Page 68 of Night Falls on Predicament Avenue
“For now” was his brief, unsatisfactory answer.
The phone call had ended abruptly. Harper was all right. Sebastian didn’t want to talk further. Norah held Naomi’s music box. Dover hadn’t bothered to take it as evidence. He said there was no sign of a crime, and an object getting moved didn’t justify their dusting for fingerprints. Norah saw things differently, but she couldn’t tell Dover how to do his job.
She stood in the entryway, the front door open, the screen door the only barrier between her and the porch. She hesitated. Should she take the music box back to her dresser, or should she put it in another room? What was the deal with the music box and this woman—apparition or real?
“Where’d you get that?” The voice came from just outside the screen door.
Norah jumped, almost losing her hold on the box. She performed a juggling act and came up the winner, clutching it to her chest. She blanched when she saw LeRoy Anderson standing there on the porch. “What are you doing here?” Norah demanded.
“Where did you get that?” LeRoy demanded back.
“That’s none of your business.” Norah had the sudden irrational wish that she’d never recovered enough to move here to 322 Predicament Avenue. She wished her years of therapy hadn’t been so helpful and that she was still paralyzed with enough fear that she needed to live with her parents. It was worse being here. Being alone. Being expected to face her fears every day and having life continue to throw them at her with unmerciful vengeance.
“It is too my business.” Without asking, LeRoy opened the screen door.
“Stay back!” Norah shouted, holding the gold-plated box before her like a shield.
LeRoy’s eyes grew wide. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to attack you!”
Norah gave a nervous shout of laughter.
“Let me see that.” LeRoy reached for the music box.
In an act of desperation and self-preservation, Norah shoved it into his hands and took several steps backward. She felt along the wall behind her. The telephone hung there, its yellow cord dangling to the floor. He could strangle her with that! Norah stayed in front of it, feeling behind her for an umbrella in the stand she knew was beside the phone.
LeRoy wasn’t paying any attention to her. He seemed to know exactly what he was doing with the box. He popped the lid open, and once again the eerie chortling of the bird filled the entryway. LeRoy gave her a look empty of threat but not at all trustworthy.
“I gave this to her,” he said.
“What?” Norah’s fingers wrapped around an umbrella handle behind her back.
LeRoy lifted the music box. “This. I gave it to Naomi.”
The thought brought little comfort to her. “Another thing you haven’t confessed to until now?”
LeRoy’s eyes darkened. “There wasn’t anything to confess about this box. It was never part of the questioning.”
“But Naomi was. Your relationship with my sister was. Why wouldn’t you have mentioned it?” Norah was ready to beat him over the head with the umbrella if she had to. And if she did, she wouldn’t stop until he was dead. For Naomi. It was the first time she had ever felt such rage in her soul. The kind that would almost find satisfaction in pulverizing the man in front of her.
LeRoy set the box on the console table near the door. He didn’t come closer. “I stopped by because...” He cleared his throat uncomfortably. “Your visit wasn’t expected. But I just wanted to tell you once and for all, from me to you, that I had nothing to do with Naomi’s death.”
Norah shook her head. “I don’t believe you.”
“I know,” LeRoy said. “She didn’t want you all knowing about us. About the baby. Said y’all wouldn’t approve.”
“We would have accepted her and the baby.” Norah’s protest was met with a small snort from LeRoy.
“Sure, but you wouldn’t have accepted me.”
Norah clenched her jaw. He was right. They wouldn’t have. “Norah deserved better.”
“Better’n what?” LeRoy crossed his arms over his chest. Norah could see the dark hairs on his hard-muscled arms. The navy-blue T-shirt he wore boasted a beer logo and was frayed around the neck.
“You.” She laughed in disbelief that he couldn’t see it. “You met her in a bar, for heaven’s sake. She was underage.”
“She didn’t drink,” LeRoy stated.
Norah pressed her lips together. “She wasn’t even twenty yet.”
