Nine Liars (Truly Devious, #5)(18)

“. . . because our friends are raging nymphomaniacs?”

“Come on,” Theo said, handing him a cup of tea. “Drink this. We’ll go have a look together.”

Sebastian sipped it and made a face.

“My God, there’s no alcohol in this. Are you trying to kill me?”

“Yes,” Theo said. “Drink your tea. And some water.”

“I am,” he said, stifling a burp, “the Honorable Sebastian Holt-Carey, the future sixth Viscount Holt-Carey. Honor me.”

Sooz threw a discarded crisp bag at him. It landed on his shoulder.

“I’ll ignore that, peasant,” he said, “because there are still some crisps in here. Fine. Send me out to my death. Theo, you’re with me. Let’s make this terrible journey into the burning desert sun.”

“How many bottles do you think we got through last night?” Theo asked as they made their way over the spongey grass. The steely tint of the sky suggested that the torrential rain of the night before might soon be repeated.

“Who can say? Probably twenty or so of the champagne. It would be embarrassing if we drank less than that. Plus, whatever else.”

“And your parents won’t mind?”

“Who cares if they do? That’s what the stuff is for, anyway. We don’t leave Cambridge every day.”

“What do you think of Rosie and Noel?” Theo asked.

“Long time coming, like some other pairings I could mention.”

He looked at Theo pointedly.

“Don’t,” she said.

“Yash has always liked you, and you’ve always liked him. Why are you waiting? This is the time to act.”

“We’ve talked about this, Sebastian.”

They passed through an archway in the garden wall and stepped into the driveway. The gravel crunched under their boots.

“No. I ask and you don’t answer.”

“Because I still have training to finish, and . . .”

They came upon an overturned wheelbarrow and a bucket.

“Chester usually keeps that locked away somewhere,” Sebastian said. “That’s his favorite wheelbarrow. He’s precious about it. I think he . . .”

His words trailed off. They had reached the woodshed. The door hung open. The padlock was still locked, but someone had gotten around that by ripping the latch away from the wood.

“Bugger,” he said, hurrying over. “Bugger . . .”

“Burgled?” Theo said.

“It sodding hell looks like it. I don’t think our lot actually tears the buildings open.”

Sebastian stepped into the shed and reached for the light switch, but nothing came on.

There was little in the woodshed to steal, unless you were in the market for wood, spiderwebs, or old, broken tools. It contained only one thing of real value, and Sebastian was checking on that now. He grabbed for something by the side of the door, which turned out to be a long-handled axe. He went deeper into the shed and held the axe up over his head, reaching around with the blade end delicately until it found purchase on a small loop of rope. He pulled down on this, lowering a set of folding wooden stairs.

“Everything’s fine up here,” Sebastian said from his position halfway up the steps. Theo could see only his lower half—the rest of him was up in the crawl space above the shed floor. “They didn’t get what they were after, if that’s what they came for. Floor’s soaked. The door must have been open most of the night. Seems like they went to a lot of effort for nothing. . . . What?”

Theo was staring at Sebastian with a strange intensity as he came down the stairs.

“Your face,” she said.

“What about it?”

“You’ve cut yourself. You’re bleeding. Right side.”

“I don’t think so,” he said, touching his cheek. “How would I have done that?”

He examined his fingers. They were streaked with blood. He touched his cheek again, feeling for a cut, but there was none there. The blood was coming from nowhere.

“I’m not cut,” he said. “Where’s this come from?”

Then he noticed it. The thing on the floor, near the woodpile. At first, he thought it was a log. But then he saw that this particular log seemed to be wearing a Wellington boot. It was a bare leg sticking out from a pile of wood.

Theo had also seen the leg and was down on the floor, pulling wood off Rosie.

At the very least, she was pulling the wood off what remained of Rosie.





4


THE DEPARTURE WAS NOW SCHEDULED FOR THE SATURDAY BEFORE Thanksgiving. Her parents were at first saddened by the thought of Stevie not being home to argue with them over a medium-sized turkey and boxed stuffing, but when they heard that David was involved, everything changed. Stevie’s parents loved David. They loved him in a way that was irritating and unnerving. They loved him because: a) they were the kind of people who felt that Stevie’s having a boyfriend was a primary mission in life and b) David was the son of their hero, who happened to be an incredibly toxic politician, now disgraced and temporarily off the radar doing whatever it was that toxic politicians do while waiting for the public to forget about their mistakes. Public memory is surprisingly short when it comes to these things.

Whatever the case, this worked in Stevie’s favor. That hurdle was easily cleared.