The Inn (21 page)

“I
told you,” Jack Devlin growled, standing at the front door of the inn, blocking their way, “I won't have you tramping through this place, making us any more notorious around town than we already are.”

Richard Carlson had anticipated this. Calmly, he reached into his jacket pocket and withdrew the court order that he'd just gotten from the judge. After Neville had paid him a visit last night, revealing the ring he'd found on the basement floor—the ring Priscilla Morton never, ever removed from her finger—Richard had made a special request of the judge to issue an immediate warrant for a search of the Blue Boy Inn. He had picked it up this morning, and showed it now to Jack Devlin.

“You'll see that this is a court order signed by a judge,” he told Devlin.

The man's face darkened as he read the document. Behind Richard, Adam Burrell and two other deputies stood ready as backup, in case Devlin resisted. They would arrest him if they needed to.

Jack's dark eyes lifted from the paper to meet Richard's.

“Well, then,” he said, his voice even. “I guess I'll have to let you come in then.”

“Thank you for being reasonable, Mr. Devlin,” Richard told him.

Jack stepped aside to allow the officers to enter the house.

“You two start in the attic,” Richard directed two of his deputies, “while Adam and I will start in the cellar.”

The chief looked around to see that the old caretaker, Zeke, had come into the parlor. Richard did not miss the look he exchanged with Devlin.

“Do you have the bolt cutters?” Richard asked Adam.

“That I do,” the deputy replied, producing them from his pocket.

Richard nodded. With a flashlight showing the way ahead of him, he started down the basement stairs.

The padlock was easily dispatched with the bolt cutters. It fell to the earthen floor with a thud.

Richard opened the old iron door of the ash dump. It creaked in the stillness of the basement. Pointing the beam of the flashlight through the door, he looked inside.

“This thing has been recently cleaned,” he said.

“How can you tell?” Adam asked.

“I can see the marks of whatever sort of brush that was used,” the chief said, snapping photographs of the interior of the chimney. “Wind and condensation would have dissolved them after a few days. But now they're plain as day. This was just cleaned this morning, in my opinion.”

He brought the light closer to the floor of the ash dump.

“But there's still some residue that doesn't look like soot,” he pointed out. “You see?”

Adam peered inside and nodded. “It's a different color,” he offered.

“That it is.” Richard swung the beam of the flashlight out of the ash dump. “When forensics gets here, make sure they take a sample of that stuff.”

“Will do, chief.”

Richard made his way around the rest of the basement. He saw nothing. He was hoping to find something else besides the ring that had belonged to one of the two missing persons. But there was nothing in the basement other than an old chest, which, when Richard opened it, turned out to be completely empty.

He hoped his deputies in the attic were having more luck.

N
eville was steaming mad. He stomped down the stairs behind the two officers who had let him out of his room—
rescued
him, in his opinion! He was bursting to give someone a piece of his mind—and he expected it would be Jack Devlin.

But in the parlor he found the Blue Boy's owner speaking with Police Chief Carlson. Well, that was convenient!

“I want to report an assault!” Neville shouted, rushing into the room and interrupting the two men's conversation.

The chief turned to look at him. Neville noticed the cagey expression that crossed Jack's face.

“An assault?” the chief asked.

“Yes, indeed,” Neville replied. “I consider it an assault to be locked in one's room, unable to get out! What if there had been a fire?”

“You were locked in your room?” the chief inquired, looking from Neville back over at Jack.

Neville nodded. “That I was! I have been trying to get out for the past two hours, banging on the door and calling, but no one came to my assistance until these two officers here.”

“We heard him calling on our way back down from the attic,” one of the two deputies told Carlson.

Jack's face turned compassionate. “Oh, Neville, I'm sorry to hear this. Zeke and I were shoveling snow off the walk and must not have heard you. Annabel is up in Great Barrington with the contractor, so none of us were here to respond. I'm so sorry.”

“There was a key in the lock outside the room!” Neville shrilled. “I was deliberately locked in there!”

“No one here would do such a thing,” Jack assured him.

Neville swung his eyes to Chief Carlson. “He's lying!”

The chief said nothing, just studied both men.

“Look, Neville,” Jack said, trying to sound reasonable, “you must have left your key in the lock last night. The doors are old. Sometimes if you don't remove the key, the door will lock again when it's closed.”

“That's not true, chief,” Neville said. “Someone came into my room while I was sleeping, found the key, and then locked me in there!”

“For what purpose would someone have done this?” Carlson asked.

