I leaned in. One by one, I turned them off and dropped them in my tote. “I promise to give you these back as soon as the danger has passed.”
“Do as she asks and you might live through this,” Colleen said. Then she did a pyrotechnic stunt worthy of the Fourth of July and disappeared.
Tomorrow, no doubt, there would be wild speculation in the news about the strange lights in Mt. Pleasant. But the women in the car were blessedly quiet. I climbed back in, glanced around. Four pale, wide-eyed faces stared towards the front of the car. Dana’s lips moved in what I’d bet was silent prayer.
I closed the door and drove towards home, praying the quiet would last. Time to call Merry and let her know what was coming her way.
Fifteen
Blake texted me while we were on the ferry: Seth is locked up.
I sent up thanks and relayed the news to Nate via text. I couldn’t speak freely in the car, and I didn’t want to leave my charges unattended by getting out.
He texted me back: Good news for all. Hope Blake can keep him there 4 a while.
I replied: He will. Miss Dean’s house unlocked. Keys on porch. Grab cameras tonight?
Nate texted: Good idea. Feed is hosed anyway. Don’t know what happened. Best to get them out before Charleston PD goes in. Going now.
Be careful. Miss Dean keeps a gun close.
Good to know.
Every light in my house was on. Merry waited on the front porch, her arms full of quilts. Rhett came running out to escort us down the driveway.
“Oooh,” Lori said. “What a pretty dog.”
“His name is Rhett,” I said.
As soon as I parked the car, they all hopped out to pet him. They were still subdued, but they all cooed and talked baby talk to Rhett, who ate it up.
Merry made her way down the steps. The stack of quilts was up to her eyeballs.
I ran to help her.
“Here. Let me take some of those.”
“I have hot tea and hot chocolate made,” she said.
“Thank you. I know all of this wasn’t part of the bargain when I asked you to stay here.”
“They need help,” she said.
This was Merry. Giving and softhearted to a fault. I hadn’t had a chance to tell her much on the phone, but it didn’t matter.
“Hey, y’all, this is my sister, Merry.”
They kept petting Rhett, but looked our way.
“Merry, this is Amber, Lori, Heather, and Dana.” Black hair, redhead, blond, brunette. I double-checked the names in my brain. Everything had happened so fast, I hadn’t had a chance to get to know any of them well.
“Hey,” Merry said. “It’s good to meet y’all.”
They all murmured greetings.
“Y’all sure do look a lot alike,” said Heather. “You could be twins.”
“We get that a lot,” I said. Except I was two years older, four inches taller, and several pounds heavier. I didn’t like to talk numbers.
“Y’all must be freezing,” Merry said. “Here, take these quilts.”
Merry and I handed them out, then made a second round making sure everyone was wrapped up and tucked in.
“Let’s go inside,” I said. “Merry has hot tea and cocoa ready.”
“Can Rhett come inside?” Dana asked.
“Of course,” I said.
Merry and I herded them indoors, down the hall, and into the sunroom.
“Everyone, please make yourselves comfortable,” I said.
Dana, the brunette nursing student, Amber, the raven-haired whiz in business and/or finance, and Heather, the blond grad student in environmental studies, huddled under their quilts on the sofa. These were the three who’d lived at 12 Church Street the longest. Lori, the redhead information systems student, who was both the newest resident and the youngest of the group at twenty-two, curled into one of the wingback chairs near the fire Merry had built in the fireplace.
Rhett finally noticed I was there and came over for attention. I ruffled his head and scratched behind his ears, then patted him on his side. “You’re a good boy.”
He wagged his tail and gave me a sloppy grin. I went into the kitchen, and Rhett followed me. Merry had a tray of mugs and was headed in the other direction. I grabbed the thermal carafes. Soon, everyone had a warm drink and Rhett had settled between my wingback and the end of the sofa. Merry pulled in a chair from the kitchen.
“If you stay, you may hear things you’ll be called to testify about at some point,” I said.
“If you think I’m leaving, you’ve lost your mind,” she murmured under her breath, a huge smile on her face.
I shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
“I usually do.”
“Mule.” I shook my head and sighed.
“Takes one to know one.” Colleen, who was still seventeen, the age she was when she died, joined us in spirit mode. I was the only one who could see her sitting cross-legged in the floor, aside from Rhett, who belly-crawled over and laid his head down beside her. Colleen obliged and stroked his head.
“I know you’re all exhausted,” I said, “and in shock from everything you’ve see this evening.”
I caught a glimpse of Merry’s scrunched-up face in my peripheral vision.
I continued, “But I need to ask you a few questions. It’s very important that you tell me anything that might be connected, even if you think it’s unimportant. Do any of you know Thurston Middleton?”
Lori, the redheaded new girl with all the dress-up outfits, gasped.
Dana said, “The man they found dead in White Point Gardens this morning?”
