Chapter 9
Instead of using the front door, I walk around the paved walkway toward the pool and pool house—where I’m staying for now. Ethan’s made it clear that I can stay in the main house, but there’s so much of Cara there. Especially with everything up for Christmas.
All the ornaments we made over the years—at her direction. Every year she had the girls make one or two handmade ornaments and she included me in that since Fiona was three. We never even did Christmas growing up so she was determined to make memories with her girls and me.
And she did.
Staying in the pool house is easier for my sanity. And I want to set up an investigative board. The closet in the bedroom is perfect for it and the girls won’t see anything either. Because I’m staying here until her murderer is caught. Or dead.
As I reach the gate, I pause at the sound of shouting. The noise is so jarring in this idyllic setting, and yes, I know that’s ironic considering what happened here only days ago.
“I didn’t mean—” That’s Ethan.
“I don’t care what you meant!” Fiona shouts. “It would have been better if you were dead instead of Mom!”
I suck in a deep breath at her cruel words and debate if I should go around and enter the front door instead, but then I hear the slam of a door. Taking a chance, I keep walking around the thick cluster of bushes and open the gate to the pool.
Ethan is sitting at one of the high-top tables that overlook the covered pool instead of at one of the loungers.
“Hey.” I’m hesitant as I approach, still second-guessing myself. “She’s dealing with a lot. She didn’t mean it.”
He shrugs, the action jerky. “I’m pretty sure she did. Because I would choose Cara over me too. So I can’t blame her.” His jaw is tight as he lets his head fall back, his eyes closed. “I’m no good without her,” he finally rasps out.
I’m not sure what to say and think maybe I should just go find Fiona and talk to her. Because even if she’s hurting, she can’t be shouting stuff like that with her sisters so close. There are better ways to deal with anger.
Ethan surprises me by continuing to talk. “When Cara got pregnant with Fiona, she was terrified.” And that’s when I see the drink in front of him and hear the slight slur to his words.
So much for escaping quietly. I step a little closer, but don’t sit down at the table.
“We weren’t even that young. Not really. But she’d planned to finally go to college.”
Yeah, I know all that. She’d held off because she’d stayed home to make sure our mother didn’t kill me from neglect.
“I wasn’t terrified though,” he whispers, as if confessing something.
“I was ecstatic because then it meant she was tied to me forever. And I know that’s shitty but I don’t care.
” He takes a big swig of what looks like bourbon.
Or whiskey. I don’t get close enough to smell it.
“She was so nervous when we first got married, when we moved out here. And part of me loved it because she needed me. Maybe even looked up to me. Then…in the last few years I’m pretty sure she finally realized that she’d married down and not up.
” His words are filled with self-loathing as he mutters to himself about everything being his fault.
“Your fault?” I blurt, unable to stop myself.
He looks at me, blinks a little, then slides off the chair as he stumbles into the house.
Great, he’s actually drunk, not just tipsy. I follow after him, but when he stumbles into the primary suite right off the living room, I hang back. Today is Cara’s memorial so he gets a pass for being drunk, but I’m going to say something to him tomorrow.
And ask him what he meant by “everything is my fault.” What’s everything?
A little alarm bell goes off inside me but I make a note of this instead of jumping to conclusions.
Marriages are hard and…at the end of the day Ethan was truly in love with Cara.
I can’t see him killing her. Maybe that makes me na?ve, but I’m trusting my instinct on this.
If he proves me wrong, I don’t want to think about what I’ll do.
Upstairs I check on all the girls, including Fiona—who has an empty bottle of vodka peeking out from underneath her bed.
Riley and Quinn are in Quinn’s room, sharing a bed and looking impossibly peaceful.
Fiona is passed out in her clothes so I tug her comforter over her and she turns over on her side, looking young and lost.
Sighing, I bend down and pick up the bottle then tuck it away next to her dresser. I’ll toss it later. At least that explains the anger from earlier. Instead of heading to the pool house, I grab a blanket and stretch out in the lounger in her room. I want to be here when she wakes up.
***
“What are you doing here, Aunt Sloane?” Fiona blinks at me as she rasps out the question.
I only woke up half an hour ago, which means I got all of four hours of sleep.
It’s not quite midnight. I’ve already brushed my teeth using a spare, and done a deep-ish dive into Cory Powell on my phone.
I have some of his details, but not nearly enough.
I don’t know Fiona’s password or I’d have borrowed her laptop to search.
“Are you wearing my clothes?” She swings her legs off the side of the bed, but continues to look confused.
“Yeah. I got tired of sleeping in my dress.” Her jeans are a little loose and long, but they’re better than the shitty funeral dress I want to burn.
“But…why are you here?” She looks around the room, her eyes landing on her small clock. It reads 11:54.
“Waiting for you to wake up after that drunken display. Jesus, your mother would be disgusted with you.” I know I shouldn’t say the words.
She’s sixteen and hurting and I know what that feels like, but apparently I’ve got more of my mother in me than I like to admit.
She had a cruel tongue and she wielded it like a blade to anyone who would listen.
Fiona rolls her eyes, but not before I see the pain flickering in them. Yep, I’m an asshole.
“Everything I did disgusted her,” she mutters.
Shock pours through me at the hard words.
“Cara was so proud of you.” I heard it every time we spoke, the pure maternal joy spilling out of her voice.
Even when she was frustrated with her kids, the love was always there.
Cara was the exact opposite of our mother.
“She loved you girls more than you’ll ever know.
” I pause, searching for the right words.
Being the fun auntie is easy; this is not. “And she’d hate to see you drinking.”
“God, I know!” She shoves the covers off, stalks to her closet. “My perfect mom…” Her voice hitches once, then she stops, stepping behind the door.
I walk to her window, look out on the backyard as I hear her moving around in her closet—a closet bigger than the dump we lived in growing up.
And their giant pool is probably bigger than the one we swam in at the community center we used to escape to.
“Your mom wasn’t perfect, but she wanted better for you than we had. ”
“Yeah, right.” Fiona steps out of her closet looking far older than her sixteen years, even having changed into pajamas.
When she was sleeping, years had fallen away, but now with the weight of her mother’s murder on her shoulders, I can see it in her eyes.
Her body language. She’s full of anger and pain and that can be a scary combination.
“She just cared about creating the perfect image, the perfect little family for all her rich friends.”
She looks so much like Cara in this moment that I feel tears sting my eyes. I turn away again, looking out the window onto the covered pool and backyard. I see a shadow by the pool house and my heart rate kicks up slightly.
Ethan is passed out downstairs, and the other two girls are both asleep in their rooms. Each door and window in this house has a little chime that announces when it’s opened so I’ll hear anything, but I don’t like this.
“I’m sorry that you feel that way and I wish you’d had a chance to get to know her the way I do.
” I clear my throat. “I’ve got to run out and handle something.
Can you promise me that you’ll stay here and keep an eye on your sisters?
And set the alarm when I leave?” I’m annoyed with Ethan for getting so drunk and not taking care of his house, his girls.
And I’m even more annoyed that I’m having to ask a sixteen-year-old to take on this kind of responsibility.
Nodding, and looking a little guilty, she says, “Yeah. I’ll go get in bed with them. They love it when I do,” she mutters.
I need to see who’s outside or whatever that shadow was. But more than that, I’m starting to feel suffocated in this room. “Thank you. Your sisters need you right now. Also, you should stop drinking or at least avoid the vodka. It makes the women in our family mean.”
I see the blink of surprise from Fiona and wish I was brave enough to stay and have a real conversation with her, but I stalk out instead, letting the door shut softly behind me.
That’s a conversation for later.