Chapter 11
I RACE INSIDE, LEAN AGAINST THE CLOSED DOOR, AND TRY TO SLOW MY breathing. Sunny is waiting in the foyer. She grabs my arm. “What did you tell the detective?”
I hear Alex’s voice somewhere in the interior of the house, talking on his phone. “Nothing. I don’t know anything, but he must think that someone murdered Simon.” I shake myself out of her grip.
“You think!” Sunny smirks and starts pacing. “This isn’t good. My father doesn’t need this kind of publicity.” She’s dressed in a tight navy pencil skirt and silk blouse, like she’s headed to the office.
“Did the detective talk to you guys?”
She whirls around to face me. “Briefly. We weren’t even here when Simon died.
How could this have happened? He interrogated Ruth and Larry, and Jeffrey.
Aubrey’s called me three times. She said that they have an appointment to talk to the detective in the morning.
” Sunny covers her forehead with her hand. “Christ!”
Alex meets us in the hall, tucking his phone in his pocket. “Let’s sit in the front room.” He herds us out of the foyer and glances out one of the tall windows as if checking that the detective has left before sitting in the armchair near the fireplace. I sit on the sofa, but Sunny keeps pacing.
Alex runs his hand through his dark hair; his eyes settle on me. “What did you tell him, Emma?”
“Not much. I don’t know anything that would help. Who would want to kill Simon?”
He shakes his head. “No one. This has to be a mistake.”
Sunny flops down on a chair. “In any case, there’s bound to be some media attention, Dad. We don’t need that.”
Alex arches an eyebrow. “I wasn’t even here when it happened. How bad could it be?”
Sunny huffs out a breath and pulls her vibrating phone from her pocket. “Here we go.” She stands and walks into Alex’s office, slamming the door behind her.
In the silence, the sound of a bird of prey penetrates the room. My gaze shifts to the window. A hawk swoops along the lake’s edge.
Alex jumps to his feet. “I need to check on Ruth. Be back in a little bit.” I watch him jog down the porch steps and move out of sight.
I don’t want to see Sunny when she emerges from the office, so I head up to my room. I sit on my bed, open my laptop, and pull up my novel. I’ll immerse myself in my story, that has been what I’ve done my whole life. Escape into fiction when the real world becomes too much to handle.
But I sit and stare at the screen, inspiration nowhere in sight.
And I wonder if I should head back to Albany.
But that’s not something I really want to do.
Ben’s there, my mother isn’t. I’ve already said goodbye to my friends at work, off to a new life, a new adventure.
Going back would seem like accepting defeat.
And I want to give my father a chance, and if I get the job in Portland, it will be a new beginning, one I’ve been looking forward to.
There’s nothing for me back in Albany now.
And I won’t let Sunny scare me off. Hopefully, the cops will discover that Simon wasn’t murdered. That his death was a strange accident. I won’t give up on Cheshire Lake yet.
Sunny appears at my open door like a ghost. “It figures Ruth put you in here,” she says.
“What do you mean?”
“This room.” She walks inside, runs her hand over the oak dresser. “It was Mary’s.”
“Well, she’s been gone a long time. I’m sure this room is used for guests, right?”
Sunny’s dark eyes lock on mine. “You’re the only overnight guest we’ve had out here in years. Anyway, I wanted to tell you not to talk to anybody about what happened to Simon. My father’s a public figure, so you don’t say anything to anybody in town or even here. Especially not Noah.”
“Why not Noah?”
“He’s a reporter, Emma. Don’t tell him anything.”
I lean back on my hands. “What could I possibility tell anybody? I was asleep, then Ruth asked me to help look for Simon. Noah and I found him dead on the road.”
“Like I said, don’t get friendly with Noah.
” And I see something in her eyes that makes me think that this is personal and has nothing to do with Noah being a reporter.
“Just watch what you say if you want to stay on my father’s good side.
He’s softhearted and he wants to be nice to you and all but just watch yourself. ”
I stand, pulling myself up to full height, although I’m still three or four inches shorter than Sunny in her stilettos. “I don’t need any warnings from you on how to behave, okay?”
She bats her false eyelashes and turns to leave, then turns back toward me. “Mary died in this room, you know.”
With that, she walks back down the hall, her heels clicking on the hardwood.