Dear heaven, had it been that same day? “Yes.” I looked from face to face, scanning for reaction. A mixture of confusion and lingering shock stared back at me from every face save one. I recognized fear on Lori’s face.
“Lori?” I held her gaze.
“He was waiting for me in the lot where I park over on Elliott Street when I came back from class one afternoon a couple weeks ago—right before winter break. He must’ve followed me there from Aunt Dean’s before then. He gave me his card, asked me to come with him for a cup of coffee. He said it was urgent he talk to me.”
“Did you go?” I asked.
She shook her head. “No. I told him he could talk to me right there, but I wasn’t going anywhere with him. He seemed nice, but you never know.”
Her mamma had given her the same Ted Bundy lecture mine had given me. “Did he tell you what he wanted?”
“He asked me about Aunt Dean’s, who paid my rent there. He said he’d heard some ugly rumors. He wanted me to confirm them. I told him it was none of his business and walked home.”
“Did he follow you?” I asked.
“No.”
“Did he ever contact you again?”
“No.”
“Did you tell Arthur about the incident?”
Tears filled her eyes. Her lips, tightly clamped together, trembled. She nodded.
“What was his reaction?” I asked.
She wiped a tear from her face.
“He was so angry.”
“Did he hurt you?” I asked.
She looked startled.
“No. Arthur is very good to me. He’d never hurt me.”
“Did he ever mention Thurston Middleton to you again?”
“Not after that night. He told me to be sure to tell him if I ever saw him or heard from him again. But I never did.”
I said, “Did Thurston Middleton ever approach any of the rest of you?”
They all shook their heads slowly.
Dana said, “I never met the man or talked to him. But James asked me if he’d approached me.”
“When?” I asked.
“Anyone else been asked about him?” I asked.
Heather said, “Henry asked me the same thing.”
Who had told Henry? According to Julia, he wasn’t close to the other men.
Amber said, “William never mentioned Thurston’s name. But he did ask me recently if anyone had bothered me or asked me questions.”
“Are any of you afraid of Seth?”
They exchanged glances.
I waited.
Dana, the Fifty Shades brunette, spoke for the group. “Seth would never hurt any of us. The men who pay our rent would be unhappy. Happy men who pay the rent are very important to Aunt Dean. But Seth is creepy. We just avoid him as much as we can.”
Lori said, “When you’re new, he spies on you. I’ve caught him following me a few times. He always just smiles and waves, like him being there’s a coincidence, but I don’t buy it.”
“How is your relationship with Aunt Dean?” I asked.
Amber said, “She’s mostly like a grandmother. Some of her rules are odd. But you can’t beat the perks of living there. Dinner on the table every night at seven. Someone else does all the laundry. Most of our time is our own to study, focus on school.”
“So none of you are at all afraid of Aunt Dean?” I asked.
They all shook their heads.
“Was everyone home Monday evening?” I asked.
“Yes,” said Dana.
They all nodded.
“And dinner was at seven?” I asked.
“No,” said Dana. “Aunt Dean was tired. Dinner was at six Monday.”
“And after dinner...did you all go to your rooms?”
There was a chorus of “Yes,” and “I did.”
“Who all had company last night?”
Dana, Lori, and Amber raised their hands. This confirmed what Nate had heard earlier when Lori and Amber had been surprised to see their gentlemen callers again so soon. But Dana had not seen James that evening. She’d been in her room when he snuck in the mystery woman. Had she really been with James and the mystery woman the night before?
“What time did the gentlemen arrive, and when did they leave?” I asked.
“James came earlier than usual, shortly after seven. He left around eight fifteen,” said Dana.
I felt my face scrunch. I’d talk to her later, privately, about the mystery woman. There were too many people coming and going between seven and nine on Monday for some of them not to’ve bumped into each other. “How does James come and go from the house? Through which door?”
Dana said, “He drives through the gate—he has an automatic opener—then comes up the steps to the landing over the garage. He almost never goes into the main part of the house.” Where her room was located. And where Thurston had been killed.
“Lori?” I asked.
“Arthur came and went around the same time,” she said. “But he comes in through the street door to the porch, goes down the back porch steps to the pool deck, then comes in through the keeping room doors and up the back staircase from the kitchen.”
“So James and Arthur wouldn’t have crossed paths, and neither of them were ever in the foyer,” I said.
“Right,” said Dana and Lori.
Amber piped up. “William arrived about seven twenty. He was there a little more than an hour. He comes and goes through the front door and the porch entrance to the street.”
So William did go through the foyer. What and who did he see?
“Once they arrived, did any of the three men leave your rooms for any length of time before they left for the evening?”
“No.” All three heads shook.
I gave Dana a stern look.
She glanced away.
“Did any of you come back out of your rooms later in the evening?” I asked.
Heather had a queasy look about her. I let my gaze rest on her and waited. Finally, she said, “I came back down to the kitchen for a glass of milk. I’m on a diet, and I’m supposed to have a protein snack in the evening.”
