I bristle, wanting to say more, like that my best friend deserves so much better, but I need to keep my anger tamed to watch each guest. She needs to explain the giant puzzle she’s finished in her head, meaning I need to focus on everyone else so we can detain the murderer amongst us. I’m a strong guy, and whilst I hopedBran had been here for more muscle, I think Cardinal could hold someone all by himself.
She turns back to the group. “This entire murder mystery game was meant to not only blow up his own life, his relationship with each one of us, but take everyone down with him. Whoever told him our secrets wanted the same thing, wanted this group of guests hurting and quite frankly, they love the game. After I found my secret, I realised Corbin planned to isolate himself from us all, then isolate me from you guys too.”
The thought makes my insides boil, but again, I remind myself to temper the anger.
“Come on, Darling, put us out of our misery. What was your secret?” Lily asks, leaning forward.
Robin taps the envelope against her palm. “I’ll get to that soon. When we started the game Friday at the dining table, does anyone remember Corbin’s glass getting knocked over whilst Aya was talking?”
There are nods around the room, small acknowledgments, but Lily throws herself back into the armchair, crossing her legs. “Completely my fault, I nearly got bourbon on my new dress! Can you imagine trying to get a stain like that out of silk? I don’t know why any of you let me pour the alcohol that night; I’d be a terrible barmaid.” She rambles on and I very much believe it when Robin said it’s her world, we’re all just living in it.
“Anyway, Detective Starling made a point that both murders have been staged like victims from my book, but today I realised that the first one was missing. My first victim—the Husband, was poisoned over dinner, but that's not how Corbin was killed. It didn’t make sense that they’d skip the first murder if they wanted to copy my book, but there was another murder Friday night. Aya must have seen something in his glass when he went to pick it up, because she made that weird sound which made Lil jump, causing her to knock his glass over. We found Aya’s secret,meaning she was meant to be a player in the game, not the pretend victim.” Her voice breaks as she looks at Cardinal, the rage wafting from him as he looms over the girls like an agitated bear. I’ll be surprised if he doesn’t snap the neck right now of who did this to his sister. “We all assumed she was playing dead, but whilst we were all outside, the killer used the thin curtain tie and strangled her, causing the line on her neck. They couldn’t have her telling him what she’d seen in his drink, because I think he’d have known straight away who was trying to kill him.”
His knuckles are white against the back of Willow’s armchair and she places her hand over his. I can see it’s taking everything in him to calm down, to keep himself controlled. After a minute, he taps her hand with his other, steps back and bridges more space closer to the door.
“We’ve all complained about the loose drapes all week, since Friday evening. Knowing something wasn’t right, Corbin didn’t say anything. Wren found her body with Corbin’s in the pool house,” She tells Starling. “So we know your team didn’t move his body.”
I wait for something to happen, anything, my body on edge to move if anyone else does, but he just licks his lips, taking a hand from his pocket to run it over that stupid mustache. “They couldn’t get the vehicle they needed over that tight bridge, so the plan had been to return with an air ambulance to move him.”
“Sure,” she says again, causing his mustache to twitch. We’d gotten through with a hire van full of equipment and she’d worked that out. “Later, Corbin confronted the killer over what had happened, incredibly drunk. I don't think it would have been hard to get the upper hand and hit him from behind. They hadn’t planned on staging him that way, but it was too much of an opportunity not to skip ahead. Jay was murdered like my third victim, when he went to get the wine from the cellar, he saw something he shouldn’t have. His body has bruises, so he fought,but none of us would have heard anything over the music in the dining room. He was then moved to be staged in his room, where one of us would find him.”
I clear my throat. “I found Robin’s cardigan with his body, so whoever did this was still trying to frame her.”
“This is insane.” Mavis whispers, fat tears flowing down her pale skin. She looks like she's on the verge of passing out. Instead, she swats at her face.
“Whoever planned to kill Corbin, wanted to make sure I was framed for this. An author killing off her ex just like out of her first novel? The entire country would know about it. You, of course, suspected me straight away. It’s why you asked so many questions to the other guests about me. You wanted to gather intel on your suspect, make sure your case was strong. But then I was attacked. I can’t attack myself, right?”
