Charley's Web by Joy Fielding

Safari for his birthday.”
    “Sounds cozy.”
    “Interesting choice of words,” he said, not bothering to disguise the strain in his voice as he returned the picture to his pocket. “What about you? Any kids?”
    “Two. A boy and a girl.”
    “But no husband.” Glen looked pointedly at the empty ring finger of her left hand.
    “No husband.”
    “In that case, how would the three of you like to join us at Lion Country Safari on Saturday? That way I can show you what a fine, upstanding citizen I really am.”
    Charley laughed.
    “I’m serious,” Glen said. “You’d actually be doing me a favor. It won’t be quite so ‘cozy’ that way.”
    “Thanks, but…”
    “Think about it. Offer’s good till Saturday. So, why are we talking about this Jill Rohmer?” he asked in the same breath.
    Charley held up the letter. “Apparently, unlike you, she’s a fan.”
    “Mind if I have a look?”
    Charley handed Glen Jill’s letter, watching him as he read, and trying to gauge his reaction.
    “So, did she whet your interest?” he asked when he was through.
    “Oh, it’s whetted all right.”
    “Does that mean you’re gonna do it?”
    “Do what?”
    “Contact her? Write her life story?”
    Charley made a dismissive sound with her lips that was half sneer, half whistle. “Why would I want to do that?”
    “Because she’s pushing all the right buttons. Appealing to both your ego and your curiosity. Waving the chance for an exclusive in front of your face, along with the opportunity to be famous. Not to mention the possibility of uncovering the real truth and righting ‘a grave miscarriage of justice.’”
    “Please. There’s been no miscarriage of justice. The woman’s a psychopath. There’s no doubt at all she killed those kids. Don’t you remember the awful tape recordings the police found in her bedroom of her victims’ dying screams?”
    “I suppose someone could have planted them there.”
    “Which doesn’t explain what her voice was doing on the tapes. She also had access and opportunity, plus her fingerprints were found at the scene, and her DNA was all over the victims.”
    “What—no videotapes?”
    Charley shrugged. There’d been rumors of videotapes, but despite extensive police searches, they had never been recovered. “What are you suggesting? That you think I should actually consider going to see her?”
    “Absolutely not.”
    “Good. Something we agree on.”
    “But you will.”
    “What?”
    “You heard me.”
    Charley snatched the letter from his hand and returned it to her purse, all the while shaking her head. Smug bastard, she was thinking. “You think you know me, don’t you?”
    People think they know me.
    They don’t.
    “Well enough to know she’s got you hooked.”
    “Is that so?”
    Actually, I think we have a lot in common.
    “Who’s got who hooked?” Bram said from beside her, opening his eyes and lifting himself up on his elbows. If he was surprised to find himself in a strange room with his sister and the man who’d knocked him unconscious, his expression offered no sign of it. If anything, he looked rested and serene. “Did I hear you say something about Jill Rohmer?”
    “Well, it’s about time you woke up,” Charley chastised, fighting the urge to shake him by the shoulders. Even with a large bruise sitting on his cheekbone, Bram was by far the best-looking of the four Webb children, with pale porcelain skin, large, luminous gray-blue eyes, and lashes so long and thick they looked as if they’d been pasted on.
    “You know I used to go out with her sister,” he said matter-of-factly, long slender fingers smoothing the front of his blue silk shirt.
    Charley felt any patience she had left quickly abandoning her. “What are you talking about?”
    “I went out with her sister—what was her name? Pamela?”
    “What are you talking about?” Charley said again, louder this time.
    “I went out with…”
    “When, for God’s sake?”
    “I don’t