by Kylie Logan
It took longer than normal to get to Tara, and maybe that was a good thing.
At least by the time we pulled into the circular drive, my heartbeat had slowed, my temper had calmed, and I didn’t feel like trouncing anyone. At least until the curly maple highboy was in sight.
I parked the car, laid my hands against the steering wheel, and studied the house. I’d been past it a million times, both before and after the Twins purchased the property, but it was set far back from the road, and though I had known it was being restored and transformed, I’d never gotten a close enough look to see what was really happening. Now, I saw that the Twins had done a ton of renovations and that they were, for the most part—
“Hellish!”
When I breathed out the single word, Kate laughed and looked where I was looking—at the huge house that spread out in either direction from a central portico. At the white pillars all along the front. At the trees that stood like sentinels on either side of the long drive. Oh, the trees themselves were real enough, but the Spanish moss hanging from them? I shook my head in amazement and jumped when a peacock strutting across the lawn let out a sound that was a combination of buzz saw and donkey hee-haw.
“People actually want to stay here?”
Another laugh from Kate was enough to warn me that I may have been a tad too critical. “It’s fantasy,” she said. “The way Revolutionary War reenacting is fantasy. Or Disney World. People come here because they want a taste of what they think the Old South was like.”
“I don’t think it was anything like this.” I was sure of it when a yellow Hummer with huge chrome wheels pulled behind us and stopped, its radio blaring a song with a beat that made my bones vibrate.
“People are fighting to get rooms here,” I grumbled. “And my place—”
“Your place is prettier, quieter, and has a whole bunch more class.” Kate opened her door and hopped out of the SUV. “Let’s go prove it.”
I knew what she meant: Mind your temper, Bea. Keep your cool. Don’t accuse anyone of anything because you never know the whole story until . . . well, until you know the whole story.
Now all I had to do was not forget any of that.
The couple from the Hummer were already rolling suitcases up to the front door, and we fell into step behind them. Inside, we walked into a wide entryway where there was a massive desk made from dark wood against one wall and a young girl in a gown with a plunging neckline and a wide skirt poised behind it with her fingers on a computer keyboard.
Since the Hummer folks were here first, I let them check in and took the time to look around.
The carpet was thick and plush and a shade that reminded me of watermelons. The walls were papered in dark green that was swirled with paisleys and accented with gold. The light fixture over our heads was made to look like a gas light, its bulbs flickering and casting soft, fluttering shadows. Ahead of us and beyond a pair of French doors was a sitting room complete with not two, but three red velvet fainting couches, a couple of chairs with stiff, uncomfortable-looking backs, and a grand piano that, at the moment, was being played by a three-year-old who I think it was safe to say was not the next Mozart.
Kate rolled her eyes.
I waited for the Hummers to step away from the desk and sashayed over there to ask for the proprietors.
I got the feeling this was something like arriving at the gates of Oz without the broomstick of the Wicked Witch. The girl behind the counter batted her eyelashes in Southern belle surprise. “I’d really have to check and see if they’re indisposed.” She said the last word as if it had taken a while to familiarize herself with it and, now that she had, she couldn’t get enough of its delicious syllables. “They’re super busy people.”
“Aren’t we all?” I pointed to the phone on the desk in front of her. “Call them and find out.”
She did, and just a couple minutes later, Riva Champion swept down the stairway at the far end of the entryway like a cool breeze over a cotton field.
She caused as much of a commotion.
A ripple of excitement shivered through the crowd. Cell phones were produced. Pictures were taken. The moment of stunned exhilaration ended when someone breathed, “There she is,” as if the words were a prayer, and all around me people moved toward the staircase, where Riva made the most of the moment, one hand elegantly draped over the banister. People begged for pictures and she obliged, and when her brother finally joined her (smelling faintly of cigars, I couldn’t help but notice), they started all over again.
I will give the Twins credit. I knew enough about fans to know the smiling and the posing and the autograph-giving could take its toll. Yet the Champion Twins handled it all like . . . well, sorry, but there’s only one best way to say it—they handled it all like champions. They posed for picture after picture and signed everything from the receipts for people’s rooms to copies of that day’s newspaper.
Ah yes, that day’s newspaper.
I told myself not to get caught up in the sweet tea atmosphere and to remember why I was there.
Once the last of the grovelers was gone (but not gone far away; plenty of them hung around the lobby positioning themselves so that their selfies included the Twins in the background), Riva hurried over, the tight, small smile on her face barely concealing the fact that she had no memory at all of who I was. “Delilah . . .” She glanced ever so briefly at the girl behind the desk, who I would have bet a bundle was not actually named Delilah. “She says you needed to see me. I do hope there’s nothing wrong with your room.”
I saw Kate’s lips twitch and spoke up fast, because I was afraid of what she might say.
“I’m not a guest. I’m Bea Cartwright. We met last night. At Estelle Gregario’s.”
I’d think that two people who’d been that close to murder wouldn’t have had to consider it for a few long seconds, but both Quentin and Riva did. The truth dawned on her first, and her expression cleared. “Of course! You’re Bea! Of course I remember you. You have that little B and B over on the other side of the island.”
