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But then she’d stood in that kitchen, trying to make awkward small talk with me, worrying the cuff of her sweater and pulling the neck aside until I saw that bruise. After that, there’d been no more pretending. If I could have, I would have turned right around and put a bullet in that man’s brain that very minute.
But I’d been a beast on a leash.
I set Poppy away from me and grabbed a towel hanging by a hook on the back of the door to wrap it around her. She was shivering now in the cooling air. Hungry no doubt. “Come on,” I said. And with the tray in one hand and my other arm around her, I led her out of the bathroom and into the room with the fire. I pushed the chair up close to the hearth and sat her down in it.
“I’ll get the chair wet,” she said, her hair streaming down her back.
“It’ll dry. Eat.” I pressed the butter-covered bread I’d made for her into her hands. I poured her a cup of tea, putting plenty of sugar and milk in it, and set it on the tray so she could reach it.
I made myself the same and dug in.
She made a low moan of pleasure and I remembered, when I didn’t want to, Sinead feeding me the exact same all those years ago. Sweet, milky tea and butter an inch thick on fresh bread. It was proper medicine.
“Was there something from the senator’s will?” I asked. “Anything surprising, like?”
“That he left it all to me,” she said, licking her lips and leaving them shiny. “I’m rich now. Like . . . really rich.”
I shook my head, sitting back with my own cup of tea, wishing it was coffee. “The Morellis wouldn’t kill you for a couple of million dollars. That’s nothing to them.”
Poppy pouted at me and it was ludicrous, but so undeniably . . . cute.
“Are you mad because I don’t think your fortune is big enough?” I asked her.
“Maybe.”
I laughed, a low surprising rumble from the center of my chest, and the sound startled us both. Her eyes lit up like the sunrise, and, uncomfortable, I turned away.
“You know,” she said after a long moment. “I thought it was really weird that he used the lawyer he did. He was local out of Bishop’s Landing. Why wouldn’t he use some multimillion-dollar firm out of New York City?”
“That is weird,” I said.
“And.” She looked at me, the fire reflected in her eyes. “There was a box of stuff he gave me. Files from a trust he’d been creating and some things to do with the foundation . . .”
I got to my feet. “Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”
“Because I didn’t know if we were on the same side earlier. You locked me in my room.”
“Where’s the box?”
“Still at the house. I was looking at it when Theo came in. I shoved it under the desk but . . . wouldn’t the police have found it when they found Theo’s body?”
“Theo’s body wasn’t at your house.” Theo’s body was buried in the Ocean City Landfill. Another favor I called in.
The truth was Caroline had probably been through that house in the hours I’d been gone with a fine-tooth comb. At this point, I had no friends in the Constantine house. But I might have some at the police department.
And I had one favor left. My last ace card.
My plan could backfire spectacularly. Or it could be a moot point. But the box was the first solid clue we had.
I stood and pulled Sinead’s landline out of the cupboard where I’d hidden it when we first got here.
“You hid the phone from me?” Poppy asked.
“I’m trying to keep you safe.”
“I don’t think your ‘safe’ means the same as it does to me.”
“What do you think it means to me?”
“Prisoner.”
No matter how much I liked this sassy version of her, I would not smile. She needed no encouragement.
I plugged the phone into the jack and tapped the button under the receiver until I got a dial tone.
“Who are you calling?”
“I think I have one friend left,” I said. “Who might be able to get the box without letting anyone know.”
“Who?”
I glanced up at her. Like the people I knew were the people she knew. She traveled with minnows and I circled with sharks. “You don’t know her.”
“Her?” She couldn’t hide her jealousy and I did nothing to ease it.
“Yeah,” I said. “Her.”
* * *
Poppy
It never occurred to me that Ronan would have a . . . girlfriend? Was that the right word? Would a man like him have a girlfriend? The word seemed far too tame for the kind of woman he’d keep around in his life. Lover? Even that seemed ridiculous.
A wife? Oh my God. Was that why he wouldn’t actually sleep with me? He could fuck around with me but not sleep with me because that was his moral marriage code? He turned away from me and I looked into the fire, pretending to give him privacy while I was actually listening as hard as I could to his side of the conversation.
