“I just have a talent for it.”
“Well, stop being so talented. It’s a liability.” But he said it gently, and his hand came up like he might touch my arm before he seemed to remember there were four witnesses and a homicide investigation happening around us, and he put the evidence bag away instead. “Stay here. All of you. I need to walk the terrace again before the crime scene unit gets territorial about footprints.”
He turned to go, and that was when I saw her.
Hyacinth Maxwell was crouched at the edge of the lawn, half-hidden behind the boxwood hedge that ran along the property line, close enough to the terrace that she had a clear line of sight to the exact spot where Evelyn had collapsed. She looked very focused and in her hand was a small silver compact open in one hand, tilted toward the moonlight. She was using something like tweezers or a nail file to work at the clasp of her bracelet.
The David Yurman bracelet.
She got it loose, held it up for one long assessing second like she was deciding something, and then she dropped it into the mulch bed at the base of the hedge and pushed a little dirt over it with the toe of her shoe.
“Um,” I said, in a voice that came out significantly louder than I intended. “Guys. Guys, look.”
Vivienne’s camera was already up. Of course it was. That woman had reflexes like a nature documentarian waiting for the leopard to finally pounce.
“Is she burying evidence?” Allison whispered. “Naughty girl.”
“She’s burying jewelry,” Reginald corrected.
“That doesn’t sound suspicious to you?” Taylor demanded. “Repeat what you just said.”
“She’s burying jewelry. In a hedge. At a crime scene. Which, forgive me, does functionally amount to burying evidence.”
“That’s a hell of a thing to do in front of five witnesses,” Taylor said.
“She doesn’t know she’s in front of five witnesses,” Vivienne murmured, not lowering the lens. “She thinks everyone is busy gossiping or drinking.”
Hyacinth straightened, smoothed her dress, and glanced up. She found all five of us staring at her from twenty feet with zero discretion.
I looked at Hollis.
Make that four of us staring at Hyacinth. Hollis was much better at being discreet.
Hyacinth only momentarily looked panicked. Then she smiled brightly.
“Harper!” she called, crossing the grass toward us with her arms already extended for a hug I had absolutely no intention of accepting. “I heard the most awful rumors. Is it true? About Evelyn?”
“It’s true,” I said, sidestepping the hug in favor of waving my arms dramatically.
“So awful,” Hyacinth said, shaking her head. “Just tragic.”
“Very. Hey, what were you doing over there?”
“Where?” Her eyes were very wide. Very blue. Very unconvincing.
“By the hedge.”
“Oh nothing, just needed a moment. It’s been a shock. I lost an earring earlier, actually, I was looking for it.” She touched her ear, which had two earrings on it, both present and accounted for, a fact she seemed to realize a half-second too late, because her hand dropped very fast.
“Your bracelet’s gone,” Vivienne said pleasantly, camera still trained on Hyacinth’s face. “You had it earlier. The David Yurman.”
“Did I?” Hyacinth laughed, a high, tinkling sound that had absolutely no joy in it whatsoever. “Goodness, I can’t keep track of my own accessories tonight, what a night, isn’t it just terrible about Evelyn?—”
“You told me about that bracelet an hour ago,” I said. “On the front steps. You made sure I saw it.”
Her smile stayed exactly where it was, but something behind her eyes went cold and calculating, just for a second, before the warmth returned. “I really don’t know what you mean, Harper. It’s been so long since school, I don’t think you know me nearly as well as you think you do.”
“But I’m still hilarious,” I told her.
