The Dirty Secret

“Clouds look dark,” Martin said.

“They do that sometimes,” Brandon laughed.

“This could be bad,” Martin shuddered.

“Naw, you’re new here, this ship was a naval ship before it was cargo, she’s tough.” Brandon said.

An hour later as the ship rose on the mammoth wave, lightning dancing in every direction, Brandon looked at Martin regretfully.

65 Years later.

Wren Alden wrestled with a little map she had of the island, “but they all survived right?”

“Yes, thanks to the help of the island community, everyone jumped into action, soaking wet in a storm to help, it was because of them that not one soul was lost from the Plassey, it’s not just history,” Carmine said.

“It’s legend,” Wren smiled.

“Give me that thing,” Carmine took the map from her.

She handed it over happily, then looked at the old man trialing them with his new nurse, physically he was fine, he was just old and still mourning the loss of his wife. Wren walked a little faster to keep pace with long legged Carmine, “do you think he’s okay?”

Carmine glanced back at the old man, Felix Thurman, the world’s most successful living Author, “he’ll be fine, it takes time.”

The three had met seven months prior at a writer’s retreat hosted by Felix and his wife, Leona. Felix had hosted them yearly for emerging Authors, it was a well-known secret that he used the retreats to pick one person to take under his wing and then set them free in the literary world. One good word from Felix was worth its weight in gold in the publishing industry. But sadly, the last one probably would be the last one considering it had ended in murder. Leona’s long-time nurse Harvey had set up an elaborate alibi and had murdered the sweet lady he had said was like a mother to him. All just to be the only person in Felix’s will. Harvey had confessed that he had planned to murder Felix a year later in a similar fashion, making it look like an accident. He had tried to make Leona’s death look like a suicide, but he hadn’t counted on a whodunit mystery writer. Wren had remembered enough from her writing research to figure it out. Plus, she had a little help from Leona’s treasured cuckoo clock.

It wasn’t hard to guess which Author Felix favored from the retreat. And Wren had felt an instant connection to the man. Carmine volunteered to help her get Felix settled after his wife’s death and they all three became close. Now the only person that could be Felix’s beneficiary was Wren or Carmine. Time hadn’t helped Felix much and they all thought being in the house he and his wife had shared for decades was not helping him at all. So, with Felix’s massive wealth they set out for Ireland. A shipwreck Carmine had found while researching for one of his historical fiction novels had led them to the Aran Islands. Inisheer Island, to be specific. It was the smallest island in the chain, and it housed the shipwreck they had been discussing. But they weren’t even going to see it yet. They had just arrived and were looking for the B&B that Felix had bought out for at least three months, “Blackwood sisters Bed and Breakfast”. Writers could do that. Well, writers with Felix’s money could do that. It would just be the four of them if you counted Felix’s new nurse Andy, staying at the B&B. The owners would be there too, but Wren wasn’t sure how many of them there were or if they had staff.

The island, and all of Ireland really, was beautiful. It was the perfect place for a writer to escape. To be inspired, even a whodunit mystery novelist, she felt like writing poetry looking at the rolling hills of green and fences of stone. The small cottage style houses that lined the greystone roads. They had taken their time traveling through the mainland and had taken the ferry to the island this morning. All their belongings were traveling by plane from the mainland and hired staff were taking it to the B&B separately. It was a shift for Wren for sure to just pay people to do all the heavy lifting, literally and figuratively.

“We are almost there Felix, you going to make it?” Carmine interrupted her thoughts. She looked back at Felix, and he was coming along good for a man of his age with nothing but a twisted cane and Andy hovering near but not holding onto him. Felix waved his free hand casually without voicing his answer.

“He’s tough,” Wren whispered with a giggle.

“Have you read his work?” Carmine whispered back.

“Every word,” Wren smiled. Carmine winked at her and then started checking the map again. She started biting her thumbnail. Carmine had a not-so-subtle crush on her and it wasn’t not mutual, but she was not ready for a relationship again. Not after her last boyfriend had been awful and kicked her out. It was by fate or blessing or something that the writing retreat at Felix’s had been only a week after she’d lost her home. The circumstances were terrible, but Leona’s murder had given Wren a place to stay right when she needed one. Felix felt like he owed her for solving his wife’s murder, but he had paid her back for it a million times and then some.

“There it is,” Carmine pointed to an adorable light blue cottage style home. It was three stories, surrounded by a stone fence and flowers. She could see some of the backyard too, with a little cottage at the very back of the garden on the edge of the yard. A guest house? Staff lodgings? She would soon find out. Carmine did have one piece of luggage with him, his ratty backpack. He took it off his broad shoulders and shoved the map inside.

“That thing is falling apart,” Wren chuckled.

“This ‘thing’ is my oldest friend,” Carmine said, “besides Felix I guess.”

“Hey,” Wren tsked him, but she knew he cared for Felix a lot, so she didn’t scold him too hard. And he knew her, so he didn’t defend himself.

“Get me inside, I want to take a nap,” Felix finally spoke. He was still a curmudgeon but had softened some since his wife’s passing. Grief seemed to have drained the fight out him.

“We’re almost there Mr. Thurman,” Andy said softly.

They all made their way up the sidewalk and into the B&B. The walls were a soft green and it was all trimmed in dark wood. Right inside the front door was a little desk for checking in guests. Behind it stood a pretty older woman with short blonde hair smiling at them kindly.

