Page 55 of In the Bones
“A … what?”
“A tell. You pop your jaw when you’re on edge.”
“I’m not—”
“Woody,” Tim put in. “You invested quite a lot of money in the Rivermouth. That was back in September, a little less than nine months ago. When did Mikko tell you he hoped to open the business?”
The man said, “By Fourth of July weekend.”
“Fourth of July of this year. That’s six weeks away. The thing is, Woody, I drove by there this morning. It’s still completely abandoned. It’s late May,” said Tim, “and there’s no sign that any work has been done at all.”
Woody’s mouth opened and closed. “We’ve had some delays.” He shrugged, as if that was no big deal. “But we’re still on track. Mikko says it’ll all happen fast once we get started.”
“Six weeks,” Tim repeated. “To build an ice rink, arcade,virtual reality room, laser tag, restaurant, and indoor mini golf course from the ground up.” Tim pushed his notepad aside and clasped his hands on the table. “Woody,” he said. “I’m going to ask you again. Do you trust Mikko Helle?”
Woody’s skin was moist and pasty, every pore visible on his puckered face.
“I think I’d like to revise my statement,” Woody Durham said, closing his eyes.
FORTY-SIX
Molly
Nine months ago
“Take this.”
The voice was slow and sticky, sun-warmed honey on the skin of my neck. One hand gripped a bottle so heavy it bent her wrist, while the other was cupped like a shell.
“A gift from Mikko,” Gigi said, cocking a shapely eyebrow, “that he doesn’t know he gave us. I swear he’s got enough of these to get the whole village high.”
I’d laughed at that, but didn’t doubt that she was right. I did wonder where she’d found the pill that was nested in her hand. The last time I saw Gigi, she was still in the corner with Woody, consumed by a conversation with a guy old enough to be her dad. I didn’t get it, but she had no interest in cruising with me, so hey. To each her own.
From the moment we’d stepped through the door, the mood had felt more like a club than a private residence, every surface a jumble of liquor bottles and the space between them seething with people. Gigi had cracked open the tequila and had been nursing it for hours, the bottle’s lip stained blood red. She and I had shared a tube of lipstick before going out. My sister and I used to do the same thing. Gigi reminded me a lot of Jenny, who was only twenty-one when she died and left me alone.
Mikko’s house wasn’t what I’d been expecting. It was the furniture, for one thing; my grandmother had been dead for years, but her place had looked a lot more modern. Classier, too. There was a water-stained pink leather couch in the living room that probably started out as red. Next to it, someone banged on the upright piano, making a show of their talentless hands. The rooms were small and padded with carpet the samemilkshake brown as the walls. It was bringing me down, the house, so I reach for the pill, along with the tequila that glowed silver in Gigi’s hand. Somehow my fingers were red from the lipstick and, as I slipped the pill into my mouth, I smelled wax and a trace of something chemical and sweet.
At least our host was hot. He was the reason we’d come. I’d been determined to get Mikko alone, to pepper him with questions and maybe hook up, but he’d blown me off early on. Which was why I had no qualms about drinking his booze and taking his stash.
As soon as the drug took effect, something changed. An easy numbness washed over me, lightening the very air, and I knew our time had come. We could have spent this night, our last, on the full-size hotel bed, eating fried river fish from Styrofoam takeout containers and watching too-loud nineties reruns on TV. Instead, we were in Mikko Helle’s tattered house with a few dozen strangers, swaying to music I didn’t recognize, the lyrics strange and slippery to my ears. It was late, it was dark, we were in the house’s grip, and there was a message we needed to heed. Staying now, like this, would only lead to trouble.
Only once I’d managed to rise unsteadily to my feet did I realize the bottle Gigi had been holding, half-empty, now sat on the table. It made a shiny wet ring on the scarred wood, not that anyone cared. I scanned the room, peering through blue smoke, but not one face I saw was familiar.
“Gigi?” I managed, my voice shockingly weak. “Where’d you go?” The music swelled, tightening my chest.
“Gigi?” I repeated, louder now, but her name was swallowed by the noise and the mark was all that was left of her, a halo glowing in the hazy light.
FORTY-SEVEN
Nicole
At the door to the 5,500 square foot custom log home near the yacht club west of Clayton, Nicole punched an access code into the digital lock. The owners of the house lived in Toronto and only visited on weekends. It was Nicole’s job to come in behind them and sweep up their mess.
Though it was bordered by woods on three sides and backed up to the river, the house had never seemed especially remote to her, but in the wake of the intruder and the bones and Woody’s horrible secrets, it now felt like a gaping maw. There was no one inside. It had been locked up tight. And yet, Nicole couldn’t wash away the residue of fear that made the place feel off-putting and strange.
It reminded her of her first visit to Mikko’s, when she heard the noises and found the message.I’m watching. She wished she’d thought to ask Tim Wellington if the woman in the house had admitted to writing it, but Nicole’s police interview had been a blur. Now, she remembered there was a time when she thought Mikko carved those words into the dust, and realized there was still a possibility that he had.
Nicole wanted nothing more than to be home, head under the covers in her darkened bedroom. Maureen had insisted they go about their lives as if they had nothing to hide, but the murder had made the news, and soon the press would have Woody’s name, and the whole county would know he was suspected of killing that young woman. And so, while her husband was being interviewed for his potential role in the murder of his one-night stand, Nicole would be mopping acres of exotic wood flooring wearing a fucking smile.
