“Are we getting rooms or not?” I hissed. She looked at me, frowning, and shrugged her shoulders. The entire enterprise hinged on being able to get access to the spa. Minka was sitting opposite with the laptop we had picked up for her in Poole. I signaled her to pull up the spa’s feed on social media. The latest post was an image of a snowy landscape with a thermal pool gently steaming against a crisp blue sky.
I skimmed the comments—hearts, praise hands, little emoji with towel turbans—until I found what I needed. Can’t wait to see you this weekend for my hen party! chirped Debbi Williams, followed by a chicken emoji and heart eyes. I went to her profile and found her location listed as Cardiff. A few more clicks and I saw the engagement pic, Debbi glowing in the arms of a pleasant-looking guy as she flashed a small, bright diamond at the camera. A few posts later was a group photo of Debbi with five other girls captioned, My best mates and bridesmaids! Six girls altogether, which meant at least two rooms and probably three. It would do just fine.
I scrolled back to the spa page and clicked the link in their bio to their website. Just then Helen started to speak again. “Yes, I am still here, and I intend to be here until you find my booking.” I made a frantic gesture at her to keep stalling, and she launched into a genteel tirade while I kept hitting buttons until I found the link to the phone number and dialed.
I motioned to her that it was ringing and she broke into her own rant. “Go and answer that other line immediately. I cannot hear myself think. Yes, I will hold.”
The desk clerk answered my call in French and German but switched to English immediately, his voice harried.
“Yes, this is Debbi Williams from Cardiff. I have a booking for this weekend for a small block of rooms for a hen party. I’m afraid I have to cancel. No, I don’t have the confirmation number handy, but I suppose I could look. It might take a few minutes . . .” I trailed off, but the desk clerk cut in.
“It is policy to use the confirmation number to cancel a booking,” he began. The Swiss and their rules. I rolled my eyes at Helen.
“It’s not my fault he canceled the wedding,” I said, letting my voice break on a sob. “I’ve had to tell all our friends and it’s been so humiliating, and now you’re going to make me pay for this booking that I can’t afford anymore because he left with all of our wedding money—”
The desk clerk might have been Swiss, but he was also a man, and I haven’t met a man yet who could handle a crying woman—especially when he already had an irritated woman on the other line and I was handing him available rooms on a silver platter. I threw in a few stuttering, dry-eyed sobs for good measure. “He cheated on me, you know. With my sister,” I sniffled. The poor desk clerk didn’t stand a chance.
“I suppose I could make an exception just this once, Miss Williams,” he said hastily.
I started to babble my thanks, but he cut in. “We have canceled your booking. Thank you and we hope to welcome you to the Spa at Courtempierre-les-Bains on another occasion.” He hung up and went straight back to Helen. Even muffled, his tone sounded relieved and Helen practically purred.
“Well, I am very glad we could get that straightened out. Yes. We will see you this weekend. Two rooms. And a complimentary scalp massage for my trouble? How kind.”
She hung up and turned to me. “Who the hell is Debbi Williams?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Two days later, my tobacco tea was finished. I strained off the solids, burying them in the garden. The liquid that was left was pure poison. We gathered around the kitchen table, gloves on and Kevin shut in the pantry to keep him from killing himself. The six of us worked slowly, using kitchen funnels to decant the murky liquid into an assortment of opaque toiletry bottles. Face wash, toner, astringent, mouthwash—all got filled and then capped, the lids sealed with melted candle wax to make them spill-proof. A few miniatures with Irish whiskey labels got the same treatment. We were going by train instead of flying, but we weren’t taking any chances on raising eyebrows at Customs. Altogether we had more than enough to do the job.
When we finished, we cleared up the kitchen and poured the rest of the poison down the sink. Natalie sluiced it out with boiling water and did the same for the carboy, eliminating any traces of what we’d done. We were packed and ready, with fresh papers, disguises, and everything else we needed, all folded into a single carry-on each. The rest of us looked away as Mary Alice and Akiko said a stilted good-bye. Akiko had hardly said two words to her since we’d been in England, but I hoped a little time apart would help her to wrap her head around the fact that this was her new normal—at least for now.
Minka drove us to the train station, where we traveled in separate carriages to London. We got ourselves to Zurich by slightly different routes and rendezvoused in the train station before piling into a hired car service—Lady Henrietta Ridley would never Uber. Helen took point, striding along purposefully while the rest of us scuttled behind. We’d scoured the local thrift shops to find tweedy English clothes, and a set of wigs from a firm that supplied Beyoncé took care of our hair. Natalie found an oversized bra she padded out with water balloons nestled into a pair of socks while I tucked prosthetic ass pads around my hips to suggest flesh that had settled with age. We looked like a girl gang that would have the Queen as our leader, all low heels and no-nonsense curls. Mary Alice had even tucked butterscotch candies in her purse, which she handed out to porters in lieu of tips.
We checked into the spa without incident. The desk clerk that Helen had gently terrorized as “Lady Henrietta” was nowhere in sight. We signed in and were given keys by a slim young woman whose name tag said she was Ji-Woo. She gave us complimentary glasses of alkaline water and Natalie deliberately tripped, spilling hers all down Ji-Woo’s tidy black suit.
“Oh, I am sorry,” Natalie drawled.
Ji-Woo gave her a thin smile. “Not at all, madam. If you will excuse me, I will just go and change my blouse.”
We waved her off, telling her we would find our own way upstairs. As soon as she disappeared through the door behind the front desk, Natalie nipped around, kneeling in front of the computer while the rest of us studied the brochures of spa treatments, keeping watch on the elevator, front entrance, and office door.
“Hurry up,” Mary Alice muttered. Natalie pushed herself to her feet, her knees giving a creak of protest as I grabbed a couple of Ji-Woo’s business cards.
“Got it,” Nat said. “He’s in Room 217.”
We took our keys and brochures and headed up to our rooms on the third floor. Mary Alice and I bunked together, while Helen and Nat took the second room. There was a handy communicating door, which we left open, and in a matter of minutes we were ready. Each room had a writing desk with a thick leather portfolio, and inside was a full complement of spa stationery, stamped with the resort’s letterhead. I scrawled a note addressed to Günther explaining that the water would be shut off for a short while the following day and that as compensation for the inconvenience, I was arranging for him to have a complimentary mud wrap in his room at five pm this afternoon. I signed it with Ji-Woo’s name and stuffed it into the envelope with one of her business cards. I addressed the envelope, careful to cross the seven in his room number like a proper little European. I handed it off to Natalie, who nipped down and slid it under his door before hurrying back.
We were sitting on the edge of Helen’s bed, waiting, when she returned.
“Was he in there?” I asked.
“Oh yeah. I could hear him snoring like a freight train,” Nat said.
“What if he doesn’t wake up in time to see the note?” Helen asked. She sounded like a fretful toddler, and Nat gave her a comforting pat.