by Amy Vansant
“I’d say we’ve got some pretty good motivation,” said Charlotte.
Seamus nodded toward the stairs as he raised the phone to his ear. “I’ll help Dec with the repairs. You go downstairs and keep the others from coming up here until we can get the place aired out a bit.”
“So they get to sleep tight, never knowing there are bags of body parts above their heads.”
“Exactly.”
Charlotte sighed and headed downstairs.
“Ignorance is bliss.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“What was all that commotion?” asked Mariska as Charlotte entered the main living area. “Did I hear Darla say something about raccoons?”
Charlotte spotted Darla’s suitcase against the wall. “She didn’t tell you?”
“She headed right into the bathroom muttering something about rabies.”
Declan came up the stairs with a hunk of plywood in his hand, paused long enough to nod and smile at the group, and then continued to the second level.
“Why did Declan just run by with a giant piece of wood?” asked Carolina, pausing from her potato peeling.
Charlotte realized how smart Declan had been, offering to fetch the wood, instead of getting stuck with the job of telling everyone else half the story.
“We heard animals in the attic. Declan and I went to investigate—”
“What was the scream?” interrupted Mariska.
“When I slipped and my foot went through Darla’s ceiling.”
“What? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. The raccoon scared us and then skittered outside.”
“Raccoons!” Carolina exclaimed, peeler pausing in mid-peel. “This is the vacation from hell.”
“But you love being here with all of us,” said Mariska.
Carolina grunted as her sister playfully bumped her hip with her own.
Darla entered the great room and headed for the computer. “I’ll write Brenda and tell her she’s got critters in the attic.”
Darla’s comment triggered something in Charlotte’s brain.
Something hit me right before we heard the raccoons...
She was staring at the countertop, deep in thought, when Mariska touched her cheek. “You look pale. Are you sure you’re okay?”
Charlotte snapped to attention and glanced at the nasty scratches on her thigh. “I’m fine. Couple of scratches.”
“Talk about pale. Compared to Phil, Brenda looks like a ghost,” said Bob, pausing to peek over Darla’s shoulder at the computer on his way to the kitchen.
“She’s darker than she was, but you’re right—Phil looks like he’s really been hitting the beach,” said Darla.
Charlotte wandered over to look at Darla’s Facebook. The photo she’d seen earlier of Brenda and Phil filled the screen as Darla commented beneath it, telling her friend about the raccoon.
“Is beneath a vacation photo really the place to tell her that her house is full of raccoons?” asked Charlotte.
Darla hit enter. “She’s not answering her email. Maybe she’ll answer that. She’s lucky I didn’t mention the ear.”
The thing in Charlotte’s brain began to jiggle again, looking for attention.
Brenda. Something about Brenda...
“Can you go to Brenda’s other photos?” she asked.
“Sure.” Darla navigated to Brenda’s personal page and Charlotte motioned for her to vacate her seat.
Darla stood. “What’s up?”
Charlotte sat and enlarged one photo of Brenda and Phil and then another. “These photos...”
“Bunch of showoffs,” said Bob shuffling back to his seat.
Charlotte opened a third photo and finished her thought. “The shadows are off. The light on Phil is different to the light on Brenda.”
Darla moved in to squint at the screen. “She’s closer to the camera.”
“Yes, but that isn’t it. Did you say she posted vacation photos before?”
“She always does. About six months ago she had a whole bunch from Mexico.”
Charlotte scrolled back through Brenda’s timeline until she hit the next bunch of vacation photos. She found one of Phil on the beach alone, probably taken by Brenda. His pose seemed very familiar. She opened it in a new window and then navigated back to the photos from the current vacation.
“Look,” said Charlotte, opening photos old and new beside each other.
Darla stared at the screen and then pulled back, looking at Charlotte with an expression of confusion. “Phil looks exactly the same in both photos. It’s the same pose, same expression—”
“The clothes, the skin tone—”
“How can that be?”
Charlotte pointed at the photos. “She’s taken this old photo of him, plucked him out of it, and inserted him into the new photo.”
Darla gaped. “How?”
“Any photo manipulation program would allow someone to do it. Photoshop, for example.”
“Brenda wouldn’t know how to do that.”
“Maybe not. But she could have hired someone to do it.”
“But why? Why would she do that?”
Charlotte sat back in the chair, realizing what had been eating at her. “To make it look like Phil is there when he isn’t.”
Darla rolled her eyes. “But of course he’s there. Why wouldn’t he be there?”
Seamus and Declan entered and Charlotte smiled at how nonchalant they were trying to appear after sealing the tomb above their heads.
“Hey guys, come here.”
The men approached and flanked her chair. Seamus leaned down and whispered in her ear.
“The police said they think they can make it here. It’s low tide. They should be here in an hour.”
She nodded and pointed to the two vacation photos on the screen. “See anything funny here? This is a new photo and this is one from a few months ago.”
Seamus squinted at the screen. “It’s the same photo of the guy.”
“But in two different backgrounds,” agreed Declan.
