Something Wicked (36 page)

But just as he was opening his door, another truck came splashing through the mud puddles and the rain and came to a stop between Charlie and the couple in the Dodge truck. Charlie hesitated, and two women jumped out of the truck, whooping and hollering as they ran inside the Crab Shack. Right behind them came a couple of cars and more women. Goddamned happy hour.

By the time they'd all gotten out of the rain, the Dodge Ram was rumbling out of the parking lot and back up to 101.

Briefly, he thought about going back inside and juicing them with some Good Time Charlie pheromones. He could probably pick up two or three easily.

But there was danger in crowds . . . and besides, he was getting a real cranking hard-on for the detective. With a vision of her swaying in front of his eyes, he followed the Ram onto the highway and headed north, because she would be panting her way to Hale St. Cloud's house soon enough.

He was going to have to ditch this truck soon. It didn't have the Bancroft logo on it, but he wasn't really supposed to even have it. He had appropriated it for the RiverEast project and had just kind of kept it. That project was being overseen by a larger construction company that dealt with high-rises; they had been hired because Bancroft Development wasn't in that kind of commercial construction. They were strictly penny-ante, in Charlie's opinion, and had to rely on experts to actually build the structure. But Bancroft Development owned the land, so Charlie and some other guys were on-site to monitor the construction.

But, well, now things had changed. Charlie was through working for the company that, by all rights, should be his. He was going to have to ditch the Bancroft truck sometime soon, but that meant stealing a car or renting one, and he just didn't have time.

He needed to lure that detective to him.

Pulling out his cell phone, he saw that his hands were shaking, and he gazed at them in wonder. What the hell? He was morphing into something else. Something more powerful.

It was . . .
awesome.

R
avinia knocked on Catherine's bedroom door, tried the knob, and when it turned in her hand, she stepped inside the gloomy space. She heard Catherine rustle in the bed and reach for the lighter to light the lamp.

“Ravinia,” Catherine said when the wick was lit and the soft glow pushed the evening shadows back to the corners of the room.

“When is Earl coming?” Ravinia asked.

“Tonight, late.” She threw a look toward the windows that faced west. “I don't think he made it to Echo in this weather.”

“But he is coming tonight, here, to . . . switch things around?” Ravinia asked.

“Yes. And I'm afraid you'll have to help him. I don't have the strength, and someone needs to stay inside the house. They won't expect you to stay around. You never do.”

Ravinia had no problem with the task. Her only complaint was the blasted weather.

“Be patient,” Catherine warned. “Unless something unforeseeable happens, Earl will be here.” She exhaled heavily. “I may need you to do something else for me, too.”

“What?”

“Let's wait until after . . . everything gets taken care of. I'll be coming downstairs in a few minutes. I can smell that Isadora's making dinner. Chicken? We'll eat and then move to the great hall, and I'll let everyone fuss over me. You'll leave early, as you always do. Go to your room and wait. When everything quiets down and everyone's in bed, watch out your east window, toward the graveyard. Earl will give you a signal. A quick flash of light.”

“What if someone else wakes up and sees it?”

“I'll leave my door open a crack, so they'll come to me first.”

“But what will you say?” Ravinia asked.

“I'll tell them it's you, going over the wall again.”

 

 

Savannah drove north through the rain, which seemed to be lessening a little. At least she hoped it was. There was water rushing in a thin film across the road. The snow was completely gone, washed away.

She couldn't wait to get to Hale's house. Hale and Kristina's house. It wasn't right, but it was all she could do. She drove through Deception Bay, past the turnoff to Bancroft Bluff, and then a few miles farther, she saw the entrance to Declan Bancroft's house. Had Declan had an affair with Catherine or, despite all Catherine's claims to the contrary, with her sister, Mary? Could the boy whom Catherine called Declan Jr. really be Declan Sr.'s son? How would you know? There was no listing of the fathers of the Siren Song girls, again, according to Catherine. There was only
A Short History of the Colony
, and that had been written by a man who, even within the text of the book, freely admitted that some of it was conjecture. Herman Smythe was no historian. He was just an older man who was living out his days at . . .

“Seagull Pointe,” she said aloud. The assisted living facility /nursing home would be coming up on her right very soon. She hadn't been there since Madeline “Mad Maddie” Turnbull's death, but Smythe was a resident, too. She'd planned on stopping in and talking to him, but, well, she'd been kind of overwhelmed with the changes in her life.

