Текст книги "Maximum Security"

Автор книги: Rose Connors

Соавторы: Rose Connors
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CHAPTER 29

Steven Collier actually asked if there was a doctor in the house. There were three. It took less than a minute for the white-haired cardiologist to revive Anastasia Rawlings. And then it took more than twenty for the plastic surgeon and the gastroenterologist to talk her up from the floor.

The Kydd and I worked on Louisa’s file while we waited. He began drafting our first round of discovery requests; we should serve them before the week is out. I made a couple of lists: one of the pretrial motions we’re likely to file and another of those we can expect from Geraldine. Harry folded his arms and promptly fell asleep, tilting toward Glen Powers every few minutes until Glen pushed him upright again.

When at last Anastasia was vertical, she keened intermittently as Steven Collier delivered a long-winded account of her father’s magnanimous life, stopping just short of nominating him for canonization. Paul Bagley’s tribute to Herb’s seemingly stellar career was shorter, but it was still too long. In contrast, the Reverend Burrows’s Scripture reading and prayer session were both mercifully brief. The crowd heaved a collective sigh of relief when the whole ordeal was over and then an audible groan when Collier approached the microphone yet again. Our fears were unfounded, though. He didn’t foist a second sermon on us. He just invited us all back to the house for lunch.

It’s almost one o’clock. We’re outside again, by the circular driveway, waiting for the less-than-happy valet to retrieve Harry’s Jeep. Louisa and her uniformed companions are waiting here too. Their driver must have taken a coffee break; the county van is nowhere in sight. The six of us seem to be the last of the stragglers.

Louisa watched in silence as the luxury cars departed, most of them probably destined for the mercy meal at her Easy Street antique. Glen Powers promised her he’d visit before he leaves the Cape and an elderly gentleman waved to her before climbing into a vintage gold Cadillac with a flying silver lady on its hood. A ’38, the Kydd informed us. Those two were the exceptions. The other guests said nothing at all to her; walked past as if she were invisible. More than once I saw Louisa’s eyes light up at the sight of a familiar face, only to dim again when the familiar face turned the other way.

Steven Collier, Anastasia, and Lance emerge from the club as a stretch limousine pulls up. I’m surprised; I had assumed they’d left ahead of the others. The driver opens the back door and stands at attention as Steven and Anastasia descend the steps and breeze past us without so much as a backward glance. Lance looks over his shoulder at us as he climbs in, though, his nonchalant expression suggesting he travels by limo all the time. He has a sizable lump on one side of his forehead, undoubtedly the result of his front-row fall. It’s the same color as his girlfriend’s fingernails.

Anastasia starts to follow him, but then hesitates. She turns, fixes her still-veiled gaze on Louisa, and marches back toward all of us. “Anastasia,” Collier says, reaching for her arm, “don’t.”

She pays him no mind, steamrolls in our direction, her veil fluttering in the breeze and her fists clenched. One of the matrons takes Louisa by the elbow and pulls her back a step. The other one moves forward, to the edge of the curb. “Hold it right there,” she says.

Anastasia stops and glares through her sheer black mantle, her nostrils flaring. “You people,” she says, “are not invited to the luncheon.”

“Damn,” Harry mutters, clutching the lapels of his suit coat. “Story of my life. All dressed up and no place to go.”

Louisa smiles at him and then turns to me. “I’m going,” she says matter-of-factly. “Aren’t you?”

She’s not, of course. Even Judge Long wouldn’t authorize a luncheon. His order allowed her to attend the service only.

“Wouldn’t miss it,” I tell her.

“Me neither,” the Kydd adds, rubbing his hands together. “I’m starving.”

The matron at the curb turns, almost smiles at the Kydd, and then faces Anastasia again. “Sure we’re invited,” she says. “That’s why I signed up for this duty. Warden promised there’d be a good hot meal.”

“You’re not welcome in my father’s house,” Anastasia says. “None of you. If you show up, I swear I’ll call the po-lice.” She pronounces the word as if she’s a brother from the ’hood.

The matron folds her arms and laughs. “In certain circles, missy, we are the po-lice.”

“Never deal dialect with a prison guard,” Harry says.

“It’s time to go now.” Collier cups Anastasia’s elbow, the way he cupped mine in Louisa’s kitchen, but it doesn’t have the same impact. She doesn’t budge. “You have guests waiting,” he tries.

