by Lea Nolan
But even though all appears to be fine, the nagging sensation at the back of my scalp tells me something isn’t right. Though I can’t say what.
“She’s obviously not here,” Jack says. “Let’s see if we can find the knife.”
Cooper nods as he steps over the threshold and points to the door at the near end of the room. “The safe is in the wall behind the mirror. Let’s start there.” It’s a good thing Beau made him memorize the combination last summer. Otherwise we’d be out of luck.
Shivering, I follow them in, my flip-flops sinking into the plush, stark-white carpet. The soft, natural fibers tickle my feet. It seems crazy, but the air feels denser and colder in here than any other room in the house. It’s probably just because the air-conditioning is blaring and the room was closed off.
While Cooper and Jack get to work removing the wall mirror and opening the safe, I look for other good hiding places. Rubbing my goose-bump-covered arms, I peek into the open walk-in closet. Nothing’s awry. Then I glance at the vanity table beyond, which is covered with makeup tubes, lipstick barrels, nail polish bottles, and an assortment of creams and lotions. If I was going to stash something really valuable, that’s probably where I’d put it. Not in a safe, which is the first place burglars are likely to look. Pulling open the center drawer, I scan its contents. There’s nothing more interesting than some foundation bottles, press-on nail kits, and wrinkle creams. Jeez. How many of these does one woman need? Especially someone in their early twenties who doesn’t have a line on her face? Shutting it closed, I sift through the side drawers and find more of the same, plus a half-dozen bottles of platinum hair dye.
A couple minutes later, Jack and Cooper set the mirror back in place, scowls on their faces.
“No luck?” Though I can already guess the answer.
Cooper shakes his head. “No, it’s filled with her jewelry but there’s no knife.”
Jack rubs his chin. “Is there anywhere else we could look?”
Cooper shrugs. “Maybe her bathroom?” He thumbs his hand toward a door on the opposite side of the room, past the four-poster bed and sitting area.
I glance in that direction. Something catches my eye. A tiny black drop mars the pristine carpet. The sinking sensation returns full force, repelling me even while it urges me toward the spot.
Forcing my feet forward, I head toward the other side of the room. Another, slightly bigger drop lies just beyond it, closer to the four-poster bed. Drawing near, a few more spots lie off to the side. “Guys…” My voice trails off as a smattering of black spots previously concealed by the bed come into view. I follow the trail that leads toward the sitting area. A biting, bitter scent pierces my nostrils, forcing me to breathe through my mouth. It’s like rancid garbage, decaying mulch, and a filthy aquarium all rolled into one. Something deep inside my mind demands that I run from the room, but I can’t stop my feet from moving forward. Rounding the corner into the sitting area, I gasp, sucking in a mouthful of the hideous scent. “Cooper, Jack, come quick.”
A swath of thick, black goop puddles on the carpet, then trails toward the bathroom door on the far wall. It almost looks like motor oil except it’s grainer and looks like it contains a few handfuls of coffee grinds.
Cooper and Jack race toward me.
Cooper stops short. “What the heck is that?
Jack winces. “Ugh, what is that smell?” He covers his nose and mouth with his palm.
I shake my head. “I don’t know. But it leads straight to the bathroom.” I point toward the closed door.
Cooper swallows hard. “Maybe we should leave.”
“Dude, I’m totally with you. But what if the knife’s in there? We have to look.”
As much as I want to race out of here, my feet refuse to move. My spirit guide clearly wants me to stay put, for what I’m not sure, but I’m guessing I’m about to find out. Deep inside my gut, confidence surges. Even though I don’t want to, I can do this. Drawing a deep breath, I force my right foot forward, careful to avoid the black, sludgy substance.
Cooper’s hand grips my shoulder. “Let me do this, Emmaline.” His voice is grave and resigned.
Pacing toward the door, he steers clear of the goop. “Missy? Are you in there?” When no answer comes, he knocks and repeats her name. After a moment of silence, he tries the knob. It turns. Swallowing hard, he pushes the door open. His skin turns as gray as a dolphin in St. Helena Sound. Gagging, he covers his mouth and bolts from the room. A moment later I hear him retch in the hall bath, tossing his breakfast.
