The covered globe in the center of the conservatory looked simultaneously disturbing and unintentionally hilarious. Plum was fighting giggles. She snapped her mouth shut.
Best not to look at it.
“I get that it was supposed to be for him,” Jude continued, that frown still on his face. “I’m just trying to figure out how in the world the killer could be certain that trap would get Sean?”
“Beats me.” Shelley sat down heavily on the fainting couch. She kicked at a small chunk of marble by her foot. “I’m still trying to figure out how you guys think my poetry is bad.”
“Why does it matter?” Dude asked. He held up a placating hand to Shelley. “I mean Jude’s question.”
“Because.” Jude’s forehead stitched tighter, a network of lines appearing like thought-generated venetian blinds. “If we can figure that out, then maybe we can avoid the next one.”
A shiver marched over Plum’s skin. What would the next death trap be?
“Next one!” Shelley stood up. “Why does there have to be a next one?”
“Just seems like the way this is all shaping up,” Plum muttered. Although she didn’t understand it, either, there was no doubt they were trapped on an island with a killer. One who wanted to keep killing.
Plum looked at the shrouded globe. She glanced at the semi-toppled plinth in the middle of the room, the marks where the explosions had loosened the globe and set it rolling. She moved down the three steps into the sunken center of the conservatory.
“To make that globe kill Sean, the killer had to be certain Sean would place his bed right there,” Marlowe said.
Plum edged closer to the globe and the liquor cart next to it. She reached out and lifted the crystal decanter filled with amber liquid. “Scotch,” she said. “The cart.”
Behind her, Warix made a snorting noise that sounded both surprised and amused.
“That would do it,” Dude agreed. “He was the only one drinking. I mean, after Brittlyn.”
Plum placed the decanter back on the full liquor cart and dropped both hands onto the handlebar. She tugged. The cart didn’t move an inch. “It’s stuck,” Plum reported. She planted her feet and gave an almighty yank. The cart didn’t move even a centimeter.
“It’s bolted to the floor,” Jalen suggested. He joined Plum next to the cart and bent to examine the solid metal wheels. “Yep.”
“So, the killer knew that Sean would drink the scotch, so much that he would bed down there,” Plum said.
“Might as well have painted a bull’s-eye on the floor,” Warix said, his voice grudgingly filled with something that sounded like admiration.
“What does that mean for us?” Cici asked. She drummed her baby-doll-pink nails nervously on her arms. “How do we avoid a trap set for us, with that knowledge?”
“It means,” Plum stated slowly, “that the killer knows how to lure us. Knows our personalities enough that if there are more traps, each one will be set with just the right bait.”
“I’m going to get Henrietta out of that cage now,” Sofia said.
“Good idea,” Plum agreed.