Guests or no guests, Anastasia stays put. It seems she plans to spend the rest of the week glaring at us.

Louisa stares back, unblinking. Her face is drawn and her dark eyes reveal the enormous toll the last four days have taken on her. The set of her jaw, though, tells me she doesn’t intend to fall apart now. She won’t give Anastasia that satisfaction.

The county van pulls up behind the limo, Harry’s Jeep following. “Oh, look,” Louisa says, sounding genuinely pleased. “It’s my ride.”

Harry, the Kydd, and I head for the Jeep. The matrons start for the van’s side door, Louisa between them. She turns and waves to all of us—even Anastasia—before she gets in. “I’m afraid I have to go now,” she says. “But I’ll see y’all at lunch.”

CHAPTER 30

It’s seven o’clock when I pull up to the cottage and discover I’ve got good news and bad news. The good news is Luke’s truck is parked in the driveway. It’s not in the shop. The bad news is Luke’s truck is parked in the driveway. He’s not at school.

The two-day job at the garage turned out to take more than three. Luke has been having a great time all week. Turns out he really is a grease monkey. He thought they’d finish today, though, in time for him to make his afternoon classes. Looks like he thought wrong.

Harry’s Jeep is here too. He and Luke are back on either side of the coffee table when I reach the living room. They’re at it again. And again, Luke is exasperated. Harry sits frozen on the living room floor, no more animated than Rodin’s Thinker.

“Would you look at this guy?” Luke says when I join them. “He’s been sitting there like that for an hour.”

Harry tears his eyes from the chessboard and blinks at both of us, looking like he’s surprised to find us here in his chess studio. “I have? Well, then, I should take a bathroom break.”

“Good,” Luke answers. “I’ll rearrange the board a little while you’re gone.”

“No, you won’t,” Harry says as he gets to his feet. “I’d never expect it from a person of your caliber, Luke. So that would be cheating.”

“Oh, great.” Luke grabs the hair on top of his head with both hands as if he’s going to yank out clumps of it. “Just what we need. Another Harry-ism.”

Harry heads down the hallway, whistling, and Luke flops sideways onto the couch. I squeeze in to sit on the end, near his size-thirteen sneakers. Danny Boy joins us, always on the lookout for a group hug. His wet nose nudges my cheek and he paws my lap, as if he might have buried something there, while his tail thumps against Luke’s legs. I thump Luke’s legs too—hard. “Are you ever going back to school, my son?”

He laughs. “Tomorrow,” he says, “I swear. We didn’t finish with the truck until late today and I don’t have class tomorrow until ten. I’ll go up in the morning.”

“And back in the afternoon,” I tell him.

He props himself up a little and looks at me, baffled. He’s his mother’s son. “Tomorrow is Friday,” I remind him.

He sits up straighter and counts—days, I presume—on his fingertips. “Cool,” he says when he finishes, a surprised look on his face. “It’s the weekend.”

Maybe his father is right after all.

Harry returns and settles on the floor again. Without hesitating, he moves a rook and then smiles at Luke.

Luke jumps up from the couch and gapes at the board. “I don’t believe it,” he says.

Harry’s smile widens. “Inspiration. You just never know when it’s going to hit.”

Luke sinks to the floor to plot his next move.

“Speaking of inspiration,” Harry says, looking up at me, “that was quite a performance we saw today, huh?” His upper body stiffens and he falls over sideways, a half-baked imitation of Anastasia’s collapse.

“That part wasn’t a performance,” I tell him, “but the keening sure was.”

“The fainting was too,” he says, falling over again. “Trust me. She’s up for an Oscar.”

“How could anyone fake a faint? She’d have instinctively reached out to break her fall.”

“The skinny guy with the ponytail broke her fall,” Harry says. “He’s the only one who got hurt. Well, besides me.”

“You?”

“Well, yeah,” he says, looking forlorn. “That mean lady with the eyes said I couldn’t come to her party. She hurt my feelings.”

“I wonder how the mean lady’s luncheon went. I’m guessing Anastasia doesn’t shine in the hostess department.”

“I wondered too,” he says, “so I drove by there about an hour and a half after we got back to the office.”

“You drove by there?” No one drives by Easy Street. It’s not on the way to anywhere.

He shrugs. “I was curious. Anyhow, all the guests had already left by the time I got there. Just one car in the driveway, a jalopy. Aside from that heap, the place looks like a magazine cover. No more cops. No more yellow tape. It looks like the goddamned Cleavers live there.”

