The Vanishing Stair (Truly Devious, #2)(66)

So, her parents. They had come. It was over. She felt herself sag into the yoga mats.

“Dr. Fenton,” Larry said. “She’s waiting at the Great House for you.”

When Stevie arrived at the Great House, Fenton was there, leaning on the security desk, deep in conversation with Call Me Charles. And she had not come alone. Hunter sat in a chair by the door, looking like he wished he could sink into the floor. He was wearing some old jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt, and had the general air of someone who had been dragged along on someone else’s date.

“. . . it’s a real work of scholarship,” she was saying. “It far surpasses the original.”

“I’ll have to be sure to read it,” Charles said. For once, Captain Enthusiasm looked like he had been bested by someone much more exhausting than himself. He shifted uncomfortably and looked at his watch.

“Stevie,” he said as she approached. “Dr. Fenton has come up to—”

“I just wanted to check on some of these references,” Fenton interrupted, holding up the pad. “It looks like I may have come on a bad day.”

“Yes . . .” Charles said. “I think what would be best is if you came to my office and we’ll look at the schedule. We’ll be a few minutes.”

“Is there any chance my nephew could have a look around? He’s always wanted to see the place.”

Hunter continued drilling into the floor with his mind.

“I . . . think that would be all right,” Charles said, not sounding at all like this was all right. “Stevie, maybe you could take Hunter on a brief . . .”

He didn’t linger on the word, but the point was made.

“. . . tour of the campus. Dr. Fenton, if you could come with me . . .”

As they stepped outside, Hunter sighed loudly. The rain had given up a little bit, leaving the day gray and soggy, but good enough to walk in.

“Sorry,” he immediately said, “she made me come. I know we’re not supposed to be here. She knows it too. I’m really sorry. You don’t have to give me a tour. I can wait in the car.”

“No,” Stevie said. “It’s fine. Today is . . .”

“Bad,” he said. “I know.”

“You know?”

“Word spreads,” he said. “Is it true? They found that girl?”

Stevie nodded. She did not add that she had found that girl. In the gray of a new day, the knowledge settled on her shoulders. She had found a body, and she was . . . okay with it. Not great. Not happy. But she was holding her own. Some coping mechanism had been triggered.

“How did you get up here?” Stevie asked.

“She told the person at the front gate that she had an appointment with Dr. Scott. He must have said we could come up.”

“What do you want to see?” Stevie asked.

Hunter looked across the vista, past the Neptune fountain, at the wide expanse of the green.

“It’s really amazing,” he said. “I’m sorry to come like this, but it’s still cool to see it. I don’t know where to start.”

“I guess, around?” she said.

Stevie started walking toward the grass.

“Sorry,” he said again. “Could we do the path?”

He held up his crutch.

“Oh, God. Sorry. Yeah.”

“Don’t worry about it. It just sticks in the ground, especially when it’s wet.”

Stevie decided that of the two possible directions, it was best to head toward the left, to the classroom buildings. It seemed like these would be less populated. David seeing would make this whole weird thing even worse. The library was as good as any place to start, so she took Hunter there.

Hunter was appreciative of everything he saw, his eyes growing wide. She could see longing on his face.

“This place is nuts,” he said as they walked between the classroom buildings. “It’s better than the pictures.”

“It’s okay,” Stevie said.

“You know it’s better than that.”

She shrugged.

“So someone gets all of this,” he said.

“What?”

“If they find Alice. Someone gets all of this.”

“That’s an internet rumor,” Stevie said.

“Not according to my aunt.”

“Bullshit,” Stevie said, shaking her head. “She doesn’t believe that.”

“She does,” he said.

Hunter stepped ahead a bit and sat down on the bench between some of the statues nearby.

“She says . . .” Hunter sighed deeply. “That Robert Mackenzie told her that there was something added to Ellingham’s will that stated that anyone who located Alice, dead or alive, would get some huge fortune.”

“That’s bullshit,” Stevie said, shaking her head. “That’s an old rumor, like that the whole thing was faked or that Alice lives in the attic and she’s a hundred years old. I’ve been in the attic, by the way. She’s not there.”

“My aunt believes it.”

“No, she doesn’t,” Stevie said. “No one who is serious about this thinks that’s real. If it were real, everyone would know. That would be the whole point. Tell everyone so that they would go look for Alice. You don’t post a reward without telling people to go look.”