Part 6 (2/2)
”Aunt Fiona, if you're not up to driving, and Dad takes you home, I'll leave my rental here and take your car home, later, where it'll be safe.”
”I can drive,” she said. Then she wilted, almost theatri cally. ”No, I can't. Harry? Do you mind?”
”Of course not. Eve and Mad?” my dad asked. ”Why don't you follow us? It's been a long day.”
”In a while. Eve might need a stiff drink on the way home. That's how I felt after I found my first, and last, dead body.”
Eve turned to look at me, and she knew, she knew, that I was up to something.
We listened for Dad and Fiona on the stairs, heard them going out the door. When a car started, I went to a front window in the big room to look out. My amus.e.m.e.nt worked like a release valve. ”My dad decided to drive Fiona's car,” I told Eve. ”I wonder why.”
But Eve wasn't about to be diverted. ”What are you up to, Cutler?” she asked, following me back to the storage room. ”Why did you get rid of them?”
I opened the drawer to reveal the quilt. ”Don't scream,” I said.
Eleven.
I'm crazy, and I don't pretend to be anything else.
-CALVIN KLEIN I went to the closet and took out a pair of st.u.r.dy black feathers, and I used them to manipulate the tangled quilt until I revealed what I feared . . . bones.
Eve slapped a hand over her mouth and screamed behind it, then she slowly raised her head to face me.
”Someone,” I said, ”possibly Vinney, took something out of this drawer, or the drawer wouldn't have been disturbed, right?”
She nodded, hand still over her mouth. Then she sobered, lowered her hand, and released her breath. ”Vinney might have kicked the drawer in frustration.”
”And left the quilt stuck in the track where it wasn't before?” I pulled my gaze from the grisly sight, enough bones strung together to form the better part of a foot. ”They might not be human.”
Eve's shoulders relaxed. ”Old Underhill might have had a dog that dragged the bones home.”
”No dog,” Dante said. ”I'm allergic.”
”He's allergic,” I repeated.
”What?” Eve said. ”Who?”
I gave her a bland look. ”What?”
”How did you know that?”
”Did Vinney know that there wouldn't be a night watchman here tonight?”
Eve's shoulders went back. ”What?”
”When was the last time you saw him?”
”Last night.”
I sat back on my heels and Chakra crawled into my lap. ”Did Vinney know what time I was getting home today?”
”I might have mentioned being glad that you were coming home for good.”
”Did you mention meeting me here at nine?”
”I don't know. Why?” She was getting defensive and I didn't blame her.
”If he knew what time I was planning to be here, he might have been watching for the construction crew to leave, and when they did, he figured he had a one-hour window of opportunity.”
”Vinney and I did talk, Madeira. But I don't remember precisely what I said. Whatever it was, it didn't feel like a state secret or anything.”
”Sweetie, I just want to know. I'm not accusing you of anything. Just fitting puzzle pieces together. You've gotten me out of more sc.r.a.pes than you've gotten me into, mostly.”
Somehow, that struck us both as funny, and we laughed . . . hysterically . . . because that's what we were-hysterical. Eve sobered quicker than I did. ”Honestly, now that we've found someone or something's remains, shouldn't we call the police, or something?”
”Yeah, I'm sure they'd be thrilled to come out this late for dog bones.”
”Big bizarro dog,” Eve said.
”Why don't you try calling Vinney again? See what he's up to.”
She shook her head. ”Wait. I remember now. I didn't need to tell him you bought the place. That nosey gossip columnist, Lolique, or whatever her name is, outed you.”
”I guess I lived in New York for too long,” I said with no clue as to who she meant.
”You know her,” Eve said. ”The councilman's flamboyant trophy wife. She likes animal prints, smokes like a chimney, and takes a perverse pleasure in revealing personal secrets in snarky ways in the newspaper?”
”We have a councilman who's married to a columnist?”
”McDowell. Wears a rug, is always in the news, though not the gossip column, and annoys the h.e.l.l out of you.”
”Oh,” I said. ”That councilman. The publicity hound.”
”Right. His wife wrote about you buying the place and what you were going to do with it, adding an unfortunate amount of speculation as to how soon you'd fail. She's kind of a local personality.”
”She sounds nice,” I said, brow raised.
”Not. But the column about you opening Vintage Magic appeared about two weeks ago.”
”So when did you meet Vinney for the first time?”
Eve thought about that for a minute. ”I believe I might have met him the night the article came out.” She sighed. ”Nah. Our meeting was a coincidence. We were eating at Mystic Pizza, at separate tables, with separate pizzas, and he smooth-talked his way over to my table. He paid for both pizzas.”
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