Page 71 of Fatal Witness

“Oh!” Dani caught her breath as tears sprang to her eyes. “I don’t know why I’m surprised.”

There was another round of hugs and congratulations. Even though there’d been no doubt in Dani’s mind that Mae Richmond was her grandmother, it was like a cloud had lifted. Even the kitchen was brighter. Alex stood and brought a covered dish to the table. “Mae made this for us to celebrate with.” She removed the decorative cover, revealing a pineapple upside-down cake.

Dani stared at her favorite dessert. “How did you know?”

Nonny beamed. “It’s always been your favorite.”

Her grandmother remembered that from twenty-five years ago? It was like the last puzzle piece slid into place. Dani sat back in the chair. Then a shiver ran through her.

No. There was still a piece missing. The person who killed her parents and wanted her dead.

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Either it was the coffee, even though it was decaf, or the cake, or just the excitement, but Dani couldn’t go to sleep. Like a pinball, her thoughts bounced everywhere except toward relaxing. Images popped in and out of her mind, including one of the man at Mae’s house that first night. She’d never drawn it for Alex like she promised.

Dani threw back the blanket and grabbed her sketch pad and pencil from her case. She stared at the blank page, reliving last Saturday night, until her fingers sketched what she saw. When Dani finished, she tilted her head, studying the image, then made a few adjustments to the eyes around the ski mask the man had worn. That was the best she could do. She didn’t know if it would help Alex, but it’d certainly calmed her down. She put the pad and pencil on the nightstand, turned off the light, and soon fell into a fitful sleep.

“Danielle! Get in here!”

She flinched.

“Now!”

If she didn’t go, he would come after her. She laid her Barbie on the floorand trudged to the kitchen, slipping inside the room quiet as a cat.

Her dad pushed her mama toward their bedroom. “Get packed. We have to leave. Now!”

Mama turned and crossed her arms. “Why is he coming here, Bobby?What does he want?”

“His share of the diamonds,” hesaid. “We need to leave before he gets here. Nowget to packing!”

“No! You have to take the diamondsback!”

“Don’t you understand? They’re our way out—”He cocked his head as tires crunched in their drive. “He’s here!” He slammed his fist against the table. “If you’d done what I’d said, we’d be out of here.”

“Me? You’re the one whobroke the law! And now you’re even stealing fromyour partner.”

His face was so red Danielle thought he might explode. Then his face changed, and he didn’tlook so mad. “I’m sorry. I’m just...” Heswept her up in his arms and turned to her mother. “You stay here. I’ll see if I cantalk our way out of this. But first, I’llhide Danielle.”

Suddenly someone else was there. And she heardyelling. A man turned, his eyes getting mean when hesaw her. Mama was still ... Daddy too.

Dani bolted upright in the bed, sweat clinging to her body. She touched her face and wiped away the tears that streamed from her eyes. Lizi nudged her, and she wrapped her arms around the dog, burying her face in the corded hair.

This was a dream unlike any she’d ever had, weighing on her like a heavy blanket. Never had she seen her parents so clearly. In the past, their faces had been obscured. Maybe it wasn’t a dream at all. Maybe she was reliving something that had happened.

Could she capture the face of the man with the mean eyes in a sketch before the image faded entirely? Dani grabbed the sketch pad and pencil she’d placed on the table by the bed and began sketching a man’s face.

Dani drew an oval. Too narrow. She widened it around thetemples, and then filled in the eyes. When she tried to fill in the rest of his features, she had nothing—her pencil refused to fill in any details. This man her mind refused to see ... had he killed her parents?

She suddenly found herself drawing her parents. Not the frightened faces she’d seen in the dream, but a sketch of her mom and dad smiling.

When she finished, Dani stared at the drawings. She hadn’t noticed in the photos she’d seen at Nonny’s that her dad favored Keith so much. A tiny smile pulled at her lips. And while her sketch of her mother was different from the photo on the mantel, she looked like Nonny just the same.

Then almost on their own, her fingers began to sketch a scene. When she finished, Dani stared at it, trying to make sense of what she’d drawn. Her dad again, sitting on a porch. Beside him was a younger man. Dani had no idea who it was, but he was familiar in a distant sort of way. She didn’t think he’d been in the dream, at least not tonight’s.

Why could she see this man’s face and not the other? Maybe if she concentrated harder ... after a few minutes, Dani shook her head and sighed. She couldn’t force it. At least she had the sketch of the man at Mae’s house Saturday night to give to Alex.

Lizi nudged her hand, and Dani scratched her head. “You want to go back to sleep, don’t you, girl?”

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