Jack’s eyes are as big as saucers. “What’s in there?”
“There’s only one way to find out.” Grabbing his hand, as much to support him as myself, I lead him toward Missy’s bathroom, careful not to step in the tar-like muck. At the threshold, we exchange glances, our twin sense wordlessly guiding us toward what to do next.
“One…” Jack says.
“Two…” I add.
“Three,” we say together, then duck our heads inside the door.
Jack’s scream bounces off the tile walls, filling my ears, and echoing through my head.
Chapter Nine
Missy is lying on the black-and-white tile floor, rigid and stiff, her skin the exact medium purple shade as a morning glory bloom. Her mouth is stretched wide and her lids are pried open over glossy, cloudy eyeballs.
Racing to her, I kneel at her body and futilely call her name.
Jack rushes to my side. “Don’t!”
But I reach out anyway, grasping her violet shoulder beneath the skimpy strap of her magenta negligee, but it does no good. She’s in full rigor, unresponsive to my touch. And her skin is as dry and unyielding as saddle leather.
There’s no mistaking it. She’s dead.
“I’m calling an ambulance.” Jack leaps to his feet and races from the room before I can tell him not to bother. We need the sheriff. Or an undertaker.
For a moment, it feels as if time stops and the oxygen has been sucked from the room. Her clownish makeup—candy-apple-red lipstick, sky-blue shadow, and shocking pink blush—contrasts with her navy-blue gums, bright white teeth, and riot of white-blond hair.
Suddenly, the world gushes back and all my senses are on fire. The putrid scent of decay soaks the air, entwined with the lingering fragrance of her strawberry perfume. Water drips from the faucet, slamming into the sink with the force of a missile, then echoes down the drainpipe. A burning, sour taste works its way up my throat. Trembling as my pulse rages, I peel my eyes away from her awful purple skin and scan the room. Aside from her nightie, which is smeared with black sludge, nothing else appears out of place. The knife is nowhere in sight. Out of nowhere, the dark, dank smells of waste, deprivation, and evil shoot straight up my nose and into my brain, jabbing a sharp, wicked pain behind my eyes. Shrieking, I clutch my head, then reel back and stumble out of the bathroom, careful not to touch anything.
Jack’s on the phone next to the four-poster bed. He shakes his head. “No, ma’am, I don’t think mouth-to-mouth will do any good.” He gulps, clearly working to hang on to his pancakes and bacon. “Please, just send someone as fast as you can.”
With a shiver he scans his contacts in his phone then selects one of the entries. Tapping on the speaker he glances over at me. “I don’t think I can handle this one by myself, Em. You’ve got to do it for me.”
“Do what?” Clutching my head, I rub at the stabbing ache as the phone rings. At least now that I’m out of the bathroom, the ghastly stench has begun to dissipate.
“Beaumont Builder’s Development. How may I help you?” The receptionist’s voice is bright and bubbly. She sounds like she’s barely out of high school.
Oh no. Even if my head wasn’t threatening to explode, I wouldn’t want to make this call either. I shoot a pleading glance at Jack, but he shakes his head, his mouth turned down in desperation.
Ugh. Sometimes I hate my brother.
“Hello? Anyone there?” Bubbly asks again.
“I’m sorry he’s out of the office for the morning. Can I take a message?”
“No, I’ve got to speak with him. It’s an emergency. Please?” I add for good measure, hoping she’ll pick up on my misery.
She sighs. “I’ll see if I can link you to his cell. Hang on.”
While we wait, Jack and I exchange looks and I glare hard enough to let him he owes me big time. Finally Beau gets on the line. “Emma, darling. To what do I owe the pleasure of your unexpected, but very delightful call?” He chuckles the kind of laugh that makes my already queasy stomach twist.
I gulp. “I’m sorry to bother you, but there’s been an…accident.” My voice trembles.
