The Bride's Secret

by Adrianne Lee

  It had seemed so urgent to tell him about Marti in the passageways earlier today, now the edge was gone, the urgency dulled. “Have you been busy?”

  “I’ve been making myself busy—avoiding you.” Chris winced as though the admission wounded him.

  “Well, you won’t need to do that much longer. I’m leaving tomorrow.”

  He nodded. But such pain filled his eyes it tore at her soul. She wiped her hands on her jeans. “Before I go, I thought you should know that Marti seems very familiar with the passageways.”

  She told him about her observation of the mystery writer’s actions that morning. Chris frowned. “Do you think she was ‘the bride’?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t imagine why she’d want to scare me away from here. Or why she’d threaten to kill me. What motive could she have?”

  “Then who do you suspect?” He held himself as tense as a soldier guarding a fortress.

  He wouldn’t want to hear what she really suspected. “Do you think Lorah was murdered?”

  His dark brows lifted and his guard dropped. He pulled out the desk chair and sat backward on it. “Why would someone murder her?”

  Nikki sank onto her bed. “The night I tried on costumes in the ballroom, Lorah suggested, in a rather unpleasant manner, that Marti, Olivia and Dorothea each had secrets, secrets she knew they wouldn’t want revealed. It was almost as if she were threatening them ... like blackmail of some kind. Marti got absolutely livid.”

  “I can’t imagine Liv taking such a threat well, either.”

  Olivia. Dare she broach the subject? She shoved her hair behind her ear. Since she was leaving in the morning, why not? “Chris, could your sister view me as a threat?”

  “A threat?” He laughed, then sobered. “Because of my feelings for you?”

  “No, because I might be Theresa’s daughter. Could she fear I’d have a claim to Wedding House?”

  He hesitated. “Theresa’s family wanted nothing to do with Wedding House after my uncle murdered her. They gave it back to the De Vega family.” Chris sighed heavily. “They didn’t even want to sell it, they didn’t want money with their daughter’s blood on it.”

  Nikki could understand that. “Did they sign it over to your mother, or just tell her to keep it?”

  “To keep it, why?” He eyed her suspiciously, the distance between them growing in that instant. “If you discover you are her daughter, will you lay claim to the estate?”

  She blew out a breath. She couldn’t answer him. She had no idea how she would feel if she discovered she was Theresa’s daughter. She suggested another possibility. “I had time to do a lot of thinking today, and I was wondering if we’d miscast Diego Sands. Perhaps he was never Theresa’s lover. Perhaps he’s a relative of Theresa’s. A brother or cousin or something.”

  Before he could comment, a woman screamed. Chris and Nikki stared at each other for a split second, then scrambled up and out into the hall. It was deserted. They heard doors opening on the second floor. Voices rose from below. Nikki grasped the railing and scanned the lower levels.

  At first she couldn’t identify the mass of white lace heaped beside the overturned foyer table, the shattered Ming vase. Then she realized she was staring at a bridal ensemble.

  She gasped. “The ghost.”

  “No.” Chris moaned. “Look.”

  In the shadowed evening light, she spied a single foot poking from beneath the wedding gown. Even as she watched, a dark stain blossomed across the veil. Horror slammed through Nikki, pulling her stomach to her toes.

  She gripped the railing so hard her knuckles ached. Chris’s arms circled her. She fell back against him, grateful for the support. “Dear God, Chris, who is it?”

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Who is it?” Nikki repeated, keeping a stranglehold on the third-floor railing. Shock and horror tangoed inside her; the only thing keeping her upright was Chris’s grasp on her upper arms, her safety net in a world that had collapsed, leaving her free-falling into the nightmare of reality.

  “Liv?” His grip tightened on Nikki, as though reassuring himself it was not she three stories down on the foyer floor, as though he needed her as much as she needed him, as though he was claiming her, tossing aside his fears of losing his sanity. And yet, there was apprehension in his hold. “Liv!”

  “I’m here, Christopher.” Olivia rushed to the second-floor landing. “Who screamed?”

  Chris let out a hard breath that lifted Nikki’s hair. He didn’t answer his sister. He released Nikki. “Call 911.”

