Stirred

by Nancy S Thompson

  So he accepted my hand and said, “Deal,” then leaned down and sealed it with a kiss.

  “So what’s the plan then?” Sean asked.

  We both stood in the middle of Aurelia’s bedroom, Sean looking at me while I spun in a slow circle, nibbling at my fingernail while I peered around the room.

  “Did you see the crime scene photos?” I asked.

  That bumped Sean’s brow high. “No. Did you?”

  “Yes. Pretty gruesome stuff.” I sighed thinking about Declan and Aurelia. “Declan’s body…what he must’ve endured.” I shook my head. “Nobody deserves that. Nobody. Not even him. And Aurelia… God, I can’t get the look in her eyes out of my head. The color of her skin. The way she was contorted and left hanging…” I swallowed the bile in my throat and directed Sean’s attention to the ceiling over the head of Aurelia’s bed. “See those eye hooks up there?”

  He moved closer and examined the hardware. “Oh God. Please don’t tell me…”

  Another nod from me. “Yeah. It was awful. Aurelia had this weird contraption with a collar and wrist restraints—”

  “Stop,” Sean ordered with his hand up. “I really don’t wanna know.” He grimaced in disgust. “I can’t believe Reed showed you the photos.”

  “He didn’t. They were conveniently left out on Commander Shermer’s desk. I think they were trying to shake me up.”

  “Did it work?”

  “Oh, yes. It most certainly did.”

  Sean snorted. “I don’t get it, Eden. What did you ever see in your husband? I mean, with all that kinky bondage shit, he just doesn’t seem your type. So why’d you marry him?”

  I sighed with the weight of that question. “Well…he saved me. When I lost the love of my life, Declan saved me.”

  “I’m sorry, what? The love of your life? What the hell are you talking about?” Sean asked with a tightness in his jaw and a possessive glint in his eye.

  “Jacob. We met in college. He was my…everything,” I swallowed the lump in my throat. “But then he died. And Declan was all I had left. He picked up the pieces and put me back together.”

  Talking about Jacob—saying his name out loud, something I never did—nearly crippled me with grief. But this conversation was long overdue, so I took Sean’s hand and led him to the top of the stairs, where I sat us both down and told him all there was to know about Jacob, Ivy, Aurelia, and Declan. When I was finished, Sean just sat there on the landing, his feet on the first step with his elbows on his knees and his hands tightly fisted as he stared down the railing to the foyer below. He was so quiet, so still, as if he didn’t trust himself to do or say anything.

  “You know,” I said to break the tension, “you remind me a lot of Jacob.”

  I pulled out my phone and scrolled to an old photograph of Jacob I’d scanned a while back. I realized then I hadn’t looked at it since meeting Sean. I stroked a thumb over Jacob’s familiar face before tilting it so Sean could see. He studied it for a long moment, then turned to face me, his eyes soft but hesitant.

  I nudged his body with mine. “It’s why I kissed you in the men’s room that first night. I remember thinking it was like Jacob had swooped down from heaven, right into your body. And I was so pulled to you. Gravity, just like you said.”

  One side of Sean’s mouth pulled upward. “Yeah, ‘cept you were being pulled to Jacob. Not me.”

  I grabbed Sean’s fisted hands. “No, not true. That’s not what I meant at all.”

  “What did you mean then?”

  I leaned my head against his shoulder. “That what you did, saving me from that guy, it stirred something within me, reminded me of who I used to be. And when I looked into your eyes, I saw her again, that girl I once was, and I realized how much I missed her, and how much I resented Declan for wearing her down until there was nothing left. You are my resurrection, Sean. I’m reborn because of you.” I lifted my head and smiled at him.

  He grinned right back. “All that in a kiss, huh?”

  I nodded. “All that,” I replied and pressed my lips to his.

  With our hands clenched together, we sat at the top of the stairs, my temple against his shoulder and his cheek along the top of my head. I was sure we could’ve sat there like that for hours on end and been perfectly content, but the day was starting to get away from us, so, while I felt much better about where Sean and I stood with each other, we still needed to search the house.

