Then who?
And the note on the wall? How did that fit?
What was more frustrating was the fact that Stevie had barely gotten a look at that message on the wall that night. It appeared as she slept. She heard a noise, looked up from her bed, and saw a glowing message. She hadn’t written it down because she had first gone to the window to try to see who did it. Then she’d experienced a massive panic attack and gone to Janelle’s room. After that, she assumed it was a dream—or tried to convince herself it was, because the truth was too creepy. That was a lot of time for her mind to work, to make things up, but maybe she could recover some of it.
She closed her eyes and let her breathing go even and steady. In for four, hold for seven, out for eight. She let thoughts come and go and kept setting her attention back on the breathing. After several minutes, she opened her eyes a bit and focused on the wall where the message had been, where the sticky notes now were. This blank, unassuming stretch. What had been there?
She resisted the urge to get up and move around. Breathe. In and out. What had she seen that night? It was there, hints of it, somewhere in her mind, like a trace of perfume on the wind. What had it looked like?
Cutout letters, ransom-note style, like the Truly Devious letter.
Be more specific, Stevie. How did they look?
Glowing. Large. Some in focus, some not. The light in the window was coming in from an angle, stretching itself, landing on that bit of wall next to the fireplace.
Riddle, riddle, on the wall . . .
Yes, that was the first line. It was easy to remember. This much, she was sure of.
But what happened from there? It had rhymed. It was something with murder. Something murder.
There were images in the message. Bodies. Something about a body in a field. That made sense. A reference to Dottie, who was found half-buried in a bit of farmland. A body in a field . . .
Her mind made noises, tried to lure her this way and that, but she stayed with the bodies. There had been another. A second body. It had to be Iris’s, as Iris was the only other body. Yes . . . a lake. A mention of Iris. Something about a lady in a lake.
Now the picture began to assemble itself a bit more clearly. Those cutout letters took on a bit more definition. Murder. Bodies. The message was eerily playful. Something about playing.
Alice, Alice . . .
Alice?
Alice. It had mentioned Alice. By name. What about Alice, she could not recall. But Alice’s name was there.
Stevie let her eyes come back into focus and let the meditation go. The light made halos around all the objects in the room as her pupils adjusted. She tucked up her knees and, in doing so, took a better look at herself. She really did need to change. She couldn’t go on like this, grabbing clothes off the floor. Maybe a shower would jog her mind into action. She grabbed her bath caddy and dragged herself across the hall, where she slumped against the queasy salmon-colored tiles and let the water run over her, flattening her short hair to her head. She remembered meeting Ellie in the shower once. Ellie walked around proudly naked.
Ellie. Ellie, I’m sorry.
Why was she thinking that? She hadn’t hurt Ellie. All she had done was tell the truth about who wrote Hayes’s show. But Ellie was gone now. And Hayes. And Fenton. It suddenly didn’t seem to matter that she may have put together the pieces of the great Ellingham case. There was something happening right here, right now. Hayes, Ellie, and Fenton—they were linked together somehow. All were dead. Larry was afraid for her.
There was a murderer here.
She wondered if she was afraid. She asked herself the question, and it was surprisingly quiet on the subject.
She turned off the water and let herself shiver, let herself feel.
That message on the wall was someone telling her something. Someone wanted to play with her. So all right. She would play. Maybe she was anxious. Maybe she was untrained. But Stevie Bell knew one thing about herself—once she had bitten in, tasted the mystery—she would not let go. She had gotten herself to this mountain. She could do this. After all, people were doing this all the time now. Citizen detectives, working on cases online, at home, alone and in groups.
She hurried back to her room, and, despite what she had just been thinking about not picking clothes up off the floor, she picked up a pair of sweatpants from the corner of the room. These were pretty clean. Ellingham did your laundry, but you had to put it in labeled bags. Stevie had not been paying enough attention to do that. She made sure to put on an extra thick coat of deodorant. She would smell good, at least. Her hair was now finger-length, sharp blond strands, crisp as wheat. The off-the-shelf bleach was strong stuff. She messed it around with her hands until it landed in basically the right position.
Now she was focused. Now she could . . .
Her phone rang. The number was blocked.
“You were in town today.”
The voice wound around her like a snake. It warmed her and chilled her at the same time. It was so close it seemed to come from inside herself.
“Where the hell are you?” she replied.
“So we got the hellos out of the way.” Just the sound of David’s voice was all Stevie needed to conjure David in his entirety—his curling dark hair, his slightly peaked brows, his ropy, muscled arms, his tattered T-shirts and sagging Yale sweatpants, the busted-up Rolex on his wrist. This reprobate rich boy—the kind of person she thought she would never be able to stand—strange and difficult and maybe a bit self-pitying. Someone who didn’t care what the world thought. Someone funny. Someone dangerous.
“You didn’t answer my question,” she said, trying to sound even, almost bored, instead of breathless.
“On vacation,” he said. “Working on my tan. Doing that thing where you surf with a dog wearing sunglasses.”
“David,” she said. Even saying the name was hard. It exploded from her mouth. “What is happening? Why did you get yourself beaten up? Are you going to tell me?”
“No.”
“No?”
“Are you worried about me?” She could hear the smile in his voice, and it both enticed and enraged her.
“No,” she said.
“Liar. You are. You are worried about me and my beautiful face. I can understand that. The face is healing. The beating wasn’t as bad as it looked. I smeared the blood around.”
“What do you want?” she said, her heart racing. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on? Or did you call just to be a dick?”
“The second one.”
“Seriously . . .”
“Something I should have done a long time ago,” he replied. “All further questions should be sent in writing to my lawyer.”
Stevie rolled her gaze to the ceiling. To her surprise, tears were forming in her eyes. Of course he was not coming back. Her whole body flooded with feeling. He was the first person she had ever kissed and done . . . other things with. Right here on this floor.
“How did you know I was in town?” she said, coughing out the emotion. “Bathsheba?”
“I have eyes and ears everywhere. I heard about your professor too. Bad shit.”
“Yeah,” she said. “Bad shit.”
“Her house burned down?”
“She left the gas on and lit a cigarette.”
“Jesus,” he said. “A lot of bad things are happening.”