“What time was that?” I asked.
She shrugged. “Around seven thirty.”
My skin tingled. “Did you come down the front staircase or the back?”
“I came down the front. But I went up the back,” she said.
“Did you see anyone downstairs?” I asked.
She shrunk deeper into the chair and the quilt. “When I was coming down the stairs, I saw someone—a man—in the foyer. I saw him from behind. I didn’t know who it was and I was in my pajamas. I waited on the stairs and he went out the front door.”
“Were any of the lights on?” I asked.
“No.”
“Did you turn on a light?” I asked.
“No,” she said. “I’m always afraid I’ll surprise someone—one of the men. If the lights are off, I just leave them off. I can see with the light in the refrigerator in the kitchen.”
“Did you see anyone else?” I asked.
She said, “I was sitting at the kitchen counter drinking my milk. I heard a noise in the front of the house. I told myself, this house makes all kinds of noises. It was nothing. But it scared me. Then Seth came in. I told him about it. He made a joke about the house being haunted. I didn’t want to be alone with Seth, so I went up the back staircase to the second floor and then up to my room.”
“Where did Seth come in from?” I asked.
“He came through the back door in the keeping room,” she said. “I guess he came from the guesthouse.”
Just then I was thinking how Heather had likely seen Robert go out the front door, heard someone else kill Thurston, and solidified Seth’s alibi.
“That’s about the size of it,” said Colleen.
I jolted. Are any of them holding anything back?
“Yes,” she said. “Dana has a secret. But it’s not relevant. Otherwise, they’re telling you the truth, at least to the best of their knowledge.”
So none of these women killed Thurston.
“No, but they are all in danger.”
From who?
“I don’t know. It’s your job to figure that out.”
Nothing we learned tonight helps Olivia.
“No,” said Colleen. “And things are about to get hairy for Olivia. She’s going to want you to hold her hand. But you can’t. You need to focus. The best way to help Olivia is to figure out who killed Thurston. But even that won’t protect these women.”
Dana said, “I’m so exhausted. Can we talk more tomorrow?”
They all chimed in in agreement.
“Sure,” I said. “Follow me.” We all went upstairs, and Merry helped me get them settled in two of the remaining guest rooms. None of them wanted to sleep alone.
Sixteen
At seven thirty the next morning, I was showered, dressed, and headed downstairs, eager to get back to Nate. The aroma of coffee wafted up to greet me. Who was up? I hustled down the hall to the kitchen. A woman who looked like my sister, Merry, was washing strawberries at my old-fashioned farmhouse sink.
“Who are you and what have you done with my sister?” I asked.
“I figured you’d have to leave,” she said. “Those poor girls are going to be hungry when they wake up.”
I gave her a quick hug. “Thank you.”
Then I headed for the coffee pot. I grabbed a to-go mug. “I’m going to arm the security system when I leave. Rhett can come and go through the doggy doors, but please keep our guests indoors. They may be in danger.”
She gave me an inquiring look. “What exactly happened last night? Why were they in shock? What did they see?”
I knew this was coming. I narrowly escaped he
r questions the night before. “I basically snuck into their rooms and told them they would die if they didn’t leave with me. I’m sure it was unsettling.”
Merry rolled her eyes. “So you’re not going to tell me.”
“Listen,” I said. “The men who employ them will be looking for them. I have their cellphones. If they ask to use a phone, tell them no. Keep your cellphone on you.”
“Okay, but what if someone is worried about them?”
“If anyone wants to let family know they’re okay, call me. I’ll relay a message. I just want to keep them safe for a few days until we’ve neutralized the danger.”
“You’d better tell Nicolette you’re going to have four more guests at the wedding,” Merry said in the tone one reserves for tormenting siblings.
I took a long drink of coffee. “I hope this is resolved before Saturday.”
“I can handle things here,” she said. “Go do what you need to do.”
I opened a drawer near the refrigerator, reached far into the back, and brought out a Sig P290. “Just in case. It’s loaded. Eight rounds. Granddaddy’s shotgun is in the foyer closet if you need it.” I put the handgun back in the drawer and closed it.
Merry’s eyes went large and round, but she nodded. Daddy had made sure we all knew how to handle guns if the need arose.
“I’ll let Blake know what we’ve got going on here. He may stop by—at least have someone drive by occasionally.”
“We’ll be fine,” she said. “There’s no way the men involved could know where you’ve stashed their women, right?”
“One of them could think to look here if they chased it hard enough,” I said. “They know Olivia owns half that house and she lives on Stella Maris. Olivia’s aunt could cave under pressure and tell them I’m involved. It’s best to stay on guard. When does Joe get into town?” Merry’s current boyfriend would be here for the wedding and for Christmas.
“This afternoon,” she said.
“Good. Have him come straight here. There’s strength in numbers.”
“That was my plan.” She went back to arranging fruit on a platter. “But don’t be sending Daddy over here with a shotgun.”
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