But now here she was.

Might as well try to see him.

 

 

Hale looked down the length of the dining table at the cartons of food he'd brought from Gino's. His grandfather sat at one end; his mother at the other. Janet couldn't forgive Declan for, at least in her mind, contributing to the failure of her marriage by having any kind of relations with the Rutledge sisters. Declan seemed perplexed by her cold distance, but it had been the same between them for years, so Hale suspected he had to have some clue.

Victoria was feeding the baby a bottle, but little Declan was starting to fuss, and the nanny heaved a huge sigh. “I don't know what's wrong with him.”

Janet rolled her eyes at Hale, silently saying, “How long are you going to let this go on?”

“I'll take him,” Hale said, and he carried the baby back to his bedroom and walked him around until he fell asleep.

He wondered what was keeping Savvy. Work, maybe. He wondered if she'd talked to Hamett and Evinrud. Probably. It gave him a slightly sick feeling to think what they might be saying about him, but Savannah was a cop and knew better than he did what to expect in a murder investigation. She could separate fact from fiction, good cop from bad, truth from lies.

He snuggled baby Declan back into his bassinet and then returned to the dining room to find Janet standing on her feet, back rigid, glaring at her father, who was still sitting. “Do you know what he said?” she asked, swinging around to Hale, her eyes bright with fury. “He said he has a son!”

“I said I have a grandson,” Declan said, sweeping a hand toward Hale, then bringing it back to rest on the tabletop, but not before waving it at Janet, as if she were a noxious fume.

“You said
son.
Who with? That whore, Mary Rutledge . . . Beeman . . . or whatever the hell?”

“I do not have a son.” Declan's face was turning red with anger.

“I'm leaving,” Janet said. “I love the baby, Hale. He's so precious, but I can't stand this.” She swept toward the den.

“I don't have a son!”

Hale followed after her, recalling how just the other day his grandfather had mistakenly said he had a son. Was he just losing it a little, like Hale had thought at the time? Or was Janet right and there was something more . . . like Declan Jr. . . ?

“You're leaving tonight?” he said to her.

“I sure as hell am. And you need to do something about that girl. She's hopeless. If she's the best they're offering at that nanny school where Kristina picked her out, that place should be written up!”

“She was pretty,” Hale said.

“What?”

“I told Kristina she could pick whomever she wanted, and she picked Victoria from some résumés the school sent. Victoria was the prettiest.”

“That's sick, Hale. Really.”

“I'll figure it out.”

Janet zipped up her bag and straightened. “I notice you're not dying to get me to stay and help you. Is it because I can't get along with my father, or do you have someone else in mind, hmmm?”

“If you're talking about Savannah, don't let your imagination run wild.”

“It's not running wild, dear.” She leaned forward and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. “I've got a pretty clear idea of what's going on, and for the record, I don't approve.”

Hale felt anger rush through him. “What the hell?”

“It's too soon. And this incestuous relationship you have going reminds me too much of your father and grandfather, hanging around Siren Song with their tongues out. It's sick.”

“That's not my relationship with Savvy.”

“Yet.” She picked up her bag, but Hale took it from her. Then he followed her back toward the dining room, where she threw a baleful look at Declan, who declared, “I don't have a son, Janet!”

“Well, Mary had one about nine months after her affair with you. When I learned about her and Preston, I checked. If he wasn't your son, are you saying he was Preston's?”

“I'm not saying anything.
Ack!
”

“Maybe you don't know,” she said tautly, heading for the front door. Before she twisted the knob, she said, “But I think you do.”

 

 

Herman Smythe was tickled pink that a young lady cop had come to see him, and he waved his guest to a chair in his meager room while he sat in a wheelchair. Savvy did as he bade her, though somewhat reluctantly. Her steps had slowed as soon as she was about to enter the building, because she'd wanted to turn around and jump in the car and race to see Hale and the baby. It was precisely her own eagerness to hurry to them, the two men in her life, that got her feet moving again. She was worried about how much it mattered. She needed to get a grip on her own emotions and fast.

And then she'd gotten the call from Detective Hamett, asking her to come in the next day and talk to them about Kristina and Hale St. Cloud.

That was what was preying on her mind now, while Herman was going on about his daughter, Dinah, who came to see him regularly.

“I'm dying, you know,” he said, snapping Savvy's attention back to him. “One of those cancer things.” He shrugged his thin shoulders. “First, it was this kind, and then it was that kind. Dinah has some herbal remedies, but when your number's up, your number's up. So, what did you come to see an old man about?”

