“And H?”
“For Holly, I think. Holly Whitaker. The police asked me about her because she’d posted the Facebook photo. And she was the one in the photo that sent me to Kuma’s, looking for Jason.”
“Okay, that’s K and J, obviously,” Wyatt says. “What’s I?” I hand him the phone again, and he reads the email, shaking his head. “I don’t get it.”
“I is for intimacy, I think.”
“You…got intimacy from this?”
“Well, I thought she was referring specifically to intimacy with our mother, which I think she was. The ‘cold fish’ is the hint.”
“The sturgeon?” Wyatt says, puzzled.
“No, not the sturgeon,” I explain testily. “Zelda says it isn’t the sturgeon. It’s something my mother said to me the day I left for France. She was…fairly blunt in her analysis of my psychological shortcomings. Fear of intimacy topped the list. So I figured Zelda wanted me to go spend time with her. And I found an envelope in her drawer.”
“You went through your mother’s drawers?” Wyatt looks scandalized.
I realize this would be unthinkable in his functional home, where privacy is respected and people share willingly with one another. “I needed the corkscrew. Which I suppose Zelda predicted. Actually…” I think back. “That clever fucking girl. She filled the fridge with sparkling wine and locked up the liquor cabinet. She knew we would drink the bubbly that first night, because she planted it. Marlon couldn’t open the liquor cabinet because he doesn’t know the combo. I couldn’t find the corkscrew in its usual spot, so she knew I would go to that drawer when I went to see Mom.”
“Good thing you rarely drink twist-offs,” Wyatt says. I snort. “What did the letter in the envelope say?”
“It was just a note. It had Jason’s name doodled on it, and it hinted that I was supposed to look for a picture. So I checked her Facebook page again, and there was nothing. But then I was fussing with her iPhone and saw that she’d opened an Instagram account a few weeks ago. I logged into it, and there was a picture of Jason and Holly standing in front of Kuma’s. Come to think of it, I is probably for Instagram,” I say with a frown. “Either way. I knew she wanted me to go talk to this Jason guy, but I assumed it was because he was supposed to meet her at the barn the night it burned. I thought he might be able to tell me something about the night or the drugs, but instead…”
“Instead, he played you a song. That L-O-V-E song, by Nat King Cole,” Wyatt finished.
“Which got me thinking about the alphabet, just like she knew it would. Then, when the cops showed up, talking about m-m-m-murder…” I shrug. “A bit slow, I acknowledge. Should have seen it coming.”
“No one can read Zelda’s mind,” Wyatt says darkly, patting my hand. “Not even you.” I get goosebumps where he’s touched me, and I realize I am thrumming with a red-wine buzz. Trouble trouble. I swallow some more. We’re reaching the end of the bottle.
“She can read mine,” I say. “Always has.” I stare out at the water, frowning. “Could she have known the cops would come while I was there? How would she have worked out the timing?” I mull this over. “She’d want the letters to go in order….”
“Anonymous tip once you left the house?”
“Do you think—do you think she’s watching us?” I ask, voicing an anxiety I’ve been feeling since Zelda’s first communiqué.
“Maybe technological surveillance?” he suggests. The words sound faintly ridiculous, coming from him. “Spying on your phone—or hers, I guess—so that she knows what you’re up to?”
“Could be.” I go to take another sip of wine, but my glass is empty. So is Wyatt’s. So is the bottle.
“Should I go get another?” he says tentatively. I pause. There’s a secondary question here. We’ve both been drinking, and if Wyatt has much more to drink, he’ll probably be over the legal limit to drive home. Which wouldn’t necessarily prevent him from driving—the roads don’t exactly crawl with cops out in Hector, and we know where two of them are—but it would introduce a new element of hesitation into his decision of whether to go home. A decision that would also be rather emotionally impacted by the two bottles of wine we had just consumed. I know all this, and I know what it might lead to. I look at the illustration on the bottle, the man caught between two shackles, and I wonder if we’re going to talk about it, review what happened after I found him and Zelda together. I don’t know that I can. I also don’t know that we can avoid it. I nod yes.
“Sure. Look for any more notes. Maybe Zelda has a tasting course planned out for us. I’m just going to check on Nadine and use the loo. I left the cabinet open. Try not to wake Marlon.”
I note that he takes the empty bottle down with him to put in the recycling. Responsible Wyatt. Little things like that endear him to me. Zelda would have left empty bottles on the railing until they fell off, and then she would have let them accumulate in a jagged heap beneath the deck. Our mother would wait for the vanished servants of her childhood to come and collect her detritus and, failing that, would have raised holy hell until we picked them up. And Marlon? Marlon would disappear before anyone would think to accuse him of neglecting the task. I’m the only one who would take it downstairs to the recycling before getting a new bottle, I think bitterly. Me—and Wyatt.
I’m wobbly crossing the room, but I’m not that drunk; I’ve been going slow tonight, and all the drinks have been spaced out. I’ll be okay for a couple more. Should definitely stop after this bottle. Probably. We’ll reassess afterward.