  He began running for the stairs. Nikki followed; the only phone she knew of was in the TV room.

  “Who screamed?” Marti tumbled from her room in a flash of purple, her hair tangled from sleep.

  “Look!” Olivia gasped, starting down the stairs. “Who is it?”

  “No! Wait!” Chris caught his sister. “Get some towels.”

  “Of course.” Olivia swallowed as though choking on something. “Who is it, Chris?”

  “Just get the towels.” He thundered down the stairs. “Quick.”

  As Nikki hurried toward the TV room, Diego emerged. He shouted, “I’ve called an ambulance.”

  Olivia returned with an armload of towels. Diego took them from her, suggested she stay put and scrambled down the stairs to help Chris.

  Chris gave him a glum expression. “I’m afraid it’s too late. She’s dead.”

  “Holy Joe.”

  “Who?” Olivia’s eyes were wide, her face white.

  The three women stood at the second-floor railing, staring at the horror below. To Nikki, the air seemed sucked from the mansion, drawn in by the holding of their collective breaths.

  Chris kneeling beside the body, his hand full of blood-soaked lace, gazed at his sister. “It’s Dorothea Miller.”

  “What?” Olivia cried. “But it can’t be. She left an hour ago.”

  “Did you see her leave?” Nikki asked, realizing even as she said it that it didn’t matter whether Olivia had seen Dorothea leave, since she was here now. Dead.

  “Well, I didn’t walk her out...” Olivia held herself as stiff as a blade of burned grass, wringing her hands. Tears brimmed her dark eyes. “What happened, Chris?”

  Diego shook his head. “To sustain these injuries she must have gone over the top railing—the one on the third floor.”

  Nikki felt sick to her stomach. “But what was she doing up there?”

  “And why is she in that getup?” Marti asked.

  “I don’t know. I helped her hem that gown earlier tonight,” Olivia sobbed. “I thought she’d gone home.”

  “Had she been drinking?” Nikki asked, recalling Dorothea’s distress after Janice Jacoby’s visit

  “Yes...a bit.” Olivia twisted her hands tighter. “Lorah’s daughter upset her something awful.”

  “Oh, that one.” Marti blew a disgusted breath. “She’s great for flinging accusations. Doesn’t matter whether she’s got proof. Or whom she hurts. Dorothea shouldn’t have let that little twit upset her.”

  “But she did....” Olivia burst into tears and fled for her room.

  “Do you think she jumped from the third floor?” Nikki asked.

  “Because of Janice?” Marti gave a startled laugh. “It’s more likely someone pushed her.”

  Sirens sounded in the distance, and Nikki’s gaze met Chris’s. Her heart thundered and her throat was thick with fear. Had Dorothea fallen? Or jumped? It’s more likely someone pushed her. Nikki shivered. Even though she realized Marti had made the suggestion in sarcasm, she couldn’t dismiss the possibility. Couldn’t help but wonder if a murderer once again stalked Wedding House.

  Leave or die, “the bride” had warned. Would she be next? She wanted to run to Chris, wanted to cry out, “Chris, I’m frightened.”

  Wanted to hear him say, “I won’t let anything happen to you, Nikki. I swear, I won’t.”

  Instead, she stood, gripping the railing, watching him hurry to answer th
e front door, and feeling as though nothing would ever be the same again.

  THE NORMAL BED and breakfast tranquility had vanished from Wedding House, and with the invasion of EMTs, plain-clothes police officers and the medical examiner, it took on the surreal hustle of a busy hotel. Nikki couldn’t wait to pack and leave in the morning.

  Guests and household staff were questioned individually and at length. It neared midnight when Nikki’s turn came. She entered the dining room and sat on the edge of the chair across from a detective in his early forties. His blond hair was clipped close to his head, reminding Nikki of boyhood chums who’d gotten crew-cuts each summer, but this man’s cut was even closer to the scalp. He had wise gray eyes and a nose that dominated his face.

  “Ms. Navarro, is it?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m just asking everyone to tell us what they saw or heard prior to this tragedy.”

