An hour passed before things calmed down enough for Bonnie to leave Andi and Tony in charge and take a break. She headed around the bar, a beer in one hand, and motioned for Harper to follow.
By then, the dance floor was mostly empty, although a crowd lingered at the tables around the edges.
The bar still looked very much like the library it had once been. The walls were covered in old bookshelves, filled with a free lending library of well-thumbed paperbacks and textbooks. The old reading rooms, reached through arched doorways, were dubbed Poetry, Prose, and Pool, respectively. Pool and Poetry were both occupied, so the two of them settled on the faux-leather couches in Prose, where the smudged white walls were painted with the opening lines of famous novels in inky black.
Bonnie propped one foot up on the scarred coffee table and studied her. “So, how’s it going? Are things getting any better out there?”
Harper wished more than anything that she had good news.
“There’s nothing new,” she admitted. “Sometimes I feel like I’m hiding from a ghost.”
“Nothing at all from that guy who called you?” Bonnie asked.
Harper shook her head. “Not a peep.”
Bonnie took a ruminative sip of beer, and then unexpectedly asked, “What if he’s dead?”
Harper blinked. “Excuse me?”
“Seriously.” Bonnie eyed her steadily. “What if since that guy told you someone wanted to kill you, one or both of them died? You’d never know. You’d just be hiding in the middle of nowhere forever, waiting for a dead man to call.”
In the long hours staring at the driveway, Harper had considered this possibility more than once. After all, there’d only been the one phone call. What if he was dead?
It couldn’t be true. Surely if he was dead someone would tell her. She’d know.
Besides, every word the caller had said was seared on her mind as if it had been written with a blade: “The person who killed your mother is looking for you. He’s been in prison for a long time and he’s about to get out. And he’s going to come for you.”
“I don’t know,” she said, after a long pause. “I trust my gut. And my gut says lay low. I need to keep digging. He’s out there somewhere. And if he won’t come to me, I need to find him. Somehow.”
She knew how unconvincing that sounded, but Bonnie knew her well enough not to argue. “Well, you do what you have to,” she said, tactfully. “I just miss normal you, you know? Coming in here all the time. Talking about crime.”
Harper gave her a melancholy smile. “I miss normal me, too. More than you know.”
In the main bar, the music changed to a soulful song. The singer’s voice reminded her of the story that had filled her day.
“Oh, I almost forgot to tell you,” she said. “That singer, Xavier Rayne. He disappeared today.”
Bonnie, who’d been about to take a sip from her beer, stopped with the bottle midway to her lips. “What do you mean ‘disappeared’?”
“He walked out of his house in the middle of the night and never came back.”
“Well, shit.” Bonnie looked shocked. “What do they think happened? Is it drugs? It’s usually drugs.” Before Harper could reply, she added, “Did you know I met him once? At SCAD. He was thinking about enrolling. Came up for a tour. But then he got into Juilliard, and that was the end of that.”
Bonnie was an artist, supporting herself by bartending and teaching at the Savannah College of Art and Design, or SCAD as everyone called it.
“I didn’t know that. What was he like?” Harper asked.
“Beautiful,” Bonnie said. “And so soft-spoken I had to lean close to hear him but, man, did he have a powerful presence. He walked into a room and everyone looked up—he’s that kind of a guy. Gorgeous eyes. Kind of amber. And my God. That new album. Have you heard it?”
Harper shook her head. She’d meant to listen to it but she hadn’t had time today. DJ had been the one writing about his music, anyway.
Setting the beer down, Bonnie jumped to her feet. “Wait here.”
She ran into the main bar. A minute later, the song cut off in midverse. After a few seconds, a new, fast-driving tune filled the air. A distinctive melody, led by keyboard and guitar. A low, smooth voice flowed over it, weaving through the chords, rising high and then sinking to sudden, shivering lows.
Bonnie returned and dropped back into her seat. “Just listen to that.” She reached for the bottle. “What a talent.”
A beautiful female voice rose behind his on the chorus, and Harper guessed it had to be Allegra’s. The two voices together were pure gold. She could see why everyone was obsessed with this album.
It was hypnotic and chilling—a musical cry of pain.
From the speakers, Xavier Rayne’s voice growled, “Revolver Road, don’t take me down Revolver Road…”
7
The next morning, Harper’s phone rang just after nine. She woke to find herself lying on top of the bed with her clothes from the night before still on, her legs tangled in a blanket. Zuzu was sound asleep beside her, curved into a perfect silver-gray circle.
It was Baxter, who sounded like she either hadn’t slept at all or had injected herself with amphetamine. “Get yourself over to the Rayne house,” she barked. “The story’s out and Channel Five is going to make a beeline for the place. Be there first.”
Her eyes still closed, Harper mumbled, “On my way.”
This must not have been convincing, because Baxter added sharply, “Make them your friends before ten o’clock this morning, McClain. That’s an order.”
Grumbling, Harper dragged herself out of bed. It had been nearly three in the morning when she got home, and it had taken a couple of hours to get to sleep.
A shower and a quick cup of coffee woke her up, though. And soon, she was in the car.
Despite Baxter’s urgency, she made two stops on the way to the musician’s mansion. The first was at the Tybee PD headquarters. “I’ve got nothing new,” the harried receptionist told her breathlessly as the phone on her desk rang unanswered. “The boats went out again just after seven. I must have said that twenty times already today.” She gave a nervous giggle. “Reporters are calling from all over. I just had a call from New York!”
Baxter was right. The media had found out about Xavier Rayne.
When she pulled up on Admiral’s Row a short while later, she was relieved to see no media circus had assembled yet outside the row of grand, columned houses. Everything was cool and quiet. Yesterday’s rain had passed, but the skies remained gray. The only sound came from the seabirds that wheeled overhead, their mournful cries rising above the breeze as she got out of the car and grabbed a tray holding four cardboard cups and a bag of warm doughnuts from the passenger seat.
It was the oldest trick in the world. But the old ones are the best.
When she climbed the front steps, she observed no signs of life. The huge windows were sealed tight, all the curtains closed. If she didn’t know better she’d think the house was empty—locked up for the season.
She tucked the bag under her arm and knocked briskly on the door.