“That’s Phil our host. The owner of this house,” said Charlotte.
“That his wife?” asked Seamus, pointing at Brenda.
“Yes. She just posted—”
She gasped.
“What?” asked Seamus, Declan and Darla in unison.
She pointed at the obscured MARINES tattoo on Phil’s tan chest. “Not A-R ARmy. A-R mARines.”
Seamus straightened. “Oh.”
Declan looked at his uncle, his brow knit before his expression released and his eyes widened. “Oh.”
“Oh what?” asked Darla. Her eyes popped wide and she put her hand over her mouth. “Oh no. You don’t think—”
She looked at the butter dish.
“How well do you know Brenda and Phil?” asked Charlotte.
Darla shrugged. “I’ve known Brenda for years. She lived in my neighborhood in Tennessee, but she was married to Jimmy Bowen the ‘King of Cadillacs’ then. I only met Phil a couple of times.”
“The King of Cadillacs?”
“He owned a few dealerships.”
“They divorced?”
Darla shook his head. “He drowned. Fell into the lake and hit his head.”
“Hm,” grunted Seamus.
“What’s going on?” asked Mariska, wandering over to them, drying her hands on a dish towel.
“They think our friend in the butter dish is Phil,” said Darla.
“What? Brenda’s Phil?” said Mariska, a little too loudly.
The yelp caught Carolina’s attention and she called from her place at the sink. “What are you people yapping about?”
“Charlotte thinks the person in the butter dish is Phil,” said Mariska.
Carolina shrugged and went back to peeling.
Charlotte touched Darla’s arm. “Brenda is most likely responsible if she’s going to these lengths to pretend he’s alive when he isn’t.”
Mariska huffed. “That’s ridiculo
us. Darla wouldn’t be friends with a murderer.”
“You’d be surprised,” mumbled Darla.
Darla moved to the butter dish and lifted the lid. “So you’re saying all these body bits are Phil?”
Charlotte joined her and pointed to the AR on the flesh blob. “I assumed that was the beginning of ARMY when it matched Mr. Marino’s tattoo, but it’s clipped tight on either side. It could easily be the AR in Phil’s MARINE tattoo.”
Darla’s head dropped. “Why would she do this?”
“Money or sex,” said Seamus. “It’s always one of those two.”
“Phil was rich,” said Darla.
“Like her first husband,” added Declan.
Darla sighed. “This is terrible.”
“What’s terrible is that we just spent a week trapped in a storm fixing up a house for a Jezebel,” said Carolina, scowling at them from the kitchen.
“I think I know who helped her with the photo doctoring,” said Seamus.
Charlotte leapt back to the computer. “Who?”
He pointed to the glass front door of a colorful shop featured in one of Brenda’s vacation photos. When Charlotte looked very carefully, she could make out a form reflected in the glass. She could tell that was the person taking the photo.
“I don’t know who it is, but Brenda ended up with his photo on her Facebook, so there’s a good chance he’s with her.”
“I know who it is,” said Charlotte. She couldn’t see the person’s face, but the shirt he wore was easier to read. It said Clemson in large white letters.
“There was a picture of James in the upstairs hallway next door. He was wearing a Clemson t-shirt in it.”
Seamus’ brow knit. “James? But I thought he and Emmitt were a thing—” He looked at Darla. “Just how rich is Brenda?”
Darla scoffed. “She was loaded. Jimmy’s family had been rich to start with—the dealerships were just icing on the cake. Then Phil—he was rich, too.”
Seamus looked at Charlotte. “James might have pretended to be something he wasn’t for that much money. Dinah said he was greedy.”
“And Brenda might have forgotten Phil when someone that young took an interest in her,” said Darla.
“Jezabel,” said Carolina from the kitchen.
Charlotte snapped. “That explains the key I found, too. Of course James would have a key to this house.”
“And no doubt he’s the one who helped her haul Phil to the attic,” added Declan.
All eyes turned to him and he bit his lip.
“Whoops.”
“What about the attic?” asked Darla.
Charlotte closed her eyes. “Now you’ve done it.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
A week earlier.
“I knew it.”
Brenda’s husband stood at the threshold of the master bedroom in his Outer Banks vacation home, staring at the man and the woman in his bed.
Brenda stared back at him. She could feel her jaw hanging slack with surprise, so she shut it and instead raised her chin in defiance.
“Are you so shocked? That’s rich,” she said.
He laughed and motioned in the direction of her lover. “Look at him. What is he? Twenty years younger than you?”
“Your mistresses are younger than that.”
Phil chuckled. “The difference is I know they’re after my money. You think he loves you.”
Brenda looked at the man beside her in bed. James smiled and took her hand in his.
“I do love her,” he said to Phil.
Silently, Brenda groaned. Even she didn’t buy James’ romantic declaration.
Why was everyone making her fantasy so hard to maintain?
Phil laughed louder.
Brenda pulled her hand from James’ and glowered at her husband. “What are you doing here anyway?”