  I patted his hand and said, “I’ll start downstairs. You search up here. Anything that catches your eye or points toward Declan or anything strange or just…whatever. You’re smart. You’ll know when you see it.”

  With that, I kissed his cheek, stood up, and trekked downstairs. I executed a cursory search of the living and dining rooms first, knowing there were very few clues to be found as any place that might’ve been used to hide anything already laid exposed after the police had overturned the sofa cushions and emptied the china cabinet. Next came the kitchen, but it was small, the countertops cluttered with gadgets, dishware, and utensils the police had left out. The cabinets were now bare, the drawers empty.

  The only remaining space on the first floor was the den. It was actually a converted inglenook with a built-in desk and shelves above on the left. All of Aurelia’s books, files, and accessories had been removed and left on the kitchen floor. I rifled through her files, but there was little to sort through, and what remained proved inconsequential or mundane. I sat down on the hard, wooden desk chair, a Stickley original, or so Reely once told me.

  Everything in her house had been meticulously selected to coordinate with the original Craftsman architecture. That was well over a year ago. Closer to two. Which meant Aurelia and Declan had been involved a lot longer than I ever suspected. Damn, she was good, cunning, way more duplicitous than I ever imagined she could be.

  She led me to believe she’d purchased and renovated this house with her own income. She’d shared every project, every detail. I remembered her telling me how she’d had one of her employer’s subcontractors—a skilled artisan—demolish the old inglenook, with its crumbling fireplace and worn face-to-face benches, then fabricate a new single bench on the right, a mantle and paneling around the new brick fireplace in the center, and, on the left, the desk Aurelia loved so much. But I also recalled her sharing the design details, too, which I was little interested in at the time, but now that I thought back on it, I remembered her saying something about hidden compartments. But where? She’d shown me; I could hear her prattling on in my head, but, in the endless procession of Aurelia’s much-coveted paraphernalia, I’d barely taken notice.

  Damn! Why hadn’t I paid closer attention?

  I began to pull out the drawers, one at a time, extending each to the full length of its slides. I shoved my hands inside and felt along each surface for catches or buttons, anything that might expose a concealed niche, but I found nothing in the first three drawers. Realizing there was little room in the remaining narrow pencil drawer, and therefore likely nothing else to find, I yanked on it unnecessarily hard, pulling it free from the desk and sending it crashing to the floor, where it came to rest upside-down. Not that it mattered. The police had left nothing inside anyway.

  I knelt down on the floor and grabbed a corner of the heavy, solid-wood drawer, tipping it over right-side up, but before I could set it flat on its thick bottom, a thin, felt-covered panel popped open and swung free on a narrow, brass hinge set into the rear inside corner. From there, a large white envelope slipped out onto the floor next to me.

  I laid the drawer down, but kept the false bottom open to make sure nothing else remained inside. Satisfied I had the only hidden item, I hefted the cumbersome drawer back into the desk and slid it closed. Then I repeated the task on each of the other drawers and found two more envelopes, one large and the other a standard business size. After returning the drawers, I gathered my treasure and sat down on the smooth wooden benchseat on the other side of the fireplace.

  I fi
ngered the envelopes, curious what might be inside, not to mention what made it necessary for Aurelia to hide them. With a glance toward the stairs, I debated whether to call Sean down or not. I figured I should wait until I knew I had something important, something of value to our cause. Why get him excited if it was nothing that could help us? I felt a pang of guilt slice through me as I clutched the smallest envelope to my chest, but I pushed it aside and slipped a fingernail under the sealed flap, ripping the top open in a clean line. Then I tipped it over and let the contents peek out.

  It was a greeting card, and a pornographic one at that. My cheeks flamed at the vulgar image of an aroused, nude man fisting a trussed-up naked woman as she knelt in front of him on all fours. With a sneer of disgust, I opened the card and was hit in the chest with the force of a two-by-four when I recognized Declan’s handwriting. A rush of wind passed between my lips, followed by a gutless whimper I found hard to accept had come from within me. I blinked back the moisture in my eyes and squinted at the note, dated seven months ago, my husband had penned to his mistress, my best friend.

