In the Worst Way (Mercy Watts Mysteries Book 5) (7 page)

“Get up now,” he said.
 

“No.”
 

“Yes. It’s time to go.”
 

“I’m going back to sleep,” I said.
 

Another jab to the ribs.

“You can sleep in the car.”
 

“Go away. It’s midnight.”
 

“It’s four a.m.”
 

I smacked his hand as it came in for another jab. “Oh my god. Are you crazy?”

“Everyone’s waiting,” said Dad. “Get the hell up.”
 

“Everyone’s waiting for what?”
 

“You, idiot.” Dad hauled me upright and I slid onto the floor. “Get dressed and come downstairs. We’ll go out the side door. Sandy’s waiting.”
 

That woke me up. “Sandy?”
 

“Yes. Get a move on.”
 

“Where are we going?”
 

“The bridesmaid trip,” said Dad with an exasperated sigh.
 

“Now? At four in the morning.”
 

“I’m not going through this again. Get up. Your bags are downstairs.” Dad left and I looked at the clock. It really was four a.m. Why was this my life? I’d been mostly good when people weren’t looking and yet here I was getting dressed to go on a bridal party trip for a wedding I didn’t know I was in until yesterday.
 

I slipped on a pair of flats and stomped down the stairs, trying to formulate a way to get out of it. After a little sleep, the Costilla threat seemed unreal. Would they really go to so much trouble to kill me? I mean, why bother? They had bigger fish to kill, federal witnesses, rival drug lords, innocent bystanders.
 

“Mercy!” Mom yelled up the stairs.
 

“I’m coming.”
 

And I’m going. To jump out of the car at the first opportunity.

Mom and Dad were at the newel post. Dad had at his feet two full-size suitcases, a garment bag, a carry-on, and my purse.
 

“Wait a minute,” I said. “You said four days.”
 

“It is four days,” said Mom and she was looking me in the eyes. Not lying or at least she was getting a whole lot better at it.
 

“What do I need all that stuff for?”
 

“For whatever you do.”
 

“Which would be…”

“How should I know?” asked Mom. “It’s your trip.”
 

“It’s not
my
trip. I don’t even know where I’m going.”
 

“Cairngorms Castle,” said Dad.
 

I backtracked up three stairs. “That better not be in Scotland.”
 

“It’s not in Scotland,” said Mom. “We wouldn’t send you to Scotland for four days.”
 

I wrinkled my nose. “Oh really?”
 

“Well, we wouldn’t this time. Cairngorms is on the edge of Johnson Shut-ins State Park. We took you there when you were thirteen. Don’t you remember?”

I did remember after some effort. Cairngorms Castle was the creation of a mining baron who decided it was a swell idea to build a Scottish-style castle in the middle of nowhere. The estate put him into bankruptcy and two years after it was finished, he threw himself off the parapet. It was said to be bad luck as well as haunted by a succession of ill-fated owners who never lived more than three years after purchase.
 

“I thought it was abandoned?” I asked.
 

“Not anymore,” said Dad. “It’s a world-class retreat.”
 

“Wouldn’t I be safer here with you than at a retreat? There’ll be all kinds of people there.”
 

“My friends own it now.”
 

“Your friends own Cairngorms Castle?” I asked. “Don’t all the owners die in hideous ways?”
 

Dad pulled me down the stairs. “Not all of them.”
 

“Which one didn’t die?”
 

“Julien Delancy. He sold the castle to John and Leslie,” said Dad.
 

“Why’d he sell it?”
 

Mom pulled me past Dad. “Never mind that.”
 

“No. No. I mind. What happened to Delancy?” I asked.
 

Dad shrugged. “It was just an accident.”
 

“The kind of accident that only happens in Cairngorms Castle?”
 

“He was in the armory. He safed a flintlock pepperbox revolver.”
 

I crossed my arms. “And…”
 

“It wasn’t loaded, but he heard a rattle so he was checking it out and shot off his ear,” said Dad all nonchalant.
 

“Was his finger on the trigger?”
 

“No.”
 

“Did it at least have powder in the pan?” I asked.

“Not so much,” he said. “Let’s go.”
 

“People actually pay money to stay the death castle?”
 

“Yes and handsomely, too. John and Leslie will take good care of you,” said Mom.
 

I glared at my parents. “What kind of friends are John and Leslie? Work friends?”
 

“You could say that,” said Dad.
 

“
Would
I say that?”

“Yes, they’re work friends.”
 

“What work?” I asked. Dad had friends in every walk of life. If John and Leslie had been cops, he would’ve just said that. They were something else and that made me nervous.
 

“They’re retired.”

“From what?
 

“That’s all you need to know,” said Mom. “Pick up a bag and let’s go.”
 

I grabbed the garment bag. “Wait. Where’s Pick?”
 

“He’s fine. Come on,” said Dad.
 

“Where is he?”
 

“You’re not taking him.”
 

I dropped the bag. “Pick! Pickpocket! Come here, fuzzball!”
 

“Mercy!” said Mom. “People are waiting.”
 

“Well, they can keep waiting. Chuck left his dog with me, not you.”
 

