Wrong Alibi Read online

  Praise for

  New York Times bestselling author

  Christina Dodd

  “Featuring an unforgettable protagonist, who makes Jack Reacher look like a slacker, Dodd’s latest superior suspense novel builds on the well-deserved success of Dead Girl Running.”

  —Booklist (starred review) on What Doesn’t Kill Her

  “Christina Dodd reinvents the romantic thriller. Her signature style—edgy, intense, twisty, emotional—leaves you breathless from first page to last. Readers who enjoy Nora Roberts will devour Dodd’s electrifying novels.”

  —Jayne Ann Krentz, New York Times bestselling author

  “Action-packed, littered with dead bodies, and brimming with heartfelt emotion, this edgy thriller keeps the tension high.”

  —Library Journal (starred review) on What Doesn’t Kill Her

  “Dodd’s gripping voice will appeal to fans of Sandra Brown, Nora Roberts, Linda Howard and Jayne Ann Krentz.”

  —Mystery Tribune on What Doesn’t Kill Her

  “No one does high-stakes, high-voltage suspense quite like Dodd, and [Dead Girl Running] is another guaranteed keep-the-lights-on-late read. Dodd is at her most wildly entertaining, wickedly witty best.”

  —Booklist (starred review)

  “Complex, intense, and engrossing, this riveting romantic thriller has a chilling gothic touch and just enough red herrings and twists to keep readers on edge.”

  —Library Journal (starred review) on Dead Girl Running

  “You can always count on the ingenious mind of Christina Dodd to deliver fascinating, unusual and highly intriguing stories. Dodd is truly a masterful storyteller!”

  —RT Book Reviews on Dead Girl Running (Top Pick)

  Also available from

  Christina Dodd

  and HQN

  Cape Charade

  Hard to Kill (ebook novella)

  Dead Girl Running

  Families and Other Enemies (ebook novella)

  What Doesn’t Kill Her

  Hidden Truths (ebook novella)

  Strangers She Knows

  Right Motive (ebook novella)

  Wrong Alibi

  For additional books by Christina Dodd,

  visit her website, www.christinadodd.com.

  WRONG

  ALIBI

  CHRISTINA DODD

  Photo credit: Marc von Borstel

  CHRISTINA DODD

  New York Times bestselling author Christina Dodd writes “edge-of-the-seat suspense” (Iris Johansen) with “brilliantly etched characters, polished writing, and unexpected flashes of sharp humor that are pure Dodd” (Booklist). Her books have been called “scary, sexy, and smartly written” by Booklist, and much to her mother’s delight, Dodd was once a clue in the Los Angeles Times crossword puzzle. With more than fifteen million copies of her books in print, Dodd’s fans know that when they pick one up they’ve found, as Karen Robards writes, “an absolute thrill ride of a book!” Enter Christina’s worlds and join her mailing list for humor, book news and entertainment (yes, she’s the proud author with the infamous three-armed cover) at christinadodd.com.

  For Lillian

  Thank you for friendship

  Thank you for love

  Thank you for wisdom

  Thank you for Alaska

  All God’s blessings on your new journey

  Contents

  PART ONE

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  PART TWO

  THE BEST GIRL FOR THE JOB

  DON’T TALK

  GAINFULLY EMPLOYED

  TOO SMART

  ALONE WITH ONLY OPTIMISM FOR A FRIEND

  EXACTLY AS I PLANNED

  KEEPING YOUR FEET

  INSIDE THE LAW

  DON’T TELL THEM

  DON’T ASK ME

  PRETEND TO BE NORMAL

  THIS ISN’T RIGHT

  SINKING AND SINKING

  IF YOU DON’T DO IT, WHO WILL?

  PART THREE

  HOW LONG?

