Again I felt along the wall for the light I knew must be there. Tim reached for my arm, and this time he caught it.
“That scene up there?” He nodded at the house and water flew from his hair in a perfect arc. “That was not okay. Pulling a weapon on a witness? Walking out on a roomful of volatile people? You need to tell me what’s going on with you, Shana, or you’re going to get us both killed.”
I was shaking so hard my teeth hurt. Tim unbuttoned his shirt, pulled it off to reveal a white undershirt, and handed it to me. Robotically, I slipped in my arms and folded the shirt over my bare chest. Even sopping wet, it was warm against my skin.
“Tell me what’s going on. You owe me that. And if you still want to leave afterward,” he said, “I’ll take you back to shore myself.”
Tim Wellington stepped past me into the doorway of the boathouse. I knew what he was doing. Setting my flight into motion was his way of proving I could trust him on his word. But he didn’t understand what he was asking of me.
With no effort at all, Tim located the switch I’d failed to find and the interior of the barnlike building was bathed in light. All the while he held my gaze. That meant I was first to see what lay beyond him in the slips. He watched in confusion as my face twisted in horror. Only then did he turn around to see it for himself.
The boathouse was empty. Our police boat, and the Sinclairs’ skiff, were gone.
Tim thrust his hair out of his eyes. “What the . . . did you—”
“No! So who . . .” Under my skin my blood felt like water, fast flowing and cold. “Someone was here, on the island. The trapper?”
Tim’s eyes darted from the hydraulic door to the brass cleats on the decking. Norton had used them to tie up both boats earlier. Now they were bare. “No. The door’s closed. Norton said there’s no remote. Someone opened it from the inside, and closed it the same way. Whoever got rid of the boats was already here on the island.”
All day long we’d been stranded on Tern, but this? This was different. A deliberate attempt to rob us of what little power we had. To trap us all. And here we stood while our suspects wandered freely out of sight.
In unison, we turned our wet and sallow faces to the hill.
TWENTY-THREE
Tim took the stairs at a run, and I followed. Halfway up, I slipped and cracked my kneecap against a stone tread, but I got back to my feet and, muddy and sore, limped after him. I tried not to dwell on where we were going, or that there was no chance of escape. No time for those thoughts now.
When we got to the porch, Tim stopped. The front door stood wide open, the hall empty. The entryway floor was plastered with wet leaves, and the mess almost felt like as much of an affront as the bloodstains on Jasper’s bedsheets. Like the people inside it, the house’s pretense of perfection was in ruin.
The scream reached me in stages, carried by the wind. This time when I drew my gun the act was deliberate. I had no qualms about putting my finger on the trigger, or the pain it caused. Tim motioned with his weapon, and I shadowed him down the hall.
The house was eerily silent. Tim made for the library while I went right, to the parlor. That’s where I found Flynn.
Twenty minutes. That’s how long we were gone. In that time someone had thrown another log on the fire and Flynn had positioned himself next to it with a glass of scotch, now nearly empty, in his hand. He was shirtless, his hairy chest on display, and I could see the bandage on his upper arm was soaked with blood. Somehow he’d managed to secure a cigarette. Maybe he bummed it from Jade. It was tucked neatly behind his ear. He was alone.
Flynn looked up with a start. He eyeballed my shirt—Tim’s shirt—and the mud on my pants, and his expression darkened. Even with my weapon drawn, Flynn made me wary. All the things he’d done to Jasper were fresh in my mind—and what had Jasper done to deserve them? I’d planned to be long gone by now, halfway to the mainland. Instead I was face-to-face with a man who was hemorrhaging from a hole I’d put in his arm.
“Been working hard to find my brother, I see.” I could hear both innuendo and the onset of a drunken slur in Flynn’s voice.
“Someone screamed. What happened?”
“Is that right?” He reached for the bottle and topped off his drink, never breaking eye contact. “Didn’t notice. I’ve been sitting here all this time. Thinking of you.”
I felt my insides spasm. Flynn’s eyes glittered black as he held my gaze. The lights in the parlor flickered.
“Shana.”
I startled at the sound of Tim’s voice. “Did you see that?” I said. I was worried my eyes were playing tricks on me again, but Tim gave a stern nod. Above our heads, a floorboard creaked. Tim looked up at the ceiling.
“Upstairs,” he said; then to Flynn, “Stay here.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” Flynn said as he glared at Tim in his damp undershirt. “I can promise you that.”
I led the way out of the parlor and into the hall, where we ran into Norton coming out of the kitchen. “What’s going on?” he said anxiously. “I thought I heard a scream.” There was a dish towel slung over his shoulder and he smelled of raw garlic and lemon. Not even Flynn’s gunshot wound could stop this man from doing his duty for Camilla Sinclair.
“Wait here,” Tim said, and by the look on Norton’s face he was more than happy to oblige. The treads of the stairs groaned under our boots as we ascended. Halfway up, Tim’s eyebrows rose. Bebe Sinclair’s face stared down at us from the second-floor landing.
“Thank God you’re back,” she said, a long pearl necklace dangling from her throat into the abyss. I hadn’t noticed that necklace before, and as we continued to climb I saw she had pearl earrings to match. She’d changed the rest of her outfit, too. Now she wore a tight black skirt and matching mohair sweater. Her mourning clothes. “You,” she growled at me. “You’ll pay for what you did to my brother.”
“We heard a scream,” Tim said. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing good,” Bebe replied. “As usual.”
Miles and Jade were in the second-floor hallway, near the room I’d identified earlier as a bathroom. Jade had her face buried in his chest. The bathroom door stood ajar and a light was on inside, but father and daughter blocked my view.
“You better take a look in there,” said Miles. He’d put on a fresh dress shirt he hadn’t had time to button, along with a tweed sport jacket. “It was Ned who found her, just a minute ago.”
My stomach clenched. Who was missing? Camilla. Camilla and . . .
“Out of the way.” Tim gestured for them to move, and at the sight of our weapons they took a step back. We had a clear path.