Confessions of a Murder Suspect

51

The first thing I did was wake up Harry.

Harry didn’t like being woken up one bit, of course. He shoved me aside and pulled the covers over his head. “Go away, Tandy. Get out of here. I’m not kidding.”

“I’m sorry, but YOU HAVE TO SEE THIS!”

I yanked down the blankets and opened one of his eyes with my fingers.

He batted my hand away. “Are you crazy?”

“Look at this, then you tell me.”

I switched on the light next to Harry’s bed and gave him the locket.

I bit down hard on my lip as he opened the heart and looked at the picture. Then Harry did as I had done; he flipped the locket over and read the inscription.

He read the engraving a second time, then handed me the locket, fell back onto his pillow, and pulled the covers over his face again.

I poked his arm. “So, what do you think?”

“Think? I can’t think anymore. I can only feel pain. What is going on around here? I mean, what was going on?”

Focus on the facts, Tandy. “Both our parents were probably having affairs. Only Maud’s looks like it was going on inside our home.” I swallowed. “That’s pretty sad.”

“Sad? I call it sick! I call it outrageously disrespectful to every other Angel in the house.”

“Well, I call Malcolm screwing around with a girl young enough to be my sister—who is ALSO MY BROTHER’S GIRLFRIEND!—probably even more outrageously sick and disrespectful.”

“That, too,” said Harry. “Let’s face it, our ’rents were pretty despicable. No wonder they’re dead.”

My thoughts were blooming like poisonous flowers, bright and noxious and irrepressible.

“Harry, think about this. I’m just trying out a theory, okay? What if Samantha wanted to go public with the love affair? What if she wanted Maud to leave Malcolm? What if Maud refused? People have been killed for less rejection than that.”

“Be careful, Tandy. All you have to support this theory is an inscription on a locket.”

“It’s a lead. It’s a clue.”

“We’ve got to trust Samantha until we know that we can’t.”

“Trust?” I narrowed my eyes. “That’s not something that makes a whole lot of sense right now, Harry. The only person I trust at this moment”—I paused to think about it—“is you.”

“Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence.”

I pulled out my phone and dialed Samantha’s number.

“I’m right around the corner,” she told me. “I’ll be home in five or six minutes.”

Harry and I were waiting for her when she came through the door, looking oh-so-pretty in pink.

“Tandy! I’m so glad you’re back,” she said, wrapping me in a huge hug. “Are you okay? Did Philippe bring you home? I can’t imagine you trapped in that terrible place!” She finally let me go and stepped back to look at our faces. “Oh, dear. What’s wrong now?” she asked as she set her Hermès bag on the floor.

“Please join us, Samantha,” I said. “Harry and I have a question that only you can answer.”

Did you kill our mother and father?