Page 79 of She Doesn't Have a Clue
Rebecca had swiped the bottle of champagne earmarked for Kennedy, which had been poisoned with the rosary peas, and brought it with her to her evening swim. When she’d started to feel bad, she must have suspected sabotage after her big announcement. She’d rushed to her office to finalize the paperwork, but the poison would have fully hit her system by then. She’d tried to go for help and gotten tangled up in the potted plants. Kate had been so focused on all the reasons why someone would want to murder Rebecca—to be fair, there were a lot of reasons—that it never even occurred to her Rebecca had been the collateral damage, not Kennedy.
“Richie!” she shouted as she entered the pool room once again.
“Howare you still here?” Richie complained.
“The secret passages,” Kate said. “What do you know about them? Where do they go?”
“Who knows?” Richie said, sweeping his arms out and turning their slice in a lazy circle. “All over the house, I think. Apparently Great-Grandpa Russell built them to hide his imported Canadian whisky. He was super paranoid about the G-men even up to his death, so he never told anyone where the secret passages were or how to open them. Aunt Rebecca spent years trying to clear them out and catalog them after she inherited. Found four skeletons.Four. Two were animals, but one was a child-size human and the other was clearly a man in a suit. We have no idea who they were, how they got in there, anything. Ineverset foot in those passages.”
“You said Rebecca cataloged all the passages she found,” Kate said. “Do you know where she kept the documentation?”
“No idea,” Richie said, starting to sound irritated. “More importantly, I don’t care.”
“The trust,” Steven said, giving a little laugh. “Rebecca would have had to submit original blueprints to the San Juan Islands Historical Trust with construction dates and architect names. She probably would have marked the passages on those documents.”
The historical society. The secret inspector. What if…
Kate needed to find Kennedy as soon as possible.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Kate took her best guess of the layout of the house and turned left inside the passage, accidentally ramming her toe into a whisky barrel tucked just around the corner and cursing the throb of pain that shot up her leg. She imagined the place even smelled like old whisky, a heady combination of wood and jet fuel. She did her bestnotto imagine those four skeletons Rebecca had supposedly found in the wall, or how they got there, or why no one had cared to find them until they were nothing but bones.
Left had at least worked out for her, directionally, as the passage reached a set of stairs. Kate shone her flashlight on the edges of the stairs where the wood was the roughest, little splinters sticking out. The ends looked discolored, and as Kate scraped her finger against them, red dust caked up under her fingernail.
“Dried blood,” Kate whispered, shining her flashlight up the stairs.
This was it. This was how someone had gotten Kennedy from the bridal suite down to the wine cave without anyone seeing. She found Kennedy’s missing shoes from the previous evening strewn along the steps farther up, all the proof she needed that this was how the bride hadbeen moved. Her shoes came off during the transport, and that’s how she got those odd scrapes and bruises on her heels. Kate reached the top of the stairs and found the door-release lever.
It swung open into the master bedroom. Of course Russell Hempstead would want a passage from his bedroom to his illicit goods storage room. Kate stepped into what looked like an impromptu sleepover, with Kennedy and her bridesmaids in matching pajamas. There were a few other guests—Veeta the marketing intern, Abraham and Jean-Pierre, and Louis the photographer capturing the cozy moment. They looked up at her in surprise, huddled around a computer screen that looked like it was showing—
“Mamma Mia?” Kate blurted out in surprise. “You’re watchingMamma Mia? You know they don’t end up getting married, right?”
“That’s why we’re watching it,” Kennedy said with a little smile, her eyes sad. “Felt appropriate for the weekend we’re having. Plus, Aunt Rebecca loved ABBA.”
“That is… surprising information,” Kate said.
“Where did you come from?” Juliette asked.
“Secret passage.” Kate pointed over her shoulder as Cassidy not-so-subtly crawled for the exit. “Relax, Cassidy. I’m not here for revenge. At least, not yet.”
“I was just… looking… for my contact,” Cassidy said, sweeping her hands over the floor with wide strokes.
“So you snuck in here through a secret passage just to stand around frowning?” Juliette asked. “Seems like you could have done that on your own somewhere else.”
“No,” Kate said, shaking her head. “I’ve gathered you all here today—”
“You didn’t gather us here,” Veeta said in confusion. “We were already here. You’re the one who just showed up.”
“Okay, well… be that as it may,” Kate said, determined to soldier on, “I’vemetaphoricallygathered you all here today to reveal, once and for all, the true murderer.”
Juliette rolled her eyes. “Kate, you’re not a real detective.”
“Well, I’m not a real killer, either,” Kate snapped. “Didn’t stop you accusing me.”
Juliette only shrugged. “I’m still not convinced you’re not the murderer.”
“Just let me do my fake job,” Kate said, exasperated.