The Last House Guest (ARC) Read online

  I blinked slowly. I thought maybe this was the key to success: eternal optimism. Taking an insult and repurposing it for your own benefit. Taking everything, even this, and owning it. Looking again and seeing something new. And I felt, in that moment, completely sure of one single truth: My mother would love her.

  “Yes,” I said, “it’s just—I’ve already been here before.”

  Her smile grew until it reached her eyes, and her head tipped back slightly, almost like she was laughing. I felt her looking me over closely. If she recognized the sweater I was wearing, she didn’t say.

  She raised the bottle toward me, then toward the ocean. “Hear, hear,” she said, tipping the bottle back, wiping her hand across her lips after.

  I thought of Connor down at the beach, ignoring me. My grandmother’s empty house, waiting for me. The silence, the silence.

  I took a long drink, my mouth on the cool glass, the edges of my nerves on fire. “There, there,” I said, and she laughed.

  We drank it straight, watching the lightning offshore, close enough to spark something in the atmosphere. I felt like a live wire. Her fingers closed over mine as she reached for the bottle, and then I was grounded.

  I IGNORED SADIE’S CLOTHES hanging in my closet, settling for my own business attire—dress pants and a white sleeveless blouse—because I couldn’t stomach the thought of Parker seeing me in his sister’s clothes.

  I arrived at Bay Street first, because I was always early. A vestigial fear ever since I started working for Grant Loman, that he could fire me for any reason and all of this would be over.

  When her parents first met me, I’d arrived as a series of failures: something Sadie had found on the beach and would hopefully get over just as quickly. They all must’ve thought I was a phase Sadie would outgrow. A finely tuned, controlled rebellion.

  She’d sprung the meeting on me with no time to either prepare or back out. “I told them I was bringing a friend to dinner,” she said as we walked up the front steps later that first week.

  “Oh, no, I don’t—”

  “Please. They’ll love you.” She paused, cracked a smile. “They’ll like you,” she amended.

  “Or vaguely tolerate me for your benefit?”

  “Oh, it wouldn’t be for my benefit. Come on, it’s just dinner. Please, save me from the monotony.” That airy wave of her hand again. All this. My life.

  “I don’t know anything about them,” I said, even though that wasn’t true.

  She stopped just before the front door. “All you really need to know is that my dad is the brains of the operation, and my mom is the brawns.” I’d laughed, thinking she was joking. Bianca was petite, slight, with a childlike pitch to her voice. But Sadie just raised an eyebrow. “My dad said it wasn’t safe to build up here. And yet,” she said, gesturing as she pushed open the front door, “here we are. And she runs the family charitable foundation.” Her voice had dropped to a whisper then, while I was desperately trying to take everything in. “All must worship at the shrine of Bianca Loman.”

  “Sadie?” A woman’s voice echoed from somewhere out of sight. “Is that you?”

  “Here we go,” Sadie mumbled, nudging my hip with hers.

  I came to understand that this was what the flourish of her hand always meant—the mother, Bianca. Grant had only one mood, stable and unrelenting, but at least it was predictable. From him, I learned what power truly was. Bianca could lull you into complacency with her praise, only to strike when your guard was down. But anyone could take someone down; even I could do that. To hoist someone out of one world and into another—that was true power.

  That first dinner, I copied Sadie’s every movement, sitting quietly, hoping to slide in. But I noticed their jaws tensing as the list of offenses mounted: no college on the horizon; no career plan; no future.

  Sadie won them over for me, in small doses, in her way. I was a project. By the end of that summer, her father had offered me a stipend to take some business courses nearby, an investment in the future, he said. The next, they purchased my grandmother’s house, letting me stay at their guesthouse as part of the trade. A taste of what it meant to be Sadie Loman.

  EVENTUALLY, I WAS WORKING full-time for Loman Properties, managing and overseeing all of their assets in Littleport while they were away. I had worked my way up, had proved myself.

