“Jane?”
Jane looked over Charlotte’s shoulder and saw Byron running toward them. Charlotte too turned and saw him. Her head snapped back to Jane. “This isn’t over,” she said as she turned and ran. Before Byron could reach them she was gone. Only the head of her costume remained on the ground.
“What was that about?” Byron asked.
“Our Gloomy Friend is back,” said Jane. “And I don’t think she killed Jessica.”
Byron looked confused. “Then who did?” he asked.
“That,” said Jane, giving the moorhen head a good kick, “is the million-dollar question.”
Chapter 28
Byron was late. This was not an unusual occurrence, and so Jane wasn’t yet worried, but she’d also had a peculiar feeling all afternoon that something was wrong. She’d attributed this to the fact that Charlotte was indeed in Brakeston, but now she wasn’t sure. The dread surrounding her seemed larger somehow, more all-encompassing.
As if there’s going to be a storm of some kind, she thought. A very large storm.
They didn’t really have a plan, which was part of the problem. Byron was going to come over and they were going to see if they could track Charlotte down and find out what exactly was going on. Byron had even gently hinted at the idea of a truce while they figured out who had killed Jessica Abernathy and why that person apparently was trying to lay the blame on Violet Grey. Jane thought this to be a terrible idea and had said so in no uncertain terms. That’s when Byron had told her to go home and calm down. And that was when Jane had said some regrettable things.
It was all very confusing, and that made her cross. She preferred it when there were defined issues to be dealt with. At the moment things were all jumbled together, and knowing where to start was near to impossible. She hoped Byron had thought of something.
A scratching at the front door caught her attention. At first she thought she had imagined it but a moment later she heard it again, a frantic skritch-skritch-skritch. Wondering what it could be, Jane went and opened the door.
Lilith ran inside. She was panting, and immediately sat down on the carpet and leaned against the sofa, her one front leg propping her up.
Jane looked at the clearly exhausted and frightened dog. “What’s the matter?” she asked. “Is someone chasing you?”
Lilith shook her head. Then she barked. Jane stared at her and she barked again.
“Oh,” said Jane. “Right. You want me to read your thoughts. I can’t. You’ll have to wait for Byron. He’s the one who can do that.”
Lilith barked again, several yips in quick succession. Jane, leery of the dog’s teeth, backed away. Lilith continued to bark.
“I don’t know how,” Jane told her. “Really, I don’t.”
Lilith yipped frantically.
“All right,” said Jane. “I’ll try.” She closed her eyes and tried to focus her mind on the sounds Lilith was making. At first she could make no sense of the barking. Then, in the midst of it, she thought she heard a single word: captured. She opened her eyes. “Byron has captured Charlotte?” she asked.
Lilith barked some more, which Jane took to mean she had guessed incorrectly. Again she closed her eyes. This time the Chihuahua’s barks changed tone and Jane distinctly heard her say Walter.
“Byron has captured Walter?” Jane said. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why would he do that?”
“No, you moron. Byron has been captured and is being held in Carlyle House.” The voice was crystal clear, and Jane knew she was hearing Lilith speak.
“I did it!” she said. Then the words sunk in. “Byron has been captured!”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you,” Lilith said. “Miriam and Beverly have taken him to Carlyle House.”
“All right,” said Jane. “We need to rescue him. Let’s go.”
Lilith yipped. “And how are you going to do that?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” Jane answered, scooping the little dog up and carrying her. “We’ll figure that out when we get there.”
She drove quickly. Lilith, trying to sit still on the front seat, was toppled first one way and then the other. Each time she slipped she swore.
“Where did you learn such colorful language?” Jane asked her after one particularly foul outburst.
“You pick things up living on the streets,” said Lilith.
“Can Miriam understand what you’re saying?”
“No,” Lilith answered. “Only your kind can. And before you ask, no, I don’t know why. And I don’t care.”
When they neared the house Jane parked the car a block away. She and Lilith walked the rest of the way, and Jane went around to the side of the house where she could look through the windows with less chance of being seen.
They were in the living room. Byron, tied to a chair, was in the center of the room. Beverly stood behind him, her hands on his shoulder, and Miriam was in front of him. She held something in her hand.
“What is that?” Jane asked.
“What’s what?” said Lilith. “I can’t see from down here.”
Jane picked the dog up and held her to the window.
“Fang extractor,” Lilith said. “She’s going to defang him.”
Jane gasped. She set the Chihuahua down. “Why?”
Lilith snorted. “Are you stupid?” she said. “Why do you think?”
Jane looked through the window again. Byron was shaking his head from side to side as Miriam tried to get the extractor into his mouth. For the first time Jane noticed a small pool of blood on the floor by Byron’s feet. Something white lay in the red puddle. It looked like a fang.
“That’s it,” Jane told Lilith. “I’m going in.”
Lilith trotted behind Jane as she went to the back door of the house. Lifting the mat, Jane took out a key and fitted it into the lock.
“Not the best place to hide a key,” Lilith remarked as Jane opened the door.
“Hush,” said Jane as they went into a small mudroom off the kitchen.
“Just what are we going to do?” asked Lilith.
“I don’t know,” Jane admitted. “I should probably think of something.”
A loud howl came from inside the house. It was followed by a thump, as though something—or someone—had fallen over.
“Or we can just make it up as we go along,” said Jane, running into the kitchen and down the hall.
Miriam whipped around when she heard Jane’s footsteps. Jane looked at the bloody extractor in her hand, then at Byron lying on the floor. He was still tied to the chair, and was trying to inch himself away from Miriam.
“She broke one of my fangs!” he yelled.
“What is she doing here?” another voice asked.
Jane looked to her right and saw two more chairs set against the wall. Tied to one of them was one of the twins. Tied to the other was Charlotte.
“What is she doing here?” Jane said.
“All of you shut up!” Miriam bellowed. She pointed the extractor at Jane. “Tie her up,” she ordered Beverly.
Beverly came at Jane so quickly that Jane had no time to respond. She felt herself being pushed to the floor. Then her wrists were pulled together and rope was wrapped around them. She was now lying on the floor facing Byron.
“That was very well done,” Byron said.
Jane ignored him, turning her head as well as she could to see what Miriam and Beverly were going to do next. Miriam was looking at all of the captives and smiling. “I think that’s all of them,” she said to Beverly. “I hadn’t anticipated taking care of this one so soon,” she added, nodding at Jane. “But we might as well stake them all at once.”
She came over to where Jane and Byron lay on the floor and bent down. “Are there any more of your kind polluting this town?” she asked, shaking the extractor in Jane’s face.