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Chapter Four
Haley work up, sweat sticking to her skin. She looked around at the unfamiliar walls. Feeling weak and alone, she got out of bed, padded barefoot to the door. Glancing over shoulder at the time, 1:18 glared at her in red digits.
Slowly opening her door, she walked out to a dark hallway, seeing a glow of light radiating from downstairs. She walked past an open door to Peyton's room and saw a silent figure lying on the bed, oblivious to the world. From the short spiky hair, she could deduce that it was Lucas.
Quietly, she crept down the stairs, hearing Peyton's husky tones murmuring to someone, she crept closer to the sounds and heard Nathan's rough voice.
"Peyton, I don't know what to do, Haley comes back, saying she wants to save our marriage and then my dad is murdered and my mom and I top the suspect list. My life is falling apart and I don't what to do," Nathan buried his head in his hands.
Haley heard a creak on the floorboards above her, coming from the second floor. Turning she tried to scurry down the stairs and get out of sight, but her foot caught on a loose piece of carpeting and she tripped. Her slender body hit the sharp edge of the stair, her hand banged on the railing and then she crashed onto the floor. She fell into a motionless heap at the bottom of the stairs.
Lucas ran down the stairs, "Haley, are you okay?" Running to her, he pushed back her hair and saw an ugly bump forming on her forehead.
Peyton and Nathan ran over to where Lucas was checking Haley to see if she was okay. Peyton leaned down to feel Haley's pulse and to check for broken bones. "Nathan, call 911."
"No." Nathan stood there, arms crossed against his chest, menace evident in his stature, malice in his eyes. "She deserves to die." Turning, he walked away.
Peyton and Lucas looked at each other. A foggy cloud misted everything hazy.
Haley sat up in bed, her hands moving to check her head. No bumps, her mind replayed what happened in her dream. Nathan saying she deserved to die.
Quickly and quietly, she got out of bed, padding down the hallway, she looked in Peyton's room and saw Peyton curled up in bed, Lucas spooning her from behind, both were asleep.
Sighing in relief, that it had only been a dream, she went back to her room and to sleep.
A blare of music awoke Haley, looking over at the bedside table, it read 6:26 to her. Pulling her pillow over her head, she tried to tune it out. Then her mind clicked and she realized that it was her cell phone.
Grabbing it out of her purse, she flipped it open.
"Haley, it's Joe, where are you?"
"I'm in Tree Hill, look I'm gonna need an extension on my leave…" dead air.
"Why?"
"Because my father in law was murdered."
"Okay, be back by June 21, no later or you're replaced." He disconnected the call.
"Thanks a lot," Haley said to herself. Turning her ringer off, she flopped over to go back to sleep.
The phone rang in the Sawyer residence at 8:45 a.m.
"Hello?" Peyton said.
"Hey Peyton, is Lucas there?" Karen asked.
"Yeah one sec, Ms. Roe," Peyton cradled the phone, covering the ear piece.
"Your mom," handing it to Lucas.
"Again?" Lucas rolled his eyes and took the phone. Lucas said hi, that Haley was there and he hadn't been contacted for questioning yet by the police. In return, Karen told him how beautiful New Zealand was and didn't mention that there still was no sign of Andy.
Hanging up from talking to her son, Karen looked around her lavish surroundings, she'd gone to where Andy had given her directions to. The staff had been expecting her but didn't know where Andy was. And as for Andy's mom, she was out of town for a couple weeks, or so the butler told her.
Shrugging her shoulders, she walked down the beach, wondering where Andy was…
Nathan peered out of the blinds looking down the street, expecting to see a police cruiser parked outside watching them.
"Nathan stop it," Deb pulled him away from the curtains.
"Well Mom this is creepy, you say we're going to get away from Dad and he magically is murdered, it's just a bit creepy." Nathan fell back against the wall, struggling to keep his composure. It'd only been 36 hours since the murder, but the police were keeping it under tight wraps.
"Nathan, everything will be fine, I promise." Deb hugged him tightly, crossing her fingers.
"Well don't you think it's weird that the police told us not to leave town and basically treated us like the prime suspects." Nathan sat on the couch.
"I know honey, but it's gonna look like we did it at first, because we had the motive to do it. I mean anyone who knows Dan Scott, knows what a bastard he was and the person that killed him had finally had enough. Still I wonder who did it?" Deb's eyes glazed over at the idea.
"Let's make a list of people and motives." Nathan smiled.
"Okay honey." Deb humored her son.
Nathan came back with a pen and paper.
"First you and me, obvious motives, we know why. Your father was an abusive, sadistic son of a bitch and he deserved to die, but we didn't do it." Deb smiled as Nathan wrote.
"Haley." Deb said.
"Why her?" Nathan asked confused.
"Dan pretty much handed her the divorce papers and she signed them and he never really liked her." Deb said as Nathan wrote.
"Peyton Sawyer?"
"No, she knew my dad and that he was an asshole, but they haven't talked to each other in at least a year, so I cross her off the list." Nathan went to put a line through her name, Deb stopped him.
"Just put a question mark next to her name." Deb said.
"Lucas Scott."
"Yeah and I can list 3 reasons off the top of my head." Nathan sneered as he wrote.
"Brooke Davis?" Deb said.
"Nah, but I'll put a question mark next to her name." Nathan replied.
"Whitey, of course, he and Dad hated each other, that's reason enough." Nathan said, watching his mom smell her wine and practically inhale it.
"Karen as well, Dan was a bastard to her too," Deb breathed after taking a deep gulp of her wine.
"Andy too."
"And don't forget Keith or Jules, his fake bride to be," Deb laughed cynically.
"10 people, it's almost like one of the those weekend murder parties, where you have to guess who did it, or people just keep getting killed." Deb said.
"Yeah mom." Nathan looked at her, concern in his eyes.
"Ok men, we have our suspect list, anyone that associated with Dan Scott in the last 5 years or was related to him. At the top of that list: Deborah Scott, Keith Scott, Nathan Scott, Lucas Scott, Brian Durham, Andy Hargrove, Haley James-Scott, Emily Chambers and Karen Roe," The detective in charge of the case, looked down the table at the 8 other police officers sitting in front of him. "Question these people and report back to me tomorrow morning at 0800 hours."
A collective silence filled the room as the officers gathered the necessary files and left the room.
Lt. Trudeau looked down at his assigned person, Lucas Scott, black sheep of the Scott family. Rejected for 16 years by his father and then accepted and acknowledged, possibly a motive for murder lay in him somewhere.
Lt. Wade looked down at his assigned persons, Karen Roe and Keith Scott.
Both men, ran their hands through their hair, knowing this could end up as a cold case.
Jake sped down the highway on his motorcycle since he was in Kansas and of course just his luck, he was running from a tornado. He had heard that a black haired girl and a baby had passed through the bar he'd been at a couple days ahead of him. All the bartender had been able to tell him was that the girl mumbled something about heading for California and that's where he was headed. If he could escape the tornado.
Whitey relaxed in his comfy chair, looking out at the crystal blue waves as they crashed on the beach. He sighed and relaxed, glad that he wasn't back in Tree Hill having to deal with a whole bunch of trouble that had nothing to do with him.
Having been in the wrong place at the wrong time and seeing someone else set fire to poor Danny boy was tragic, but he didn't feel like saving the devil from hell. So he'd walked away from the scene and packed for a summer vacation away from hell.
Toasting the silent sweet air, he tossed back his tropical drink and relaxed in the sun.