  But it was hard to shake the sort of paranoia that comes from the doorbell ringing twice in the middle of the night, long after my parents should’ve been home, when I expected to open the door to my mother rifling through her purse, laughing, pushing the dark hair from her eyes—I lost the keys again—and my dad’s sly smile as he watched her, shaking his head. Only to reveal police officers on the front porch instead.

  So I was always early—for a meeting, a walk-through, a phone call. Falsely believing I was in a position to see something coming head-on this time.

  “Reservation for Parker Loman,” I told the hostess. There was always a thrill in giving the Loman name, watching the subtle shift in an expression, the quick accommodation. She smiled as she led me to the table, in service to something greater than me.

  I sat with my back to the wall, facing the open room and the windows overlooking the dock and the harbor beyond, from one story above ground level. But I froze a few moments later, when Detective Collins was led by the same hostess in my direction. A flip of her hair as she gestured to my table, and my stomach dropped. His smile fractured for just a second when he saw me, but I had composed my face by the time he sat down. “Hi, Avery, I didn’t realize you’d be joining us,” he said.

  The napkin was bunched together in my lap, and I slowly released my grip. “Didn’t realize you were a member of this committee, either, Detective.” But it made sense; had I given it much thought at all, I probably would have landed on his name.

  “Ben, please,” he said.

  Along with Justine McCann, the town commissioner, Detective Ben Collins organized and hosted most public relations events in town, from the kids’ parade on July Fourth to the Founder’s Day festivities on Harbor Drive. He was the man whom I’d seen on the cliffs that night. Who had shone his flashlight in my face, blinding me with the light. And he was the man who had interviewed me, after. Who wanted to know everything about the party and why I’d been back at the edge of the cliffs.

  He was considered traditionally handsome—broad-shouldered, strong-jawed, bright-eyed, just beginning to show the signs of age, which somehow seemed to heighten his appeal with others, but I could only ever see him in negative space. Always, as on that night, with a beam of light cutting him into horrific angles.

  “Well,” he said, taking a sip of his water, “it’s good to see you. Been a while. Where’ve you been staying these days?”

  I didn’t answer, pretending to look over the menu. “Good to see you, too,” I said.

  It was hard to know where small talk ended and interrogation began. Before they’d found Sadie’s note, he’d sat across from me at my kitchen table and picked through my story of that night over and over. As if he’d heard something in my initial statement that had struck him as off.

  Who were you with? Why did you call her? Text her? And here, he would always stop: But you didn’t go back for her?

  It was rapid-fire and brutal, so that sometimes I couldn’t tell whether I was pulling a memory of that night or just of what I’d told him last.

  Who else was there? Did you know she was seeing Connor Harlow?

  “I’m glad you’re here,” he said. “Truth is, I was getting ready to call you this afternoon.”

  I held my breath, waiting. That list of names he’d given me, I’d realized, was a way to find a hole in someone’s story. To shake out the truth. So when he’d stood to take a call during the interview, and his partner had turned away, I’d snapped a photo of that list with my phone, trying to see what they saw.
It was all for nothing, though. They found Sadie’s note the same day, and none of it mattered anymore. But sitting across from him now, I half expected him to pick at a detail again, searching for a discrepancy.

  “Heard there was some trouble at one of the properties last night,” he said.

  “Oh, yes.” I shook my head. “Nothing was taken.”

  He smoothed the tablecloth in front of him. “The tenants were spooked pretty good.”

  My head darted up. “You were there?”

  He nodded. “I took the call. Walked in, looked around, made them feel safe.”

  “Why didn’t you call me last night?” My only missed call had been from the Donaldsons.

  “Wasn’t worth waking anyone up over,” he said. “Honestly, I couldn’t see any evidence that someone else had been there.”

  “Well,” I said, my shoulders relaxing, “we’re not going to be filing a claim either way. The tenants decided to leave. No need to write up a report.”