“Accident? Good Lord, what’s Missy up to now?” His voice is a low growl. I can almost see the grimace that’s likely plastered across his thin lips. “What’d she do, knock down a wall or something?”
“No, it’s nothing like that. But you really need to come home. Now.” I could spit it all out, give him the gory details of what lies on his bathroom floor, but I can’t bring myself to do that, even to him. Although he and Missy have had their fair share of troubles lately, this kind of news is likely to bring on a heart attack, or make him crash his car on his way home, endangering innocent fellow drivers. Better that he gets here safely first. The sheriff can fill him in on the rest.
“I’m in the middle of a board meeting at The King Center. Can’t it wait?” He pauses. “It’s not your Daddy, is it?” For the first time ever, I detect a hint of genuine concern for my father.
“No, sir. It’s Missy.” My throat constricts, making it nearly impossible to utter the words. “An ambulance is on its way. And so is the sheriff.”
I can hear his anger simmering through the phone. “I’m about through with my wife’s accidents. You tell that ambulance to go on to the hospital without me. I’ll join up when I’m finished here. Or when I’m not so angry.”
Crud. He’s left me no choice. But how do you find the words to express something so horrible? “You don’t understand. She’s…gone.” My voice breaks. I wait for some response but he doesn’t say anything. Jeez, he’s going to make me explain. I take a deep breath. “As in not alive.”
“I’ll be right there.” The line goes dead.
Jack grasps my wrist. “Come on, we’ve got to get out of here.” He drags me out of the master bedroom.
“To where? We can’t leave. We have to wait for the ambulance.”
“We’re not going anywhere. There’s something we’ve got to take care of before they get here.”
My brain spins. “What?”
“Trust me.” Pulling me out into the hall he calls, “Cooper? Cooper!” Silence. He calls again. A few seconds later, a low murmur comes from Cooper’s room at the end of the hall.
Releasing his grip, Jack charges toward the sound. I follow. Cooper’s in his trashed room, huddled in the corner, a look of sheer terror on his face.
Jack kicks his way through the rubble on the floor. “Dude, you’ve got to pull it together. The ambulance is coming. And so are the sheriff and your dad. We’re going to have to talk to them.”
Cooper shakes his head. He opens his mouth to say something, but no words come out. Just a jumble of strained sounds.
Jack turns to me. “Emma, we’ve got to straighten this room. Now.”
He wants to clean? Now? “Why? Who cares what the room looks like? Missy is dead.” I can’t believe I’ve got to remind him of that gruesome fact.
Cooper makes a wrenching sound.
“Exactly. Which is why we can’t let the police see it like this. If they realize Missy tore his room apart, they’re going to wonder why. And that will only end up raising their suspicions about Cooper.” He snatches an overturned dresser drawer and sets it onto its track, shoving it into place.
The logic clicks in my head, bringing everything into sharp focus. He’s right. In a sick way, it makes sense to think Cooper might retaliate for her wrecking the room, or to try and conceal whatever she might have found in here. Thank goodness High Point Bluff is in the boonies. It’ll take a few extra minutes for the ambulance and sheriff to arrive.
“Okay, but where do we start?” I will myself to ignore the headache that’s causing my left eye to pulse and twitch.
Jack throws his hands into the air. “Anywhere. Just bend down and pick up whatever you can. Hey, Coop, you going to help?” He grabs another drawer and puts it in place.
Cooper doesn’t flinch. It’s as if he hasn’t heard a thing we’ve said.
A surge of adrenaline hits my system, propelling me forward. There’s no time to make the bed properly, so I figure it’s best to camouflage things as much as possible. Wadding his bed sheets in a pile, I shove them into the near-full hamper, then drape the stripped mattress with the bedspread and set his pillows in place. It looks as good as new, at least at first glance. Then I scoop up his scattered clothes, cram them into each drawer without any care as to where they should actually go. As Jack rights the desk and replaces the drawers, I do shove the books back on the bookcase. They’re not in any discernible order but at least they’re all spine-out.
Just as we’ve finished setting up Cooper’s laptop and printer, the ambulance sirens whirr in the distance. The room’s not perfect, but at least it doesn’t look like a war zone. I don’t think I’ve ever moved so fast, not even when we outran the plateye hellhounds at the museum.
