As the three of us reached the fourth floor, Katie gestured toward her own room. “That’s the old nursery suite where I lived for years as nanny. The Finches offered me and your aunt cottages, but it’s a force of habit to stay up here. Every year, the same week, like clockwork. A family reunion of sorts.”
“How wonderful,” Summer said softly.
A sudden guilt pricked at me as I realized that I’d never even asked my aunt about her annual foray into the pageant world. I knew the basics—that Aunt DeeDee had won the crown thirty-odd years ago, that she got a job as coordinator and MC a few years later, that she came back here to stay every year like a pilgrim returning to a holy site. But beyond asking,Did you have a good week?I just hadn’t bothered, and I certainly didn’t care half as much about her role here as Summer did. The back of my throat clenched, and I wiped at one eye.
Katie opened the door to Aunt DeeDee’s room and moved to let me and Summer step inside. It was obvious from the few beauty products and unmentionables scattered across the bed that the police had already been here, but I was determined to take a look for myself. The paisley carpet was thick beneath my feet, and a hunter-green wallpaper darkened the room. A gold-tinted comforter and rectangular pillows with dark blue cases sat atop the made bed. An unlit but gleaming fireplace with a tiny mantel sat at the back of the room, and paintings of crowns, scepters, and roses hung along the walls.
My eyes landed on my aunt’s summertime purse—she preferred to change them with each season. Next to the mirror was her black makeup bag and on the bed was a garment bag with a Post-it reading,For Dakota, All That Glitters… Jewels & Gems party. Trust me—Aunt D. This must be the outfit that my aunt had selected for me to wear to the opening party this evening. She’d been thinking of me despite all of the drama.
Katie must’ve noticed the emotions rising in me as I stepped across the threshold because she reached out a comforting hand. “I’m sure she’ll be fine.”
“That’s right,” Summer added, already making a beeline for the bathroom, where my aunt’s beauty supplies might be kept.
“They’ll hold her for a few hours, realize they’re barking up the wrong tree, and send her home,” Katie added. “Nobody thinks your aunt stole a crown—or was involved in anything else.”
I considered the “anything else”—Mr. Finch’s disappearance and possible demise. I tried to believe her.
While Summer checked the bathroom, Katie scanned the room and I stood still, assessing the space. Aunt DeeDee’s room appeared to be pretty standard with a sitting area and a queen-sized bed. I took in the neat row of perfume bottles on the desk and the line of dresses hanging inches apart in her open closet.
“I know this isn’t about a wig, so what exactly are you looking for?” Katie asked. “I’m happy to help if I’m able.”
“I have no idea, but I’ll know when I find it,” I told her as I got on my hands and knees and felt under the bed, which was spotlessly clean. Not a dust bunny in sight.
“Oh dear. I can’t join you down there, but I’ll check the…” She studied the cherry wood dresser at eye level. “Perhaps the drawers?”
“Sounds good,” I said. I stood back up and rifled through the nightstand that held a stained glass lamp that looked like Mr. Tiffany himself might’ve made it. Inside, there sat a Bible and notepad and pen, but no notes scrawled across them.
“What’s this?” Katie asked, holding up something she’d found while poking in my aunt’s undergarments. Heat rushed to my cheeks as I thought about how much Aunt DeeDee would hate anyone searching through her things, but the police had already done as much. “I heard something rattle when I pulled open the drawer, and I found this wedged in the slides.”
I took three steps forward so I could study the object Katie extended in an open palm. It was a ring, thick and sturdy, but small. Summer joined us from the bathroom, a makeup bag in one hand and, sure enough, a wig draped over her arm.
Katie placed the object in my hand, and all three of us formed a triangle, trying to understand what we were looking at.
“It’s too small for a ring finger,” Summer commented.
She was right.
I held the piece of jewelry up to the light and my stomach dropped.
ELEVEN
“Hello, Miss Green,” Sheriff Strong said evenly as he entered Aunt DeeDee’s room, where we stood staring at the ring.
Katie and Summer shrank back as if we were wayward children, and I could understand why. His intensity, along with his evergreen scent, filled the room.
“May I ask what you found?” He stepped beside me, taking in the object in question, and I hated the way that his nearness made my face flush. “Something shiny?”
“Something that’s… that’s none of your business,” I stammered. I wanted to keep my cool with him this time. He was just a man after all, a man who was trying to prove my aunt guilty of who knew what. But still.
“My business is anything in this room,” he said just as quickly.
I gripped my palm around the ring and slid it into my pocket as I glared at him. Momma’s words from the past—Family matters most—and Aunt DeeDee’s plea from earlier—Don’t believe a word they say—rang at once in my mind.
He seemed content to wait for me to hand over the object as he folded his arms. “Did you know that the first-ever beauty pageant was staged by P.T. Barnum, the circus guy? He had allsorts of contests—the cutest babies, the finest flowers, the best chickens…”
“And the prettiest girls?” I asked. “How very progressive of him.”
“You’re the one competing,” the sheriff said. I glared at him, and he was the one to backtrack this time.