  He watched me carefully for a long beat of silence. “I know how to do my job, Avery.”

  I looked away, that same feeling taking root again. Like there was something he was looking for, hidden underneath my words.

  “Oh, there’s Parker,” I said, watching him enter the room with Justine McCann and another woman. When they got closer, I recognized the third person but couldn’t put a name to the face. She looked about my age, light brown hair in a French braid, red-rimmed glasses that perfectly matched her lipstick.

  Parker leaned down and air-kissed my cheek, which was surprising. “Sorry if you’ve been waiting long,” he said.

  “Not at all.”

  He shook the detective’s hand and finished up introductions. “Justine, you know Avery Greer?”

  “Of course,” Justine answered, polite smile. She was the oldest person in our group by at least two decades, and she commanded attention with that fact alone. “Glad you could join us, Avery. This is my assistant, Erica Hopkins.”

  “Actually, we’ve met before,” Erica said, her hands curled on the back of a chair. “You and your grandmother used to live next door to my aunt. Evelyn?”

  “Right. Yes. Hi.” That was how I recognized her. Erica Hopkins hadn’t gone to school with us, but she’d visited her aunt in the summers. I hadn’t seen her in years, though.

  She smiled tightly. “Nice to see you again.”

  “How are your parents, Parker?” Detective Collins asked as they took their seats around the circular table.

  “All right.” Parker ran a hand through his hair, his thumb down the side of his face. A nervous habit, scratching the faint shadow of a beard. “They’ll make it up for the dedication after all.”

  “That’s wonderful,” Justine said, hands clasped together. As if we could pull a positive out of this. A tribute to a dead girl. A visit from her grieving parents, who had wanted to blame this whole thing on the people in town. I didn’t even realize I was shaking my head until I noticed the detective looking at me curiously.

  “A few requests, though,” Parker added, rubbing his hands against his pants under the table. I watched as he became business Parker. Readjusting the sleeves of his button-down, a warning of what was to come. It would be easy to attribute his position to nepotism alone, but I had to concede that he was startlingly effective, making us all believe we were on the same side, wanting the same thing—and he knew just what we needed.

  Eventually, I zoned out as they discussed the press for the Lomans’ new foundation. A suicide-prevention community outreach program, dedicated to providing mental health services and screenings. I knew all about it already, had read the pieces, the public interest stories. Sadie’s death had somehow only made the Lomans more interesting, more worthy. As if they had been humanized by tragedy. Leveled by Sadie’s death and slowly emerging once more, re-formed from the ashes of their lives. The whole thing was nauseating.

  I focused on the lobster salad that had been served to the entire table, light and satisfying, trying to recall the last time I’d joined the Lomans here.

  I remembered in a sudden jolt: Sadie’s birthday. Late July of last year. Her parents and Parker and Luce and me. She’d been unfocused. Jumpy. She’d recently changed roles at her job. I’d thought she was preoccupied. Distant and detached, was how the police described it after. As if this was the first sign we had missed.

  “Avery?” Parker was looking at me like he’d just asked me a question. “Will you handle the newspaper piece? Find the right photo?”

  “Of course,” I said. And then I understood my role. Justine had brought her assistant, and Parker had brought his. I was an employee of the Lomans, a set piece, a show of clout. I’d even dressed the part.

  “I’ll be in touch soon,” Erica said as we stepped outside, handing me her card. She walked down the wooden steps before the rest of us. When she reached the car, she stared back up, but I couldn’t read her expression.

  I could only imagine what Evelyn had told her.

  PARKER STOOD BESIDE ME as the others drove away. He touched my shoulder, and I flinched.

  “Are you upset? Avery, I’m sorry. My parents sent me here, thinking I could handle this. But I can’t. I really need your help with this.”

  I crossed the street to my car, wedged between two expensive SUVs, and he matched me stride for stride. “Jesus, Parker. A little heads-up next time? Also, I didn’t realize Detective Collins would be part of this. God.”

