Stephanie’s description was spot-on.
In my next life I intend to come back as a wine publicist. A wealthy wine publicist.
Boyd’s expansive one-story house towered over the bluff like a modern fortress. Its winding driveway took full advantage of the waterfall view, complete with boulders and glimmering lights. I was certain Eli and Stuart were in there. Hungry, antsy, and loose-lipped. What I wasn’t sure of was what Boyd planned to do or, worse yet, what he had done upon discovering two uninvited guests.
If I was right about Barbara’s end of the phone conversation, then Kelsey Arnet was on his way to Boyd’s “fortress of solitude.” Who else would be “on her payroll”?
And if Boyd was indirectly involved in Brewer’s murder, I was pretty certain he was directly involved in Frank’s. It was too coincidental to have both bodies turn up with puncture wounds to the neck. I surmised Boyd saw what Kelsey Arnet had done to Brewer and replicated it with Frank so as to cast suspicion on Kelsey if the need arose.
“We’d better park down below on the lake road,” Theo said. His voice interrupted my reverie and I had to ask him to repeat what he said. “Are you all right, Norrie? Because we can call the sheriff’s office.”
“I’m fine. Park the car at the closest pull-off and we’ll walk up there. Right now I think Boyd’s in the house with the boys but we’re soon going to get company when Kelsey arrives.”
“Or we can call the—”
“It’ll be too late. Come on.”
“I’m telling you right now I’m really getting tired of crawling through windows, picking locks, and tiptoeing down wobbly basement stairs.”
“Oh, drat. My phone just buzzed. It’s a text. Hold on.”
I read the message and nearly kneeled over. “It’s from Zenora. Can you believe it? It says, I can sense that you’re near water. Of course I’m near water. I live in the Finger Lakes. Yeesh. She also wrote, You’re in danger. Turn back. Boy, if that doesn’t read like a line from an old forties movie, I don’t know what does.”
I tucked the phone in my pocket as Theo pulled to the side of the road and turned off the engine. “Must be our lucky night. It’s my phone this time. Give me a sec.” He tapped the screen and sighed. “Don sent a text. Probably insisting we go home. Let’s see, he wrote, whoa! Not what I expected.”
“What? What did he write? What didn’t you expect?”
“He wrote a long message because Don really doesn’t know how to text. It says, Finished C. J. Box. Went back to the freezer files and read everything. Barbara Stanowicz was Frank Liguori’s silent partner in more than one business dealing. Maybe Brewer wasn’t the only one who gave her the shaft. Text or call me. This is looking ugly.”
“I think your partner just found the smoking gun.”
We got out of the car and eyeballed the steep driveway. “My guess is motion sensor lights,” Theo said. “Stay behind the bushes to your right and we should be okay. Worst-case scenario is that we’ll get scratched up a bit.”
Getting scratched up a bit was an understatement. The bushes on the side of the driveway were rosebushes. Thorny miserable rosebushes. We narrowed our plan of action to two options—bang on the door and demand Boyd release Eli and Stuart or use the tried-and-true method of seeing if we could get in through an open window or pick a lock.
What we didn’t count on was the third option—someone else banged on the front door while something hit one of the windows on the side of the house, causing shards of glass to rain down on us like sharp pieces of hail.
“And you complained about the rosebushes,” Theo announced. “Look up! I think that’s your boy by what I’m guessing is a bathroom window.”
Sure enough, I heard Eli’s voice loud and clear. “I swear I’ll jump, and when I’m dead I’ll come back to haunt you!”
Is the whole world into this paranormal thing? First Zenora, now this . . .
“It’s only four or five feet,” I yelled back, thankful the interior lighting in the room gave off a wide glow. “You won’t be in the next world, but you will get cut up. It’s Norrie. Who are you talking to?”
“The nutcase guy on the other side of the door who yelled at my father before we found the dead bodies. You know who I’m talking about. He’s the man Stuart said could’ve been my principal.”
“You broke into his house,” Theo shouted. “What did you expect?”
Eli yelled back. “We didn’t break in. He drove us here when we snuck in the back of his car. Stuart and I were trying to save the civilization of Tantos by fighting off the Umbreon. Really evil dudes. Stuart got a new Lightseekers molten blade weapon and we wanted to try it out.”
“Is that why your bikes were stashed behind the garage of that old house in Dresden?” I asked.
“Yeah. We couldn’t take them with us. We were playing in the yard between the house and the garage when he and the stinky perfume woman showed up. We hid behind the garage and listened to them. The woman told the guy he shouldn’t’ve done what he did because one dead body was enough. That’s when Stuart and I knew they were the killers. But they were about to leave so we covered our bikes and got in his car. We ducked down behind the front seats. The woman must’ve had her own car because she didn’t get in.”
Theo sounded exasperated. “Why didn’t you use your phones and call the sheriff’s office?”
“We were going to do that from the car only we forgot our phones. Once we got here, the guy went in the house and we hid in one of his garage closets. Then he left. He didn’t know we were here. Good thing his kitchen had lots of cookies and chips. We figured he’d come right back but he didn’t. Not until now.”
I tried not to groan. “Is Stuart okay?”
“Yeah, he’s locked in the bedroom but I had to use the bathroom so the guy let me in here. That’s when I locked myself in.”
“Is the man outside your door?”
“Not anymore. I heard him go down the hall. Someone’s knocking on the front door.”
“Stay where you are,” I said. “Theo and I are going to come in through the broken window, but first, grab a towel so you don’t get cut and push the rest of the glass out of the frame. Got it?”
“Duh.”
I turned to Theo and kept my voice low. “This isn’t good. That’s probably Kelsey at the front door and I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re both armed.”
“Now’s a good time to call the sheriff’s office,” he said. “You start climbing and I’ll dial. It’ll take them at least a half hour to maneuver the bluff road and find us.”
“Maybe I’ll get lucky and it will be Grizzly Gary’s night off.”
It wasn’t.
Eli did what I asked and cleared the glass from the window. If it wasn’t for some large decorative stones that hugged the side wall of the house, Theo and I would never have been able to reach the window ledge and hoist ourselves into the bathroom.
No sooner did our feet hit the floor then we heard Boyd on the other side of the door. “Open this up, kid, we’re going for a ride.”
The pounding on the front door got even more intense. “I’m coming back, you little reprobate, and you’d better open the damn door.”
“Shh!” I whispered. “He doesn’t know Theo and I are in here. We’ve got to get Stuart and get the heck out of here.”
“Who puts a lock on the outside of a bedroom door?” Theo asked. “It better not be keyed.”
“Only one way to tell. Come on.” Then I turned to Eli. “You stay here and keep quiet. We’re going to climb out through this window once we get Stuart. Better yet, stand in the shower stall.”
The bedroom was secured, all right. But not high-tech. Boyd had wedged a chair under the doorknob. I waited until the sound of his footsteps waned as he approached the front door. Then Theo and I tiptoed to the bedroom adjacent to the bathroom, rattled the door enough to dislodge the chair, and motioned for Stuart to follow us.
I put my finger over my lips and gave Stuart the eye. He got the message and didn’t say a word. A few seconds later, I pushed the bathroom door open just as Kelsey’s voice exploded a few yards away.
“Talk about ruining a perfectly good night. Your mother said you needed some help disposing of something.”
“Looks like the shoe’s on the other foot this time.”
“Let’s get it over with. I haven’t got all night.”
With a quick thud, I shoved Stuart into the bathroom and turned to Theo. “I think they mean to do to Eli and Stuart what was done to Brewer and Frank,” but no sooner did those words come out of my mouth than I felt a hand pressing into my shoulder, and it wasn’t Theo’s.