I walked away, happy I’d seen Lizzie, but in the next aisle I was attacked with even more guilt than I’d felt with Eric earlier. Jane and I had sworn each other to secrecy, and that meant keeping information from our dearest friends. I hoped they wouldn’t be furious with us when they found out about the necklace.
I had known Lizzie for as long as I’d known Jane. In other words, for most of my life. Lizzie’s family had lived down the street from me, and because she was five years older than me, she had been my babysitter while I was growing up. In those days, I had looked up to her as an older, smarter woman and had shared all my deepest, darkest thoughts and secrets with her. And now I couldn’t tell her my current deepest, darkest secret!
Emily and Marigold had moved here more recently, but I felt almost as close to them as I did to Lizzie and Jane.
I hurried out to the parking lot, but the guilt followed me.
When I got home, I called Jane’s cell while I put away my groceries. When there was no answer, I didn’t leave a message for fear of someone overhearing me. As soon as I ended the call, I realized how ridiculous that was. I was in my own kitchen, leaving a message on a cell phone.
“Oh great,” I muttered, as I stashed the pint of half-and-half in the fridge. I was getting to be just as paranoid as Jesse had been.
*
Somewhere in the middle of the night, I was woken by another flash of light coming from next door. I jumped out of bed, wondering how someone got in there. Jane had just changed the locks today. I reached for my cell phone and called Eric to report it. When I got his voice mail, I had to leave a message.
“Damn it. Now what?” But I knew what I had to do. I threw on my clothes, grabbed my baseball bat, and ran downstairs with Robbie at my heels, the floppy stuffed skunk dangling from his mouth. “Stay,” I whispered, and once he was curled up on the rug under the table, I slipped outside my kitchen door and found Mac waiting.
“You saw it, too,” I whispered.
“I was going to give you another five minutes.”
“I called Eric, but I had to leave a message.”
“I got ahold of him,” he said. “Hey, you’ve got a baseball bat.”
I held up the bat. “It’s not quite as effective as a gun, but it can’t hurt.”
“It can, actually, if you swing it too close to my head.” He grabbed my free hand as we walked down the driveway.
It felt oddly as if we were going on a date. To a dead man’s house. To find a killer. I suppose I’d been on weirder dates.
Since the police arrival was imminent, we didn’t venture onto Jesse’s property but stayed on my driveway and out of the way. Eric’s SUV approached quietly and parked a few doors away. He searched Jesse’s house high and low but found no one inside. He scoured the backyard, too, but there was nothing. No clues, no sign of an intruder, nothing.
I thought Mac and I had been as quiet as little mice, but whoever was searching Jesse’s place must have heard us coming. Or maybe they never got inside. Maybe the change of locks had discouraged them. But I’d seen the flashes of light. So maybe they’d only used their flashlight to check the lock and a few windows and then left when they realized they couldn’t get in.
Both Mac and Eric walked me back to my kitchen door and we all whispered good night. They waited until I was inside and the door was locked before Mac returned to his place up the stairs and Eric left through the gate and down the driveway. Holding Robbie, I watched from the kitchen window until everyone was out of sight before I went back to bed.
These late-night missions were oddly thrilling, especially with two good-looking men escorting me around. I wondered what I would do for excitement when we finally caught the culprit.
I mentally smacked myself at such a foolish thought. I mean, we were on the hunt for someone who might have killed my sweet old neighbor. How could I possibly consider it exhilarating—except in the murkiest way possible?
Then call me murky, I thought as I punched my pillow into shape, because I was having way too much fun. And why not enjoy it for now? The thrills would end soon enough and I would go back to my usual routine of sleeping peacefully through the night without all the flashing lights and guilt-spawned nightmares.
And Mac would move out of my garage apartment as soon as the lighthouse mansion—his new home—was fully refurbished. After that, we would see each other around town every so often, but it wouldn’t be the same. And since that thought depressed me more than anything else, I picked up Tiger and held her close. As her steady purring lulled me to sleep, I prayed I’d make it through one night without dreaming of dead bodies and dark basements.