  THE WAY IS OPEN

  PART FOUR

  THE FACTS

  ON THE WAY

  BURIED ALIVE

  ESCAPE TO LIFE

  NEW FACE

  CLEARING THE FOG

  MOTHERS AND SISTERS

  SISTERS TO FRIENDS

  PART FIVE

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  CHAPTER 21

  CHAPTER 22

  CHAPTER 23

  CHAPTER 24

  CHAPTER 25

  CHAPTER 26

  CHAPTER 27

  CHAPTER 28

  CHAPTER 29

  CHAPTER 30

  CHAPTER 31

  CHAPTER 32

  CHAPTER 33

  CHAPTER 34

  CHAPTER 35

  CHAPTER 36

  CHAPTER 37

  CHAPTER 38

  CHAPTER 39

  CHAPTER 40

  CHAPTER 41

  CHAPTER 42

  CHAPTER 43

  CHAPTER 44

  CHAPTER 45

  CHAPTER 46

  CHAPTER 47

  CHAPTER 48

  CHAPTER 49

  CHAPTER 50

  CHAPTER 51

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  PART ONE

  PETIE

  1

  ALASKA

  Midnight Sun Fishing Camp

  Katchabiggie Lodge

  Eight years ago

  JANUARY.

  Five and a half hours a day when the sun rose above the horizon.

  Storm clouds so thick, daylight never penetrated, and night reigned eternal.

  Thirty below zero Fahrenheit.

  The hurricane-force wind wrapped frigid temperatures around the lodge, driving through the log cabin construction and the steel roof, ignoring the insulation, creeping inch by inch into the Great Room where twenty-year-old Petie huddled on a love seat, dressed in a former guest’s flannel pajamas and bundled in a Pendleton Northern Lights wool blanket. A wind like this pushed snow through the roof vents, and she knew as soon as the storm stopped, she’d be up in the attic shoveling it out.

  Or not. Maybe first the ceiling would fall in on top of her.

  Who would know? Who would care?

  The storm of the century, online news called it, before the internet disappeared in a blast that blew out the cable like a candle.

  For a second long, dark winter, she was the only living being tending the Midnight Sun cabins and the lodge, making sure the dark, relentless Alaska winter didn’t do too much damage and in the spring the camp could open to enthusiastic fishermen, corporate team builders and rugged individualists.

  Alone for eight months of the year. No Christmas. No New Year’s. No Valentine’s Day. No any day, nothing interesting, just dark dark dark isolation and fear that she would die out here.

  With the internet gone, she waited for the next inevitable event.

  The lights went out.

  On each of the four w alls, a small, battery-charged night-light came on to battle feebly against the darkness. Outside, the storm roared. Inside, cold swallowed the heat with greedy appetite.

  Petie sat and stared into a dark so black it hurt her eyes. And remembered...

  There, against the far back wall of the basement, in the darkest corner, white plastic covered...something. Slowly, Petie approached, driven by a terrible fear. She stopped about three feet away, leaned forward and reached out, far out, to grasp the corner of the plastic, pull it back, and see—

  With a gasp, Petie leaped to her feet.

  No. Just no. She couldn’t—wouldn’t—replay those memories again.

  She tossed the blanket onto the floor and groped for the flashlights on the table beside her: the big metal one with a hefty weight and the smaller plastic headlamp she could strap to her forehead. She clicked on the big one and shone it around the lodge, reassuring herself no one and nothing was here. No ghosts, no zombies, no cruel people making ruthless judgments about the gullible young woman she had been.

  Armed with both lights, she moved purposefully out of the Great Room, through the massive kitchen and toward the utility room.

  The door between the kitchen and the utility room was insulated, the first barrier between the lodge and the bitter, rattling winds. She opened that door, took a breath of the even chillier air, stepped into the utility room and shut herself in. There she donned socks, boots, ski pants, an insulated shirt, a cold-weather blanket cut with arm holes, a knit hat and an ancient, full-length, seal-skin, Aleut-made coat with a hood. She checked the outside temperature.

  Colder now—forty below and with the wind howling, the wind chill would be sixty below, seventy below...who knew? Who cared? Exposed skin froze in extreme cold and add the wind chill... She wrapped a scarf around her face and the back of her neck. Then unwrapped it to secure the headlamp low on her forehead. Then wrapped herself up again, trying to cover as much skin as she could before she faced the punishing weather.

  She pointed her big flashlight at the generator checklist posted on the wall and read:

  Hawley’s reasons why the generator will fail to start.

  The generator is new and well-tested, so the problem is:

  1. LOOSE BATTERY CABLE

  Solution: Tighten.

  2. CORRODED BATTERY CONNECTION

  Solution: Use metal terminal battery brush to clean connections and reattach.

  3. DEAD BATTERY

  Solution: Change battery in the autumn to avoid

  ever having to change it in the middle of a major

  fucking winter storm.

