What is going on in there?
Just as I thought there would be, there's a motel near the edge of town. Dean looks around at the sun-lightened parking lot with its tufts of grass peeking up through cracks in the corners and the sign that still relies on hand-positioned black letters to announce they have a vacancy. It's not derelict or neglected, just dulled around the edges by many years of travelers passing through.
"I'm sure if we keep searching just a bit more, we could find a sweet little bed and breakfast around here," I tease.
Dean shoots me a look across the top of the car and tugs the bags out of the backseat.
“This will be fine,” he says. “I don't think prodding into a couple of missing people necessitates floral bedspreads and tiny jars of jam in the morning.”
I laugh as I follow him across the parking lot. “Oh, but I love those tiny jars of jam. Some of them come from fruits I've never even heard of.”
He's still shaking his head as we walk into the lobby. An ancient man who may have been standing behind the registration desk since the motel opened looks up at us when we open the door. He straightens from where he's leaning and closes a weathered book.
"Afternoon. Can I help you?" he asks.
"We'd like a couple of rooms for the night," Dean says.
"Sure thing," the man says.
We walk up to the registration desk, and I notice the cubby holes built up along the wall behind him. I tilt my head toward them.
"Reminds me of Myrna's," I comment. "She puts people's mail in those."
"That's the hotel near Feathered Nest?" Dean asks.
I nod, but before I can respond, the man behind the counter chips in his two cents.
"Feathered Nest. That's that place down past Richmond. In the mountains."
"Yes," I say.
"Where all those folks got killed. Fascinating. Fascinating. I read all about it." He wiggles his age-curled fingers around in the air in front of him. "Amazing how it all unraveled like that. With the house in the woods and the bodies."
Dean's eyes slide over to me, and I do my best to keep my expression neutral. This isn't the first time I've heard the dramatic retelling of my experience in Feathered Nest. People have a tendency to perform it like their own disturbing rendition of Rocky Horror. Just with less singing. I hope it stays that way.
"Yes, it was fascinating," Dean says, obviously trying to move the conversation along.
"But it makes you wonder."
"Wonder about what?" Dean asks.
The man leans slightly across the counter, lowering his voice just a touch as if he's trying to stop someone from hearing what he's going to say even though there's no one around.
"That girl. The one who came in and solved the crime. She seemed awful close to that Jake Logan guy. Heard rumors they were canoodling and didn't want the townsfolk to know about it. Makes you wonder what else she might have been doing with him and didn't want the townsfolk to know. Seems tied up right neat, if you ask me. Now, what was her name?"
Dean reaches in his pocket and pulls out his credit card. Setting it on the counter, he slides it firmly toward the man with a tense smile. "It'll just be the one room. Under Dean Steele."
I walk back out of the lobby and stand on the exposed sidewalk, trying to let the sunlight burn that conversation out of my brain. It doesn't work by the time Dean gets out to me and holds a key card out to me. I snatch it away from him.
"Floral bedspreads and tiny jars of jam are sounding pretty good right about now, aren't they?" I mutter.
"At least his vision is so bad I'm pretty sure he didn't even know you were standing there," Dean offers as we start walking around to the back of the motel to find our rooms.
"Better than if he did see me and recognized me. I'm sure that would have been a lovely conversation. First time I've been accused of being an accomplice in that whole situation, though. So that's something."
"I'm sorry about that," he sighs as we walk up to our room.
I shake my head and wave him off. "It's fine. Really. That feels like a lifetime ago. Almost as if a different person did all that. If people want to keep telling stories about it, let them. It will keep them saying the names of the victims, so they'll never be forgotten."
Chapter Nineteen Dragon
Six years ago…
She didn't come back.
He expected her to walk back in and ask for another invitation.
But she didn't.
He stood and waited in the middle of the floor. People hovered around him. Noticing him. Watching him and wondering what he was going to do. He cared only about the door.
When it didn't open, he straightened his suit and went to his table. His drink was already waiting for him. The women were happy to see him back, and with two drinks down, he took one by the wrist and pulled her down into his lap.
Her skirt was so short, just sitting brought it up. There was nothing between his pants and her but a string of satin. She draped an arm around his neck and flipped her hair, so it tumbled down in thick blond curls that framed slumbering eyes and waiting lips. His hand cupped her ass and slid over her hip. The other traced fingertips along the deep scoop of her neckline, over the swell of breasts as manufactured as everything else about her.
She was beautifully crafted. Her hair, her eyelashes, her nails. Everything about her was meticulously designed for one purpose. There was nothing
