The Cousins(85)

“Paula,” Theresa says. I have no idea who she’s referring to until the second woman steps forward. “There’s a chill in the air. Why don’t you light a fire in the south parlor, and then leave us to talk about—” She pauses, eyes glinting. “What happened to Matt.”

“Tess, are you sure?” the other woman says nervously.

“Positive,” Theresa says. Paula brushes past us into the hallway.

Uncle Archer takes a deep breath. “Matt drowned, and that’s awful, but—”



“Matt didn’t drown,” Theresa says sharply. “He was killed. That night at Cutty Beach? Matt would never have gone into the water on his own. He might have been drinking, but he wasn’t a fool. He knew what the undertow could do on a night like that. Your snake of a brother, Anders, told him that Kayla had been swept away by the tide and needed help.”

“Kayla?” Uncle Archer looks bewildered. “She wasn’t even there.”

Theresa’s lip curls. “No. And Anders was perfectly aware of that. He lied to get Matt in the water. He knew he’d probably never come out. And Adam—Adam was standing right next to them, and he let Matt go.” She’s shaking now, her eyes wide and shiny. “Adam just let him go.”

Adam just let him go. The words ring so loud in my ears that I almost miss Uncle Archer’s next question. “How could you possibly know that?”

“Kayla,” Theresa says. “Anders got drunk one night and spilled everything to her. I don’t think he even remembered doing it. But she told me. Said he’d always been jealous of Matt, and resented him even more when Matt got Allison pregnant the summer he died.” She laughs bitterly at Uncle Archer’s shocked expression. “You didn’t know? Me either. My grandchild, imagine that. And your mother’s. But Allison miscarried.”

“She did?” Uncle Archer asks blankly.

“Yes.” Theresa’s mouth presses into a thin line. “And she knew what happened to Matt. Anders told her that night, and I’ll say this for her: at least she sounded the alarm that he was missing. But then she protected her brothers. She let everyone think it was an accident.”

“Kayla told you all this,” Uncle Archer says slowly. “And then—what? You killed her? Drugged her and put her in her car?” Theresa startles, and Uncle Archer presses. “Fred Baxter gave me the original autopsy report. There was a sedative in her system the night she died.”



“So that’s why she asked about Kayla,” Theresa says, looking at me. I’ve become she all of a sudden; a prop in the conversation.

“You killed an innocent girl and you have the nerve to play victim?” Uncle Archer asks, his voice rising.

“That wasn’t me,” Theresa insists. “It’s just—everything happened at once. I found out about Matt. I was devastated and furious. The only thing I wanted in the world was to make your brothers and sister pay, somehow. And then your mother died.” Her eyes get a faraway look. “She and I had been alone in the house. I called Donald Camden, because, well—we called Donald for everything back then. He said something about how you children would burn through Abraham and Mildred’s fortune in no time flat. And I got an idea.”

The edges of her mouth curve into a smile, and it’s a gruesome sight. “It seemed ridiculous at first. But Donald loved it. He’d always wanted to get his hands on your parents’ money. We looped in Fred Baxter, who was drowning in debt, and promised to make all that go away if he’d keep acting as my physician. We buried Mildred here, on the grounds of Catmint House, and I brought my sister, Paula, here to take my place. Then Donald wrote to all of you.”

Theresa’s face tightens. “But Kayla kept trying to see me. She wanted to know if Mrs. Story had disinherited the children because of what I’d told her. I talked to her on the phone a few times, trying to placate her, but she just became more agitated. I stopped taking her calls, and she went to Fred Baxter. He urged her not to worry about it, to keep quiet. But then she asked Donald. And Donald—well, he thought it would become a problem if she kept talking. If people knew I had a reason to hate the Story children. So he took matters into his own hands.” A defensive note creeps into her voice at Uncle Archer’s horrified expression. “Fred and I wouldn’t have condoned that, but by the time we realized what had happened, it was too late.”



“Well, aren’t you and Fred just a pair of ever-loving saints,” Uncle Archer says icily. Then he draws in a sharp, shocked breath. “Holy shit. Is that what happened to Fred, too? He started talking this summer, trying to piece together a confession in that addled brain of his, so Donald took matters into his own hands? Drowned the man in his own backyard?”

He takes a step forward, and something cold and hard presses into the side of my neck. I whimper involuntarily, and Uncle Archer freezes.

“Let’s not forget who’s in charge here,” Theresa says.

Uncle Archer raises both hands in a gesture of surrender. “I’m not coming any closer, okay? But it’s over. You have to know that. You can’t put the genie back in the bottle this time.”

“Probably not,” Theresa says. “But I beg to disagree with you that it’s over. Because here’s the thing.” Her voice turns musing. “Adam is the worst of them, I think. Anders never had a redeeming quality to speak of, and Allison is weak. But Adam—I adored Adam. I always stood up for him when the pressure from his parents got to be too much. I would have done anything for that boy. And then, when he had the chance to keep my son safe, he didn’t take it. All Adam would have had to do is say stop. Either to Anders or to Matt. They would have listened to him, and Matt would still be alive.”