“I don't know,” Neville admitted. He looked over at Jack. “To be free to hide evidence, perhaps? Or look for it?” He opened his fist, which until now had been tightly clenched at his side. “Were you looking for this, Jack?” Neville asked, revealing Priscilla's ring.

“I don't know what that is,” Jack said calmly.

“The night before Priscilla disappeared,” Neville told the chief, “Jack was putting the moves on her. He was very aggressively getting her drunk. I don't know what happened, because I was too drunk myself.”

The chief's eyebrows lifted. “How come you didn't tell us this before?”

Neville frowned. “I didn't think it had any relevance. But mostly because I didn't want to offend Annabel, who has been very kind to me.”

Jack was smiling. “We all had a little too much to drink. I told you that, chief. But I was certainly not putting the moves on Priscilla, as Neville says. I think he might just be a little jealous because Priscilla clearly was coming on to me.”

Neville saw the way the chief looked at Jack, the deep suspicion in his eyes. “Just like Tammy Morelli was putting the moves on you, too?” He smirked. “Seems every woman who comes into this house gets the Jack Devlin treatment.”

“I don't think that's fair, chief,” Jack told him, looking wounded.

“Look,” Carlson said, turning his attention back to Neville. “You may well have locked yourself in by mistake. There's no way to prove otherwise. I'd just suggest you pack your things and leave. But before you do, I'd like you to come down to the station and give us an amended statement. Tell us everything you left out the first time.”

“Gladly,” Neville sniffed. “I leave tomorrow for England, but I think I'll head down to Hartford this afternoon and stay at a hotel outside the airport tonight.”

“If flights are taking off,” the chief commented, and they all looked up at the window. The snow was coming down heavier now. “We're supposed to be getting a nor'easter tonight.”

“Well,” Neville said, “I'd rather brave snowy roads than spend another night in this place.”

He turned and headed back up the stairs. He could feel Jack's eyes on the back on his head until he was out of sight.

“S
urely, you don't think I'd lock him in his room, do you?” Jack asked Richard once Neville was gone.

“I don't know what to think,” Richard replied. “All I know is . . .”

He was distracted by the sound of people coming through the front door.

“The forensics team is here,” Adam announced.

“What's that for?” Jack asked, his eyes narrowing as he watched Adam direct the two women and one man down the basement stairs.

“Just taking some samples,” Richard told him. “I'm sure you want to find out what happened to Priscilla and Paulie as much as anyone, don't you, Mr. Devlin?”

The man's eyes darkened. “Did you find any sign of them at all? Your men have been crawling all over this place from top to bottom for the last hour.”

“Not yet,” Richard admitted. “But we'll keep looking.”

In his mind, he cursed the snow. It could obscure or obliterate any clues outside. Thankfully, they'd already searched most of the surroundings.

“How much longer will you be here?” Jack asked. “Not that I'm trying to hurry you. I want to be completely cooperative.” He smiled insincerely. “I'm just curious.”

“We'll be out of here in a few minutes, I'd think,” Richard told him. “Just long enough for the team downstairs to scrape a little gunk out of the ash dump.” He smiled. “But the court order allows us to return if need be.”

“I ought to just give you a key to the front door,” Jack said, smirking.

“No, we're happy to knock,” Richard assured him.

One of the two deputies who had searched the attic came up behind the chief. “We did find one thing that we can't account for,” he said.

“What was that?” Richard asked.

The deputy held up a plastic Baggie. Inside was a tampon. Used, slightly pink.

“The old man says he sleeps up there from time to time,” the deputy explained. “But I doubt this is his.”

Richard turned to Jack. “Any ideas?”

Jack sneered. “Well, it certainly isn't mine, either.”

“Have it analyzed,” Richard told the deputy. “See if it matches the DNA we took from Priscilla's hairbrush.”

“Maybe it's my wife's,” Jack offered helpfully, though the insincerity was still evident in his voice. “It looks a little too fresh to have been my grandmother's.”

“When is your wife back?” Richard asked.

“Who knows, with this storm?”

The two men locked eyes for several seconds.

“Okay, chief,” Adam said. “Forensics got what you wanted.”

“All right, then,” Richard said, nodding in Jack's direction. “We'll leave you alone for now, Mr. Devlin.”

“Be careful on those roads,” Jack said, walking with the officers to the door, doing little to disguise his contempt for them. “Looks like it's getting slippery out there.”

