You Owe Me a Murder(47)



“The thing is, another person I talked to said she was a bit of a drinker,” I said. I couldn’t believe how easily the lies were slipping out of my mouth. “My parents don’t want a neighbor who’s loud or trouble.”

She arched an eyebrow that had been tweezed almost to nonexistence and then drawn back in with a reddish-brown crayon. “Who told you that? This is that stupid neighborhood scandal again, as if it’s anyone’s business. What with her no-good husband gone off to Canada, who’s to fault her for having a glass or two in her own garden? Was it those nosy people on the corner?” Her dog lay down and seemed to fall asleep.

“I think so,” I hedged. “What about her daughter? Do you know anything about her?”

She yanked on the dog’s leash, pulling him up. “I’m not saying a word about that girl.”

Her reaction startled me. She seemed angry. What had Nicki done that made her neighbor so leery to talk?

“I’m so sorry. I just wondered—?”

The woman jammed her sleeves back as if ready to wade into a fistfight. “How dare you ask questions about that wee girl? What business is that of yours?”

I took a step back. “I guess I just wondered if she and I might be friends,” I said.

“What are you playing at?” Her nose wrinkled up. “What did you say your name was?”

I started walking away. “I need to get going. I’m supposed to meet my parents.”

“Now, wait a minute—?” She took a step toward me, but her dog held her in place like a fat furry anchor.

I walked quickly back to the Tube stop, my feet feeling light for the first time in days. The trip had been worth it. I’d learned a few things. As I suspected, this was an expensive neighborhood. I’d also learned that for a supposedly sloppy drunk, Nicki’s mom didn’t have a lot of bottles in her recycling box. Maybe she was ashamed and threw them away someplace else, but people who went to that kind of trouble usually weren’t yet to the full-blown alcoholic stage that Nicki had described. But the neighbor had made it sound as though there were problems of some sort. Nicki’s issue with her mother might not be that she was a drinker.

Her issue could be that her mom was alive. In Nicki’s way. Without her mom, Nicki would inherit the house and any money left over. It would be a pretty nice setup. And it struck me that that might have been Nicki’s plan for a long time. Long enough that she’d been on the lookout for someone like me. Someone she thought she could manipulate. She’d lucked out when she bumped into me at the airport.

But she was going to learn that it wasn’t that easy.



* * *





“Where do you think you’re going?”

My foot froze a few inches above the step. Shit.

Metford House had a curfew, but no one paid any attention to it. There was only the one ancient security guard, who could be counted on to never leave his office near the front desk. He would sit with his feet propped up on an open drawer, his head back, snoring.

Except for this time.

I turned around slowly. “Oh, hey,” I said. I pressed my mouth into a smile as if I were thrilled to see him.

The guard tapped his foot on the floor. The rubber soles made a dull thwak, thwak, thwak sound. “Go on, what were you up to?”

“I was just outside . . .” I motioned behind me with my thumb as if maybe he was confused about where I had come from. Telling him I had been casing a house for a possible murder wasn’t going to reassure him. I scrambled to come up with an excuse for being out past curfew. My ability to lie on demand seemed to be drying up. The last thing I needed was to be in more trouble. I had the feeling he wasn’t going to buy the story that I was volunteering with the homeless.

“Did you find my lighter?” Alex came down the stairs in a thundering rush as if he were half walking and half falling.

I stared at him with my mouth open. I didn’t have a clue what he was talking about.

Alex turned to the guard. “I went out for a smoke and must have dropped it out there.” Then he smiled at me. “So, did you? Find it?”

I glanced behind me as if I half expected to see a lighter lying in the foyer. I held up my empty hands. “Um. Nope.”

Alex sighed. “Can we borrow your flashlight?” He pointed to the giant utility belt around the guard’s waist. “I want to check one more time.”

The guard’s eyes narrowed and his giant bushy eyebrows came together over his nose like mating caterpillars.

“It’s my lucky lighter,” Alex added with a wide innocent smile on his face.

I had to hand it to him. He lied brilliantly. He had the face for it: lots of freckles. Anyone with freckles automatically looks sincere. I believed him and I knew for a fact he didn’t smoke. His asthma was bad if it was even a slightly smoggy day.

The guard unclipped his flashlight and handed it over. “Don’t you kids be out there too long. And get that torch back to me.” He hitched his pants up over his thin hips, under his swaying gut.

Alex pushed me toward the back door, practically saluting. “No sir. I’ll bring this right back.”

We stepped onto the back patio. Alex swept the light beam across the ground in case the guard was watching us from a window. Discarded cigarette butts were sprinkled around. An empty gin and tonic can slid across the pavement with a screech. I followed it with my eyes—?I’d never seen a cocktail in a can until I’d been on the trains here. Thumping sounds from the dryers came through the narrow casement window to the laundry room in the basement. I shivered, wondering if Nicki could be in there now, waiting for me.

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