  Bile rose up into my throat as tears spilled over onto my cheeks. They weren’t tears of pain or betrayal, but rather loss, for wasting the last eighteen years of my life on such a miserable excuse for a husband. I should’ve left Declan after Ian was born, but I’d been too weak. Regret threatened to bowl me over, but before it could take full hold, I swiped at my tears and stashed the X-rated card back into the envelope, more concerned now at what the message meant.

  It confirmed my suspicions that, in addition to the house, Reely’s Jaguar had been paid for by my husband, but instead of a simple gift in appreciation for services rendered, it appeared to be a payoff, one Aurelia had apparently demanded through extortion. I wondered if the house was a bribe, too. And for what? What secret had she been keeping for Declan? It had to be more than just their affair. His assets were too well-protected to be threatened by a little infidelity. I felt sure this secret could be the reason for their deaths, but what that secret could be was beyond me. I just hoped to learn more from whatever else Aurelia had hidden away.

  I opened one of the large envelopes and pulled out a thick legal document. I scanned the top sheet and discovered it was a copy of Declan’s irrevocable trust. What the hell was Aurelia doing with this? Even I hadn’t seen this latest version dated only four months ago. Declan had told me he was amending it, but that was all I knew. Now, in light of his affair and Aurelia’s blackmail, I wondered how extensive those amendments had been and if I was affected in any way. I’d have to spend more time poring over the document, but a quick glance over the first few pages revealed two names that hadn’t been on previous versions, one being Aurelia’s and the other one I’d never heard before—Alexandra Morra.

  “Who the hell is Alexandra Morra, and how does she know Declan?” I whispered aloud.

  With a shake of my head at the quickly mounting secrets, I shoved the thick document back into the envelope and traded it for the last remaining one. It wasn’t sealed like the others. I tipped the contents out onto the bench next to me, two items this time, paperclipped together, a laminated eight-by-ten photo and a birth record. I slipped the paperclip off and examined the birth certificate issued nineteen years ago for a baby girl named…

  Sonofabitch.

  Alexandra Morra.

  Now I was really curious who this Alexandra Morra was and how Aurelia and Declan had known her.

  The father’s name was left blank on the birth record, and the mother was listed as an unknown Jane Doe, deceased during delivery. I didn’t recognize the child’s name as anyone Aurelia had ever mentioned. And I wondered why in God’s name she’d hidden this away. While nineteen years was a long time ago, and I’d been a newlywed at that time, it had only been a year since losing Ivy. I was still in tremendous pain over her loss. Yet I’d remained in school and spent a lot of time with Aurelia, so I would’ve noticed if something was up. But there had never been a secret, unplanned or unwanted pregnancy. She’d been too thin to hide one. And the document said the mother was deceased. Obviously, this child was not hers. So whose was it, and why did Aurelia have her birth records?

  I scrubbed a hand down my face, overwhelmed with the information Reely’s desk had given up. I set the birth certificate aside and picked up the photograph. It was relatively recent, taken at an event at the U-Dub sorority Aurelia had been a member of back in our undergrad days. Reely loved being a part of a sorority and had tried in vain to get me to pledge alongside her, but sorority life had never even remotely interested me, so it remained the one and only thing she and I had never shared or participated in together. Frankly, I’d considered it a reprieve.

  Reely, however, had flourished in her newfound sisterhood, and every year since graduating, she attended two annual events, a fancy fundraising banquet and the Big Sister/Little Sister weekend, where past members were matched to newly-minted ones they vowed to mentor through college and with whom they often remained lifelong friends.

  The photo had been taken at a Big Sister/Little Sister weekend four years ago, or so the banner in the background revealed. Also in the background stood a small group of Big Sisters and their young counterparts. But up close, in the foreground on the right, Aurelia’s face loomed large, her platinum-blonde hair shining brightly in the sunshine, and her arm slung around the neck of a chunky girl with striking eyes and short, dark hair. Where Reely’s smile glowed, lighting up her entire face, her Little Sister appeared the exact opposite—her mouth firm and her eyes flat. I didn’t recognize the girl as anyone Aurelia had ever introduced me to, but when I turned the photo over, I found what must be her name, and damn if it didn’t match the one on both the birth certificate and Declan’s irrevocable trust.

