CHAPTER 80

Under the tree, the girls were curled at right angles to each other, creating a lopsided triangle, each of their faces slack with sleep. I stared down at them, my mind frantic as I tried to piece together what to tell them and what to tell the police. I had her blood on my hands. Figuratively, not literally—not best as I could tell. I had been standing behind her when I yanked the knife, so the blood sprayed outward, and I was very careful where I stepped and what I touched in the room. I had washed my hands and changed my clothes, but it only took one hair, one clothing fiber, and it was over. Just ask Leewood.

The girls were safe, given that Perla was dead, but I couldn't leave them here. I'd need to bring them with me. I crouched down and shook Sophie. She rolled onto her back, looking up at me, then yawned. Precious minutes passed as I got each girl to sit up, their sleepiness fading as they blinked and stretched, then looked around, remembering where they were.

I helped them to their feet, realizing that they were all barefoot save Sophie, who was in a pair of dirty white socks. Shit. I looked down our long driveway. "Okay, let's go."

"I'm tired," Mandolin complained, hugging her pillow to her chest. "Also, I need my phone. This no phone at night rule is stupid. My mom said that, by the way. She thinks it's stupid also."

"Yeah, I'm not going to argue with her on that one." I grabbed Sophie's hand. "Okay, we're going to walk to the neighbors' house, but we need to hug the tree line and stay hidden, okay?"

"Walk?" Mandolin looked aghast at the idea. "Like, how far? I'm not wearing any shoes."

"What about Mom?" Sophie looked over her shoulder, toward the house.

"Come on, we can talk as we walk." I pulled on her hand and started off, gesturing for the other two to follow me. Bridget, who hadn't said anything yet, grabbed my other hand, her palm cold and timid. "I have to go to the bathroom," she whispered.

Oh jeez. "Okay, we'll go to the bathroom as soon as we get to the neighbors'. If you have an emergency before then, we can make a pit stop in the woods."

"Ew. Bridget, you are not going in the woods," Mandolin stated.

"What about Mom?" Sophie asked, louder.

I shushed her with a warning glance and made a big show of looking around. "Girls, we all need to speak very quietly and move as fast as we can, okay? Sophie, I don't know where your mom is, but right now I just want to get you to safety."

She digested this, and I watched her face as we walked, gauging her response. I don't know that she believed me, but she kept her mouth closed, her features set in determination.

"The ground is hurting my feet," Bridget complained.

"Yeah, I was just about to say that," Mandolin chimed in. "Why aren't we walking on the path?"

A valid question, since I'd just killed the bogeyman, assuming Perla was working alone. Maybe she wasn't. Maybe right at that moment, there was someone else in the house, someone who might run out and follow us. Unlikely, but with what had just happened, everything felt eerie and dangerous. I stared at the ground before me, trying to see any dips or hazards, and attempted to piece together an answer to Mandolin's question. Whatever I told the girls would follow me into the courtroom, if it got to that. "I want to stay out of sight, just in case someone comes by."

"What do you mean, ‘in case someone comes by'?" Bridget said, alarmed.

Okay, maybe the wrong thing to say.

"He means a bad guy," Mandolin said importantly. "Right?" She spun around to face me, her expression pointed.

God, this was a stupid idea. So much for the thought that we would be able to traverse in silence and let me sort out my explanation of events on the way. "I don't know who is in the house right now, so I'm just trying to be extra cautious. It's probably nothing, but just to be safe, I'd like to get you all to the Scotts. We're halfway there. There, we can call your parents and the police, and you can use the restroom and get some shoes or socks."

"I thought we didn't like the Scotts," Sophie said.

"Well, your mom doesn't like the Scotts, for a reason that is neither here nor there. They will help us, and that's what we need right now."

"Why doesn't Perla like the Scotts?" Mandolin asked.

"They left their trash cans out on the curb a few times. It wasn't a big deal." I skirted a tree root. The trash cans shouldn't have been a big deal, but Perla had made it one. She'd sent a report to the homeowner association, complete with time-stamped photos of their driveway, their cans at awkward angles by their mailbox.

