Клэр Донелли - Hiss And Tell

Priscilla watched Sunny take it all in. “Yankee thrift,” she said, confirming Sunny’s impressions. “A lot of this stuff came with the house when the Senator bought it.”

Sunny nodded. “Good enough for a summer vacation home.” She knew the drill. That was part of the Kittery Harbor Way, too.

“If you’re looking for marble step-down bathtubs with whirlpool attachments, try my Cousin Tommy’s place in Palm Beach.” Priscilla laughed. “Or one of Augustus’s palaces. When you’re invited out here, you’re expected to ‘rough it.’” She went through the kitchen out into the center hallway and back to the stairs. “Mainly that room is being used as wedding central. Another is being used by Tommy and Yardley.” Priscilla paused for a moment. “I had the spare room set up for you. Didn’t think you’d want to sleep where Eliza had.”

“Um, no. Thanks,” Sunny said.

Her hostess led the way up the stairs, then shot another quizzical look at Sunny. “Do I need to tell you ‘off the record’ all the time?”

“Certainly for stuff you want to keep private,” Sunny replied. “I don’t think the sleeping arrangements need to be publicized.”

Cillie nodded. “So let’s get you settled, and then I’ll introduce you to people.”

Sunny stashed her bag beside a pile of white towels on a comfortable enough looking bed with a chenille spread. Nothing ostentatious, and nothing very personal.

“You may want to change into a bathing suit.” Priscilla opened her terrycloth wrap to reveal a bikini. “We’ve been hanging around at the pool.” She made a helpless sort of shrugging motion, just as she’d done when she’d mentioned being outvoted. “I can’t say I’m wild about it.”

It might not make a good impression after someone died under suspicious circumstances, Sunny thought. And, of course, that’s where Eliza got into all the fights the other day.

“Problem is, there aren’t that many places to go in the compound. My grandparents are in the big house, and nobody disturbs the Senator. My brothers and their wives took over the tennis court. We’d either be sitting in here getting on one another’s nerves, or out on the lawn somewhere, doing the same.”

Sunny nodded. The seaside view with the rocks below would bring up unpleasant associations, too. Aloud, she said, “Okay. Just give me a minute.”

She quickly changed into the navy blue one-piece she’d brought, snagging a towel and wrapping it around her hips. Then she rejoined Cillie, and they went downstairs and out the door. It was a weird sort of déjà vu for Sunny, walking along the path to the pool, especially when they passed a security guard and she glanced back over her shoulder and saw him looking after them. But he was wearing sunglasses, so Sunny couldn’t figure which of them he was checking out.

Before they even reached the tennis court, Sunny heard a series of rapid-fire noises: Thwock! Thwock! Thwock!

Then, as she got closer, she saw two guys who looked to be in their mid-thirties, complete physical opposites. One was short, compact, and agile, racing all over the court to make shots. His opponent was tall and rangy, all arms and legs in his tennis whites, galumphing around—but still arriving in time to drill shots back. From the looks on their faces, the men were conducting a war rather than playing a game. Cillie smothered a laugh as they came closer. “Now you’ve really learned something about my family. Tennis is our religion, and the court is our altar of sacrifice.”

Almost exactly what Cale told me, Sunny thought. “And what are you offering up?” she asked. “Sweat?”

“Not to mention a little blood,” Priscilla told her. “The tall one is my older brother Lem. The shrimp is Tom. He and I both take after the Neal side of the family.”

“Nothing wrong with being petite,” Sunny said. “At least for women. Short guys like them, tall guys like them, and designers love them—or so says my dad’s friend Mrs. Martinson.” She readjusted the towel around her hips. “Me, I wouldn’t know.”

“Oh, come on, you’ve got a great figure,” Priscilla protested.

“And a job that tends to put more on it,” Sunny replied gloomily. “Sometimes I wish I could just fit into a little black dress and be elegant. Or maybe be a tall blond drink of water in an ice blue gown.”

“Lem married one of those.” Priscilla nodded beyond the court to where a small group of people sat on lawn chairs arranged under the shade of colorful umbrellas. A tall, Nordic-looking woman took a sip of iced tea from a long glass, her face expressionless under a large pair of sunglasses. “Deborah’s a perfect political wife—or a born press manager. Whenever she opens her mouth, the perfect phrase emerges.”

Priscilla waved to the onlookers, and one of them, an energetic-looking brunette, waved back. “Tom’s wife, Genevieve, is livelier, but she shoots from the hip.”

“So she’ll give me better quotes,” Sunny quipped, then stopped at the look of chagrin on Cillie’s face. “Look, I’m supposed to be doing a color piece on your family getting ready for a wedding, not a political hatchet job. For the rest, well, we’ll have to talk about that.”

A white-haired woman wearing a broad-brimmed straw hat suddenly burst into laughter at something that had happened on the court. The man beside her leaned forward in his chair, scowling.

“That’s Grandmother Kingsbury,” Priscilla said. “And the Senator, of course. He’s always the referee for these bloodbaths. What do they say on that TV show? All of his judgments are final.”

“They look pretty busy with the game.” Sunny turned again to watch Priscilla’s brothers sweating on the court. “Maybe you can introduce me later. Right now I’d like to meet your friends.” AKA the people who argued with Eliza Stoughton, she added silently.

The atmosphere around the pool was much more subdued today compared to what Sunny had seen on her tour with Caleb. The music wasn’t as loud as it had been, and the people seemed a bit quieter, too. Carson de Kruk was the first to notice them and came over immediately, greeting Cillie with a kiss, and then shaking hands with Sunny.

With his blond hair and slim figure, he was the picture of a conventionally handsome young man. When the nuptials had been announced, Mrs. Martinson had said Carson de Kruk was perfectly cast—he already looked like the figure of the groom on a wedding cake.

Close up, however, Sunny noticed the thinning of the hair at his temples and the dark patches under his eyes. “Thank you for agreeing to do this,” Carson said in a low voice as he shook hands. “The situation has been so awful, with those people outside swarming to get at us.”

Sunny responded with a sympathetic smile, wondering what exactly Priscilla had told her prospective husband—or the others—about what she was really doing there. Was he only in on the embedded reporter idea? Or did he know that Priscilla also hoped that Sunny could shed some light on what had happened to Eliza?

Something to ask Cillie—when I get her alone again, Sunny thought. Not as though that seemed likely to happen anytime soon. As soon as they realized Priscilla was there, the rest of the wedding party clustered around her. When Cillie introduced Sunny as a local reporter who was going to spend some time with them, Sunny watched for the reactions. No one seemed overjoyed. They all seemed, unconsciously or not, to move a little closer to one another.

No matter what’s going on between them, they want to present a united front to the outsider. When she considered it, Sunny couldn’t really blame them.

Carson’s best man, Beau Bellingham, looked as if he’d just been roused from a deep sleep, and his reaction was about as polite as might be expected from a hibernating bear. In fact, with his thickening middle and tousled, shaggy hair, he had a bit of a bearlike quality that was only strengthened when he blinked, nodded, and headed back to the shade of a beach umbrella.