Last to Know: A Novel(32)

They were tall girls and slender, but Bea was taller and skinnier, and looked as though someone had thrown her outfit together, the washed-out denims and the T-shirt.

“Hey,” Madison said, giving her a smile. “Have you seen your room yet?”

Bea gave her shy upward glance from under her long lashes. “Well, no, I sort of only just got here…”

“And Mom’s already stuffing you with my banana muffins.” Madison laughed. “Come on, then, we’ll show you to your room, we’ll help you settle in.”

“It’s the haunted room,” Diz called as the girls each took one of Bea’s arms and bustled her upstairs, flip-flops banging on the wooden steps.

Bea stopped. She turned and looked at him, bug-eyed. “What do you mean—haunted?”

She looked so scared Diz was sorry he’d said that. “Just teasing,” he shrugged it off. “Anyhow it’s not serious haunting, just stuff that goes bump in the night. Some guests have said that anyway.”

The twins groaned, while Rose laughed.

“He’s a terrible tease,” Madison told Bea. “Trust me, you’ll be okay. It’s just my cat, Baby Noir, you have to look out for.” But still Bea flung a nervous look over her shoulder at Diz as they ran up the last of the stairs.

The phone was ringing and Rose hurried to answer. It was Harry Jordan.

“I thought you’d be coming with her,” she said, without any preliminary “hello, how are you.” “She arrived all by herself.”

“That’s the way she wanted it,” Harry explained. “She’s an independent young woman.”

“Well, my girls are taking care of her, so she’ll be fine.”

“What about your husband?”

“Wally? Well, of course he’s not thrilled but he’s willing to allow it, for a week anyway. That is all I agreed to, remember?”

Harry said he remembered. Then, remembering Divon, he said, “Does Roman know Bea from somewhere? I mean, they could have possibly met, walking round the lake…”

“Roman? Why, I don’t think so, he’s never mentioned her, but surely he would have said something now, after all that’s happened.”

“I guess you’re right.” Harry wondered again about Divon. Then he said, “I have something to tell you but I don’t want to say it on the phone. I should come out there and tell you in person.”

“Oh my God, now what?” Rose held the phone closer so Diz would not listen in. That kid was so snoopy he overheard everything and she didn’t want her talk monitored, and perhaps repeated to her husband. She didn’t know why she was behaving like this about the detective, but her heart beat faster when she heard his voice. And that was that. He had never flirted with her, never indicated any interest. She was behaving the way those blond vacationers behaved with her husband. She was as bad as they were.

“It’s better if you don’t come right now,” she told Harry, “until Bea’s settled in a bit. Besides, I almost forgot, we’re supposed to be having a dinner party tonight, some of the locals. Really, I don’t have time for any more drama today, Detective Jordan.”

There was a long silence on the other end of the phone. Then Harry said, “I have no choice then but to tell you now that Lacey Havnel was murdered. I can’t say why or how, yet, but we have an investigation going on. Later today my colleague Detective Rossetti and I will be at the lake with a second forensics team, searching for evidence. I would like Bea to know that we’ll be there, but please do not yet tell her that it is murder.”

“Murder!” Rose said, holding the phone away from her, looking at it as though wondering if what she’d heard could be true. Then, “Hasn’t that poor girl gone through enough?” she asked, anguished.

“She has.” Harry’s tone was gentle. “And I promise we’ll do all we can to protect her. But her mother’s killer has to be found. We’ve arrested one person of interest but that’s all I can tell you right now.”

“I see.” Rose really didn’t see. She didn’t know what was happening suddenly to her quiet household where this evening she was giving her annual dinner party on the terrace for friends of long-standing. Just like normal.

“Please, I’m asking you not to confide in anyone,” Harry was saying. “Even your husband.”

“Wally?”

“No one, Rose. Please. Can I trust you on that?”

Rose said she supposed he could and Harry said he would see her later. Still stunned, Rose walked back into her kitchen and fixed a quick Nespresso. She thought about Wally sinking his shots of vodka and for the first time she sort of understood why.

She did not see Diz watching from the terrace door, did not know he had overheard.

Rose went back and stood by the phone, looking at it as if expecting it to ring again and Harry to say it was all a mistake … “Please forget what I said.” Of course it did not ring and Harry did not say it. She was facing a terrible reality and with the murdered woman’s daughter in her care, living in her house, she was now involved in it.

“Mom?”

She turned and looked at Diz.

“What’s up, Mom?” he asked. In the back of Diz’s mind was that scary image of his father rowing back across the lake from that house, from that woman’s house.