When she saw the multicolored canopy of the parachute, she sobbed with relief. Jeremy gently touched down, and she watched as he feverishly unstrapped the harness and dropped the pack. Even as the voluminous canopy billowed in the wind, he was running.

He knelt beside David. And he looked up at Ashley and waved furiously.

Her brother was alive.

MacGregor Stevens had regained consciousness and was nearly delirious with pain, but he insisted on telling Lillian how stupid he’d been. “I was wrong about everything.”

“Just rest easy, Mac,” she told him gently.

He winced, his face ghastly pale. “I loved her, you know.”

Tears streamed down Lillian’s face. “I know. She loved you, too.”

“I...I never saw her again after that night on the border.”

“Mac, don’t torture yourself.”

Tears streamed down his tanned temples, but she didn’t think he was even aware of them. “She fell in love with Balaton so quickly.... It never would have worked between us.”

“Oh, Mac—don’t you know how much she loved you? She thought you were dead. She thought her life was over. We’d had to practically knock her out and drag her over the border. She wanted to die with you. We thought... We were so sure you were dead. Why didn’t you try to reach her after you got out of Hungary?”

He tried to lift his head, but his face grimaced in agony, and he lay still. “She was married.”

Lillian laughed softly, sadly, even as she cried. “You’re always so honorable, Mac. That’s one of the things Judith loved about you. I guess we were both doomed to fall in love with honorable men.”

He closed his eyes. “I have Elaine now.”

And I have no one. Lillian tried to sound cheerful: “I’ll call her just as soon as we get you squared away. You’re going to be fine, Mac. Really.”

“Wakefield?”

“He’s gone after Andrew. He thinks—he knows Andrew will try to get the rest of the jewels and murder the twins. Their Barky has been protecting them from him all these years and... If I’d only known.”

Mac’s hand slipped out from under the poncho and covered hers. He felt so damned cold. “I’m sorry, Lil. But Balaton—even he wouldn’t kill his own children.”

“Oh, Mac,” she sobbed. “Oh, Mac, you damned fool. Ashley and David are yours. That’s why Judith rushed into marrying Andrew. She was pregnant. She—Mac, except for Crockett’s eyes, David is you all over again.”

Bartholomew Wakefield headed toward the western edge of the island—away from Stevens. He had heard a small plane landing and assumed it would be Ashley. If she heard the shot, she would investigate. So would the others. And Balaton couldn’t be there when they arrived.

Barky had to draw him away. But there was no problem there: he knew he could. He still had the tiara and the choker. There was no question that Balaton would follow him.

He had crept among the rocks and the woods, and when he heard the plane again take off, he knew now he could act.