  If she wasn’t standing there alone in the dark in the bitter cold, she would have grinned. The owner of the fishing camp, Hawley Foggo, taught his employees Hawley’s Rules. He had them for every occurrence of the fishing camp, and that last sounded exactly like him.

  The generator used a car battery, and as instructed, in the autumn she had changed it. This was her second year dealing with the battery, and she felt secure about her work.

  So probably this failure was a loose connection or corrosion. Either way, she could fix it and save the lodge from turning into a solid ice cube that wouldn’t thaw until spring.

  That was, after all, her job.

  She shivered.

  So much better than her last job, the one that led to her conviction for a gruesome double murder.

  “Okay, Petie, let’s grab that metal battery cleaner thingy and get the job done.” Which sounded pretty easy, when she talked to herself about it, but when she pulled on the insulated ski gloves, they limited her dexterity.

  Out of the corner of her eye, a light blinked out.

  She looked back into the lodge’s Great Room. The night-lights were failing, and soon she really would be alone in the absolute darkness, facing the memories of that long-ago day in the basement.

  Good incentive to hurry.

  She grabbed the wire battery connection cleaner thingy and moved to the outer door.

  There she paused and pictured the outdoor layout.

  A loosely built lean-to protected the generator from the worst of the weather while allowing the exhaust to escape. That meant she wasn’t stepping out into the full force of the storm; she would be as protected as the generator itself. Which was apparently not well enough since the damned thing wasn’t working.

  She gathered her fortitude and eased the outer door open.

  The wind caught it, yanked it wide and dragged her outside and down the steps. She hung on to the door handle, flailed around on the frozen ground, and when she regained her footing, she used all her strength to shove the door closed again.

  Then she was alone, outside, in a killer storm, in the massive, bleak wilderness that was Alaska.

  2

  SOME MIGHT SAY PETIE was stupid to put herself in this situation.

  She had to agree.

  Except...

  No, really, she had to agree.

  Her forehead light scarcely pierced the dark of the night and the dark of the storm, so she groped in her coat pocket for her big flashlight, clicked it on and waved the beam around.

  The left wall of the lean-to had been shattered by a tree branch that had ridden a gust like a battering ram. Everywhere, snowflakes twisted and spun in glittering arcs, and more snow settled against the outside of the generator.

  Stupid to feel relieved, but nothing she’d done had compromised the generator. It was that bitch Mother Nature. She was out to kill them all.

  Who could blame her?

  A snow shovel hung on the external wall of the lodge, clamped at the top and bottom; still it clattered like a skeleton’s bones. Petie used the broad scoop to clear her path to the generator. Putting the shovel down, she knelt to release the lock on the door that opened onto the battery.

  The wind caught the shovel and shoved it across the slick ground.

  On her knees, she hustled after it, caught it before it escaped into the storm, brought it back to the generator and knelt on the scoop. The cold seeped through her ski pants, pants and underwear. Incentive to finish quickly. She cleaned the posts, scraping, wiping, scraping, wiping. She reattached the battery cables and pushed “Start.”

  The generator coughed and chugged on. A light popped on over the door leading to the lodge. More came on inside.

  She had fixed it. She had fixed it!

  She had saved Hawley’s lodge. It would be safe until spring. Probably safe until spring.

  Her momentary exultation flickered and died.

  Now she was stuck here, alone, for another four months.

  Her head bent. She closed her eyes. She felt the pain of piercing cold, of blistering wind, of loneliness and hopelessness that had no end.

  Four more months of life barren and lost to exile...unless she did something to change that.

  She turned off the flashlight and left it on the ground next to the shovel.

  She didn’t need them anymore.

  She pushed her way through the snow to the broken north wall and faced the full brunt of the storm. Even through her scarf, the wind scoured her face. Snow froze onto her eyelashes. If she walked out there, straight into the storm’s violent embrace, she would struggle and struggle, until at last she would lie down and die.

  Why not? What did she have to live for?

  TSTL. That was what they called women like her. Too Stupid to Live.

  Truth. She was too stupid to live. She despised herself. Now she was stuck here, forever, alone every winter, without anyone who cared about her.

  Why not walk out and die? Why not?

  She took the first step.

  A gust of wind slammed into her belly, lifted her off her feet, carried her backward and knocked her into the wall. Her neck whiplashed, and her head thumped hard enough to rattle her brains.