“What was your relationship with Claude Drake?” Leroy asked.
She shook her head again. “I knew who he was because we worked together ten years ago, but I hadn’t seen him since or ever really talked to him before he left this weekend. At least, we thought he’d left.”
“Why did you question whether he had or not?”
She told him about the ghost stunt. “The lock of hair found on the tree was synthetic. It was someone wearing a wig and a white dress just trying to scare us. Also...” She seemed to hesitate. “I’m sure Finn has probably already told you about the car accident Megan was in earlier that year. It was apparently why her parents had sent her out here to work for the summer. Megan had lied about being behind the wheel. Finn found out that Claude might have taken the job here at the hotel to get some kind of revenge on Megan, since he was friends with the brother of one of the girls who was badly hurt in the wreck.”
No, Finnegan hadn’t mentioned that. He wondered if it had anything to do with these latest murders or if all of it was tied to Megan Broadhurst and her murder.
“Who had access to the wine cellar?”
“I don’t know,” Casey said. “I hadn’t been down there until tonight. I was surprised to see that someone had replaced the lock down to the basement and put a padlock on the door.”
“You went down to get wine?” She nodded in response. “Who broke the locks?”
“Finn.”
He nodded. “I’d prefer you didn’t leave town.” She didn’t seem surprised at his request, and she rose to leave but then hesitated again. “Yes?” He expected her to tell him that she needed to get back to work or some other excuse.
“There’s something I need to tell you.” He saw her swallow, and he thought, What now? “You asked me about Megan’s diary ten years ago.” He realized he was holding his breath. “I said I didn’t know anything about it.” She swallowed again. “I wasn’t telling the truth. I found the diary before Megan was killed and burned it because she’d been tormenting me and saying she’d written awful things about me in it.” Relief seemed to make her body limp. “I didn’t read it. I just burned it in the firepit.”
He swore silently. She’d interfered in a murder investigation. He doubted she was the only one. “You were sixteen, right?” A nod. “Megan had been tormenting you?” Another nod. “How did everyone feel about Megan?” he asked, suspecting Casey wasn’t the only one who’d lied.
She met his gaze. “They hated her. She plagued the entire staff. That’s why I can’t understand why they would come back here for some stupid reunion.”
“Apparently, someone had unfinished business.”
FROM OUTSIDE BY the campfire, Jason watched the bodies being brought out of the basement in black body bags. No one had told them anything except that they weren’t allowed to leave. He didn’t have to guess who was in those bags.
The cold night spring wind whipped the boughs of the nearby pines as the bodies were loaded into the back of the coroner’s van. Shirley was crying, Benjamin holding her. Jen stood staring into the fire as if she couldn’t bear to watch.
Jason couldn’t help but think of Megan. She’d been zipped up for that same ride. Like tonight, he’d stood out in the cold and watched as the body was taken away. Like then, he’d realized he was lucky that it hadn’t been him.
The deputy who’d ordered them to stay by the fire had said the marshal would be speaking to each of them before the night was over. Jason had been one of the first to go inside. He’d answered a few questions about why he was at the closed hotel and then the last time he’d seen Claude, then Devlin.
He’d answered the marshal’s questions, before being told to not say anything to anyone else. He’d been asked his room number, and a deputy had escorted him to it.
Sprawling on his bed, he couldn’t get Megan out of his mind. He was sure Devlin and Claude were dead because of her. He thought of the night he’d gotten his hand caught in the scarf she’d had tied around her neck. She’d actually dressed up to come down to the campfire each and every time as if she wanted everyone to know that she was special.
But that night, alone with her, both of them breathing hard, he’d pulled back from a kiss, and his hand had gotten tangled in that damned scarf.
When he tried to jerk it free, it had tightened around her neck. He remembered the way her eyes had widened in alarm—and something else. It was the something else that had excited him.
He’d twisted the scarf, tightening it around her throat as her eyes widened further. He’d been scared that he might keep tightening it, but even the thought excited him. He’d kept twisting until she writhed on the bed beneath him and clutched at him, digging her fingernails into his shoulders.
That had been the best sex he’d ever had, and Megan had come back for more, each time saying she didn’t want it rough.
But the truth was, she did. Until she didn’t. Just like Patience.
FINN FOUND CASEY in her room. The moment he walked in, she ran to him. He took her in his arms, kissing the top of her head as she cuddled against him.
“It’s just so...awful,” she said as she pulled back to look at him. All he could do was nod. There weren’t words. He’d feared something had happened to them, just as he feared it wasn’t over yet. “Is it true Patience is missing?”
“Jason says she left.” He could see that she didn’t trust Jason’s word on anything. He felt pretty much the same way.
One of the windows was open a crack. He could smell the
