by Wendy Tyson
“It said ‘one down, three to go.’”
A shiver twisted up Allison’s spine. “Anything else?”
“The same stuff: how awful we are to play with people’s lives, etcetera.”
“So why didn’t Sam come forward with the letter?” Vaughn asked.
“I don’t think he ever received it.”
Allison looked at him, a question reflected in her eyes.
“The letter was intercepted and hidden. I found it today.”
“Where?” Allison’s heart was pounding.
“In Elle’s room. I was looking for Sam, and there it was amongst her things.”
Allison was stunned into silence.
“You think Elle knew and didn’t say anything? Why would she do that?”
Jeremy stood. He took another swig from his flask, then turned the container upside down and shook it. “Damn.” He swung around, looking directly at Allison.
“I think she’s in on it. The letter was delivered here, to the castle. She must have intercepted it, perhaps figured out who the murderer is. She wanted in on it. She gets nothing if the foundation is successful. Nothing at all. If it fails…the money goes to her. She’d be a very rich woman.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Allison asked. Again, she was afraid she knew his answer. “You should be telling Balzan.”
“You were—are—her ticket. You aren’t just an image consultant. You’re a detective, albeit an amateur one. I read about you, Allison. I know about the young girl you helped. And that older woman—the Italian.” Jeremy cocked his head, his eyes probing. “You’re also the best kind of alibi. If she has you snowed, she can snow everyone. And if you find the real killer after damage is done, she wins. The charter says the money has to be given away in Sam’s lifetime. He wants to see it go. Otherwise, it’s returned to his estate. She can sit back and watch the drama unfold, taking the spoils at the end.”
Allison shook her head. “I’m sure she could just have asked to be part of the foundation and Sam would have allowed her.”
“Elle Rose doesn’t want control of the foundation. That would be real work. She wants the money, pure and simple.”
Allison headed into the kitchen for a glass of that wine. She suddenly felt shaky, and her head was pounding. Could this be true? Could Elle be an accomplice to murder? She’d have to be a hell of an actress. But hadn’t she pulled off a metamorphosis in just a few short days? And didn’t she once act for a living? Once upon a time, anyway.
“You should talk to Balzan,” Allison said. “Tell him what you told me.”
“We are in danger. I could be next. Sam could be next.”
“What do you expect us to do about that, Mr. Kahn?” Vaughn asked.
Jeremy’s tone cut through the next round of thunder like a knife through snow. “Find out who’s doing this. That’s what I want you to do.”
Jeremy left and Allison locked the doors behind him. She braced herself against the counter. “Holy cow.”
“What do you make of that?”
“I don’t know what to think.” Allison rubbed her temples. “That was a lot to take in.”
“Do you believe him?” Vaughn looked skeptical.
“I believe that he means it. He seemed genuinely scared. I think the only thing keeping him upright is whatever was in that flask.”
Thunder roared and the lights flickered again.
“We really do need flashlights.”
“There are candles and matches under the sink.” Allison went in search of them. She pulled out three long white candles and placed them on the counter next to her computer. “Some of this makes sense. Elle has been pushing me about Damien. And she has not been particularly focused on change, at least not consistently.” Allison paused. “On the other hand, if Jeremy got into Elle’s rooms today, it’s possible others did as well. The police have been in and out of this place. Doors could be left unlocked.”
Vaughn nodded. His handsome face looked troubled. “So what are you going to do?”
Allison glanced at her watch. “We’re meeting with Elle soon, right?”
“Yep. Fifteen minutes.”
“Let’s go then. Someone’s got some explaining to do.”
THIRTY-ONE
“I have absolutely no idea what Jeremy is talking about.” Elle fell onto a chair in her apartment with a thud. “He’s bonkers—or lying. Look around. Please. I’ve never seen such a note.” She smacked her head lightly with one hand. “Oh my god, if he’s right, then someone here knew early on that this was murder. Who would take that note? Who would plant it here?”
Vaughn was standing near the locked door, and he moved across the room, staring at Elle’s desk. “If we believe that there was a note, and if we believe that you didn’t take it, then that leaves two options that make sense.”
“One, the killer placed the note there to scare you—or implicate you,” Allison said.
“Or two, we have a killer, and we have someone who has known Damien was murdered and did nothing about it.”
Vaughn picked through some papers, put them down. “Who has that kind of access to Sam?”
“Just about everyone. Especially the employees: Dominic, of course. Karina. And Hilda.” Elle’s eyes widened. She stood. “Speaking of Hilda, the lab got back to me with the drug results. They don’t make sense.” Elle grabbed her phone off a table. “Promise me you’ll hear me out, okay? I haven’t done drugs. I swear.”
Allison frowned. She accepted the phone and read the drug screening analysis. “They found amphetamines? You’ve been taking speed?”
“No, I haven’t. I swear to you. I swear on everything I know and love.” She took the phone back and scrolled through until she reached another page. “I did some research. Speed is detectable in urine for three to five days, that’s it. That means whoever did this gave me the drug within three to five days before Friday, when I went for the screening.”
