Chapter 45
Chapter Forty-Five
Harriet
“Hold on, you’re going to what?” Josie gawks at me.
“I know it sounds kind of weird.”
“Kind of? When I said you should move out of that antique store, I was imagining… oh, I don’t know, a fabulous condo on the river? Or maybe one of those cute little cottages up by the music conservatory?”
“I know.” I sip my champagne cocktail. It’s three days after Bo “disappeared” and we’re just catching up.
“But to move into Kingston Manor with your boss?”
“I’ll have my own entire wing.”
“Dude.”
“My bedroom will be in a turret. And there’s a lavish sitting room all my own, a state-of-the-art office, and a porch with a great place to grow flowers.”
This is how Gregor described it. I haven’t seen my supposed wing yet, but it’s not like I can say no to moving into Kingston Manor at this point.
Josie is just shaking her head.
“It’ll be amazing! Liz the monstera will have plenty of room to grow weirdly huge, and the quiet there is incredible. Also, there’s a massive library in that place. It would completely blow your mind. The central turret spirals three stories high with books. It’s unbelievable.”
Josie regards me suspiciously. As well she should.
The truth is, I don’t want to leave Mom and Granabelle. And if I decided to leave of my own accord, it wouldn’t be to move into a windswept gothic mansion on a hill because if I don’t, a murderous vampire will start killing my friends, family, and neighbors.
“It’s so beautiful and luxurious.”
“You’re not a luxury girl,” Josie says.
“Maybe I’ve come to like a little luxury.”
“Don’t bullshit me,” she says. “You quit your job to work with this guy, and now you’re going to be living with him? You’re not into him, are you?”
“Not in the least,” I say.
Josie positions the base of her cocktail glass in the very center of her napkin, pondering.
I’ve been dreading this conversation. Josie is too smart, and she knows me too well.
“It took you five months and three spreadsheets just to change your brand of multivitamin, but now you’re suddenly moving up there for no apparent reason?”
“There are reasons. For example, it’s really convenient when you’re managing a massive worldwide empire to run it from somewhere like that, where you can hop on with Brussels from a state-of-the-art office before breakfast.”
“You can hop on with Brussels from your laptop at Berky’s.”
“Not like I can at Kingston Manor.” I grab a breadstick and swipe it through the artichoke dip. “Look, this is the choice that I made, and you need to respect it.” I stuff it in my mouth, chewing with determination.
She watches me, unconvinced.
“You need to respect it,” I repeat with more conviction than I feel.
She looks away.
“Is that a no?” I ask.
“Harriet,” she says in a small voice, “I just don’t want to lose you.”
“I’m not going anywhere. I’m still in Ashwood. We’re still neighbors.”
“It’s not the physical distance,” she says. “I feel like I don’t know your mind right now. Or your heart. What you are doing makes no sense.”
“You know my heart—you know you do. And my mind.”
She shakes her head. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”
I grab another breadstick, but I don’t eat this one. I just focus on it, trying to think of what to say.
I’m not ready to tell her the truth. I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready.
“I promise you—you will understand. And in the meantime, after I get settled, I’m going to have you over for a fabulous dinner in my new digs, and you’ll be so jealous.”
“I guess I wouldn’t mind seeing that library.”
“There’s the spirit!” I say.
I ask her about Angus, and she fills me in on his new fire truck phase.
We’re acting as if.
It’s the best we can do right now.
“Also, I think congratulations are in order.” She lifts her glass. “To the one very brilliant and amazing person who called it on the wedding accidents.”
“Thank you!” We clink glasses.
After Bo didn’t show up for work, Valerie went to his home, looking for him. She discovered a room decorated with the accident photos he had taken, displayed like museum pieces.
They discovered a workshop in his garage where he made all of the little devices that helped him stage the accidents.
They found his research, too, on how to use chemicals to create metal fatigue that mimics rust, and use lye to weaken wood supports.
They found a 3D printer and plans for a tiny heating device that could be stuck under a table holding a cake.
And there were prototypes for the hydraulic device used in the grand stairway collapse that killed the deputy mayor.
They also found a “Manny” disguise—a cap, wig, and dark glasses, and even a selection of clothes. The going theory is that Bo worked some weddings as Manny in order to throw off suspicion, just in case somebody noticed he was present at all of the weddings where there were accidents.
Valerie has been telling people that she thinks Bo staged the accidents as a twisted way of seeking authentic moments.
When I heard she was saying that, I remembered the cynical way he talked about people he’d photograph for weddings, how they’d “pretend to feel emotions they didn’t feel” and so on. How even Whitney had stopped recommending him because of how jaded he was.
At any rate, Maverick and his team were able to pin every single one of the wedding accidents on Bo.
There was nothing in the news about anything amiss in the photography studio. No traces of blood, no signs of a struggle.
No drained body.
What happened? Did Alexandru spirit it away? Did Gregor come and help?