  He put a hand on the roof of my car, leaning over me. “I know. I know it isn’t easy.”

  I was guessing he didn’t. By the time Parker had given his statement, the family lawyer was with him. His father was probably in the room as well, overseeing everything. Parker was the victim’s brother and was treated accordingly. I was a product of Littleport, a piece severely out of place, and Detective Collins didn’t trust me from the start.

  Can anyone vouch for you the entire time, Avery?

  Parker, Luce, there was a houseful of people. They saw me. I was there.

  You could’ve left. They can’t account for every single moment.

  But I didn’t. And I told you, she was messaging me. She was fine.

  What about Connor Harlow?

  What about him?

  Would you know his state of mind last night?

  I wouldn’t know anything. Me and Connor don’t speak anymore.

  “It would mean a lot,” Parker said, “if you would help me here.” Changing tactics to get me on his side.

  “I thought you said your parents weren’t coming up for the dedication,” I said, unable to hide the accusation in my voice.

  He looked down at his phone, sending a message. “Well, it’s not definite. They probably won’t.” Half paying attention. Half caring. “But better if the others think that. It’ll make everything easier.” Parker always told people what they wanted to hear, and I couldn’t tell which of us he was playing right then.

  His lies, either then or now, so effortless.

  As, I had believed, their entire lives had been.

  CHAPTER 5

  When I stepped inside the Point Bed-and-Breakfast, Mr. Sylva smiled politely. In the summer, we kept our faces calm and predictable, a mask, part of the endless charade. Mr. Sylva gave no indication that when we were kids, Faith and I once raced these hallways, our bare feet stomping in time to our laughter, while he called after us, Girls! Be careful! Or that years later, he’d had to call the police to remove me from the premises.

  “Good afternoon,” he said. Faith’s father had the look of a fisherman, with a weathered tan and hands gnarled not from hauling in lobster crates but from carpentry, not that anyone could tell the difference. The Sylvas all looked like they were one with the Maine coast, part of the product. Though Mrs. Sylva’s hair had gone gray at her temples last I’d seen, the rest was still a fiery red. And the
lines around her face were deeply grooved, like she’d spent years on the balcony, watching the ocean, facing the wind. Faith’s hair was closer to auburn, but it was curly and wild and she never bothered to tame it—perfectly Faith. Whatever they were advertising, people were buying, judging from the looks of the place.

  I walked straight to the large oak reception desk in the two-story foyer, placing the envelope on the surface, my scrawling script on the front: Kevin Donaldson. “Hi, Mr. Sylva. I believe the Donaldson family was scheduled to check in sometime today? Would you mind passing this along?”

  The doors opened from the kitchen entrance behind the desk, and Faith froze in her steps, the doors swaying behind her. “Oh. I didn’t know anyone was out here.” She cleared her throat, obvious that by anyone, she meant me.

  “Hi, Faith. Welcome back.” Her loose T-shirt hung from one shoulder, so I could see the jut of her collarbone. Black leggings and black slip-ons and her hair in a ponytail. At a quick glance, she could still be that girl sneaking into the kitchen for a midnight snack during weekend sleepovers, who roamed the property barefoot both inside and out with a literal spring to her step—like she was waiting for the starting gun. But she’d gotten skinnier since I’d seen her last. From the way she was looking me over, she was probably assessing the changes in me, too.

  “Thanks.” She quickly pivoted toward the front desk. “Mom needs the numbers for lunch, when you get a chance.”

  Mr. Sylva nodded, and Faith disappeared behind the swinging doors once more. I’d heard she’d finished her graduate program, moved back, and was poised to take over the bed-and-breakfast as soon as her parents retired.

  “Must be nice to have her home again,” I said.

  “It is. You’ll have to stop by to visit and catch up sometime when she’s not so busy.”

  “Definitely.” Pleasantries. He didn’t mean them, and neither did I.