F
or the past hour, Annabel had managed the impossible. She had forgotten all about the nightmares back at the inn. Just as she used to do when she was working in New York—on a magazine photo shoot, maybe, or organizing a fashion show—she had focused in, laserlike, on the task at hand. Looking at tiles, comparing paint colors, she allowed herself to shift into creative mode. In her mind, she could see the parlor designed as a sleek, contemporary room, with lots of glass and exposed brick and mirrors on the walls. The kitchen would sparkle with new appliances and the bedrooms would be painted throughout with a soft, comforting blue. The bathrooms would be lined with brilliant Italian tiles.

“I'm really into bringing out the brick,” Annabel said, looking at a sandblaster. “If we offset the brick with some glass and metal . . .”

“Sounds good to me,” Chad agreed. “Maybe even knock some of the brick out and replace it with glass blocks to bring the light through.”

“Oh, excellent idea!” Annabel beamed. “This place will make
Architectural Digest
. I know people there.”

“Here are some of the paint samples you requested,” said a stocky clerk with thick glasses, worn low on his nose.

“I like the blue,” Annabel said, examining them, “but the yellow is a bit too bright. Can you subtle that a little more?”

“Sure thing,” the clerk said, returning to his paint mixer.

“This is so much fun,” Annabel gushed to Chad.

“It's nice to see you smile,” the contractor told her.

Annabel felt herself blush. Chad was awfully sweet, and cute, too. “Well,” she said, “I must admit it feels good to smile.”

At that moment, her phone buzzed in her purse.

It had been so long since her phone had worked—the cell reception at the Blue Boy was the next problem they needed to address—that she almost didn't recognize the sound. She dug the phone out from among the lipsticks and tissue and tampons in her purse. The number was that of the inn. It had to be Jack. Oh, God, what was he going to say?

“Hello?” Annabel said into the phone, walking over to a quiet corner of the store.

“Annabel. It's Neville.”

He was whispering.

“Neville. Is there anything wrong?”

“I had to call you from the house phone because my mobile doesn't work here.” He sounded anxious. “I don't want anyone to hear me.”

“What's wrong?”

“I wanted to let you know I'll be gone by the time you get back. Someone locked me in my room this morning. I expect it was Zeke, on Jack's orders.”

“Why would they do that?”

“Because they were cleaning the house of evidence. I'm sure of it. Chief Carlson was here, searching the place.”

Annabel was stunned. “So he got a warrant?”

“Yes. And he found nothing. That's why I expect Jack and Zeke cleaned things up.”

“The ash dump?”

“They opened it, and it was as dry as a whistle.”

“None of that wet soot?” Annabel asked.

“Nope. Though they did scrape out something from the bottom for analysis, but it wasn't very much.” Annabel could hear Neville shudder at the other end of the line. “I've never been happier to leave a place, no offense to you.”

“None taken.”

“I'm leaving now, heading down to Hartford before the snow gets too bad. Even if my flight's canceled tomorrow and I'm stranded at Bradley Airport overnight, it'll be better than spending another night here.”

“I understand.”

Neville sighed. “I'm supposed to fly to New York to catch a connecting flight to London. Pray that I make the connection. I'll be in touch, Annabel. I may have to return to testify if they find whoever took Priscilla.”

“So you spoke with the chief?”

“I'm heading there now to give him a final statement before I head out.”

“Oh, Neville . . .” Annabel thought she might cry.

“Thank you for your kindness, my dear,” he said, “and good luck with everything.”

“Yes, Neville, good luck to you, too.”

“If you don't mind me saying so,” the Englishman said, “I think there's something very sinister going on in this house. Take care of yourself.”

“I will, Neville.”

“Good-bye.”

“Good-bye.”

Annabel clicked
END
on her phone. She suddenly felt endlessly sad.

“Everything okay?”

She looked up. Chad had approached her.

“I don't know,” she said. “Neville just called to say good-bye. He's leaving. But he told me the police had been by with a warrant and searched the place.”

“Did they find anything?”

“Apparently not,” Annabel replied. “But who knows? They took a sample from the ash dump. Otherwise it was clean.”

“That's odd,” said Chad. “Hard to imagine that thing being very clean after all the chomping I heard in there. Raccoons aren't the neatest eaters.”

“It was clean,” Annabel said, her mind suddenly very far away.

“Look,” Chad said. “The snow is getting heavier. I've put everything on order. We should head back.”

“Yes,” Annabel agreed. “We should.”

The happiness she'd felt just a few moments earlier had now completely evaporated. The idea of going back to that place depressed her thoroughly.

I've got to hold on,
she told herself.
I can't allow myself to fall down into a black hole again. I have to stay clearheaded. Strong. Resist my tendency to hallucinate and catastrophize. I have to keep my head, not lose it.

But Neville's words kept echoing in her mind.

Annabel followed Chad out to his truck.