Valerie has taken over managing duties at the studio. Perhaps she’ll purge the archives of Roy’s obnoxious foot photos. Or maybe she’ll talk to him about it.
Some people say Bo disappeared to Rio de Janeiro, because he had vacationed there some years back. Others think he went to Qatar or maybe the Philippines.
Apparently, he’s also in the national “Most Wanted” databases.
I haven’t seen Alexandru since that night.
Since Bo.
Since the palm kiss.
Sometimes I tell myself I’m making too big a deal of it. Alexandru kissed my grandmother’s hand after all. Yes, he kissed my palm instead of the back of it, but it’s still the hand.
It changes nothing. He’s a monster, and I’m managing the situation the best I can.
Maverick Cooper came by our store on Saturday to apologize for ridiculing my theory.
“I should’ve known if you were saying it, it wouldn’t be bullshit,” he said. “I should’ve looked at it harder.”
“Well, it was outrageous,” I said to him. “Kind of unbelievable.”
“No, I should’ve had an open mind,” he said. And then Granabelle wandered up and asked him about his grandmother and cajoled him into buying a paperweight in the shape of a lighthouse, and that was that.
A small package came for me that day. Inside was a key, a remote control for the gate, and Alexandru’s calling card. Written in heavy scrawl above his name were two words.
It’s time.
“Oh, hey, I forgot to tell you the new city council gossip!” Josie says.
I lean in. “Spill!”
Josie smiles. “I found out why the mayor flip-flopped on Harlan’s horrible park-ruining development.”
“What? I haven’t even been following. There was another vote, and the mayor changed his mind?”
“Yeah.” Josie leans back. “That vote was the day before the news about Bo came out, and to everybody’s utter shock, the mayor lobbied for Harlan, and it was on the verge of passing.”
“No!” I say.
“Right? They had to take a recess to do some stuff to finalize the zoning, but it was all but done. Then, just yesterday, the mayor called an emergency session to change his vote back to ‘no.’ He got all the people he had strong-armed to change their votes back to ‘no,’ too. He made sure that Harlan’s proposal got killed. ”
“That’s a pretty massive about-face.”
“No kidding, right? What changed, you might ask?” Josie holds up a fork.
“What changed is that everyone found out Bo was behind the staircase collapse murder. Because, as it turns out, the mayor thought Harlan was the one behind it, and he was scared out of his mind that Harlan would kill him, too.”
“He thought Harlan engineered the stairway collapse?”
“Yes. The mayor literally thought Harlan killed his deputy and might kill him due to their opposition to the project, so he changed his vote. Out of fear! But luckily, the news about Bo came out in time, before things got finalized.”
“Thank goodness! It’s weird that the mayor would assume Harlan was the one who did it.”
Josie’s eyes sparkle. “I got it from a good source that Harlan actively said things to imply he was responsible for it. Little comments here and there, sort of like, ‘Shame about that collapse. Just a couple more accidents to go…’”
I sit up, shocked. “Harlan was trying to take credit for the stairs to scare the mayor into voting his way?”
“Yup! And it almost worked!”
“Whoa.”
“That guy is the worst. They’re both the worst.” Josie goes on about the cowardice of the mayor and the awfulness of Harlan.
Meanwhile, a few more pieces come together in my mind.
The mayor must’ve said something to the police about Harlan’s vague threats, and that’s why Alexandru sensed that Maverick had suspicions about Harlan.
I push the plate toward Josie. “Last bit is yours.”
“Don’t mind if I do.”
“You will be such a better mayor,” I say to her. “I can’t wait.”
She grins. “I know, right?”
We always talk about when Josie will become mayor, not if. She’s just biding her time for now. Gathering allies. Waiting for the right moment.
We still don’t have answers about the gunman who shot Alexandru during that mugging.
Who sent him?
Alexandru says that Bo was telling the truth when he said he didn’t send the gunman.
I agree. Bo’s words had a ring of truth to them. Also, why would Bo deny sending a gunman after us when he’d already basically confessed to two murders?
Which leaves the question: Who did send the gunman? Harlan?
Did Harlan think that mugging us and taking my tablet would slow down the investigation? Maybe buy him enough time to get that project passed?
It makes a little bit of sense, I guess. Not a lot of sense, though.
Could it have been some random mugger who picked the worst victim ever?
Either way, the man shot Alexandru right in the face—three times—and Alexandru is currently walking around fresh as a daisy.
That’s got to raise an eyebrow or two to whoever was involved.
Did the gunman chalk it up to hallucinations? Or does he think that Alexandru is some kind of supernatural being?
Did he tell the person who hired him what happened? Did he tell anybody else?
Though when you think about it, a tale that features you shooting a person in the face three times is probably not one that you’d tell just anybody.
Rita comes by just then with a plate of cheesecake slices. It’s a new dessert she’s developing in the kitchen—salted caramel pretzel cheesecake.
“We’ll test!” Josie moves over so her mom can sit down, and we dig in.