“Well, it’s certainly nothing like this.” How’s that for diplomatic? And just cutting enough to make me feel righteous?
“Oh! Oh, my gosh.” Before I could say another thing, Riva turned as pale as the lily-soft hands on the most spoiled Southern belle. “I heard what happened at your place last night. Quentin, did you hear?” Since her brother was standing just off to the side, sizing up Kate from the tips of her shoes to the top of her head, she had to raise her voice. “Someone broke into Bea’s B and B last night.”
“They didn’t break in,” I corrected her. “They tried to break in.”
“Still.” She fanned one hand in front of her face. “I would just never get a wink of sleep in a place that might be broken into at any minute. Would you get a wink of sleep, Quentin?”
I was fairly certain that Quentin wasn’t thinking about sleep at that moment. Kate knew it, too. That would explain why she skewered him with a laser look and turned her back on him.
“Bea’s place is safe and beautiful,” Kate said, a little louder than necessary. “That’s why people love to stay there.”
“But not a whole lot of people. Not right now.” Riva raised pencil-thin eyebrows. “Am I right?”
“So much to discuss at the next Chamber meeting in addition to all the details for the gala!” I managed to make this sound as if I actually would. Yeah, like it was anyone’s business but my own. “For now, there’s something else I’d like to talk to you about.” I’d brought the newspaper with me, open and folded to the page that showed the picture of the Twins, and I flashed it in front of Riva. “Highboy,” I said.
She had the nerve to smile. “It’s way cool, isn’t it?”
“It was supposed to be mine.”
“Really?” She couldn’t have been more surprised if I told her that I saw righ
t away that her snakeskin ballet flats were knockoffs. “Come on.” Riva led us through the parlor and into a room that must have been used for guests’ breakfasts.
There were twenty tables there, all of them covered with white linen cloths, each of them with a small vase filled with fabric flowers at the center of it. Since it was late, the settings were already out for the next morning: pink napkins, along with flatware that wasn’t nearly as nice as the silver I put out for my guests. There was a sideboard opposite the door, and on the other side of the doorway . . .
I made a beeline for the highboy and Kate followed along.
It was just as beautiful as I remembered it from the time I saw it at Estelle’s and told her how much I admired it. Top-notch workmanship. Gorgeous wood. Lovely hardware.
“Estelle told me I had first dibs on the highboy,” I told Riva when she joined me.
“That’s weird.” She wrinkled her nose. “Because last week when I talked to Vivien, she said she didn’t know what to do with it. She talked about donating it to Goodwill.”
My heart nearly stopped, and something told me Riva realized it. She laughed. “I offered to take it off her hands. It reminds me of a piece of furniture my mom has in her house in Malibu. Or is it the house in Honolulu?” Apparently, she decided it didn’t really matter because she shook her shoulders and laughed. “It looks perfect in here, doesn’t it?”
It would look more perfect in my dining room, but rather than point that out I said, “There must have been some miscommunication.”
“Must have been.” She ran one finger lovingly down the side of the highboy. “I’m sure Vivien didn’t know what her aunt told you. Otherwise, I mean, she never would have sold this piece of furniture to me, right? I’ve had it just about a week now. Long before . . .” Riva’s eyes filled with tears. “Poor Vivien.”
“You were there last night to pick up more of Estelle’s things.” Yes, a no-brainer, but I wanted to hear it from Riva.
She nodded. “There were some books I thought would look precious on the tables in the parlor, and a couple pictures, and . . .” She tipped her head, thinking. “I wonder what happens to all of it now.”
“I suppose that all depends on if Vivien had a will.”
“Well, it doesn’t really matter as much as finding out who killed Vivien.” Riva lifted her perfectly shaped chin. “Have the cops arrested anyone yet?”
“They’re working on it,” I assured her.
“I hope they’ve talked to that woman.” Riva’s golden brows dropped low over her eyes. “That what’s-her-name.” When we walked into the dining room, Quentin had stayed near the door to chat up a couple of sweet young things who couldn’t control their giggles, and Riva had to call out to him. “Quentin, what’s the name of that woman? The one we saw at Estelle’s last night?”
Quentin pointed to me. “That’s her.”
Riva rolled eyes the color of a clear Georgia sky. “You’ll have to forgive my brother,” she said. “He’s always had an eye for pretty ladies, and after what we went through during our terrible captivity . . .” She glanced away, swallowed hard, then turned her attention back to me. “He’s making up for lost time, and who can blame him!” She tried again. “Not her, Quentin. I know she was there. I mean earlier. You see”—Riva glanced my way again—“you were already at the house when we got there last night. You and that good-looking guy.” A smile touched her lips. “Somebody told me he owns a bar somewhere here on the island, but I never did catch the name of it.”
I lied with a straight face. Yes, it was unworthy of me, but hey, there was nothing wrong with fighting fire with fire, and Riva had snatched the highboy out from under me. “I don’t have a clue.”
