Page 64 of The Perfect Guests
She glances at the clock again. Their guest will be here in a few minutes. She raps on the kitchen window to summon Markus and Nina in.
By the time the car draws up on the gravel, the three of them are linedup on the top step, and Leonora shoots a quick look at Markus over Nina’s head: Can they really pull this off? Are they making a mistake? Is it too late to change their minds?
The car door opens, and out steps the child, blond-haired, round-cheeked, her face a mask of self-protection that Leonora recognizes only too well: the face of a survivor, the face of an orphan. Leonora’s heart squeezes with a painful mix of sympathy and terror. This girl is their best chance—their only chance.
Leonora hurries down the steps to greet her.
Beth
This isn’t a game, Nina!” I shake her by the arms, trying to make her look at me. “Why did you do it?”
Nina’s expression is closed now; she turns her head away. Sadie moves to the window, to the gap in the curtains, and the relief in her voice makes my heart ache.
“The police are here.”
I’m shocked to feel tears welling up. Jonas has called for help. We’re going to be okay. I turn back to Nina, but still, she refuses to look at me, and I feel my anger rising.
“What was this allfor?” I gesture at Sadie and the other guests huddled in their dressing gowns and overcoats; at the abandoned whiskey glasses; at the door that hides the blackened staircase beyond. “Just tell me, will you?”
“Yes, tell us.” Nazleen’s voice is indignant. “You don’t even know me. Why would you want to hurt me?”
“Yeah,” Zach chimes in plaintively. “What did we ever do to you?”
Finally, Nina meets my gaze—only for a fraction of a second, butit’s enough to make my blood freeze. I stumble backward, away from her, away from the ice-cold fury in her eyes.I know what some of us did to her.
Leonora made her sick, hid her from the world and from her own grandfather. Jonas switched his attentions to me when I came on the scene. And as for me, I took her place, pretended to be her, stole her only friend away from her...
“There’s no point in looking for a rational reason,” Everett growls from his armchair. “She’s a criminal. She needs locking up.”
Nina gets to her feet. Blue light slices through the window and washes over her face. She moves closer to the armchair by the fire.
“Dr. Everett,” she says, “I noticeyouhaven’t asked me why I invited you here.”
Everett’s tone is aggrieved. “I’ve never met you before either.” He glances around the room nervously. “I had no idea that woman was your mother until just now.”
“That woman,”Nina says, “has a name. Leonora Averell. Do you remember her? Please tell me you haven’t forgotten driving her back to your house, years ago, when she was alone and vulnerable.”
Everett’s dark eyes widen, and Nina nods as something tightens in his expression.
“I see you do remember,” she says.
Blue light fills the room now. Car doors slam outside; boots pound across the gravel.
Everett barks at Zach. “Get them in here, quick. They need to take her away, lock her up.”
Nina tilts her head, and she looks him straight in the eye. “Dr. Roy Everett. We haven’t properly met. I’m Nina Averell. And I’m your daughter.”
Sadie
For a long, breath-holding moment, no one says a word. Nina stares down at Everett, and Everett gazes back at her with mounting horror.
“It’s not true, Dad,” Zach says. “Is it?”
Everett is saved from having to reply. The front door crashes open in the hall, and a woman’s voice shouts, “Police!” Beth leaps to her feet, and Sadie moves to stand next to her.
Two uniformed officers burst into the drawing room, firing questions at the guests, and more than one trembling hand rises to point directly at Nina. The officers converge on her, and they take her to one side to talk.
“I don’t understand,” Sadie murmurs to Beth after a few minutes have passed. “How did you live with this family for so long? The mother poisoning the daughter, the daughter setting the house on fire. It all sounds...”
