Page 72 of From the Darkness

“Yes, but we need her to keep the School Board off our back—since we had to move up the timetable. We need her so everything here looks nice and normal until the sale goes through. And when she disappears, it will be easy enough to say that she’s gone back home.”

The breath froze in Bree’s lungs, and her hand clenched on the door handle. Oh Lord, it sounded like they were planning to kill her, too.

“We didn’t need the Sterlings.”

“Who else are we going to pin London’s murder on?”

“Yeah, well, now they’re dead, too.”

“So—they ran away. Or they were trying to run away, and they had an accident. We’ll let Helen decide about that.”

Graves made a sound of agreement, then said, “I know you and Miss Helen are friends, but do you trust her? What if she turns around and stabs us in the back like she does everybody else?”

“Helen would never do that to me! We go way back. I worked here when she was just a girl. I was nice to her. Sweet and kind. The way I am with Dinah.”

Graves snorted.

“She trusts me. She knows I’m the one making this whole plan work.”

“Just watch your back with her.”

“You don’t have to worry about me and her,” Mrs. Martindale insisted, but this time she sounded a shade less positive. “Now go on; get to work.”

“I don’t like it when you boss me around. We’re supposed to be partners,” Graves muttered.

“I’m not bossing you,” the woman denied. “I’m just trying to make sure that things look normal around here.”

“Normal! Yeah, right. What are you going to tell the teacher when she asks why the Sterlings aren’t around?”

“I’ll tell her they decided to leave. Maybe the ghost scared them away.” She cleared her throat. “Are the bodies in the sea cave?”

“Yeah.”

“Then Helen can decide what to do with them. I vote for weighting them down and taking them out to sea.”

“Weight them down! That will sure look like an accident.”

“Not if you make certain they don’t come bobbing up to the surface again.”

Bree held back a strangled exclamation. The woman had seemed so nice—but now she was showing her true personality. She must be some piece of work.

Bree heard water running, then footsteps rapidly leaving the kitchen.

Graves was going up to check on the entrance to the passageway!

Quickly she tiptoed back up the stairs, stepped into the hall, and closed the panel. She was just starting toward Dinah’s room, when Graves walked around the corner of the hall; and she made a startled sound.

“I didn’t mean to scare you,” he said, giving her a long look.

“No of course not,” she murmured, keeping her voice low and controlled.

“Just came up here to check something,” he said.

“Well, I’m on my way to the classroom. I just had to stop and . . uh . . . make a quick trip to my room,” she answered, surprised that she could make her voice sound normal when she talked to him.

He stood in the hallway, waiting for her to leave, and she knew he was going to check the panel the minute she was out of sight. Thank the Lord she’d gotten out of the passage before he discovered her there.

Turning, she walked away, hurrying toward the schoolroom. Dinah was alone, curled on the couch. She sat up and rubbed her eyes.

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