She was not deterred. “Well, I’m sure I’ll run into him somewhere. But that’s not what we were talking about, was it? I was telling you that Quentin and I, we were at the house earlier. You know, before anyone else got there.”
“And you saw Vivien?” I asked her.
“Vivien? Oh, no. We knocked, but there was no answer. That’s why we left and came back again later, and that’s when you were there. But when we were there the first time . . .” Thinking about it, she hugged her arms around herself. “Well, I never thought about it. I mean, I should have. I know I should have. But the thought of Vivien being dead . . .” She sniffled. “I’ve had a pounding headache all day and I know I haven’t been thinking straight. That’s why I didn’t remember, not until right now. We were already back in the car, see. That first time we stopped to see Vivien and she didn’t answer the door. We were already back in the car, and that’s when we saw her.”
I was afraid to ask.
Almost as afraid as I was to not know the answer.
“Who?”
“Well, I don’t know her name, but I’ve seen her around. Blond. Middle-aged. She wears these crazy clothes and usually all bright colors, but yesterday . . .” Thinking, she squeezed her eyes shut, and that gave Kate and me a chance to exchange glances. “She was dressed all in white, and just as we pulled away from the house, she walked around the front. You know, like she’d been in the backyard the whole time. She must have heard us when we were pounding on the door, don’t you think? I wonder why she never let us know she was there.”
Yeah, I wondered, too.
But I sure wasn’t going to wonder out loud.
Instead, I thanked Riva for clearing up the confusion about the highboy, gave it a long, wistful look good-bye, and Kate and I headed back through the parlor.
My mood did not improve one bit when I saw that painted, potbellied lamp in there along with the silver candlesticks I’d planned to buy at Estelle’s.
Back at the car, Kate leaned against her door. “Wow. You don’t think—”
I knew what she was thinking. And it wasn’t about my highboy. I yanked my car door open. “I don’t know what to think,” I admitted. “Chandra never mentioned that she’d been to Estelle’s.”
“Well, she wouldn’t, would she? Not if she—”
“You can’t really believe that!”
Kate spent a few moments considering the possibility. “There was a time I would have liked to,” she confessed. “I mean, Chandra with her crazy drum circles and her bonfires and her customers who show up at all hours to commune with the Other Side. She drove me crazy for years.”
“And now?”
“And now, she’s my friend. She’s your friend, too, and you don’t think—”
“I don’t think it. But there’s something going on, and we need to get to the bottom of it.”
I pulled out of the driveway, carefully making my way around not two, but three groups of people dressed in Civil War–era costumes. Either they were early for the gala or they always dressed that way. At least when they were under the spell of the Twins and Tara. “I wish there was some sort of proof that Riva and Quentin killed Vivien,” I grumbled.
Kate had the nerve to laugh. “Why would they want to kill Vivien?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “But the more I get to know them, the more I’d like nothing better than to see them leave the island. At least if they were in prison, I might get some customers back. And maybe my highboy, too.”
9
By the time we got back home, it was nearly dark and I was more than ready to pop that pizza in the oven, sit back, and finish the bottle of white burgundy.
I would have done it, too.
If there wasn’t something weird going on at Chandra’s.
Yes, yes, I know. Weird and Chandra go together like hot fudge sundaes and whipped cream.
Only this weird was an out-of-character sort of weird.
Kate and I both noticed. When I parked the car, we exchanged looks.
“If we’re smart, we’ll just keep walking and pretend nothing odd is going on,” Kate said.
I knew she wa
s right.
Which doesn’t explain why I got out of the car and headed right next door.
Here’s the thing about Chandra’s house: Though we are next-door neighbors, our homes couldn’t be any more different if she lived in an igloo and I pitched a Bedouin tent in the yard. My grand Victorian was built a little more than a hundred years earlier; Chandra’s single-story ranch was a product of the fifties. From what she told me, it had once been the summer home of some banker from Cleveland who packed up the missus and the kids as soon as school was out and sent them to the island.
All that fresh air and sunshine.
All that fooling around he was doing back in Cleveland while his family whiled away the hours on South Bass.
Eventually, the house was sold and the profits were divided as part of the divorce settlement. Chandra’s parents were the ones who’d bought it.
All told, Chandra had lived in the house for nearly fifty years, and since her parents had moved to Florida, she’d owned the house outright for more than twenty. In that time, she’d put her own stamp on it, and it should come as no surprise to learn the place was . . . well, let’s just say eclectic. Artistic also fits the bill. The house had Chandra written all over it, from the four outside walls each painted a different color (turquoise, pink, purple, and orange on the side of the house that faced mine) to the sunshiny yellow doors. There was a patio out back that she surrounded with twinkling lights and plantings everywhere that included plenty of the herbs she used for teas and spells, a variety of flowers, and a veritable forest of wind chimes, fountains, and chubby gnomes.
Back when I moved to the island, my first encounter with Chandra was on the night of a full moon when she was burning what she called a bonfire and what I termed a conflagration in her yard, and I soon found out that those once-a-month fires were a bone of contention throughout the neighborhood.