Page 22 of The Wives of Murder Club
“Nothing, there’s nothing,” said Marta.
“Did you do something to it?” Imogen turned and pointed at Bernie. “I saw you creeping around down here last night. I know I did. I got up to go to the washroom and then I got hungry and went into the kitchen for a snack. I saw you in here. Did you mess with the phone?”
Bernie gave her an incredulous look. “Creeping? Imogen, I said hello to you. I wasn’t creeping. I woke up, checked my phone, and realized it was almost dead. My charger was in the sunroom. If anyone was acting strangely, it was you—alone in the kitchen in the dark.” She cocked her head to the side. “What are you really saying? Why would I do anything to the phone?” Imogen and Bernie stared at each other, and Imogen wondered what Bernie saw when she looked in her eyes.
Marta broke the tense silence with a question. “Wait, is it even plugged in?” She followed the cord to the wall. The three women saw the problem at the same time. While the plug was securely in the socket, the cord, which ran along the baseboard, looked as though it had been chewed through.
“Gross! And on top of everything, we have mice,” said Imogen. “I guess we’ll have to wait for Rick to come tomorrow?”
“This is a nightmare.” Marta’s voice broke. “We can’t spend the next twenty-four hours in a standoff with each other. We don’t even know what happened—and I don’t want to believe that one of you would do this to her. What if a strangerdidland his boat on the shore last night? Maybe he found Celeste outside and it was a crime of opportunity? Oh my god, what if he’s still on the island?” Marta looked panicked. “Or inside the cottage? I think we have to be extra careful and stay in the same room together at all times.”
“Fuck that.” Bernie stood and put her hands on her hips. “I am not camping out with a killer. I’ll be sleeping upstairs with my door locked tonight. And I think it’s rather interesting that you’ve seized on this idea of a stranger, Marta. Sure, it’s a possibility, but that’s pretty far-fetched if you ask me. It seems far more likely that it was one ofyou.”
26
MARTA
Marta’s heart skipped a beat. Bernie was pointing straight at her.
“You were sharing a room with her. I’d say you had the perfect opportunity.” Bernie paced in a circle around the sunroom. “Look, this is harsh, but I’m going to say what we’ve all been thinking: Derrick’s probably dead. Who might have had a reason to follow him around and snap photos of him? Maybe the person who killed him? Maybe hiswife? What if Celeste found out something she wasn’t supposed to know about Derrick’s ‘disappearance’?” Bernie made aggressive air quotes. “How’s that for motive?”
Marta wanted to tear the smug expression from Bernie’s face. So much of what she’d said was wrong, but the sliver that was right sliced through her. Bernie and Imogen were looking at her as if they were seeing her for the first time, a mist of suspicion spritzed across their expressions.
“That’s completely false,” said Marta. “You cannot seriously believe I would do something like that to my husband. Or to Celeste. I think . . . I think we need to search the island. We need to know if someone else is out there, because we arenotsafe right now. And then we need to search every room in this cottage.”
Mercifully, the rain had stopped. Marta stepped outside in her wet shoes, flanked on either side by Imogen and Bernie. It didn’t take them long to search the island. The trees weren’t dense enough for anyone to hide in, and the island was small enough that they could see straight through to the other side. When they got to the boathouse, Bernie ducked inside and called out that it was clear. The sick feeling in Marta’s stomach was getting stronger. It wasn’t that she wanted to find a crazed maniac hiding out, but the alternative was arguably worse.
Back inside the cottage, they checked the kitchen cupboards, the storage closet, and under the couches. “If we don’t find anyone, that doesn’t mean he was never here,” Marta rationalized out loud. “He could have boated away after killing Celeste.”
Bernie gave her a condescending look. “Sure.”
They decided to sweep the bedrooms, starting on the main floor. Imogen was the first to arrive at her own room, but Bernie stopped her from entering with a hand on the shoulder. “It’s better if we search each other’s rooms.”
Imogen made a noise in her throat like she was about to protest, but relented and hung back, tapping her fingernails against the door’s painted wooden trim. Marta unzipped Imogen’s large leather bag and began rifling through it, pulling out a stack of folded T-shirts—how long did she think we were staying?—and shaking each one open. They were all clean and smelled of laundry detergent. Bernie checked the dresser beside the bed, finding nothing more than a lavender sachet.
“This is ridiculous,” Imogen announced loudly from the doorway. “We don’t know what we’re doing. Even if we do find something, then what? We don’t know shit about dealing with evidence.” She took a step into the room. “We’ll probably mess up the forensics. Like, what if we get our fingerprints on something? This is a bad idea.”
Bernie did not stop rummaging through Imogen’s oversized purse. “That may be true, but it also sounds like something someone would say if she had something to hide. Is there something you want to tell us?”
“No! I’m not fucking hiding anything.” Imogen crossed her arms. “But I think this is stupid. We’re messing around trying to make ourselves feel less scared.”
Marta went over and patted Imogen’s back. “Let’s just get through this.”Why is she resisting?“We’re almost done your room.”
Bernie pulled a face somewhere between a smile and a grimace.“C’mon, Marta, I’ll check the closet and you check the bed.”
27
IMOGEN
The bloodstained rope changed everything.
The last place Marta looked when searching Imogen’s room was under the bed. She got down on her stomach and swept her arm to grab hold of an item she could only just reach. When she pulled it out, she let out a little gasp and let go of it as if it were burning her fingertips. She scrambled to her feet, stumbling backwards in her haste.
Imogen’s heart was in her mouth. She glared at the rope as if it were going to announce who had hidden it under the bed. She felt like she was spinning out, her thoughts flying by too fast to snare them. When she looked up again, Marta and Bernie were staring at her.
“Don’t look at me like that, I had nothing to do with it. I have no idea how that got there. Do you think I’d be so stupid? Hiding evidence under my own bed? It’s not even really hidden! Obviously, one of you put it there and you’re trying to pin this on me.” The fact that no one was saying anything was making Imogen nervous. She locked on to Marta and directed her next comment at her. “I would never hurt Celeste, she’s my friend. She’s Milly’s mom, for god’s sake. This is absolutely going to destroy Ari . . .” As she said it, she realized that it was true. An ache bloomed in her chest.
“I guess we don’t have any way of knowing how it got there,” said Marta.