“I came to end this for you before he bleeds us dry.”
“I’m not in it for the money—” began James.
“Shut it, before my lawyers make your life a living hell, one way or the other.”
James swallowed.
Phil turned his attention back to Brenda. “I want him out of my house.”
He left before she could respond.
Brenda sat, stunned. Downstairs she could hear Phil dropping ice cubes into a glass, making himself a scotch as if nothing had happened.
“You should divorce him,” muttered James.
“Pre-nup.”
“What?”
“Pre-nup. If I divorce him, I’ll lose everything and he knows it.”
“Will he divorce you?”
“I don’t know.” She turned to James. “But if he did—or if I did—we could be together. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, not to sneak around anymore?”
“Yes.” James smiled and squeezed her hand. She could feel the hesitation in his touch. See the disappointment in his eyes.
I’m an old fool.
She knew James didn’t love her. Hell—she was pretty sure he was gay.
In her experience, straight men his age didn’t stay in such amazing shape.
No. He only loves my money.
But her money made them a perfect match. He got what he wanted, she got what she wanted—was that so wrong?
Frustrated, she slapped the bed with her other hand. “Why did he have to come here and ruin everything?”
Brenda stood. “Stay here.”
She threw on a silk robe and stormed downstairs.
She found Phil in the kitchen, peering into the refrigerator.
“You’re a bastard, you know that?” she asked.
“Is there anything to eat in this place?”
“Do you hear me? I said you’re a bastard. You think you can waltz in here—”
He closed the door and stared into her eyes, his face close to hers. “I don’t think, I know. And stop being so dramatic. Get rid of the pool boy and let’s have some dinner.”
Brenda could feel the blood rising to her cheeks. “I can’t even count your mistresses on one hand! Why can’t you let me have my fun?”
“Because with me it is just fun. I know how to handle things. You’ll let that trash fill your head full of pretty lies about your sagging ass until you run out of money—”
Brenda saw white. Raising both fists, she flung herself at her husband.
“I hate you!”
Phil grabbed one wrist in mid-air and slapped her across the face with his other hand. She spun away, but keeping his grip on her wrist, he jerked her back into his arms.
Roaring, she wrestled to escape. He grabbed her other wrist and spun her around. As she twirled, Brenda felt her head clip the refrigerator and saw stars.
“Hey!”
She heard the word and then she was falling.
Everything went black.
“Brenda?”
Someone called her name. She felt a hand on her cheek, tapping.
“Brenda?’
She opened her eyes. James knelt beside her. Eyes bouncing left and right, searching for a frame of reference, she realized she was on her kitchen floor.
“What happened?” she croaked. She tried to sit up but the room began to spin.
“Phil attacked you.”
“Phil?”
She gasped, her memory returning. He’d made her so angry. She’d pounded on Phil with her fists. He’d grabbed her—her head hit the refrigerator—
“Where is he?” she asked.
James frowned and pointed past her. “He’s there.”
“Where?”
James helped her sit up and she saw Phil’s body. He lay on his stomach, body splayed on the floor beside her.
“Phil!”
On her hands and knees she crawled to him. Her hand touched the back of his head and she jerked away, something sticky grabbing at her fingers. That’s when she noticed the blood on the floor.
“He’s bleeding.”
“Not anymore. He’s dead.”
“Dead?”
“What happened?”
“He was attacking you. I grabbed the salt shaker.”
She glanced toward the kitchen table where she knew a tall, heavy, pewter salt and pepper shaker sat. She saw only the pepper. Her gaze fell to the ground near the table where the top of the salt shaker sat, separated from the base. Salt scattered across the floor.
“You hit him with it?”
He nodded. “He collapsed on you. I pulled you out from under him. I tried to wake you up. When you wouldn’t open your eyes I checked on him, but he wasn’t breathing.”
“Did you call an ambulance?”
James scowled. “Are you crazy? A woman, her lover and her dead husband? They’d lock us up and throw away the key.”
“They wouldn’t know you and I—”
James rolled his eyes. “Come on. It wouldn’t take a genius to suspect it. One glance at the bed...”
Brenda gasped. “My bank accounts...”
“What about them?”
Once Brenda started making a mental list of the ways the police could connect her to James, the list was endless. Phil had found out. She’d definitely left evidence behind.
“What are we going to do?” she asked.
“Does anyone know he’s here?”
“No. I don’t know. He wasn’t supposed to be here.”
“We could say we never saw him. Get rid of the body.”
“Get rid of the body?”
Brenda dropped her head into her hands. James put his arm around her. She realized he thought she was crying. She wasn’t. She wanted to—felt like she should—but the tears wouldn’t come.
Maybe I’m in shock.
“I’ll do it. I’ll take care of it,” he said.
She looked up at him as a thought bounced through her brain.
He can’t leave me. I have this on him. I know what he did. He can never leave me.
Nothing about leaving her life as she knew it behind bothered her. She didn’t want it anymore. None of it.
A fresh start. I need a fresh start.