The rule was that cans should be removed from the street by noon on trash-collection day, and each hour that had ticked past that deadline had been like a new thorn in Perla's side.

I was certain they knew that we had been the ones to file a complaint against them. Perla had made several pointed comments to Julie Scott about the cans and had included a flyer with the trash-collection schedule and rules in her Christmas-card mailing to them. I hadn't spoken to Julie or Bill since the debacle, but as I'd told the girls, it didn't matter.

It was too risky to pretend like I didn't know Perla was dead. I needed to tell the police as much of the truth as possible while covering my involvement in the crime.

Okay, so I'd tell the truth. All of it, except for the fact that I had been the one in control of the knife. So I'd tell them a version of the truth. I woke up. I found the bag. I got the girls out of there. And then ... I frowned. I should have left with them. That's what a normal person would have done. So why didn't I?

The problem was, a normal person probably wouldn't have been alarmed by a shopping bag full of toys. I gritted my teeth, aware of the domino effect of suspicion that might be unearthed by me introducing the Folcrum Party into this equation.

But they would, of course, know of it on their own. If not right away, as soon as they looked into Perla and me.

"How much longer?" Bridget asked, her hand slipping from mine. She covered her mouth with her forearm as she yawned.

"Not far." I moved to Sophie's other side, my stride picking up speed as I approached the small opening set into the bushes on the side of our big vehicle gate.

"Look, the gates are open." Sophie pointed.

I turned and squinted, trying to see where she was pointing. Our vehicle gate was a giant iron fortress–looking set with W 's set in the center of each side. I had always thought they were a little gaudy and certainly not worth the ridiculous expense, but Perla had insisted on them. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah, I can see them. Can't you?"

I strained my eyes, but everything was too dark. "No," I admitted. "Mandolin? Bridget? Can you tell if the gates are open?"

"Yeah, they're open," Mandolin said, bored, as if she weren't accomplishing a feat of strength by seeing that far.

"I can't tell," Bridget said, and with her Coke-bottle glasses, I wasn't surprised.

"Okay, come through this gate. We'll leave that one alone." I ushered them through, closing the gate behind them and looking through the darkness, trying to understand why the gate had been open. Was this why Perla had gone out the front door? Probably not. If she had needed to let someone in, she could have just given them a code.

Unless she hadn't wanted a code to be logged by the system. Every time a code was entered, it was stored somewhere. When the police investigated this evening, they would be able to tell who had opened the gate and when. Unless that was why Perla left. Maybe she walked down here and manually opened it.

I thought of my missing phone and the cameras at the gate and on the exterior of our house. She'd probably turned off the cameras. If she hadn't, there'd be footage of whatever she did, as well as footage of the girls' exit across the roof and down the tree.

The footage, or lack of it, was another reason I would need to be very careful with what I told the police and why I should stick to the true timeline as closely as possible.

"The Scotts don't have a gate," Sophie whispered, for Mandolin's and Bridget's information. "And their house is close to the road, so we won't have to walk as far."

"Have you been to their house before?" Bridget asked.

"Just for trick-or-treating."

We were at the cul-de-sac now, and they moved off the grass shoulder and onto the pavement. I was running out of time, and my mind was still piecing together my story for the police.

Sophie was right: the Scotts' house was only a short distance off the curb. They had put their home at the front of the lot and used the rear acreage for their horse barn and paddocks—another checkmark against them, in Perla's book.

Their two-story brick home was dark, save for discreet path lighting and some landscaping uplights. I checked my watch, then remembered I didn't have it on. The girls quieted as we hurried down the driveway and up their front path. They hung back on the steps as I approached the front door and pressed the doorbell.

It illuminated with an electronic chime, and we were most definitely on camera.

I stepped back and waited as the doorbell slowly pulsed blue.

No one answered, and I gave it a minute, then pressed it again.

A scratchy male voice finally spoke through the speaker. "Hello?"

Bill.

"Bill, there's been an emergency. This is Grant Wultz from next door. Can you let us in?"