“I recently read
A Short History of the Colony
, and I thought I'd like to meet the man who wrote it.”

“You investigating something that involves Siren Song?” he asked keenly, his bushy eyebrows lifting.

“Well, not really . . . I met with Catherine Rutledge, and it reminded me that I'd been meaning to read your book,” Savvy said, stumbling around.

“Ah, Catherine. You know about her sister, Mary, don't you?” He smiled in remembrance. “I should probably be ashamed of it. My ex-wife certainly thought I should, but I was one of Mary's lovers. I think I shared that in the book.”

“You mentioned her sexuality,” Savannah said.

“Mary was something, all right.” He winked at her. “Dinah gets tired of me saying it, but I was quite a swordsman in my day.” While Savvy was wondering how to respond to that, he went on. “Mary got crazy, though. No doubt about it. It just got worse and worse.”

“You say in the book that many of Mary's children never knew who their fathers were.”

“That's right. I think maybe one or two of them's mine, but Mary would never let anyone know. I could get a test now, I suppose, but Catherine keeps those girls locked up pretty tight, and, well, it's just never happened.”

“Catherine told me that Mary put down Declan Bancroft as one of the possible fathers of a son that she named Declan.”

He frowned. “She adopted her sons out.”

“Yes. And one she named Declan.”

“No, I don't remember that.... She did name one Silas, I thought.”

“Silas?”

“I don't remember Declan,” he said, mulling that over. “Someone said that Declan Bancroft was spending a lot of time there for a while. That was after my time. Mary would suddenly be tired of whomever she was with and would just give one of us the boot.” He chuckled. “You always hoped it was some other guy getting kicked out, but it happened to us all eventually.”

“Did you ever interact with the children?”

“Nooo . . . Catherine would never have allowed that, and we didn't want it, either. She finally burned that bunkhouse down, just to get rid of some of those guys who wouldn't leave. Then she locked the gates.”

Savannah remembered the passage about the bunkhouse. “You're sure that was Catherine? You didn't say that in the book.”

“Catherine said, ‘You have to burn them out.' If she didn't do it, she had somebody who did. Not that it was a bad thing, I suppose. Mary was getting crazier, and Catherine wanted a better life for the girls.”

They talked for a few more moments, with Herman reminiscing some more, and then Savvy stood up and said she had to leave.

“You made an old man happy, Detective,” he said, clasping her hand. When she was almost out the door, he said, “Oh! Did I tell you she had a son named Silas?”

“Well, you said you thought so.”

“He wasn't Declan's boy. He was Preston's. Mary always hated Janet Bancroft, and she got her hooks into Janet's husband and woo-wee. . . .” He mock shuddered. “Lucky one of 'em didn't kill the other.”

Well, someone killed Mary, Savvy thought while driving the rest of the way to Hale's. She wasn't sure whether she believed Herman's account that Preston St. Cloud had fathered another son besides Hale. He'd said himself there was no proof about the paternity of most of Mary's children. And she sure as hell wasn't going to lay that one on Hale without proof.

When she got to the St. Cloud house, she saw the outdoor lights had been left on for her. She glanced down at her watch and groaned. She'd told Hale she would come for dinner, and though they hadn't set a time, it was pretty late.

As she pulled into the drive, she noticed Janet's rental was gone, and then she looked over to see Hale coming through the front door. It gave her a warm feeling to think he'd been waiting for her, but then again, maybe he'd been worried.

Savvy stepped out of the car into the faintest of drizzles, the outdoor lights shining in her face. Hale came toward her, a smile of greeting on his face.

“I'm sorry I'm late,” she apologized.

“No set time,” he assured her easily. “Just glad you're here. You need me to bring anything from your car?”

She patted her messenger bag, which was slung over her shoulder. “My pump's in my messenger bag. I'm good.”

“If you want to spend the night, we have more room. Mom left about twenty minutes ago.”

Savvy was surprised. “She just got here.”

“I know. The problem is, she and Declan have a lot of issues that neither of them will let go of.”

They walked along the sidewalk to the front porch together. Being this close to Hale, with the misting rain surrounding them, feeling now more like a soft caress, Savvy tried to hold down her racing heart. She seemed to be infected with a kind of sexual madness herself.

He gazed down at her, and his lips parted, as if he were about to say something.