here and investigate on their own. I’m sorry if they’ve caused any trouble.”
Kerry shook her head, pointing to Claire. “After I dropped you off, something didn’t feel right. I went home, tried to sleep it off. I couldn’t shake the feeling, though, after what you’d said in the diner about Patrick’s house. And your face reminded me … That’s why I came. Bonnie thought I was crazy. Turns out, I wasn’t.”
Kerry was still shaking her head, but she seemed looser, like someone recovering during the credits of a horror show. “I’m trying to wrap my mind around this,” she said.
Me too, thought Murphy. She was pretty sure everyone was: her sisters, Mom, and the sheriff Mom mysteriously knew. Murphy’s brain was pulsing with everything Mom had told them about the Enright brothers and the murders. The true story—the one she’d never been told.
“I really am sorry, Kerry,” Mom repeated. “I know this is serious, and it’s my fault. I left the girls unsupervised. If I were at home, if I’d paid attention to what was going on …”
“Enough of that.” Kerry waved a hand at Mom, looking almost angry. “We’re not talking about breaking and entering. There’s heavier stuff on the table here; don’t pretend there’s not. I mean, Leslie. God. It’s you.”
“Me,” said Mom, hiking her shoulders, and she suddenly looked so young to Murphy—as young as Eileen.
“I’m sorry I didn’t write.” Mom pushed off the couch to her feet. “Mark and I agreed, better to have a clean break. It’s not that we didn’t think it through, or that it wasn’t hard for us. It was hell, Kerry. And I could’ve used a friend.”
“Where?” Kerry asked.
“Three hours south. Mark got a lead, found an opening at a library. We figured it’d be a transition, a way to get on our feet before heading out farther—Sacramento, maybe, or LA. Then … well, life happened.”
Murphy’s mind was reeling, but she understood at least what “life happened” meant: Eileen, Claire, and Murphy, and then their dad’s death. That was a lot of life to happen in a few years.
“Mark?” Kerry whispered, like she already knew.
“Leukemia.” Mom’s jawline was stiff. She didn’t talk much about Dad at home, but when she did, her jaw always locked into place, metal bar shut across a door, keeping bad things inside. “The medical bills were bad. There was no leaving after that.”
“You could’ve written or called.”
“I was … ashamed.” Mom broke then—voice and body, her neck bending sharply.
“My God.” Kerry pinched the bridge of her nose. “This is a Christmas punch dream.”
The parlor got quiet, and Murphy glanced around—first to Eileen, with her dark eyes and folded arms, then to Claire, sitting cross-legged by the couch, gaze vacant. She returned to Mom and Kerry, who were looking anywhere but at each other. They’d been friends, once upon a time. That’s what was going on here: Years ago, Mom and Kerry had lived in Rockport, teenagers together.
Then the murders had happened.
And now the past and present were colliding, exploding. Had Uncle Patrick known this would happen when he left his house to the sisters? Murphy wondered. It could be this was Patrick Enright’s own “ta-da” moment. That he, like Murphy, was a true magician.
Because here were all four Sullivan girls together, and here were two old friends reunited. That was magical, wasn’t it? The good kind of magic. The Cayenne Castle kind. And even though Murphy was cold down to her muscles, and so confused her mind was whirling like a spinning top, she felt a sureness and safeness she hadn’t known before.
“So,” she said, cracking the silence in two. “You’re not going to arrest us?”
She smiled guiltily at Kerry, raising bent arms as though to say, It’s the holiday season, am I right?
Kerry did something unexpected: She laughed. There were tears beaded in the corners of her eyes, and her laughing sent them streaming down her cheeks.
“God,” she gasped. “God.”
“Kerry,” said Mom, “we’ll clear out of here, I swear. If what this attorney says is true, the girls will go about things the proper way from here on out. No trespassing whatsoever.”
Kerry wiped at the tears, her chest heaving. “It’s Christmas Day, Leslie. I’m not going to arrest you. I’m going to invite you to my home.”
Murphy blinked, dumbfounded for the hundredth time that day.
“I couldn’t impose,” said Mom. “This was a misunderstanding. We didn’t—”
“You’re not arguing.” Kerry cut Mom off. “I always win an argument, remember? You called it my special skill.”