“Right now Anastasia Rawlings and Lance Phillips live there,” I tell him. “A far cry from the Cleavers.”

“The Addams Family?” he tries.

“Now you’re talking. And now that Morticia and company have set up camp in there, I’m wondering if Louisa will ever be able to get them out.”

Harry looks up at me and shrugs. “It might not matter in the long run.”

“What does that mean?”

“Your move,” Luke announces.

“If Louisa goes to prison,” Harry says, focusing on the chess-board again, “the house will pass to Morticia anyhow. Along with everything else her father owned.”

He looks up at me again and I shake my head. “Why do you say that? Anastasia is specifically excluded from Herb Rawlings’s will.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Harry leans back against the overstuffed chair behind him and Luke groans.

“If Louisa is the sole beneficiary of Herb’s will,” Harry continues, “and she’s convicted of his murder, the will is automatically null and void. It’s as if he died without one, intestate. And if he had died intestate, Anastasia would have inherited the whole kit and caboodle—aside from the government’s take, anyhow—because she’s his only child.”

I knew that, of course. But I hadn’t given it a thought until now. And I’m astounded that Harry knows it. It’s not the kind of information that normally interests him. “Now who’s the nerd?” I ask. “Don’t tell me you actually attended your trusts and estates classes?”

“Hell, no.” The look on Harry’s face suggests I accused him of showing up for ballet lessons—in a pink tutu. “That’s one of the many legal principles I learned when I got out of law school,” he says, “about ten years out, as a matter of fact. I was assigned to a guy who couldn’t wait to get his mitts on his wife’s family money. She’d left him everything in her will, but dammit, she just wouldn’t die fast enough. So he fed her a lethal overdose of barbiturates with her nightly highballs. Then he realized he couldn’t move the body.”

“Speaking of moving,” Luke interjects, “why don’t you?”

“I don’t remember anymore,” Harry continues, “but I guess she must’ve been a full-figured gal.”

Luke groans again.

“’Course, my guy wasn’t exactly Atlas,” Harry adds.

“Bet he could’ve lifted one of those pawns,” Luke mumbles.

Their banter continues, but I’m not listening anymore. I’m registering that feeling again: my stomach running laps around my brain. I force myself to ask the question a second time. I have to be certain about this. “So because the guy was convicted of his wife’s murder, her will leaving everything to him was automatically null and void. It was as if she’d died intestate.”

I had been talking to myself, really, but Harry nods anyway. “That’s why her schmo of a husband ended up in the Public Defender’s Office.” He looks over at Luke and arches his eyebrows. “The guy wasn’t playing with a full deck.”

“At least he was playing,” Luke answers.

I move Danny Boy’s head from my lap and leave the couch. I hurry into my bedroom, change into jeans and a turtleneck, leather jacket, and hat—all black—then check to make sure the Lady Smith is fully loaded. It is. I tuck it into my inside jacket pocket and head for the kitchen door. “I forgot something,” I tell Harry and Luke. “I’ll be back in a little while.”

“Don’t worry,” Luke says, “take your time. We’ll be here. Right here. Right in this very spot.”

Harry looks like he’s full of questions, but I’m not hanging around to answer them.

The Herb Rawlings jigsaw puzzle isn’t finished yet, but the border pieces are starting to connect. Whoever used a TFR to secure Herb to his watery grave knew exactly what he was doing. He knew the pop-up would let go. He knew Herb Rawlings’s body—whatever was left of it, anyhow—would float away from the weight that held it on the ocean floor.

Taylor Peterson’s words come back to me as I start the Thunderbird and back out in the moonlight. He was wrong about Herb Rawlings being at the helm when the Carolina Girl left the dock. But he was right about a few other things. Whoever dumped Herb’s body in the Great South Channel knew how to negotiate the cut. He also knew a pop-up when he saw one. And, as Taylor put it, the dead guy surfaced on schedule.

CHAPTER 31

The full moon bathes Easy Street in a pale yellow glow and scores of stars light the sky. I don’t give a damn about the scenery at the moment, but I am glad to be able to leave my flashlight behind in the glove compartment. Free hands seem like a good idea—I might need them to strangle Lucifer. I pat the small weight of the Lady Smith in my inside jacket pocket, cut the engine, and get out of the car.