  Nikki gathered her breath. The shock that had insulated her earlier was dissipating into a somber melancholy. Dorothea Miller had been full of life, the kind of person who gave color and flair to the dullest day. Her neon light had been squelched too soon. By her hand? Or someone else’s? “Did she fall?”

  “We’re not sure. Why don’t you tell me what you know.”

  Nikki sighed. “I don’t know anything. I was in my room on the third floor, talking to Chris, er, Mr. Conrad, when we heard a woman scream. We rushed into the hall and saw—”

  She broke off as the horrible sight flashed into her mind.

  “It’s my understanding that Ms. Miller consumed quite a lot of alcohol today. Was she in the habit of drinking like that or did something unusual upset her?”

  The question snapped Nikki’s attention to the detective. He feinted an innocent expression, but she didn’t buy it. This man was too smart to act dumb and carry it off. If he knew Dorothea had been drinking, he knew about Janice Jacoby’s visit. So why was he fishing? She pushed her hair back from her cheek. “I assume others have told you about the visit Lorah Halliard’s daughter paid us today, and her accusation that one of us had killed her mother with an overdose of narcotic. I suspect the traces of opiate found in Ms. Halliard’s system were from pain pills. Dorothea told me she’d given Ms. Halliard one pill on the night she died.”

  He frowned and tapped the tablet he was writing in. “You mean she was upset because she gave this Halliard woman one pill?”

  Nikki shrugged. “I didn’t say it was logical. You had to know Dorothea Miller. She was dramatic. Perhaps there was more to it than we’ll ever know.”

  “And she did drink?”

  “She kept a vodka bottle in her desk drawer upstairs.”

  “Really?” He scratched his nose and stood. “Why don’t you show me?”

  Nikki led the way to the ballroom. Next to the sewing machine on Dorothea’s desk, the vodka bottle stood like a glass tombstone. Sadness spiraled through her. “It’s empty. It was three-quarters full just yesterday.”

  She glanced around. The clothes rack of costumes was pulled askew, the bridal ensemble missing. Her heart clenched, and again she struggled to hold the ugly memories at bay.

  The detective sank onto the chair and began pulling open desk drawers, flicking through the contents, then through the magazines. Absently Nikki watched him. He sat straighter, pulled a couple of the magazines from the drawer and laid them open on the desk. “What do you suppose she was doing cutting letters out of these?”

  Nikki’s heart climbed into her throat. She couldn’t swallow. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t answer. She shook her head, her mind racing to an awful conclusion. She had to get the note. Had to compare it. Had to be certain. A jag of ice cut through her, pulling the heat from her face, her body.

  The detective scooped the magazines back into the drawer and slammed it, riveting Nikki’s attention. He stood. “I think we’ll find that Ms. Miller’s death was an accident brought on by her own folly.” He placed the vodka bottle in a plastic bag and sealed it. “But meanwhile, I’m asking all the guests to remain here until we’re certain.”

  Nikki nodded woodenly, still trying to come to terms with what she’d just seen. She had to know. She followed the detective into the hallway. Chris sat on the bottom step. Nikki glanced at him, signaling with her eyes her need for him, then she rushed to her room and found the anonymous note. Chris was letting the detective out as she started downstairs again. She hastened to the ballroom.

  He joined her there, moments later. “What are you doing?”

  “Oh, Chris, look at this.” She laid out several of the magazines on the desk, frantically flipping though them, seeking the pages with the cutouts. Her hand froze. She smoothed the note out beside the pages. “See?”

  He came to her side, peered over her shoulder. She poked the pages, then the note. “These are the letters used in this note. Look.”

  They could both see she was right. She lifted sad eyes to him. “Dorothea must have sent it to me.” Her heart felt like a block of stone. “And now I’ll never learn what she knew about my family.”

  “Your family?” Olivia had entered the ballroom without either Chris or Nikki noticing. Her eyes were narrowed. “She didn’t know anything about your family.”

  Nikki jerked toward Olivia. “Then why did she send this mysterious note?”

  Olivia blinked. “She sent you an anonymous note?”

  Chris’s ebony brows dipped low. “What do you know about this, Liv?”

