Nine Liars (Truly Devious, #5)(23)

One thing, however, was securely packaged and packed. She removed this and took it down the hall, where Janelle was delicately removing her journaling supplies from her carry-on bag and lining up her pens and notebooks on the desk.

“I need to show you something,” Stevie said, coming in and shutting the door behind her. “Do you want to see what I bought? For the thing.”

Janelle’s eyes opened a bit wider.

“Let me see!”

Stevie ripped into the packaging.

“I got it yesterday right before we left,” she said. “I had to shove it in my bag before I could even open it.”

She ripped through the inner plastic bag, knocking loose two silica gel packs. She shook out the garment and held it up for inspection.

Janelle stared for a long moment.

“Is that a union suit?” she said.

“It’s a fleece-lined onesie.”

“I can’t believe it. You found a sex hoodie.”

“Hear me out,” Stevie said. “It doesn’t seem like it’s for sexy times, but it’s got all these buttons . . .”

She indicated the buttons as proof.

“And you can undo the buttons and . . .”

Stevie looked at the onesie that hung from her hands. All the details stood out to her—the brightness of the black-and-red check, the body-obscuring thickness of the fleece, the sturdy closures. It had made so much sense when she’d picked it out.

“I think whatever works for you is the right thing,” Janelle finally said. “And that is the most you thing I have ever seen.”





June 24, 1995

8:00 p.m.

IN THE AFTERNOON, THE RAIN STARTED UP AGAIN. NOT LIKE LAST night this time—it didn’t pound the roof and windows. It pattered. It misted the glass. It rinsed the flowers and turned the earth soft, releasing the smell of ozone. The house fell into soft shade, and the Nine sat inside it, quiet and broken, as the day slipped away. Outside, there were three police cars and a van, officers in uniform walking across the muddy lawn. Sooz watched them from the sitting room window. An hour before, she had been sobbing so hard that she had been physically ill.

They had been asked to remain in the house, and specifically in the sitting room, while the police examined the rest of the house. One by one, they had been taken out to give statements. Sebastian had been asked to come out for a second round, as it was his house and the police had some additional questions. They were waiting for him to return. Angela sat between Peter and Yash. Theo curled in on herself in a reading chair and stared at the cold embers in the fireplace. Julian paced around the room, looking at the shelves, the walls, the backs of the furniture. It was cold inside Merryweather, but no one had the initiative to start a fire, nor would it have been clear if they would be allowed to do so. Could you burn logs after a murder?

“What the hell is happening?” Sooz said, mostly to herself. “Are we having a nightmare? All of us?”

There was a creaking sound. Sebastian was returning down the stairs from his questioning. They all turned to look at him as he entered the room. The normally bouncy and smiling Sebastian was now hunched. The color had not returned to his face, and he kept rubbing his skin as if there still might be blood somewhere on it. He had washed his face at least six times, rubbing the skin until it was raw. He walked straight to the bar cart and reached for the nearest bottle.

“They said we’re allowed to go to our rooms if we want,” he said. “They’re finished up there. We still can’t go outside. We’ll have to stay here at least for tonight. After that . . .”

He let the sentence trail off. After that . . . who knew? The future had changed.

“They also said there have been a string of burglaries recently,” he went on. “Four times in this area in the last few weeks. They’ve been nicking tack and things.”

“Burglars,” Yash said after a moment. “Fucking burglars?”

It was so horrifically absurd. It sucked the meaning out of the world.

Sooz began to tap her foot on the floor, then got to her feet and circled the sofa.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “Wasn’t that shed locked? You said everything was locked. How did Rosie and Noel get in there if it was locked?”

“I don’t know.” Sebastian swirled his drink to steady himself. “I suppose Rosie and Noel went in after the door was ripped open. They must have heard them or seen them, tried to stop them. Or they went in there and the burglars came back and found them.”

Angela stood up suddenly.

“You all right, Ange?” Peter asked.

“I need to change my clothes,” Angela said. “I need to take these off. I need a bath.” She rubbed her arms violently and hurried from the room, back up the steps.

Angela felt like a ghost, moving out of time. Yesterday, they had rushed down this hallway, screaming with laughter as they grabbed their favorite rooms. Now the doors were all cocked open from when the police had trampled through. There had been strangers in the house, strangers in the suitcases, strangers in the drawers and closets. The view outside was just as lovely and lush as ever. Just outside the window, there were wild dog roses with their delicate pink petals and sunny bellies. Their beauty offended her. Confused her. She wasn’t sure if she was real. Real was Noel—long and lean Noel, with his slow smile and moony face and his nerdy-cool 70s style. Noel who said the most surprising things sometimes. The freckles under his eyes you could only see in the bright sun. She remembered a night that she and Noel stole a shopping trolley and pushed each other down the street and looked up at the sky and talked about how much they loved Bagpuss. Noel who asked so little of everyone else, who always did the washing-up, who could not drink tequila or he would turn into a strange creature who liked to run naked down the road. Noel, the nice guy who played villains shockingly well, who let anyone use his car.