The Final Victim(19)

"I am. I feel like I want to crawl into bed and sleep for days," she tells Royce wearily.

"Well, then, go ahead and do just that when we get home." "I wish."

"What's stopping you? You need to recover from all this. You should rest. Take some time for yourself."

She shakes her head, thinking again of Lianna, of the visiting cousins.

Both Gib and Phyllida are quite a bit younger than she is, and they lived up North, so she never really knew them as well as she'd have liked to. Her father always dismissed them both as spoiled brats, but Charlotte could imagine her Uncle Xavy might have said the same about her. He never seemed to give his only niece the time of day.

Then again, for all they had in common, he and Daddy weren't particularly close, either. The brothers were longtime rivals in everything from sports to acquiring fancy status symbols to garner their lone parent's meager affection.

"Listen, don't let your obnoxious cousins get to you while I'm gone," cautions the apparently clairvoyant! Royce.

"They're the only family I have left in the world now that Grandaddy's gone," she feels obligated to point out "What about me?"

"Other than you and Lianna," she says hastily. "Bu you know what I meant. It's just kind of… strange, suddenly feels like the Remingtons are… I don't know a dying breed."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be-"

"Oh, I know." She smiles up at him. "The fact is they're my only flesh and blood in the world, beside Lianna, doesn't make my cousins any less obnoxious."

Royce grins. "I just hope they're not planning hang around for too long after I'm back."

"I doubt that I have a feeling that once the will read, they'll take their money and run."

"I wouldn't be surprised."

"And what about us?" Charlotte asks her husband.

"What do you mean?"

"We're about to inherit a life-changing amount money, remember?"

He shrugs. "Frankly, I like our life just the way it Don't you?"

She flashes him a grateful smile. "Absolutely. And i always said that when the time came, we'd just tuck away and go on the same as always."

"My thoughts exactly. I'm assuming that's still the plan?"

"That's still the plan," Charlotte assures him, aware, as always, how different he is from her first husband. Royce is as cautious financially as Vincent was a flashy spendthrift.

Both Grandaddy and Mother tried to warn her that Vincent married her for her money-they saw it from the start.

But Charlotte, still reeling from her father's death and her mother's cancer diagnosis, wouldn't listen-any more than she suspects her own daughter will listen to her.

But what can she do about that?

Nothing, Charlotte dunks helplessly for the second time this evening, but hold my breath and let go.

CHAPTER 3
"Want me to pick you up again tomorrow night?" Kevin asks hopefully.

Lianna pauses, her hand on the car door handle.

"I don't know," she hedges, needing to think about what just happened between them.

"Well I can, if you want me to. Or I can meet you somewhere, if you don't want to sneak out. You can tell your parents you're with one of your friends or something."

"You mean my mother."

"Huh?"

‘'You said my parents. My father lives in Florida-he's not the one with all the stupid rules. Royce is just my stepfather."

"Yeah," he says in a whatever tone, as if it doesn't matter.

But it does. It matters to her, a lot.

"So let me know, okay? I have to work at the gas station all day so I can't answer my cell if it rings, but you can text message me if you want."

"Okay. I'll let you know."

He leans over the console and kisses her one last time. She can feel stubble on his face, a tactile reminder that he's older than she is. Much older.

Perhaps too old, she allows herself to consider for the first time, as she closes the car door as soundlessly as possible.

Picking her way in the headlights' beam toward the stone-and-iron entrance to Oakgate, she wonders if she's in over her head.

If the wine hadn't smelled musty and tasted bitter, who knows what might have happened?

As it was, Lianna couldn't bring herself to drink more than that first tentative sip. She had tasted enough good wine pilfered from her friend Devin's parents to know that the stuff Kevin offered was either horribly cheap or horribly spoiled, perhaps both.

In the end, much to his disappointment, she managed to maintain her sobriety-and virginity. Not that she's particularly prone to clinging to either in the grand scheme of things.

But tonight, it wasn't meant to be. Or perhaps, just not there, on the island beach. Or with him.

Having reached the lowest spot in the stone wall surrounding the gated entrance to Oakgate, she waves alt Kevin.

He blinks the headlights once before driving away, leaving her alone in the dark.

Royce reaches over to turn off the alarm a minute before it rings, not wanting to wake Charlotte.

She's sleeping soundly at last. Between her grief and the houseguests and Lianna's typical teenaged strife, his wife is on the verge of becoming a physical and emotional wreck.