be walking free tonight?
    No, she thought. Arnold Ward had seen Taylor put Crawford’s body in the trunk.
    Or had he? If Ward lied about what he’d seen that night, what exactly did he lie about? Did he really see Taylor put Mattie in the trunk of that car but lie about his certainty? Could Arnold Ward have framed Taylor for the murder?
    And was there new DNA evidence to prove Taylor not guilty? Or was Vivian hinting at something else entirely?
    Jess shook her head to clear her mind. What should she do? Whatever it was, she had to do it now. Attempt to pry more out of Vivian? Or leave for Tampa Southern?
    She considered a fire at the governor’s ranch, a victim hovering near death. What were the chances that the fire tonight was an accident? On the same day as the truck bombing? On the night before Taylor’s execution? Something was happening. This couldn’t be coincidence.
    Jess glanced again at Vivian and shook her head. What if this woman, who lingered on the fringes of health and sanity, held the answer? Even so, would she tell Jess anything definitive before Taylor was executed? Given that her