  Olivia Conrad seemed to have aged in the past few hours. “Oh, Chris, we meant no harm. Shortly after we started planning the grand opening, Dorothea was in the bookstore in Silverdale and she bought a coffee table book, your first book, Nikki. Your photo was on the inside back cover. We were both intrigued by your resemblance to the portrait.

  “Dorothea got it into her head that you should be here for the grand opening. I wasn’t sure you’d come. But she said she’d get you here. She had thought of a way.”

  Nikki blew out a taut breath, grappling with her disappointment. “Then she knew nothing of my past? My family? Neither of you did?”

  “How could we? We didn’t know you.” Dots of color pinkened Olivia’s ghostly cheeks. “I’m really sorry if we’ve upset you. That was never our intention.”

  Nikki felt like a complete fool. Dorothea had made up the message, hoping to hook her into coming to Wedding House, and the bait had worked better than either Dorothea or Olivia had expected. She’d even based her newest project on that note. If it weren’t so tragic, she’d laugh.

  But her resemblance to Theresa couldn’t be denied. Had she found a clue to her past?

  Chris asked his sister, “Did you know about the pills?”

  “Only that Dorothea took them for back pain.”

  “She wouldn’t have mixed them with alcohol—would she?” He scrubbed his face with his hand. Weariness held his mouth tight.

  “I don’t know.” Olivia shook her head. “But she said she couldn’t find the bottle. She thought she’d left it here in her desk drawer.”

  Nikki closed the magazines, feeling like she was closing important pages in her life. All the possibilities, all that might have been, gone, lost forever to her now. “Dorothea told me she might have taken it home in another purse.”

  “No.” Olivia twisted her hands together. “She looked and couldn’t find it there, either.”

  Nikki moved away from the desk, hugging herself against an inner chill that seemed to grow by the minute. More than ever she needed Chris’s reassuring embrace, the comfort of his silent support.

  More than ever he withheld it. Chris sat in the desk chair and opened drawers, carefully emptying then replacing the contents of each. “If she had the prescription bottle here, it’s not here now.”

  Silence fell over them, as heavy and separating as a blinding fog. The uneasiness Nikki had felt since morning gnawed at her with newer, sharper teeth. She wanted reassurance from these two that all would be well, that nothing bad would befall her
as it had Lorah and Dorothea. She wanted a course of action, instead of this standing still waiting for disaster to strike afresh.

  “Do you think she fell?” Olivia asked, at length. “Or jumped?”

  “She wouldn’t have killed herself because of Janice’s threat, would she?” Nikki studied Chris’s sister. “You knew her best of all.”

  “How well do we know anyone?” Olivia sighed.

  “Just what does that mean, Liv?” Chris scowled at his sister. His usual tenderness was missing. Anger clouded his brown eyes, churning more and more at the surface—exactly as he’d warned Nikki.

  “Oh, I don’t know.” Olivia stalked to the windows, then back. “Okay, I’ll tell you.”

  “What?” Chris rose.

  “I was in Lorah’s room, packing her suitcase, when I heard the scream.” She choked, cleared her throat and continued, “I’d just come across a day-planner. As I was putting it into the bag, this fell out of it.”

  She pulled an aged newspaper clipping from the pocket of her black dress and handed it to her brother. Chris read it, then gave it to Nikki to read.

  She read with growing interest, then lifted her gaze to Chris. “I guess we should talk to Marti.”

  “And just what is it you all need to talk to me about?”

  Nikki flinched, startled by Marti’s sudden appearance in the doorway. What was she doing—eavesdropping? A worse notion flew through Nikki’s head. Perhaps Marti was coming into the ballroom for some nefarious reason—like to return the missing Percodan bottle?

  “Well, is someone going to tell me what’s going on?” Marti moved into the room, shoving a hand into her robe pocket as though grasping on to something. A pill bottle?

  No. Nikki shook herself. Why was she casting Marti in the role of murderer? How had the mystery writer gone from her favorite author to the top of her suspect list?

  Chris perched his hip onto the desk. “Do you know Janice Jacoby?”

  Marti’s eyebrows shot upward. “Holy Joe, that little twit who stormed about with threats of imprisonment to us all?”

  “Yes.” He nodded.