Wheezing for air, I kneel beside Cooper and place my hand on his. “They’re coming. We’re going to have to let them in the door and tell them what happened. Can you get up?”
He looks up at me, his hunter-green eyes rimmed with red and heavy with grief.
The sirens blare up the long oak-lined driveway leading to High Point Bluff.
Jack crouches in front of Cooper. “Dude, just get yourself downstairs, okay? We’ll do the talking until your dad shows up. Think you can do that?”
Cooper nods.
“Good. Come on.” Standing, Jack extends his hand to Cooper, who takes it and pulls himself up to his feet.
We race through the hall, then down the stairs just as the doorbell rings. Johnson and Briscoe, the two paramedics who helped Miss Delia after she was attacked, are at the door, a stretcher in hand.
“She’s in the master bathroom. It’s at the back of the master suite at the end of the hall.” I point in the general direction.
“Would you like us to come with you?” Jack asks as they push past and mount the stairs.
“No thanks,” Briscoe answers. “We’ll take it from here. Y’all wait on the sheriff. He ought to be around shortly.”
With nowhere else to go, we settle onto the upholstered bench on the side of the grand foyer, waiting for whoever comes next. Cooper grasps my hand, gripping my fingers as if his life depends on it.
“It’ll be okay. I promise,” I whisper.
He gives me a hard squeeze.
Jack’s shoulders slump as if the adrenaline rush has finally worn off and the enormity of everything that’s happened has finally hit him. “I can’t believe it. Missy is dead.” He stares down at the floor, his mouth agape.
A single tear runs down Cooper’s cheek. Which is super weird. Of course her death is a horrible shock, but she was pretty awful to him, especially lately. No one would blame him if he didn’t exactly mourn her passing.
I search for something to make him feel better. “I’m sorry for your loss. I’m sure you’re going to miss her.” Lame, but isn’t that what you’re supposed to say when someone dies?
Both he and Jack turn to me, their brows crinkled in confusion.
“Are you crazy?” Jack asks.
I shrug. “What do you want from me? His stepmother just died and he’s obviously upset about it.”
Cooper shakes his head. “I’m sorry she’s gone. But that’s not why I’m upset.” He swallows hard.
“Then why?” Jack looks mystified.
Cooper draws a deep breath then exhales, bracing himself. “She looks just like my mom did when she died.”
Chapter Ten
“What?” Jack asks, his jaw hanging as slack as mine.
Cooper never talks about his mother. Ever. So to bring her up now—and her death when he was just five years old—amid everything that’s happening just makes it all the more jarring.
Cooper opens his mouth but then shuts it again and drops his gaze to the floor.
Sirens wail and speed toward the house. Jack and I spring off the bench and charge to open the front door. Two sheriff cars barrel down the driveway at top speed, kicking up gravel, then skid to a stop behind the ambulance in front of the Big House. The two deputies in the first car barely allow it to come to a stop before jumping out and racing up the front steps.
The first, a thick-necked, muscle-bound specimen of crime-fighting prowess, clasps his hand on the grip of his holstered revolver. “Where’s the crime scene?” he asks Jack.
“Upstairs, hang a right, then head to the end of the hall.”
Muscles and his partner fly up the stairs. A second later the Beaufort County sheriff jogs up the porch steps, then wipes the soles of his buffed cowboy boots on the mat before stepping into the house. Moving with less urgency than his deputies, he removes his ten-gallon hat. His close-shorn gray hair sets off his light brown skin. “Morning. I’m Sheriff Walker. Beau home?”
I rise off the bench. “No, but he’s on his way. Mrs. Beaumont’s upstairs. In the master bathroom. The paramedics are up there, too.” Swallowing hard over the lump rising in my throat, I point in the general direction of the growing commotion upstairs. Even from down here, I hear their shocked and almost excited voices. St. Helena’s a pretty sleepy island so I’m guessing they don’t come across many dead bodies. At least not those belonging to young people.