The connection ended. Obviously Mavis wanted more information. She would alert Billy to Annie’s call. Annie could not afford to have her cell phone ring, not for a good long while. She turned off the phone, dropped it into her pocket.
She moved out of the shadow of the woods into the Jamison backyard. She passed Elaine’s cottage and the gazebo. She walked boldly to the back steps and climbed to the verandah. She knocked on the back door. If the door started to open, she would have time to remove the wrap from her hands.
There was no response.
Annie waited a moment, tried again. The door remained shut. The house was apparently empty.
Now she would set her plan in motion. If they ever knew, Billy—and Max—would be appalled. But she had made up her mind. The murderer of Glen Jamison had left no traces. Annie was certain she knew the identity of the shadowy figure behind three murders, but she had no proof. There would never be proof unless she succeeded in her scheme.
Getting into the Jamison house was the first essential step.
Annie opened the screen door, turned the handle of the back door. It was locked. Most island homes did not run to alarm systems and doors were often left unlocked during the day when residents were home. The locked door gave her a sense of reassurance that no one was in the house.
Annie moved down the verandah, trying the French doors. All were locked. Hurrying down the steps, she ran lightly to the end of the porch and came around to the west side of the house. The house was built on arches to avoid flooding by storm surges. She stopped at the first window. She stood on tiptoe and used the chisel to poke a hole about six inches up on the left side of the screen next to the frame. She edged the chisel inside, worked it back and forth to loosen the latch. She pulled the loose side out far enough to unsnap the other latch. Now she was able to unlatch the other side and stand between the loose screen and the sash. She pushed and the window slid up. She dropped the chisel into her pocket.
Annie felt a sweep of relief. If necessary, she would have found something in the garden, a brick, a small pottery decoration, to break a window. She had a fuzzy understanding of breaking and entering and hoped she would never have to understand the finer points. If she succeeded in slipping in and out of the Jamison house without leaving any evidence of her visit, she would be much better off. The small slit in the screen might escape notice, and certainly, if she relocked the screen, there wouldn’t be a suggestion of forced entry.
An incorrigible optimist, Annie felt buoyed by the unlocked window. She pushed aside the interior shutters and scrambled to pull herself up and over the sill. It was only when she stood in the dim room, its silence broken by the tick of a stately grandfather clock, that she realized she was in Glen Jamison’s study. The room was airless and still. The scrubbed patch on the Oriental carpet was a haunting reminder of violent death. Annie turned and pulled the screen shut. She latched it. As she pushed the window down, she felt trapped in a chamber of horrors.
She was breathing fast by the time she skirted the discolored rug and reached the door. She wanted to fling it open and be free of the study, but she carefully turned the knob, barely pulled the door ajar.
Silence.
She waited, listening over the quick rush of her breathing. There was no sound of life or occupancy. She slipped into the hall, again listened hard.
No one home. Thank heaven, no one home.
In a flash Annie was at the cross hall. She unlocked the door to the back verandah for her escape, then turned and hurried to the stairs. She eased up the steps, two at a time. In the shadowy upper hallway, she wanted to hurry, run and grab and be gone, but she forced herself to move stealthily.
She was close.
She tried one door after another. It didn’t take long to find the room she sought. She stepped inside, noted the double bed with a canopy. She turned to her right and walked directly to a vanity in an alcove framed by velvet hangings. She opened a makeup kit, selected a smooth lipstick, a rich bronze. She held it delicately with her plastic-wrapped fingers. She pulled the plastic bag from her pocket, dropped the case inside, and tucked the bag in her pocket.
She hurried across the room, turned the knob, ready to step into the hall.
Distantly, unmistakably, she heard the slam of a door.
Max eased up on the throttle. Oh, man, did he like speed. What a fine and fabulous day. As the boat slowed, he turned the wheel. He was about ten miles offshore and could barely discern a faint hint of land. He glanced at his watch. Almost eleven-thirty. He had cheese and beer in the fridge. Annie, dutiful and dear, would stay at her post until closing time. But he could probably persuade her to take a lunch break. He needed to convince her that Tommy Jamison’s problems were not of her making. Max shook his head. If Tommy shot his dad, surely Pat Merridew’s death had to be classified as suicide. Henny swore that was wrong. But Tommy certainly couldn’t have dropped ground-up pills in Pat’s Irish coffee. Probably Annie right now was muddling about Death on Demand, trying to fit round pegs into square holes. He’d cheer her up. He whistled “Pretty Woman,” but the tune was swept away by the breeze as he pulled on the throttle and headed home.
Chapter Fifteen
Treads creaked on the stairs.
Annie’s heart thudded. She edged the bedroom door open just enough to peer down the hall. The doorway to the upper verandah was visible from the stair landing. She would be seen if she tried to reach the verandah. But there was no place to hide on the porch anyway. Her throat dry, she eased the door shut. If only she knew who was coming up the stairs. She had no assurance this room was not the destination.
Annie hurried back to the alcove, stepped within, pressed against the wall. She was hidden behind the red velvet hanging unless—oh, dear heaven—someone walked to the vanity.
The bedroom door opened.
Annie watched in the vanity mirror as the panel swung in. She shrank against the wall.
Richard Jamison stepped into the room. He didn’t turn on the light. He stood with his head bent forward, his