Mom and Dad followed me through the first floor, protesting that I needn’t worry about Pickpocket. The more they protested, the more I worried. And I was right to worry. I finally found Pick in the butler’s pantry, trembling in a corner, surrounded by the evil Siamese. Swish had a tuft of fuzzy fur in his chops and Swat had all his claws out.
 

I grabbed the broom and brandished it. “Not today, you freaks. One bald pet is enough.”
 

“Mercy!” said Mom. “If you hit my babies, so help me, I will—”

“What Mom? What are you going to do? Those cats are evil and mean and evil.”
 

She squinted at me. “You said that already.”
 

“I’ll smack them into next Tuesday!”
 

Dad wrestled the broom out of my hand. “No, you won’t.” Then he whispered in my ear. “Because I have to live here.”
 

“Give me that broom,” said Mom with a strange glint in her eye. She was going whack me with it. I could tell.
 

“No, I don’t think I will,” said Dad. “Mercy will take Pickpocket with her. Problem solved.”
 

I took Pick’s leash off its hook and Mom gathered up her babies and took them cooing into the parlor. They hissed at me over her shoulder, but, of course, she didn’t notice.
 

“Your friends won’t care about bringing Pick?” I asked.
 

“I’ll explain it to them. Get a move on,” said Dad.
 

We got my ridiculous number of bags and went out the old servant’s entrance. It was a concealed door that you’d never know was there if someone didn’t open it for you. Our house hadn’t seen a servant since Josiah Bled had lived there. He moved out and disappeared, then my parents moved in. Josiah designed the house with secret doors and hidden staircases. As we stepped out into the cool morning air, it occurred to me for the first time that the secret of why Millicent and Myrtle had given the house to my parent’s might be hidden in the house itself.
 

“Hey, Dad?”
 

“Yeah?”
 

“Do you think you’ve found all the hidden stuff in our house?” I asked.
 

“How would I know?” He laughed. “The building plans he filed with the city are practically blank.”
 

“That’s weird.”
 

Dad shushed me. “Keep quiet. Why do you think we’re getting you out at this hour?”
 

“You’re crazy,” I whispered.
 

“I’m hoping that if the Costillas have anyone watching the house, they’ll be lax at this hour.”
 

“Is that why we’re going to Sandy’s?”
 

Dad nodded and we went through Mom’s side garden. There was lots of ivy, good for concealment. All the outdoor lights were off and Dad was very quiet about opening the gate to Sandy’s house next door. Her house was built about the same time as ours but was a Tuscan-style villa. Every house in the Central West End was as unique as its owners.
 

We went through Sandy’s sculpture garden and Dad knocked softly on her side door, which wasn’t concealed at all.
 

The door cracked open, showing a young woman only five years my senior. Sandy was a celebrated young sculptor and heir to a small paper company fortune. “Hi,” she whispered and waved us in.
 

Sandy brought us through the main floor of her house to the garage, attached at the back through a long walkway. She gave Dad the keys to her Jag and said, “Good luck.”
 

The garage door opened and we drove out into the alley. Dad was all concentration, but there wasn’t anybody about. We left Hawthorne Avenue and were downtown at the Hyatt Regency in fifteen minutes. Dad pulled into the hotel’s underground parking after getting the nod from the attendant, who didn’t look like that was his real job.
 

As we drove down the ramp, I asked, “How well did you know Josiah?”
 

“What makes you think I knew him?”
 

“You have the building plans.”
 

“I got them from the city.”
 

“Oh. So you didn’t know him?”
 

Dad glanced at me and I tried to keep my expression neutral. I’d never asked Dad directly about Josiah Bled before. Until a few months ago, I thought Dad hadn’t known him at all. Myrtle and Millicent gave Mom the house, not Josiah, even though it was his house originally. Spidermonkey had discovered that Josiah signed over the house to The Girls the day he and Dad had taken off for Paris and The Girls in turn signed it over to Mom. No one would say why.
 

“We met,” said Dad. “He was an unusual man.”
 

“Did you like him?”
 

“Why all these questions about him of all people? We’re trying to slip you out of town so you don’t get murdered. Why aren’t you worried about that?”
 

“I am.”
 

Sort of.
 

“Doesn’t seem that way.”
 

“There’s nothing I can do about it. You’re handling it. So about Josiah?”
 

Dad grinned. “There they are. Perfect.” He pointed to a long black limo parked in a corner of the garage. There was a uniformed driver standing beside it and four plainclothes cops positioned around the area.
 

“A limo? That’s a little over the top,” I said.
 

“Your mother and Aunt Christine cooked it up,” said Dad.
 

“And they decided I’m Snot’s maid of honor?”
 

“Bingo.”
 

“Why me?” I asked. “She has two sisters.”
 

“They were fighting over it.” Dad pulled up beside the limo.
 

“She doesn’t even like me.”
 

Dad cocked his head at me. “Bridget likes you just fine.”
 

“No, she doesn’t. She and her sisters used to duct tape my legs together every Christmas and put me in a closet.”
 

He laughed. “Oh, that. That was bonding.”
 

“For them. What about me?”
 

“They were bonding with you.”

“I was their victim.”