The Final Victim(38)

Next, the pieces of furniture are arranged one by one on the makeshift rug: a small wooden table and three small chairs.

Finally, the family materializes.

Three small dolls-a blonde, a brunette, and a redhead-perfectly scaled to occupy the furniture, their plastic lips frozen in garish smiles, unblinking eyes unable to witness what will unfold within these walls.

*

The lush, landscaped grounds at Oakgate might be inviting during the day, but at night, even with a three-quarter moon hovering above the oaks, it's the opposite.

Phyllida is glad she thought to stop in the kitchen and hunt down a flashlight-she found it in the utility drawer-before slipping out the back door; she wouldn't want to be alone out here in the dark.

She doesn't want to be alone out here at all, but she has to make this call. Brian and Wills are asleep in her room upstairs and she doesn't want to disturb them. Nor does she want to risk being overheard by anybody in the house.

So here she is, clad in a filmy summer nightgown, making her way through the shadowy back garden. The wet grass brushes against her bare feet in hastily donned flip-flops. She tries not to think about snakes, or anything else that might be slithering nearby, as she heads as far away from the house as she dares to go.

The night is still and moist; the live oaks form a canopy overhead, although it's anything but protective. Phyllida won't imagine what creatures might be tucked amid the foliage webbed in dry Spanish moss, poised to drop on her head at any moment.

She comes to a halt when she reaches the small cemetery surrounded by a low ironwork fence.

Gravestones of her ancestors loom eerily in the night. Some are thin, leaning slabs whose etching is all but worn away, glowing white beneath the moon. Others, like the large one belonging to Grandaddy and the grandmother Phyllida never knew, are elaborate monuments carved in polished black granite, rising from the earth like formidable warriors standing guard over fallen comrades.

Phyllida takes a few more tentative steps forward, until some winged creature abruptly departs an overhead branch with a rustling flutter.

She stops short, her heart pounding.

That's it. Phyllida won't venture any closer to the graveyard, and she certainly has no desire to venture past it.

Night sounds reverberate from the thicket on the far side of the iron fence: crickets, frogs, owls, an ominous, occasional rustling in the undergrowth, a distant splashing sound from the marsh and tidal creeks.

The current property line extends a little ways in. Beyond that line, to tile north and east, are acres upon acres of woods and wetlands that were once a part of the Remingtons's plantation. Grandaddy sold the entire parcel years ago to some developer, who had planned to build a sprawling condo community, until a vocal environmental group successfully challenged the plan. Now it's a wildlife refuge, protected in its natural state from further development.

When Phyllida was a little girl and Daddy would bring them down to visit his family on the coastal island, she and her brother loved to explore the abandoned portion of the property, especially the remnants of slave cabins.

It's hard to believe nobody kept a closer eye on them. But then again, Mother wasn't here to do it because she rarely came South. She said she didn't like the heat and humidity, but Phyllida suspected that in reality, she didn't like Grandaddy any more than he liked her.

Back then, the undergrowth didn't seem this dense-or maybe it was, and Phyllida and her brother brazenly pushed their way through it anyway, not caring about things like mud, or rattlesnakes and gators.

Charlotte cared. She never came with them. She might have been older, but she was always squeamish, not to mention afraid of everything, even the dark.

Wanting to get this over with so she can go back to bed and maybe get some sleep at last, Phyllida flips open her cell phone, presses a speed dial button, and holds it against her ear, listening to it ring.

"Hello?"

Her throat clogged with emotion, she manages to say, "Mom? It's me."

"Phyllida?"

"Yes…" She's crying, then. She can't help it.

"What's wrong, Darling? What is it?"

"He cut us out of the will. Both me and Gib. He left everything to Charlotte."

On the other end of the phone, Susan Remington gasps. "Oh, no!"

"I'm afraid, Mommy," Phyllida sobs. "What are we going to do now? We were all counting on that money… all of us."

"I know, I know…" Her mother's voice is soothing. "Don't worry, sweetheart, we'll survive. We always have."

"I know, but…" She sniffles. "I don't know how."

"What does your brother say about this?"

"That we're going to contest the will." 'That's my brilliant attorney son. That's exacdy what you'll do."

Still sniffling, Phyllida wipes her eyes with the back of her hands, feeling better already. She knew she would, if she could just talk to her mother.

Mommy always makes her feel better.

"There, now, Darling, you just calm down and get some sleep. It's late."

"I know."

"Where's your brother? Is he there? Can I speak to him?"

"He went out someplace," Phyllida says truthfully, then adds, "please don't tell him I told you about the will, okay, Mom? He didn't want to worry you with it"