AllFreeNovel
Share Us
All the color drained from her face. “I already own a condo in Key West,” she said, and Richard tilted his head with a quirky little smile. He didn’t say it, but he didn’t need to; we were all thinking it.
That’s not an answer.
Diana’s gaze traveled from Adam’s face to his hand, still resting on my arm, and her eyes narrowed. Adam saw her looking and quickly turned away. “I’ll go talk to Dora now.”
Diana watched him go, waiting for the sound of his footsteps to recede before she spoke again. I thought she might lay into Richard, or maybe say something about Adam—that goddamn male nurse of hers—but the next thing out of her mouth was unexpected.
“Delphine,” she said, her voice low, “does Adam eat pistachios?”
“What?”
She waved her hand impatiently. “Pistachio nuts. The kind with the shells on. Have you seen him eating them?”
“No,” I said. “Why?”
William cleared his throat. “Are you sure?”
“Jesus, yes. What the hell? Did someone steal your nuts or something?”
Richard guffawed and Diana said, “Don’t youstart,” as William reached into his coat pocket and retrieved an object that he laid on the kitchen counter. It was an empty bag of, yes, pistachios—the kind with the shell on.
“We found this outside,” he said.
“Not just outside.” Diana barged in, her voice impatient. “It was onthe ground in that grove of trees. The one across the parking area.” She paused. “If you stand there, you can see the front door.”
I looked back and forth between them. “I don’t get it. You think Adam has been sneaking out of the house to... to eat nuts? In the woods? Like in secret?” I started to laugh, too, unable to help myself.
“Well, not necessarily, but—”
“Oooh, no,” Richard interrupted, “that’s just one possibility. But—and this is the really exciting one—maybe it belongs to someone else. Some secret snacker who’s been hiding in the forest, watching us come and go. Is that what you’re thinking, sister mine?”
Diana frowned. “You don’t need to make it sound so ridiculous.”
“Au contraire,” Richard said, “I think it’s intriguing. Pistachios, that’s a very specific nut. Aren’t police officers partial to pistachios? Maybe some old-school beat cop has staked out the place, surveilling all of us, snacking to pass the time.” He paused. “Or maybe we’re being stalked by squirrels.”
I laughed again. “You’re all being ridiculous. It’s just litter. It probably blew in from the road.”
William cleared his throat. “It’s not litter.”
Richard cocked his head. “No?”
William reached into his pocket again, then held out his hand. In it were a half-dozen shells.
“We found a whole bunch of these,” he said.
“In the woods?” Richard asked.
Diana moved to stand beside me, picked up the glass of wine that Adam had left behind, and took a long swallow. “Some of them were in the woods,” she said ominously, “and some of them were somewhere else.”
“Where?” I said, but I wasn’t laughing anymore. In my head, I heard Mimi’s voice.
He always comes at night.
He’s always watching me.
The man with the brown teeth.
Diana had let out a shaky breath. “Underneath your grandmother’s bedroom window.”