I’m parked at number two, the saltbox, behind a row of hydrangeas on the side. My tires aren’t doing anything good for the manicured grass, but I can’t worry about landscaping right now. It occurs to me as I hurry down the hill toward number one that Louisa might have to foot the bill for her part-time neighbor’s lawn repair. And if my hunch is even close to accurate, she’ll have plenty of cash to cover it.

The forecast Judge Long mentioned was on target. It’s cold. For the first time this fall, I can see my breath. And as I get closer to the water, the wind picks up, making it feel even colder. I zip my jacket to the top and pull my hat down over my ears.

The jalopy Harry talked about isn’t in Louisa’s driveway. I’m hoping Lance took the little lady—and her mini-poodle—out to dinner after their difficult day. But it’s possible only one of the humans is out, the other inside, so I take a quick spin around the perimeter of the house, slipping behind bushes to look in the windows. A lamp is on in the living room—as is the light over the kitchen sink—but no one is here, at least not on the first floor.

I head for the front door out of habit—Louisa’s got me trained—and, as usual, it’s unlocked. I let myself in and walk quickly through the foyer to the living room, then check the kitchen and sunroom. Everything’s in order; the place is tidy. And the rooms are unoccupied, the house still. No one’s home, not even the beast.

With the exception of the unmade bed, the master bedroom is tidy too. It’s lit only by moonlight streaming through the veranda’s double doors. They’re closed and locked, but I check out there anyway. Empty.

The Queen’s Spa is dimmer than the bedroom, the moonbeams muted by the block glass behind the hot tub. I don’t turn a light on, though. I don’t need one.

The crunch of oyster shells in the driveway paralyzes me. But it isn’t a car pulling in. It’s not loud enough, and it’s not the crushing sound made by tires.

Footsteps. They move from the shell driveway to the wooden deck. And it isn’t one of the neighborhood foxes passing through, either. I have company. Human company. And whoever it is didn’t drive here.

I force myself to leave the Queen’s Spa and move to a window in the bedroom, where I’ll be able to see anyone who approaches the front door. The footsteps don’t travel in that direction, though. They head toward the side of the house. And they stop. There’s no sound at all. Anywhere.

Now there is. There’s a new noise—a rustling—and it’s in the kitchen. Someone is opening the kitchen door. Whoever is here lives on Cape Cod, enters houses the way the locals do. And now the Cape Codder is inside. Walking in this direction.

The only real exit from this room is the veranda. Its double doors have two locks, though. The Kydd opened them easily when we were here with Louisa on Sunday, but I didn’t pay attention to the mechanics. I won’t be able to do it that fast. I could climb out a window, but I wouldn’t make it in time. The footsteps are too close.

I move back into the Queen’s Spa. Maybe my visitor will stop in the foyer, or the bedroom. But maybe not. The steam room would buy me thirty seconds or so. The glass is frosted, but it is glass. I’d be spotted pretty quickly. And I’d be cornered. Now I’m battling panic. Deep breaths, I remind myself. Silent ones.

The Kydd’s words come back to me as my eyes find the other door. A completely separate room for the throne. That’s my only option—the throne room. If the caller decides to use the facilities, I’m trapped, of course. But at this point, that’s a risk I have to take.

I move inside and pull the door almost closed, but not completely. I can see only the far wall from in here—the tub and the block glass behind it—and I realize that means I probably won’t see much of anything. It’s unlikely the visitor came here to take a hot bath. But still, I leave the door open a crack, just in case I can steal a peek at the intruder.

I can. I breathe a silent sigh of relief when the gentleman caller comes into view. He doesn’t turn a light on either. He’s facing the hot tub, his back toward me, but I know who he is; I’d recognize that lanky silhouette anywhere. He’s staring down into the tub and for a second I wonder if he did come here to take a bath.

I’m about to push the throne-room door open, to chastise the Kydd for shaving a solid year off my life, but something makes me pause. The Kydd is dressed exactly as I am—completely in black, head to toe. And he parked somewhere else too, just as I did. He didn’t want to drive his pickup into the Rawlings’s oyster-shell driveway. He stands perfectly still, staring downward.

I can’t see his face but I’m nonetheless certain he’s not looking into the hot tub. He doesn’t give a damn about the tub right now; he’s interested in the mother swan. He has the same question I have. And he came here—just as I did—to get the answer. My gut tells me to stay put while he does.

