Chapter Twenty-Six
Twenty-Six
The terrace shimmered with midday heat, the kind that made your limbs feel syrupy and your thoughts slow. A dragonfly hovered low over the shimmering pool water, beguiled by its own reflection and darting after unseen insects.
One by one, the guests drifted out to the sun loungers.
“Shame to waste this lovely weather,” Francesca said a touch guiltily.
“May as well sit outside as in, I suppose.” Sylvie settled herself on a lounger, her face tipped up to the sun.
Baxter had prepared jugs of cucumber iced water, condensation sweating on the glasses as he carried them out to the pool.
He was still making sense of his discovery at breakfast and had tasked Red—who was clearly more au fait with technology than he was—with investigating further.
From whose device had that track come from?
He went in search of her, finding her making up Sylvie’s bed with surprisingly neat corners. “Any luck with the sound system?”
“Every time I go near it, someone comes in.” She straightened.
“And Miriam keeps giving me jobs to do; I’ve never worked so hard in my life.
” Despite her complaints, there was a color in her cheeks that hadn’t been there before, and Baxter thought he detected a note of pride as she surveyed the pristinely made bed.
“I found something while doing the laundry though.” Glancing toward the door, she reached into her pocket. “Hold out your hand.”
Baxter did as he was told.
Red dropped four tiny screws into his palm. “They fit the handrail; I’ve checked.”
“Where were they?”
“In Sylvie’s laundry basket, in the pocket of a pair of shorts.” Red indicated the en suite. “There’s a body lotion in her bathroom. See if it smells the same as whatever was on the stairs.”
As Baxter crossed the bedroom, he realized it had been a long while since he’d worked alongside someone like this.
He often had a team, of course—Thierry and Miriam, or their equivalents—but as the butler, Baxter stood slightly apart from the other domestics.
He was the head of the household; it wouldn’t do to fraternize too closely with the staff.
Or perhaps, he thought suddenly, that was simply a choice he had always made.
Sylvie’s body lotion was by Jo Malone, a pear and freesia blend that reminded Baxter of childhood summers in the country.
He rubbed a little into the back of his hand and inhaled the scent, but it was softer and less astringent than whatever had sent him crashing down the stairs.
Baxter had felt certain Miriam and Thierry were behind the break-in, but Sylvie’s motive for killing Alec was far stronger …
Could it have been her who sabotaged the stairs and sent him crashing to the floor?
When Baxter returned to the pool to check on the guests, Jade was misting her legs with sun protection. “Carter, will you do my back?” She had dragged two sunbeds closer to the pool, angled in what felt like a deliberate way away from the others.
“Shout if you need a hand, mate.” Damian grinned, ignoring the death stare from his wife.
Sylvie laughed. “You’re so naughty.”
“I always think there’s a fine line,” Jade said, her tone loaded, “between ‘naughty’ and ‘sleazy, offensive, and borderline criminal.’”
“Steady on.” Damian sat up, his brows knitting together. “Just because you can’t take a joke, doesn’t make me a—”
“A joke’s supposed to be funny.” Jade threw the sun lotion on her lounger. “Whereas everything that comes out of your mouth is misogynistic or disgusting, or both. I don’t know how you manage to keep hold of one woman …” She left a beat, her eyes flicking to Sylvie. “Let alone two.”
There was a devastating silence.
“Wh—what are you talking about?” Damian spluttered.
Francesca turned to look at Sylvie, then Damian, then Sylvie again. Her lips slowly parted as the truth dawned on her.
“Mum?” Carter looked confused. “What’s going on?”
Before anyone could answer, Kaitlyn appeared. She was wearing a voluminous white dress over a neon pink bikini, and both her hands were clasped around a large mug.
“How’s the morning sickness?” Sylvie asked, clearly relieved to be presented with a diversion.
“Morning sickness, my arse,” muttered Carter loudly enough for everyone to hear.
Kaitlyn looked like she might bolt, but instead she held up her mug as though this alone would prove she was pregnant. “Miriam made me a ginger tea.”
Baxter felt a dart of alarm. It wasn’t Miriam’s job to fetch drinks for the guests. What if she had slipped something in Kaitlyn’s tea?
“How could you?” Francesca stared open-mouthed at Damian. “And with my best friend!”
Baxter walked smoothly toward Kaitlyn. “I’ll take your drink to a lounger for you.” As he took the mug, he made a show of looking inside. “Dear, dear, dear … A fly seems to have drowned itself in your drink—let me get you a fresh one.”
“I’ll just fish it out.”
“I insist. You can’t be too careful …” Baxter paused. “In your condition.” They locked eyes, then Kaitlyn slid her gaze away.
“This is absurd.” Carter walked toward them. “The game’s up, Kaitlyn. We know you’re not pregnant.”
“I—”
“What was the scam? Get as much money out of Dad as possible before pretending to lose the baby?”
The deep flush on Kaitlyn’s face suggested Carter was bang on the money.
Sylvie’s sun lounger scraped against stone as she leaped to her feet. “You convinced him to change his will, didn’t you, you little gold digger? I’ve seen the draft— You can’t deny it.”
“Talk about people in glass houses!” Francesca rounded on Sylvie. “What exactly was it that interested you in my millionaire husband? Because let’s face it, we both know it wasn’t his dick.” She hooked her little finger and wiggled it in the air.
“I knew it!” Jade burst out laughing. “Small dick energy, right there.”
Things were deteriorating rapidly. Baxter was in such a hurry to get rid of what may very well be a doctored ginger tea, that he wasn’t looking where he was going.
As he passed Jade, his foot slipped on a thin film of suntan oil, and for the second time that day, he flew through the air, landing on the ground with an impressive crash.
Kaitlyn’s mug shattered into a hundred pieces.
“What on earth are you doing down there?” Damian said as though it had been entirely Baxter’s choice to sprawl in such an undignified manner, drenched in hot tea.
Baxter didn’t immediately get up. Partly because he was really very sore, but mostly because the slick patch he had skidded on had the same sharp floral scent he had been trying to identify all morning.
The stairs had been greased with suntan oil.