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Barbara nodded. “That’s good.”
“What I’m saying is…” A hesitation. “When they said they didn’t know about the stuff in the freezer…they were telling the truth.”
Barbara stared at the girl, feeling the sour taste of disappointment at the back of her throat. “But you did?”
“Yeah.” Mayflower’s cheeks flushed. “Kurt Mowlam…before Dan, we had a bit of a thing.”
“Mowlam?”
“No need to sound so shocked.”
“No, it’s just…”
He’s lying dead in the freezer with a stake poking out of his chest.
“I guess he doesn’t seem your type. Go on,” she said.
“A few months ago, Kurt asked if I could do him a favor. Not for free. There’d be some cash in it for me, too.”
“He asked you to store vampyr body parts in your deep freeze?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you know Mowlam was involved in illegal artifact trading?”
“Not when I first met him, but later I found out he was involved with the Helsing League. He showed me some of the stuff he collected.”
“Guess that made him even more exciting, right? Every girl loves a bad boy.”
Mayflower’s eyes flashed. “Actually, no. That’s why I dumped him.”
“But you didn’t inform the authorities?”
“In case you hadn’t noticed, this is a small town. I didn’t want to make trouble for myself.”
“You could have refused his request, though?”
The girl glared at her. “Look, I’m not proud. But we needed the extra cash, okay? This place barely keeps going and, with Dad’s debts, I just thought it would help.”
Barbara nodded. “So, when your parents said the Doc asked them, they lied to protect you.”
“Yeah. They were pretty pissed.”
Barbara thought of something else. “You gave Mowlam a key so he could sneak stuff in and out?”
Mayflower nodded. “I didn’t know he’d shut you in the freezer, okay?”
Barbara was willing to believe her.
“Why are you telling me now?” she asked.
“Because Mom said if all this comes out, if you charge them for keeping vampyr artifacts in the freezer, they’ll lose this place, and I don’t know what they’ll do if that happens.”
Barbara sighed. She was angry with the girl. What Mayflower had done was wrong, sickening. But she had done it to help her parents. Poor people didn’t have as many options as those with a healthy cushion of wealth. As the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. But sometimes, if you cut people a bit of slack, you could keep them from heading all the way down.
“Mowlam pay you in cash?” Barbara asked.
“Yeah.”