He reaches down toward one of the brass handles and hesitates. Then he takes a deep breath and turns it hard, as far as it will go. Water rockets from the swan’s beak and pelts the marble tub below, filling the entire room with gushing noise. The Kydd stares for a few seconds, standing perfectly still again.

He leans down after a moment, the water still pounding, and clutches the rim of the tub with both hands as if he needs more than just his legs to support himself. As he moves, I get a glimpse of what he’s already seen. It explains his weak knees. A leak.

A small stream trickles from the base of Mother Swan’s neck and meanders down the outer casing of the hot tub to the pale oak below. It pools first in the ten-by-ten cutout, where portions of the planks were excised by the guys from the state crime lab, and then it spills over to the rest of the floor. The Kydd has his answer now. And so do I.

But that’s not all we have. We also have a problem. Gushing water isn’t the only sound I hear anymore. There’s a new one—a higher-pitched noise—and I’m pretty sure I know what it is. The Kydd shuts off the water and erases all doubt.

Yip-yip-wail.

“Mr. Kydd.” I can’t see her—she’s on the other side of my door—but there’s no mistaking Anastasia’s baritone. “You shouldn’t have come here,” she says. “I told you earlier. You’re not welcome.”

“Why don’t you call the po-lice?” he answers, turning to face her.

Bad brother-from-the-’hood talk sounds even worse in Southern-speak. It’s a fine idea the Kydd has, though; Tommy Fitzpatrick and a few of his officers would be a welcome sight right about now. But Anastasia won’t call the po-lice, of course. Not now and not later. Cops are the last people on the planet she wants to see.

“No time for that,” she tells him. “After all, a woman who arrives home to find an intruder in the house needs to defend herself. I’ll have to get rid of you right away. For my own protection.”

The Kydd actually laughs out loud. I wish he wouldn’t. Geraldine was right about one thing. If Louisa had attacked her husband here in the Queen’s Spa, she wouldn’t have been able to dump his body by herself. Anastasia couldn’t have either. She had help. And the most likely helper—Lance Phillips—is undoubtedly around here somewhere.

My certainty about this has nothing to do with Anastasia’s physical strength. For all I know, she’s entirely capable of lifting her father’s weight. Even if she is, though, she couldn’t have dumped him in the Great South Channel alone. No one person could have. Because, somehow, that person had to get back to shore. The Carolina Girl never made it. Another vessel did.

The Kydd has stopped laughing, but he still looks a little more amused than he should. “What are you going to do,” he asks, “sic Lucifer on me?”

Upon hearing its name, the beast emits another yip-yip-wail.

Anastasia doesn’t utter a word, but the Kydd’s demeanor does a one-eighty. It’s in his eyes. Suddenly I’m panicked. His hands fly up in a “don’t do it” gesture and then he dives to the floor. A gunshot blast shatters the silence along with a single block of glass behind the tub.

I release the safety on the Lady Smith. God only knows how it got from my pocket to my hand.

When I can hear again, I realize Anastasia is laughing. “Very impressive,” she says. “Encore.”

At first I think she’s speaking to the Kydd. But now I hear another laugh—one that’s not Anastasia’s—and I realize she’s not the shooter. She’s talking to the person who is.

“Okay,” he says, and he repeats his performance. The Kydd lunges toward the side wall and takes cover beside the marble vanity of the sink in front of my door. A second glass block takes a bullet.

Again, momentary deafness. When it lifts I hear clapping, applause. “And I thought we were just going to watch TV tonight,” Anastasia gushes. “This is way better.”

It’s not Anastasia’s voice that interests me at the moment, though. It’s the other one—the man’s. I heard only a short laugh and a single okay, but I know who’s shooting. And it’s not Lance Phillips.

The Kydd lifts his head above the vanity, high enough so he can see, and it’s all I can do not to scream at him to get the hell back down. The shooter fires again but this time it’s just for effect. The moon-snail tile takes a hit; it’s nowhere near the Kydd’s vanity fort. His eyes clear it once more.

And then I get it. He knows I’m here. The tilt of his head in my direction is barely perceptible, but it’s there. Somehow, through the minute crack in the door, he caught a glimpse of me. He has a plan; it’s plain on his face. And my gut says he aims to elicit a confession.

“All right,” he says to the duo on the other side of the door. “My number’s up. So get it over with already.” He stays crouched behind the vanity but points toward the Mother Swan. “I guess you’ll want that,” he says. “It worked well for you the last time—or its twin did, anyhow.”