Putting the red envelope down on the table, Robin puts her empty palm out to me and I pull out both of my secrets, just as we planned, and give them to her. “This is where I can’t quite figure something out. The killer knows my book, but they took me out to the lake, when they could have just drowned me in a bathtub like what happened in my book. Suddenly they need a refresher on Featherton? Before I was attacked, I realised someone had written fake secrets,” She holds up the written secret. “This isn’t Corbin's handwriting and all his secrets were typed.” She then holds up the real secret. “Someone here took matters into their own hands and wrote new secrets for some of the guests. They must have used the master key from the office, because Wren found his real one on his pillow whilst we had all been downstairs. Things have been happening all weekend whilst we’ve been all together, but in a hotel so big, someone could get around undetected.”
I hadn’t thought that over, but my room hadn’t been broken into, so it was true. Robin said barely anyone knew about the key’s hiding spot.
“Something else I found is that two of the secrets are wrong. Jay’s and mine.”
All eyes shift to the silver-headed woman still crying into the armchair. Taking a shaky breath, she swipes at her face and nods. “I wasn’t having an affair with Jay. Bran, Jay, and I were together. On and off, but I was going to end things with them both this weekend.” She sniffles, trying to sit up straighter, but the fight has left her delicate frame.
Willow leans over and squeezes her hand.
Lil slaps her hands together. “You little minx.” causing both girls to shoot glares her way.
Retrieving her secret from the table, this is finally where Robin looks most nervous and I move towards her, raising her chin up with my finger and giving her a comforting kiss. She can do this.
“Mrs. Wilson did the ultimate dirty. Who wants a Buchanan baby? Not her.My secret isn’t true, and there's only one person here who thinks I got pregnant and must have had an abortion.” She gestures down to her flat stomach. “Clearly not with child, it was a false positive. Only one person knew I took a test, but I never told them it had been wrong.” Her gaze moves around the room and the anticipation of who the fucker is makes my skin itch. “Corbin thought I got rid of his baby and decided to plan this entire weekend to ruin my life, like he thought I’d ruined his. Isolate you all from him and then me. I don’t know–maybe he thought I’d crawl back to him,” She scoffs, but it’s full of disgust. “A.Claythorne is my non-existent child, Detective. I wanted a girl called Agatha. Just some sick joke on his part, giving us the house I walked away from.” She drops the envelope onto the floor and just stands there, so brave, looking over to thearmchairs. “You were like a sister to me, Lil. How can you hate me this much?”
Chapter twenty-eight
Robin
MYheart shatters into a thousand pieces on the floor as I watch the girl I’ve known my entire life, smirk up at me like she’s won a grand prize. Those light blue eyes twinkle, her enjoyment making me feel physically sick. Running the tip of her tongue over her canine, she taps her long nails on the arm of her chair.
“Such a clever little thing, aren’t you, Darling.” she coos and everyone around her recoils.
“You fucking bitch!” Willow spits, grasping for Cardinal’s hand and he pulls her up to stand beside him. Merle comes away from the bookshelf and starts spitting words too, but Goldie shouts something to him which immediately makes him go quiet.
I can’t focus on anyone as my eyes blur, hot tears threatening to betray how calm I'm trying to remain. Wren's hand wraps around my elbow, but I’m stuck to the center spot.
“We sent Maggie home Friday night because I couldn't risk her in the background, not when I needed to sneak around.” Starling chuckles, his entire demeanor changed. He smirks at me, hands in his pockets, but he’s widened his stance, cockily. Goldie, too,actually laughs and Cardinal reacts by placing Willow behind him. “Couldn't have her revealing I wasn't actually a detective, I was the new gardener. I only met her that morning, but she was the only one who could give me away, even if I did shave the beard and style my hair.” The unfitted clothes that he didn't wear naturally made perfect sense now. Starling stroked his mustache, smiling. “Couldn't help keeping a tash, even if you do hate it Babes.” He turns to Lily and blows her an air kiss, to which she rolled her eyes.
I expected this; there was no problem she couldn't fix by enticing a man to do whatever she wanted.
