Stella joked, but it was true. “Thank you so much. He will appreciate it.”
If he was still around and she hadn’t buried him in the backyard.
Had she just thought that?
Stella walked away with their lunch orders and Holly leaned back in, her voice low. “Guns? Are you sure they’re real guns? Maybe they’re like toys or water guns or something. Men can be weird.”
“I know what a gun is, and these are real.” She’d had guns pointed her direction more times than she would like to count. She’d also been pepper sprayed once, and she swore it hurt less than finding those guns. “They’re not hunting guns, either. I thought about the fact that maybe Henry used to hunt, but they were handguns. They’re semiautomatics, and one of them has a suppressor.”
Holly’s brow rose. “What’s that?”
Laura was staring Nell’s way. “It’s what laypeople call a silencer. I find it interesting that Nell knows what a gun enthusiast would call it. Did he have any ammo?”
“A couple of…” She’d been about to say magazines. “Boxes. They’re the clippy things.”
Laura still looked suspicious, but she seemed to let it pass. “Okay, so where were they?”
“Two were in his shop, and one was in the back of the closet under some old textbooks. I went out to his shop because I’d cleaned his pliers. He’d gotten them all filthy working on our septic system. I went back to put them up on his tool wall and that was when I noticed his tool kit.”
“Did he have it with him when he came back from Seth’s?” Holly asked.
“He didn’t. And before you tell me maybe he grabbed it this morning, he didn’t. I went over there early to drop off some muffins. I checked the bathroom and it wasn’t there. Also, it looked like he hadn’t touched it in a couple of days. I put his pliers up and that was when I noticed there was something behind the organizational wall.”
“I understand how you found the guns in the shop, but how did you find the one in your closet?” Holly asked.
“Because Nell is exactly like the rest of us and she went crazy-ass paranoid and tossed her whole house,” Laura replied.
Nell bit her bottom lip and sighed. “Not the whole house. Just the parts I don’t regularly see. Like his side of the closet and his desk. Maybe I went through his wallet.”
There had been nothing special in his wallet—a couple of pictures of her, his driver’s license, two fives and a ten, a library card.
But then she’d found the small case under an old blanket at the very back of his side of the closet. It had been locked but she’d quickly figured out the combo. Their anniversary.
“Why haven’t you asked him?” Holly took a sip of her water. She seemed oddly flustered, as though she was as shocked as Nell herself. “I’m sure there’s a reason. He came from the city. He’s probably had those guns for years, and honestly, Bliss can be dangerous at times.”
That had also gone through her head. “He’s always been so in sync with me when it comes to gun control.”
“He’s got them hidden and or locked up. It sounds like they’re under control.” Laura had never seen her point on guns, but then Laura had actually been held hostage and tortured by a real serial killer, so she had her reasons.
“Honestly, my views have changed a bit over the years. I suppose I was influenced by the fact that my mother kept many weapons in our house at one point. She had several swords, a mace, knives, and some weird-looking thing she always told me was a sonic weapon I should never touch.” The weapons her mother had hidden all over any place they lived had been one of the reasons Nell had spent time in the foster care system. When her mother had regained custody, she’d gotten rid of all of them, but Nell would still find odd knives under her mother’s pillow. And bits of wrought iron sometimes.
“Was it because she was worried the bad faeries would come and take you?” Holly knew the story.
Nell nodded. “According to the state’s psychiatrist, my mom was the victim of a violent incident that her mind couldn’t process, so her brain created a more comfortable backstory. She believed she was a Fae royal who had to flee her home plane when her evil cousin killed her nice cousin and took over. It was why we couldn’t have cats. They’re familiars to hags and sent to spy on us. We couldn’t have dogs because she was allergic. But we had lots of swords.”
“I don’t think Henry keeping a couple of guns around for protection is the same thing,” Holly said gently. “Why don’t you ask him about them? You’re going to have a baby in the house.”
“Were they loaded?” Laura asked.
“No, but the magazines were close at hand. It wouldn’t have been at all hard to…” Nell stopped.
Laura pointed her way. “I knew you knew more about guns. What the hell is going on? Last week you left a bunch of notes at my house about how to defuse a bomb. What are you planning, Nell? I know you’re upset about the practices at the new water treatment plant in Alamosa, but you can’t blow it up.”
They thought she was going full-on anarchist, blow everything up? It was good to know she could still surprise someone. So many people assumed she would be nonviolent—likely because she preached nonviolence—and she’d found that made many of them think she was weak.
She’d once lived in a massive tree for two weeks in order to save it from being turned into someone’s mulch. There were no bathroom breaks when protesting. She wasn’t weak.
“I’m not blowing anything up. I’m merely researching for my book.” The one her friends thought she’d been writing for years.
Laura’s eyes narrowed. “The book
