Софи Райан - Telling Tails

I pulled to the curb and parked. Up ahead, on the other side of the wide street, I saw a vehicle I recognized. I didn’t point it out to Rose. “Guard the car,” I said to Elvis as I got out of the SUV. The cat moved over to the driver’s seat, reaching up to rest a paw on the steering wheel.

The front door of the house had a replica twist doorbell in an oiled bronze finish. I turned the knob and after a moment the door opened. Nicole Cameron was about my height. She had the same blond hair as her brother in a chin-length bob. Where Jeff Cameron had the lean build of a runner, Nicole was built more solidly, with the same strong, muscular arms and shoulders as her sister-in-law. She was probably a rower, too, I was guessing.

“Ms. Cameron, my name is Sarah Grayson,” I began.

“You want to ask me about Leesa,” she said. She was wearing a yellow T-shirt and gray cropped leggings and her feet were bare.

I nodded. “Yes.”

Nicole Cameron turned her attention to Rose. “You’re Rose Jackson, aren’t you? You were delivering the candlesticks my brother bought for Leesa.”

Rose nodded. “Yes, I am.” She sent me a look that was as confused as I felt.

A frown creased the younger woman’s forehead. “I’m sorry you were hurt. You’re all right?”

“Yes, I am,” Rose said, her voice gentle, as though she were talking to an animal that might spook at any moment.

Nicole sighed softly. “You should come in,” she said. “I uh . . . I know you have questions.”

She moved back and we stepped inside. The house opened into a small foyer. Ahead of us was a hallway that I guessed led to the kitchen and the stairs to the second floor. To our right was a coat closet, and the sun-filled living room opened to our left.

Rose took several steps into the room and then stopped so abruptly I almost bumped into her. Liz was sitting on the sofa.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, surprise evident in both her voice and the rigid way she held herself. So she hadn’t spotted Liz’s car on the street when I did.

“I know Nicole from Phantasy,” Liz said. Phantasy was a spa that belonged to Liz’s niece, Elspeth. “And I’m here because I wanted to find out if her sister-in-law was here last night.”

Nicole Cameron wiped her hands on her leggings. “Leesa was here last night,” she said. She shook her head and gestured in the direction of the sofa and a pair of boxy apple green Fillmore chairs. “I’m sorry. Please have a seat.”

I sat down on the gunmetal gray couch and Rose took one of the chairs. Nicole sank onto a tufted brown leather ottoman. “Leesa got here sometime around six thirty. She was upset. You know that my brother left her?”

I nodded.

“I put the TV on and the news was just starting. We watched Murder Ink ,” she said, referring to the program known as water-cooler television because it was the show everyone was talking about the morning after it aired. “It was a rerun. It was after eight when Leesa left.”

Rose had gotten to the Cameron house just before eight o’clock. There was no way the hooded figure she’d seen was Leesa Cameron.

“I was just asking Nicole if she’d heard from her brother,” Liz said.

The younger woman shook her head. “The last time I talked to Jeff was Tuesday. I’ve been texting and calling since I got up, but he hasn’t texted me back and the calls just go to voice mail.”

“Did you have any idea your brother was going to leave his wife?” I asked.

She stared down at her feet for a moment. “No,” she said. “I didn’t see any sign that anything was wrong, and Jeff didn’t say a word to me.”

I glanced at Liz and one expertly groomed eyebrow raised about a millimeter.

“But . . . uh.” Nicole hesitated. “That’s the kind of person Jeff is. He wouldn’t have let on what he was planning to anyone. He isn’t good with emotions. We were raised by our grandmother. She died three years ago, and after it happened he just disappeared. He couldn’t handle the grief. We just reconnected less than a year ago. At some point he’ll call. It’s just the way he does things.” She was wearing a stack of bracelets on her right wrist and she slid them up and down her arm.

“When you talk to him, would you ask him to call Detective Andrews at the police department?” I said. I got to my feet. Liz and Rose stood up as well.

Nicole did the same, walking us to the door, still absently playing with her bracelets.

“Thank you for talking to us,” Liz said.

“I’m sorry Jeff got you all mixed up in this,” Nicole said. She turned to Rose. “And I’m very sorry you were hurt.”

Rose smiled and patted her arm. “Thank you, my dear,” she said.

No one spoke until we reached the street, and no surprise, it was Liz who had the first words.

“At some point he’ll call.” She snorted, turning to glance back at the house. “What a load of—”

I arched an eyebrow at her.

“—horse pucks,” she finished.

“Liz is right,” Rose said. “She doesn’t seem very concerned about her brother being missing. Maybe that’s because she believes he’s alive.”

“Well, if he’s done this kind of thing before, that’s understandable.” I held up both hands before Liz and Rose could object. “I’m not saying I think Jeff is still alive. I’m saying I can see why Nicole might.”

Liz rolled her eyes.

I pulled my keys out of my pocket. “So you think what? That Leesa Cameron killed her husband and his sister helped her cover it up?”

Liz shrugged. “Maybe.”

Rose studied her friend, her head tipped to one side. “You believe me.”

“Well, of course I believe you,” Liz retorted, as if there had never been any question of it. “I wouldn’t have gotten up at the crack of dawn to get here before the police and had one of those hideous smoothies Avery makes for breakfast if I didn’t.” She pulled a face. “I can’t believe the good Lord intends for me to drink what is essentially a weed for breakfast, not when he created sausage.”

I put my arms around her shoulders and pressed my cheek to hers. “We appreciate your sacrifice.”

“Yes, we do,” Rose said. She and Liz locked eyes for a moment, and I knew everything was all right with them again.

“So what are you doing now?” Liz asked.

“We’re headed to the shop,” I said.

Rose gave a melodramatic sigh. We eyed each other. The stubborn jut of her chin warned me I was in for an argument.

I crossed my arms over my chest. “We had a deal,” I said, warningly. “You let Nick look at your neck and I don’t drag you back to the hospital.”

“What happened to your neck?” Liz immediately asked.

Rose turned and tipped her head forward. “Sarah thinks someone might have injected me with something.”

Liz bent over her friend’s neck. “There?” she asked, pointing with one finger.

I nodded. “Maybe that’s why Rose was unconscious. Not because of the bump on her head.”

She squinted and leaned in for a better look. “I think you might be right,” she said. I could see the concern in her blue eyes, which she masked when Rose turned around.

“If you don’t want to go back to the store to wait for Nick, we could just go over to the hospital right now,” I said sweetly to Rose.

“Are you trying to blackmail me?”

I nodded. “Is it working?”

A smile pulled at the corners of her mouth. “It is, but only because at the moment Nicolas is the lesser of two evils.”

I laughed. “I’m sure he’d be flattered to hear that.”

“Fine,” she said with a bit of a martyred sigh. “You win.”

“Thank you,” I said. Then I reached out to touch her arm. “You did have a head injury. I just want to be sure you’re all right.”