  Alexandra Morra.

  That was it. Besides the sex, she was the one thing they seemed to have in common. I felt sure, if I could find this girl, I could find out what secret Reely had been keeping for Declan and how they were all connected. And maybe, if I was lucky, that would lead to their killer.

  Eden had called me down and was cleaning off Aurelia’s kitchen table when I walked into the room. She set some paperwork in the center next to her phone and looked up at me.

  “Whatcha got, boss?” I asked, both hands on my hips.

  She chuckled at my appearance. “Where’ve you been?” she asked with a grin.

  “The attic,” I replied. “Can’t you tell?” I flopped both arms against my thighs.

  Eden wrinkled her nose at the cloud of dust that rose around me. “Well, go brush yourself off so I don’t start sneezing. Then come back and sit down. I’ve something to show you.”

  I went out back and slapped at my black t-shirt and loose-fitting jeans, then returned inside and washed my grimy hands and face before taking the chair next to Eden.

  “Do I pass inspection?” I asked after noticing her staring at me.

  Momentarily flustered, her face warmed to a becoming shade of pink, but she couldn’t seem to turn away. Instead, she offered me a nod and an appreciative grin before turning her attention back to the task she’d been working on. She picked up one envelope and handed it to me.

  “Here…” she started, looking rather uncomfortable by whatever it was she was about to show me. “I, um…think this pretty much…you know…speaks for itself.”

  I raised a brow, but proceeded to slide the contents out. I couldn’t help but snort in amusement over the obscene image on the front of the card. After a small shake of my head, I opened it and read the inscription.

  I rolled my eyes. “What a prince.” I looked up at Eden. “Sounds like she had something on him, though, huh?”

  Eden nodded. “Looks that way.”

  “Any idea what it could be?” I added as I laid the open card on the table in front of us.

  “You tell me,” she said and handed me a thick document.

  “Huh…your husband’s irrevocable trust,” I confirmed before perusing it a page at a ti
me. “This’ll take some time to look over carefully.” I glanced back up at her.

  “No doubt. But first…look here…and here,” she said, pointing out two names.

  I read over those portions, then rifled ahead and read some more before returning to the sections she’d first directed me to. I read silently for a good five minutes, slipping back and forth between the pages.

  “Well…I’ll need more time to be sure, but…at first glance, it appears Ian, at least, is well-provided for. You, not so much. Just an annuity from what I can tell.” I caught Eden’s worried eyes. “Seems the bulk of this particular trust is reserved for your friend, Aurelia, and this other gal, Alexandra.”

  Eden’s concern turned to suspicion. “That’s what I got out of it, too.”

  “Do you know who this person is?”

  She shook her head. “Not a clue.”

  I focused back on the document and rummaged through it again to find the passage I was most curious about. With a finger pressed to the paper, I read aloud, “Should trustee one—that’s Aurelia—predecease trustee two–Alexandra—trustee two shall receive trustee one’s portion.” I sat back in my seat and looked up at Eden. “I’d say that’s motive enough to kill them both. Wouldn’t you?”

  “Damn straight,” she replied as she tapped her fingers against the table.

  I could tell Eden was anxious, but my thoughts were too engrossed in who this unknown woman could be and why Eden’s husband had chosen to allocate such a staggering amount of money to someone his wife didn’t even know. Stranger still, the name sounded vaguely familiar. I stared at the name, urging my brain to recall it, but all I got back was a big, fat blank.

  “There’s something else,” Eden said and pushed a single sheet of paper my way.

  I picked it up and studied it. “The woman’s birth certificate?”

  “She’s hardly a woman,” Eden offered and pointed to the birth date.

  “She’s only nineteen?” I asked, and she nodded. “Think your husband had another kid with someone else?”