Allison understood what she was getting at. “The Benadryl.” When Vaughn looked confused, Allison said, “Hilda gave Elle a drug on Wednesday. She told Elle it was a sedative, something to calm her nerves. When I questioned Hilda later, she told me it was only Benadryl.”
“But it must have been something else. Something that would elicit this result.” Elle turned her head toward the window. “She must have wanted me doped up. But why?”
“So you would seem unstable? On drugs.” Allison said. “To discredit you.”
Elle placed a hand over her mouth. “If Hilda did this to me, is it possible she’s been drugging my father?”
“He was sick before she came, wasn’t he?” Vaughn asked.
“He’s only deteriorated over the last year or so. The last few months have been the worst.”
Which is when Hilda arrived, Allison thought, about a year ago.
“Vaughn, did Jamie send you the results from his new software?”
“I don’t know. I never had a chance to check.”
“Why don’t you go check now? And forward him the list of drugs Sam is taking. I’ll stay here with Elle and start to go through the information she pulled about the foundation’s rejected applicants. Maybe there is some link to our friend the nurse.”
Allison watched Vaughn go. She wasn’t just thinking about Elle and Sam, she was thinking of Grace, and all the exposure Hilda had to her niece. Allison had a reason to get to the bottom of this. She recognized the feeling creeping around the edges of her head as guilt. How could she be a mother if she couldn’t even keep her niece safe? Maybe things were working out for the best. One way or another, she needed answers.
Vaughn was gone for almost an hour. In that time, Elle and Allison poured through hundreds of pages of application materials. Despite the medication she’d taken two hours prior, Allison’s head throbbed, the pills barely keeping the migraine
at bay. Nevertheless, she flipped through page after page of rejections. Nothing rang a bell or raised a red flag.
“These are all over the place,” Allison said finally. She tossed another set of materials on the table and sat back in her chair. “Some real sob stories are rejected. Applications for life-saving medications or amazing business ideas. How do they decide?”
“It’s whatever strikes their fancy. Each board member has a say, and he can advocate for the ones he wants to grant.”
“And that’s it? There’s no other criteria?”
Elle glanced up from the page she was reading. “Not that I know of. Some of the board members have their pet projects. They tend to grant awards for those things. Damien, for one, liked to help children. He was a sucker for anything that assisted underprivileged children. Or sick kids.”
“What if there is disagreement amongst the ranks?”
“I don’t think there usually is. But if it happens, I guess my father has the last say. While Jeremy and Douglas’s father contributed to the operation, most of the money will come from my father.”
“Will come? I thought the money was already in the trust?”
“Something to do with how the charity is set up. For estate planning purposes. Sam donates to the trust on an annual basis.”
“And if your father dies before it’s all given to the foundation?”
Elle held Allison’s gaze. “I get the rest.” She slammed the package she was working on down on the desk. “Is that what you want to hear? Yes, it’s mine. Every last cent now that Michael is dead. If I choose to take it, that is.”
Allison studied her client, trying to decide how to react. “Do you have anything to do with any of this?”
“Of course not.”
A low rumble reverberated through the thick walls of the castle. Light flashed outside the arched window next to Elle’s desk.
“Do you believe me?”
Allison took off her reading glasses. “Elle, I don’t know what to believe anymore. These deaths could be connected by something as basic as jealousy—a love triangle we’re unaware of—or the culprit could be someone we haven’t even thought of. Someone not here.”
“But you don’t think so.” Elle’s voice was quiet, hard. “You think the killer is here.”
Allison hesitated. “I do.” She sighed. “And no, I don’t think it’s you.”
A loud bang reverberated outside Elle’s rooms, followed by a yell. Allison sprung up, her fight or flight instinct kicking in. In the hall, someone shouted. There was a knock on the door.
“What the hell?” Elle stood close to the locked door. “Who is it?”
“Your father.”
Elle and Allison looked at each other. Sam sounded…normal. Elle opened the door. Sam Norton stood there. He wore blue cotton pajamas and brown leather slippers. He was also sopping wet. The light in his eyes was clear and focused. This man was not confused. He was frightened.
“Elle, let me in.”
“Daddy, what’s wrong?”
“Let me in.” He pushed his way into the room and locked the door behind him. It took him a moment to register Allison’s presence. “Why is she here?”
“This is Allison, remember? She’s helping me.”
With a brief nod at Allison, Sam took Elle by the arm. “Look, you need to get out of here. Now. And you need to take me with you.”
“We can’t leave. The inspector said—”
“To hell with the inspector.” Sam’s eyes searched the room frantically. “Do you have a car?” he asked Allison.
Allison nodded.
“Then let’s leave. Now. They’re here, and they’re going to take me. Please.”
Sam made a low moaning sound. Elle caught Allison’s attention behind her father’s back. She shook her head back and forth. Her expression said “see how he is?”
“Who is coming, Mr. Norton?” Allison asked.
“Them. The aliens. The rocket men. The bad guys. Call them what you will.”
“Who told you that?”
“She did.” His eyes watered. “She said it’s time. And I believe her.”
