Jericho's Fall Read Online Free Page A

made a right turn to the remaining suite, tucked away in a corner, because Jericho wanted to keep future grandchildren as far from him as possible. I’ve put you in the back .
    As Beck approached the double doors to the master suite, they swung open and out stepped a smiling Audrey—Saint Audrey, as Jericho liked to sneer, always so sweet, and therefore, in Beck’s tortured mind, even less trustworthy than her younger sister. Audrey enfolded Rebecca in thick arms, drawing her against ample breasts. She was a large woman, more squarish than round, with a plump, somehow grandmotherly face. Her dark hair, frosted at the edges with gray, was more organized than styled. In green pajamas and brown robe, she could have been part of the mountain.
    “You look great,” said Audrey, exhausted eyes less delighted than the fulsome greeting. She was a nun, Beck reminded herself, marveling. An Episcopal nun. Until Audrey joined her order ten or twelve years ago, Beck had been unaware that the Episcopal Church had nuns. “How do you stay so thin?”
    Rebecca offered her standard answer: “I’m too busy to eat during the day, and too tired when I get home.”
    “You work too hard.”
    “So my mother says.”
    A momentary hiatus, both women perhaps thinking about Audrey’s late mother, eight years dead. Audrey’s mother, Jericho’s ex-wife. The one he had left for a college student.
    “And how’s that darling little girl?” said Audrey brightly, who had never met Nina in her life.
    “She’s wonderful. She’s perfect.”
    “Sean says she’s as gorgeous as her mother.”
    Were those eyes mocking her? Rebecca could not be sure. She looked away. “Thank you,” she muttered.
    “You’re so blessed,” said Audrey, hands still clutching Beck’s shoulders. “You have so much to be thankful for.”
    “I’m thankful, Aud. Believe me.” Beck bit her lip, hoping Audrey would not start babbling about God, as she often did; although another part of her longed for any distraction that would postpone the moment when she had to walk into the sickroom. “I’m content with my life,” she added, as if to bat away weightier emotions.
    But the nun was hardly listening. Keeping a heavy arm locked around Beck’s shoulders, Audrey drew her away from the master suite. “He isn’t the Jericho you remember, Beck. Try to keep that in mind.”
    “I will.”
    “I’m not talking about the illness.” Audrey was brisk, even impatient. And no matter how welcoming the words, the eyes were watchful and withholding, as if she worried her guest might steal the silver. “He’s been waiting for you, Beck. He’s too happy about the fact that you’re here. He has the look that always used to mean he was up to something. Be very careful. He’ll fool you. He’ll seem to be himself. He’ll be brilliant and funny and sarcastic. He’ll taunt you and argue with you and play with your words for hours. He’ll charm you, Beck, and then he’ll scare you, and then he’ll charm you some more. Same as in the old days. You’ll think, other than the cancer, nothing’s the matter. But don’t fall for it. The cancer’s moved into his brain. Even before it got there,my dad wasn’t right. Now he’s worse. Everything he says is going to seem logical. It isn’t. Bear that in mind. It isn’t logical, and it isn’t necessarily true.” She kissed Beck’s cheek. “I guess you should go on in. He’s waiting for you. Just try to remember that he’s a madman.”
    (ii)
    At first glance and even second, Jericho Ainsley looked the picture of rosy-cheeked health. Oh, there was an oxygen tank beside the bed, but the rest of what Rebecca had expected was not there. No tube in his nose, no monitors bleeping forth their useless data, no hospital-style bed, none of the cloying odor of sickness and death that she had imagined must attach to the departure of even the very rich, and the very secret.
    Beck advanced upon the bed cautiously, the way she had in the