Part 11 (1/2)
CJ remained quiet, then finally asked, ”It's him, isn't it? Your lover is the vice president.”
Elinor hesitated before responding. ”Please, CJ, please don't tell a soul.” She didn't ask how CJ had figured it out. After all, she knew the twins' connection as well as CJ did.
”What if they find out? Alice? Poppy? Yolanda?”
”They won't. The blackmailer certainly isn't Remy.”
”What if it's someone connected to the White House? Someone who might want to stop him before the next election?” Remy had been vice president for more than seven years. Most people presumed he'd be the party's choice for top dog next year.
”He won't run for president. He hates his job. He hates Was.h.i.+ngton.”
CJ felt as if she'd been told something she shouldn't know, a top-secret-secret worth-what? Their dignity? Their lives? The future of America?
Good grief.
They sat in silence. Then Elinor said, ”He called me today.”
”Did you tell him about the blackmail?”
”No. Not Remy. The blackmailer called.”
CJ sucked in the night air. ”It's a man?”
”Yes.”
”What did he say?”
”He asked if I had the money. I said I would have it by Friday night.”
”And?”
”And he hung up.”
In the distance, the night birds began their ballet as they settled into the pines. CJ wrapped her shawl around Elinor. ”So now we know it isn't a hoax.”
Elinor gave a short laugh. ”It never occurred to me it was a hoax. A part of me knew from the start that nothing in Was.h.i.+ngton stays a secret forever.”
The truth about Jonas had not yet been discovered, but CJ did not want to bring that up now. ”Maybe we'll find the blackmailer. Maybe Alice and Poppy and Yolanda and I...”
Elinor stood up and wrapped CJ's shawl tightly around her the way CJ had. ”And then what? What was I thinking? That we'll scare him off? That we'll bring him to justice? You were right...I shouldn't have dragged anyone else into this. We should have tried to resolve it, just you and me.”
It was hard for Elinor to admit when she'd been wrong, so CJ didn't make things worse by saying it was too late for regrets. She stood up next to her sister, shoulder to shoulder, eye to eye. ”We could tell the others to stop. We could say you found out it was a hoax. Or that you were just playing a game.”
”It's too late for that.”
”They don't know about Remy.”
Elinor shrugged again. ”If I tell them to stop, my bet is they won't. Poppy and Alice are too curious. Alice called to say they didn't learn anything concrete at the Lord Winslow today, but that they have another idea they're going to go after tomorrow. She didn't elaborate.”
”Good grief,” CJ said. ”Let's face it, E, this is the most excitement they've had since-”
”Since the incident with the gardener.”
They laughed a little, at the way their mother had always referred to that horrid day as ”The Incident with the Gardener,” as if it had been the t.i.tle of an Agatha Christie novel.
Then CJ said, ”Come on, E, let's go inside. Whatever happens will happen, but we'll face it together.”
She did not mention Ray Williams again. The topic seemed insignificant, in light of the rest.
Alice was in Yolanda's bathroom, putting on the housekeeper's dress, when Manny strolled into the kitchen. Poppy wondered what he would look like in a newly pressed uniform sporting a holster and a gun. The image was disturbing in a good sort of way.
”I see your friends managed to return without getting arrested,” he announced.
”I thought you weren't going to get involved,” Yolanda said. Belita said, ”Da-Da,” because she must have thought Manny was her Da-Da, not her uncle.
He went to the counter and poured a cup of coffee. ”The Lord Winslow has more security than Fort Knox.”
Poppy cleared her throat, because he hadn't looked at her as yet. ”They didn't find 'Momma.'”
”They were humoring you,” he said, stirring cream in his coffee, making eye contact with a carton of half-and-half and not her. ”The minute you approached the manager, they had you pegged as a whacko.”
Poppy recoiled.
”Manuel!” Yolanda scolded. ”Watch your tongue.”
”Sorry, but that's how they saw her. They a.s.sumed it was a phony routine, but if it wasn't, they figured she was looney.”
Was that what he thought, too? That she was crazy? She pouted. Momma always said pouting was childish, but Poppy couldn't help it.
Manny dumped in sugar and stirred some more. ”These people are trained to spot impersonators. And fake accents are a dead giveaway.”
She'd thought her Winston-Salem imitation had been right on target. She'd never been there, of course, but a girl at McCready had been from that area, and Poppy thought she'd sounded just like her. Shoot. Her lower lip protruded a bit more.
He took a sip of coffee. Then his back stiffened and he looked into his mug. ”You need to stay away from the hotel,” he said. ”All of you.”
His tone was stern, the way Mr. Harding, Elinor and CJ's father, had been when they'd been girls back in school. Unlike Mr. Harding, Poppy's father had been quiet, agreeable, a sweet, gentle man. Her best memory of him came from the photo on the front porch swing, Poppy sitting beside him, his arm cradling her, keeping her safe and warm. His fortune had come from the backbone of his father and his father's father, from their railroads and skysc.r.a.pers. But the men who'd made the money had died before Poppy was born, so she'd never known either of them. If she'd grown up around stern men, like Mr. Harding, she might have been accustomed to stiff backs and cold stares. Instead, they made her twitch.
”But,” she said. ”Elinor-”
He held up a hand. ”Forget it,” he said. ”I don't know what's going on, but you need to stay the h.e.l.l out of it.”
She winced again, as if she were a child in the headmaster's office.
”Look,” Manny said, now leveling his dark eyes on hers. ”The truth is, the Lord Winslow does not have a Dumpster.”
Poppy curled a few strands of hair. ”Of course it does. That's where the blackmailer found Elinor's panties!”