Allison took the agitated man’s hand. At first he pulled away. She took it again, drawing on her years of working with teens in a psychiatric setting. With a firm voice, she said, “Who is she?”
“There’s no time.”
Allison repeated the question. “Tell me, Sam. Who is she?”
“She says she would know.”
Elle moved closer. “What else did she tell you?”
Sam’s eyes watered. “That my son is dead.”
Again, Elle and Allison locked eyes. “Was it Hilda who told you that, Daddy?”
Sam started shaking. A bony hand raised forward, pointing at the door. “They’re here.”
Allison followed his gesture. Vaughn stood there, laptop bag in one hand, Karina by his right arm. Hilda sagged behind Karina.
“Come on, Sam,” Karina crooned. “Come with me. It’ll be okay.” She threw an apologetic look at Elle. “I told Hilda not to let him out of her sight.”
Hilda didn’t look much better than her patient. “I’m sorry,” she mumbled.
Elle frowned. “Is there an officer with him? Balzan’s men are supposed to be here.”
The two women exchanged a glance.
“There is not,” Karina said. “Mazy heard something outside by her cottage. The police went to investigate.”
“It’s storming,” Elle said. “Who would be out there now?”
Karina let out a huff of disgust. “Really? With everything that has gone on here, someone sneaking around in the dark should not be surprising.”
“Everyone should come into the castle,” Vaughn said. “With the police. For tonight, at least.”
Elle nodded. She looked at Karina. “Can you ask Dominic to make the rounds? Ask our guests to join us here, at least for tonight? The castle has a backup generator in case we lose electricity. That can be his excuse.”
Karina agreed. “Let me help Hilda get your father settled first.”
As the two women neared Sam, he let out a scream like an animal about to be butchered. “Elle, don’t let them take me.” He stared at Vaughn.
It dawned on Allison that Sam never met Vaughn. She explained who he was.
“They’re still coming.” He looked toward Hilda and Karina. “You said they’re coming.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Hilda said soothingly. “You need your medication.”
With that, they left.
“Should we follow them?” Elle said.
“You stay here. Vaughn and I will go. Just keep the door locked.”
Vaughn glanced at his watch. “And get ready to greet your guests.”
THIRTY-TWO
“How exactly do you expect to follow them?” Vaughn asked. “This place is quiet as a tomb. They’ll hear us, for sure.”
“We’re not following them, Vaughn.” Allison led Vaughn down the hall, toward the center staircase. She listened as Karina, Hilda, and Sam’s footsteps echoed against marble, waited for the click of Sam’s doors. “Sam’s rooms are right next to Elle’s. Once we know they made it inside—and they have, I think—we’ll be making a different trip.”
They walked downstairs quietly, then darted through the arch that led into the lower south side of the castle. “Traditionally the servants’ quarters. This is where Hilda and Karina’s rooms are.”
Vaughn nodded. “You want to search their rooms?”
“You have a better idea?”
“No, but they’re surely locked.”
“I guess we’ll take that chance.”
Vaughn smiled. He held up a set of keys and swung them back and forth. “Just a game of trial and error.”
“Wher
e’d you get those?”
“I was doing some exploring myself.”
“I was wondering what was taking you so long.”
Vaughn slowed. He whispered. “Jamie was trying to send me files but they wouldn’t go through. I went in search of Dominic to see if he could get the internet working. I couldn’t find him, but I did find these in his workshop behind the kitchen.”
Allison wondered where the caretaker was. Increasingly, she thought Vaughn’s idea of having everyone at the castle was a good one.
They came upon a small wooden door. Allison tried it. “Locked. Want to give it a go?”
Vaughn tried key after key while Allison kept watch. The hall lights flickered.
“Hurry,” Allison urged.
Vaughn inserted another key. This one seemed to fit. He turned it and the door opened with a gentle creak. The interior was dark.
“Come on,” Allison hissed. She used her phone to find a light. Vaughn closed the door and Allison turned on a wall sconce. They were in a large room, about twenty by twenty. The ceilings were high, the windows narrow, and the furnishings sparse. One wall was lined with bookshelves, each shelf crammed with reference books. A plain Scandinavian-style desk sat against one wall, under the windows. A chair and a small side table had been placed in front of the shelves. Two medical journals sat on the small table, their titles in German.
“This must be Hilda’s room,” Allison whispered. “Let’s check out the bedroom.”
The back room housed a simple bed. It was low and functional and sat on a beech-wood platform. The blankets were white and no-nonsense. A small beech table sat next to the bed, and a chair stood next to that. A book—the one Hilda had been carrying the day Allison asked her about the drug she’d given Elle—was sitting on the chair. A white robe hung on a hook by the window. One door led into a tiny closet, the other a small bathroom.
“Not much to go on,” Vaughn said. “Ready to move on?”
“Give me a minute.”
Allison looked through the bathroom, ignoring a sense of urgency that was quickly bearing down. The bathroom consisted of a toilet, a pedestal sink, a small cabinet, a bidet, and a bathtub. The cabinet was locked.
