Finlay Donovan Knocks 'Em Dead(Finlay Donovan #2)(44)

“We need to talk.” I stepped to the door, but Theresa didn’t budge.

“We have nothing to say to one another.”

I loosened the drawstring of the trash bag under my arm, nudging down the plastic to reveal the head inside. “Oh, I’m pretty sure we do.”

Theresa’s eyes went wide. “Where did you get that?”

“I think you know.”

She grabbed the door, preparing to slam it in my face. I thrust a foot in the gap.

“I told you,” she said through clenched teeth as she leaned all her weight against the door, “I have nothing to say to you.”

“Fine!” I jerked my foot from the opening. “I’ll just leave all this here and we’ll go.” I dumped the contents of the bag in the middle of her front stoop. The hair on the corpse had thawed, clinging like tangled seaweed to the condensation on his forehead. His dead-eyed, slack-jawed face gaped at her. “Your lease at the storage place is up, by the way. I told Phyllis you weren’t interested in renewing. We took the liberty of cleaning out the unit for you.”

Vero grabbed another trash bag from the trunk. The weight of the body parts packaged inside strained the plastic, creating macabre outlines as she carried it to Theresa’s stoop.

Theresa stiffened. “What are you doing?”

Vero turned the bag upside down, shaking it out with a flourish. The color drained from Theresa’s face as the contents fell to the concrete with a series of sickening thumps. She gaped at the piles of butcher paper, at the dark stains where the brown wrapping had grown soggy. Her throat worked with her rising panic as we retreated to Vero’s car. “Wait! Where are you going? You can’t just leave those here!”

“I don’t see why not,” I said, slamming the trunk closed. “According to Phyllis, they belong to you.”

“What am I supposed to do with them?” she asked, gesticulating wildly.

Vero shrugged. “I don’t know, but I suggest you put him in the fridge until you figure it out.”

“I can’t put those in my refrigerator! They won’t fit!”

Vero chuckled. “I’ve seen that fancy Sub-Zero in your kitchen. That bitch could probably hold the entire meat department at Costco.”

Theresa’s eyes narrowed to slits. “When were you in my kitchen?”

“Forget it!” I said as I threw open the passenger door. “We’re not cleaning up your mess. If it won’t fit in your fridge, you can take it to the dump.”

Vero ducked into the driver’s seat and put the keys in the ignition.

“Stop! Please!” Theresa yanked up the hem of her sweatpants, thrusting her right foot out the door, revealing a thick black tracking device around her ankle. “I can’t go to the dump. I can’t even leave my house!”

My jaw fell open. Vero’s dark giggle built into an outright guffaw. “Try the shed. Maybe Steven left you a shovel. You can bury him in your backyard.” She turned the key, revving the engine.

“Okay, fine!” Theresa cried out. “You can come inside, but you can’t leave those here!” She pointed to the thawing parcels on her stoop.

Vero raised an eyebrow, deferring to me. I shut the passenger door and crossed the lawn, ducking to put the head back in its bag as I shouldered my way past Theresa and carried it into her house. The engine cut off behind me. Vero picked up a few more parcels before following me inside. Theresa pulled a face, gathering up the last of them and dropping them indelicately on her kitchen floor.

Theresa stared numbly at the piles of brown paper. She grabbed a tub of disinfectant wipes from the cabinet under the sink and handed one to each of us. We stood beside the marble table in her kitchenette, frantically wiping our hands with matching expressions of disgust. She collected our used-up towelettes, pinching them between two fingers and hurling them into the trash bin.

“If I tell you what I know, do you promise to take it all with you?” She jutted her chin at the floor.

“That depends,” I said. “How is Steven involved?”

Theresa’s green eyes bored into me, her arms crossed stubbornly over her sweatshirt. “He’s not involved. I rented the storage unit without him.”

“Are you telling me he had no idea what you were keeping in there?”

“Bree gets all the monthly statements. I doubt he even looks at them.”

“He fired Bree last month.”

Theresa’s thin lips parted with surprise. “Does Steven know about the storage unit?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out. Who is he?” I asked, pointing to the bags.

Her jaw rocked back and forth through her hesitant pause. “He was one of Steven’s silent partners in the farm.”

I blinked at her. “Steven never mentioned any business partners.”

“That’s why they’re called silent. How do you think he bought all that land? With his mountains of cash? Or maybe his stellar credit?” she asked scornfully. “Why would he finance the farm through a bank, knowing full well he was going to divorce you? He’d have to be an idiot to give you that kind of legal claim to it.”

“Wait…” I held up a hand, certain I’d misunderstood. “Are you telling me he bought the farm before the divorce?”