The woman pulled a water bottle from the fridge, uncapped it. Before she went back to the living room, she swung her head, her eyes scanning the spotless countertops of the kitchen. I got a better look at her, the kitchen’s overhead fluorescent reflecting off her eyes, an unworldly green that seemed to glow for a moment. I dropped down off the tips of my toes. It was Lily Kintner. I’d seen her eyes and now I was sure. Without hesitation, I quickly walked back to my car, swinging wide of the front of the house so I wouldn’t activate the motion-sensor light again. I slid back into my Mini. It was Lily. I was sure of it. But how was that possible? How had she possibly become involved with Brad? And it wasn’t just Brad, obviously. Ted’s trip to Winslow had clearly been to see her. So she must have been involved with Ted. Were they having an affair? Had she initiated it, after some long gestating need for revenge? But, more importantly, at this moment, how had she found Brad, and what did she want from him?
I slid farther down in my seat to wait. My mind reeled. The rain had stopped but the sky was still blanketed by clouds, and I felt protected in the black shadow of the tree I was under. I watched Brad’s cottage, wondering if Lily would spend the night there, but knowing I needed to wait it out in case she didn’t. My mind was filled with a swarm of possibilities, but in all of them, I was being hunted. Somehow, Lily was hunting me.
It felt like two hours but it was probably only one when Brad’s front door opened and Lily emerged. The outside light flicked on and I watched her get into her car. She backed out of the driveway and turned south on Micmac Road. Part of me wanted to follow her, to see where she went, but it was more important that I talk with Brad and find out what was possibly going on. I forced myself to wait for five minutes, just in case Lily realized she’d forgotten something and turned around, then I bolted across the road and rapped on Brad’s door. He cracked the door and looked out at me, his puffy eyes confused for a moment. I pulled the hood off my head. “It’s me, Brad. Let me in.”
“Shit,” he said and opened the door for me. I took a step inside and pushed the door closed behind me. I could smell cheap perfume.
“What the fuck was Lily Kintner doing at your house?” I said.
“Is that her name?”
“Jesus, Brad, what did she want?”
“I just met her tonight. She was at Cooley’s. She came up to me in the parking lot.” His eyes were shifting, as though he were trying to figure out exactly what to say to me. I resisted the urge to punch him as hard as I could in the throat.
“Brad, what the fuck did she want from you?”
He slumped a little, looking like a dog that had just been swatted in the nose, and said, “She wants to kill you, Miranda. She wants me to set it up. She told me it’s the only way I won’t end up in prison. I was going to tell you, I promise.”
CHAPTER 24
LILY
I arrived in Kennewick at 8:00 P.M. on Tuesday, twenty-four hours after making the plan with Brad. Without traffic, the drive from Massachusetts was just over an hour. I parked my car at the Admiral’s Inn, a brand-new resort hotel shoehorned onto a bluff on the other side of the beach in Kennewick Harbor. The parking lot wasn’t full, but it wasn’t empty either. I had circled and parked so that I was facing the short sliver of beach, and beyond it, the soft lights of the Kennewick Inn. I sat in my car for a moment. It was a cloudless night, the black sky pocked with yellow stars. A three-quarters moon reflected on the ocean. I had brought a small penlight so I could navigate along the cliff walk to Ted and Miranda’s house, but I didn’t think I’d need it.
Earlier, after making myself a simple cheese omelet for dinner, I’d called my boss at his home, and told him that I still had a sore throat, and that it might be getting worse.
“Don’t come in tomorrow. Stay home. Get better,” he said, rising panic in his voice.