Mila leaned on the wall and watched me. “You okay?”
“Peachy. It’s just…a lot. I’ve been on my own for a while. I’m happy, though.”
Both women gave sympathetic looks.
Mila filled Lovelyn in about how I was there at the start of the family handouts. Her expression grew serious. “I was just telling Dixie how we believed the payments Austin made to those in what he called the family vault were in part, a front.”
“The family vault.” I goggled at the memory. “I forgot he called it that. It was his filing system to keep track of everyone. I haven’t heard that name in so long.”
Mila scrunched up her nose. “Then you didn’t come back to it recently to remove your record?”
I blinked. “No, why would I? But talk me through your suspicions.”
She explained. “Some of the families were really needy, but others less so. They could’ve been involved in the trafficking. It makes sense why money would be diverted to them if they were up to no good.”
Mila listed out six Marchant families who had potentially been forging documents and moving people around. I could see it. There were many I hadn’t liked on instinct alone, and memories rushed back.
“It doesn’t surprise me that Phylis Marchant-Smythe is on that list. She was a piece of work.”
Both women stared.
Mila recovered first. “Yes, she is. Tell us what you remember, if that’s okay?”
I tried to arrange my thoughts. “The start was simple. Austin’s business had taken off hugely in the year they came for me. I’d barely been in their mansion a couple of weeks when a relative came calling. Some cousin whose adult child was ill. There were mortgage arrears, a really bad loan from some shark who was making threats. Austin stepped up. He paid the debts,gave them a chunk of cash to help for the next year, and they went away happy. All this, he did with me in the room, teaching me a lesson in how we should help those around us when we had more than we needed. He called it a duty.”
Mila’s watery eyes told me she’d heard that speech, too.
I continued. “Then came the greedy guts. All those who’d heard of his generosity and saw pound signs. He had a big heart. Despite how obviously some were hamming it up, he believed them and didn’t turn any away. In my hearing, he vowed to meet all their needs.” I’d blocked out so much about that brief part of my life for so long, but Austin’s generosity had stuck with me. To some degree, shaped me.
Mila took a deep breath. “I’m finding it so hard to reconcile that caring man with someone who would willingly hurt women. He was generous at heart.” She switched her focus to Lovelyn. “Do you see what I mean now? How difficult this is?”
Lovelyn’s smile was soft. “I always believed you. I really do think he sounds wonderful.”
Mila sniffed, a little shaky when she came back to me. “Did you see the Marchant-Smythes come cap in hand for their share?”
I cast my mind back. “I’m not sure I saw the first time. Far as I can recall, they were always around. They’d bring their kid to visit Primrose and Austin and had him call them grandparents, though they weren’t. So they were into bad shit? That tracks. Wait, does that link them to the trafficking? Do the cops know?” I was no great lover of the police, but four women had died on that ship. Probably more hurt.
Lovelyn folded her hands in her lap. “The detective investigating the deaths is unfortunately known to me, and I passed on their names with those facts. I hope it gives him enough to make arrests.”
Mila cut in. “Except the Marchant-Smythes did a runner after. Hold up, I need to backtrack to the Deadwater murders.”
My eyes rounded. “How are they connected?”
She breathed out, her excitement plain. “Their son is a suspect in Karla’s death. He left here with her in pursuit, then she was found hours later on the banks of the river.”
Astonishment took me over completely. “Presley? Has he been arrested?”
“No, he’s disappeared with his parents. No one can find them.”
The two of them said something I didn’t hear, because my mind had jumped back over a decade to a weekend spent with the Marchant-Smythes. “Has anyone checked Austin’s bolthole?”
The chatter ceased.
Mila cleared her throat. “His what now?”
“It’s what they were often angling for on their visits. An invite to the house he had on the banks of Lake Andmere. Our grandmother didn’t know about it. He bought it in cash and used to slope off there for quiet time. He took me once because Primrose had gone to find Wallace abroad somewhere.”
Lovelyn collected a tablet from the desk. “Do you happen to have an address? Or could you find it on a map?”