They both laugh now—hers low-pitched and menacing, his too loud and forced. Anastasia Rawlings and Steven Collier. Strange bedfellows indeed.

Louisa’s words during our Monday-afternoon meeting in the jury room come back to me and one more piece of the puzzle locks into place. Anastasia Rawlings spent her entire childhood around boats, thanks to her father. And Steven Collier owns a vessel of his own.

“That won’t be necessary,” Collier replies now. “You’re breaking and entering in the nighttime, after all, Mr. Kydd. I’m entitled to use reasonable force to protect the home’s occupants. Every court in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts would agree.”

This man is hell-bent on practicing law.

“And just look around the room,” Collier continues. “We’ve had quite a struggle in here.”

“Why not get rid of Herb that way?” the Kydd asks. “Why use a goddamned plumbing fixture if you’re packing a piece?”

The Kydd’s plan has one thing going for it: Collier loves to hear himself talk. It’s not Collier who answers this time, though. “You fool,” Anastasia spits. “My father wasn’t supposed to die.”

“He was only supposed to sign a couple of documents,” Collier adds. “It could have been so simple.” He sounds almost wistful.

“What documents?” the Kydd asks.

This dialogue can’t go on much longer. Collier has a loaded revolver trained on the Kydd, after all.

“A new will,” Anastasia says calmly.

I wonder if Attorney Collier drafted it.

“And a new beneficiary designation form,” he adds, “from New England Patriot.”

The life insurance. Collier would have known all about the double-indemnity clause. He’d have known about the three-year proviso for suicide, too. He’s a money guy.

“My father agreed,” Anastasia volunteers. “He said he would sign them. He promised.” I can picture her stomping a clodhopper.

“But then he reneged,” Collier complains. “Changed his mind for some reason.”

“Some reason?” Anastasia snaps. “Please. We all know the reason.”

Something tells me the reason has auburn hair and a French manicure.

“Did you confront him together?” the Kydd asks.

I’m sweltering in here. Zipping up my jacket was a mistake. I don’t dare touch the zipper now, though.

“We didn’t confront him,” Anastasia says. “We tried to talk sense into him. It wasn’t right, what he was doing. I’m his flesh and blood.”

Collier takes a couple of steps toward the Kydd. I can see him now. “We came on Sunday morning,” he says, “knowing Louisa would be at the club. We thought he’d be more reasonable without her influence. He was in the steam room when we arrived.” Collier takes another step and leans on the vanity, obstructing my view of the Kydd. “So we waited right here.”

“But he wouldn’t sign?” The Kydd’s calm is extraordinary. It’s also insane.

“He refused.” Collier actually laughs. “But that’s not all. He became combative. Took a swing at me. So I pushed him away.”

“You shouldn’t have done that,” Anastasia says. She sounds close to tears all of a sudden. “That was the mistake. That’s why all of this happened.”

“Dear girl,” Collier answers, “we’ve been through this a hundred times. The man left me no choice.”

“He slipped,” Anastasia says. “My father slipped and fell backward. No one hit him.”

And there it is. Mother Swan didn’t attack Herb Rawlings. Herb Rawlings walloped her.

Collier stands up straight, away from the sink, and I can see the top of the Kydd’s head above the vanity.

“What’s in it for you?” the Kydd asks. He points toward Anastasia. “She gets the money. But what do you get?”

I can see Collier in full profile, revolver still in hand. He has the Kydd in point-blank range now. “Twenty Questions is over,” he says.

And he’s right. It is.

The blast knocks me backward for a second and then I’m through the throne-room door. Collier writhes on the floor, clutching his shoulder, a pool of blood collecting on the floorboards beneath him. His weapon is nowhere to be seen. Anastasia backs up against the steam-room door and wails. It’s even worse than the funeral keening—she’s scared now. The beast scampers around the room in circles. Yip-yip-wail. Yip-yip-wail.

No Kydd.

My Lady Smith zeros in on Anastasia—Collier’s not going anywhere at the moment—and I flip on the tulip-shaped lights above the sink. And then the Kydd’s head pops up, as if he’d been attached to a TFR. He’s in the hot tub. “Look what I found,” he says, showing me Collier’s revolver. His tone suggests he found a shiny new penny, head’s up.

“Get out of the damned tub,” I tell him.

I’m going to strangle him yet.