Now You See Her Page 0,71

the hall.”

“Yes.”

“Almost naked, from what I understand.”

“That’s a slight exaggeration.”

“And then he followed you onto the street.”

“He was fully dressed at that point.”

“And he returned to your room again after you left.”

“According to Mrs. Doyle.”

“Who claims he was in your room waiting for you when she went in to make up the bed,” Murphy stated.

“Yes, that’s what she says.”

“You don’t believe her?”

“I don’t know what to believe. For all I know, it could have been Mrs. Doyle who trashed my things.”

“And destroyed her own property? Why would she do that?”

“You’d have to ask her.”

“We already have. Frankly, it seems highly unlikely.”

“What about her son?”

“It appears Colin was out for most of the morning.”

“Which left the front desk largely unattended,” Marcy said, pouncing. “Which means anybody could have wandered in off the street and taken the master key and gone up to my room.…”

“But why, Mrs. Taggart?” Murphy asked logically. “Why would someone do that?”

“I don’t know.”

“That would mean someone had been watching the inn and seen you go out, waited until Mr. Sorvino exited the premises hours later, and noted the reception desk had been left unattended, none of which makes any sense unless …”

“Unless?” Marcy hung on the word as if she were suspended from a clothesline.

“Unless it has something to do with your daughter,” Murphy said.

Marcy tried to digest what he was saying. “You think there’s a connection between my search for Devon and someone breaking into my room and trashing my things?” Marcy asked.

“You said yesterday there’d been issues with your daughter,” Murphy explained, “that there were problems between the two of you, that perhaps she might not want to be found.…”

“You think it was Devon who did this?”

“I’m simply suggesting it’s a possibility.”

“But why?”

“Perhaps she was looking for something.”

Marcy hugged her purse close to her chest. Was it possible?

“Or maybe that was her way of telling you to go home, to leave her alone.”

“Or maybe it was someone else,” Marcy said. “Someone who doesn’t want me to find her.”

Murphy shrugged as Colleen Donnelly reentered the room. “We’ve just checked with Hayfield Manor. Apparently Mr. Sorvino checked out at noon.”

Disappointment stabbed at Marcy’s chest. “Can I go now?” she asked.

“Where exactly is it you plan to go, Mrs. Taggart?” Murphy asked.

He was right, Marcy realized. She couldn’t very well go back to the Doyle Cork Inn. She smiled. “It looks as if Hayfield Manor has an unexpected vacancy,” she said.

TWENTY

I’M SORRY. HOW MUCH did you say?” Marcy asked the bright-eyed, dark-haired receptionist, who didn’t look a day over twelve.

“Six hundred and fifty euros,” the girl repeated with a smile that exposed her entire upper gum.

I could do something about that, Peter said from the dark recesses of Marcy’s brain.

Six hundred and fifty euros translated into around a thousand dollars, Marcy calculated silently, thinking that Peter would have a fit when he saw this month’s credit card bills, whose charges he’d agreed to cover for two years—“within reason,” he’d stressed—when she’d agreed not to contest their divorce. Silly man, she thought now. Had he really expected a crazy woman to act reasonably?

“Is that all right?” the receptionist asked, small clouds of worry disturbing the sky blue of her eyes. “It’s a deluxe room. I’m afraid there’s nothing else available at the moment.”

“It’s fine.” Marcy pushed her credit card across the black-and-gold-flecked marble counter. She could use a little deluxe treatment about now, she was thinking, wondering if the room she was getting was the same one Vic had abandoned earlier.

“Do you need help with your luggage?”

“Don’t have any.” Marcy surveyed the soft peach-and-gold-colored foyer with its marble columns and magnificent mahogany staircase. The hotel resembled an elegant, if large, manor home of the type that was common at the turn of the century, but the truth was that it had been built in 1996 and expanded to its current eighty-eight rooms in 1999. Nothing is what it seems, Marcy thought, returning her credit card to her wallet. “Is there somewhere I can buy a toothbrush and toothpaste?”

“Housekeeping can provide you with that, and we have a wonderful spa that sells all sorts of beauty and hair products,” the receptionist told her without further prompting.

Marcy’s hand went immediately to her hair, tucking it behind her ears and feeling it instantly bounce back to its former position as the receptionist handed her the key card to her room. “You’re in room 212. The elevator is straight ahead. Or you can take the stairs.” She pointed with her chin toward the