Page 53 of The Dearly Departed

Ike looked like that sometimes, but I was able to reel him in.

Who reeled Benjamin in?

Did anyone?

Virginia folded her hands in her lap and sat up straight as she asked, “Will you be moving in with him?”

“Um … honestly, I hadn’t really thought about it,” Analise replied.

It was impossible to miss the change in her voice. The subtle difference in volume. The clipped edge to her tone. She didn’t want to talk about this—at least not now. Maybe ever.

“Well, I wasn’t expecting you’d move in with him right away,” Virginia amended, her eyes blinking rapidly. “But I assumed it would be on the horizon. Sooner rather than later, yes?”

Analise faltered for a moment before nodding as she dabbed a cloth napkin along her lips. “Well … I mean, of course. But … it just …” She swallowed and laid the napkin on her lap. “It feels very … early to be considering things like living together. We barely know each other. It—”

“What are you talking about?” Benjamin interrupted incredulously. “We know things about each other.”

“And, sweetheart,” Gerald’s prim and proper wife began with a humoring smile, “it’s like … well, look at Gerry and me.” She laid a hand against Gerald’s shoulder. “We were together for—how long before we were married?”

Gerald hastily swallowed a heaping spoonful of lumpy soup before replying, “Two months.”

Two months.

It had taken him just two months to secure his spot in this cushy life.

It was almost impressive.

How the hell had he managed that?

“That’s right. Two months. And as you get older, sweetheart, you need less time to know these things. And you and Benjamin, well—"

“It just makes sense,” Benjamin finished for her as he wrapped his arm around Analise’s shoulders. “Right, baby?”

“But nothing has to happen right away,” Virginia quickly threw in, smiling reassuringly toward Analise. “You have time.”

After that moment, Analise never said anything else throughout the duration of dinner. She kept her head down as she finished her lumpy soup and ate the roasted chicken and mashed potatoes that came afterward. No longer did she smile or joke around with me, and if I said I wasn’t saddened by it, I would be lying.

But she had been a distraction, and without her stealing my attention, I was able to refocus on Gerald and Virginia, who made small talk with everyone else around them … but never Leonard. And he, like Analise, remained silent. Eating his meal and keeping his head down.

He didn’t appear uncomfortable, but he also didn’t seem at all like himself. Subdued and silent, as if he was nothing more than a fixture in the room and not a guest at a party.

And all the while, warning bells rang loudly through my head, above the voices and clinking and clanking of utensils. Because something—many somethings—felt off in this place. Wrong. And I wished I hadn’t come. I wished I hadn’t gotten mixed up in it all.

But even as I longed for the ability to turn back time, sitting there beside a silent Analise, I couldn’t begin to know just how much I’d live to regret driving my hearse out to Hollow Cove.

***

All things considered, it was a beautiful night.

And as I stood on the terrace overlooking a hedge maze that looked like it was straight out of The Shining, an inkling of intuition told me to appreciate it. To breathe what little bit of fresh air I could through this mask, to close my eyes and cherish these moments of gentle calm.

But I knew it wasn’t what I should’ve been doing at all.

I should’ve been finding Leonard, pulling him aside and demanding he talk to me and explain himself. Even if it broke my heart, I needed to know why he was there, and I needed to hear it from him.

But it’d been impossible to get him alone after dinner. He wandered off toward the library to observe the artwork with Gerald. He mingled quietly amid the guests, making sure to be surrounded by others at all times. And I wondered if perhaps it had been done on purpose, to avoid being alone.

And, I figured, it was just as well. The party had begun to die down before I stepped outside. Guests were beginning to leave, and as soon as I was certain he’d gone home, I’d leave as well. I could always talk to him later, and for now, I could spare a moment to enjoy this view and breathe.