“Hello,” Wren stepped up and held out her hand.

“Hi there, you guys must be the writers,” the woman said, Wren nodded and she continued, “well my name is Lucia and I’m one of the owners.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Carmine held out his hand and shook hers.

“Well are you two a couple?” she asked them.

“Oh no, no,” Wren shook her head vigorously.

“Not yet,” Carmine said with a chuckle and Wren elbowed him.

Lucia smiled at them and then looked behind them, “And is that Felix Thurman?” she bit her lip excitedly.

“Uh huh, Felix, this is the owner Lucia,” Wren told him as he shoved between Wren and Carmine to shake Lucia’s hand.

“I am a huge fan, Mr. Thurman,” Lucia said, “and of course I just started reading your work Wren, I LOVE it, truly.”

“Thank you,” Wren said.

“I appreciate it,” Felix mumbled, “now about the bill.”

“It’s already been settled and you have the place for three months,” Lucia said.

“Well now, that’s for now, I might want to stay longer,” Felix said.

“That’s alright, we can revisit that in a few months but for now it’s all dealt with,” Lucia said.

“Umm will the staff be here?” Wren asked.

“We have a chef and a few housekeepers that work regular shifts but they don’t live here full time, my sister and I, she’s the co-owner, we live out back,” Lucia said.

“Oh, in that cute little house at the back of the yard?” Wren asked.

“Yea, little is right, for two people who… well never mind,” Lucia said, “We will be on the property pretty much all the time if you guys need anything, even if it’s midnight…”

“I wouldn’t say ANY time,” a woman appeared out of nowhere with mousy brown and grey hair, it was shorter than Lucia’s and this one had a sour look to her, she walked up to Lucia and leaned in, “you were supposed to call me when they arrived.”

“Well, I was just standing here when they walked in,” Lucia said, clutching her hands together.

“We literally just walked in the door, I’m sure we’ve been talking her ear off not letting her go fetch you,” Wren said and held out her hand to the other woman.

“Hmm,” the woman said, “I’m Darcia.” Her hands stayed at her sides.

“Your guys place is beautiful,” Wren said looking around.

“You’re writers?” Darcia asked.

“Yes all three of us,” Carmine said, maybe a little put off that Lucia hadn’t mentioned his work. But he and Wren were new, maybe she was still getting around to it.

“This place was my sister’s idea, it was either follow her here or live in America alone with no living relatives,” Darcia said. Felix harrumphed lowly and Wren gave him a warning look to be nice.

“Well, you didn’t have to follow me,” Lucia said. Darcia rolled her eyes; there was rivalry for sure but that was probably normal for siblings. Wren wouldn’t know, she’d been alone for a long time.

“Where is Owen?” Darcia asked, “you didn’t call him to show our guests to their rooms?”

“I was about to,” Lucia said defensively, sounding childlike.

“I’ll do it,” Darcia said and spun around to leave the room.

“Well,” Wren said, “that’s your roommate then?” She gave Lucia a little grin and Lucia laughed nervously.

“That’s my sister, like I said, it’s a small house,” Lucia said, she sounded tired.

In a few moments a young man, barely over eighteen probably, came to show them to their rooms and explain how things worked. Felix had the biggest room downstairs, it was the only bedroom downstairs. On the second story was a bedroom for Carmine that had its own separate bathroom and walk in closet. There was another room on the floor that was an office with a big wooden desk in the middle of the room. The third story, which was almost like an attic but with taller ceilings, was for Wren. The floor was just one room, a bedroom with a claw foot tub on one side surrounded by a white sheer curtain. Beside that in the back corner was a small toilet and sink, both could be hidden by a curtain as well. There was a small desk near a huge window looking out over the backyard. A cute little white iron bed with pink dressings sat alongside the other huge window, as wide as the bed was long. This window was facing the ocean beyond the fields of green and stone walls.

They all settled into their rooms and Owen helped Felix’s staff take their luggage to each of them once it arrived. Wren just had one suitcase and a duffel bag. Owen instructed her that the sisters were hosting a dinner for the guests in the main dining room that evening and that she should go down for pre-dinner tea and conversation whenever she was done unpacking. It was almost too formal for what she was used to traveling Ireland. Owen sounded Irish but he behaved like British society. He was a redheaded young man with freckles like crazy. Wren shared both things but in much less noticeable fashion. Her hair was wavy, shoulder length and dark brownish red, and she had a slight amount of mostly unnoticeable freckles. She was thirty-two but most people said she looked younger. Felix said she had the forever spirit of a twelve-year-old girl who was just too excited about the world to age out of it. Carmine was her opposite, being thirty-eight and tough. He’d worked as a real-life, no joke lumberjack in Washington and wrote in his spare time. But he was a handsome man, rugged but still young looking despite his mostly dark grey hair and beard. He wore flannel shirts with jeans and boots, Wren wore trench-coats with cozy slacks and flats. He was the rocky mountains tough-guy and she was trendy Seattle hipster. The hipster guys in Seattle dressed like Carmine but he could have never passed for one of them, his grit looked too real and lived in, you felt it in his presence.

She shook off her thoughts as she put away her scant amount of items. Just toiletries, some clothes, a few books, writer’s notebook and her laptop. She put the soaps and makeup in the medicine cabinet above the sink. What little of that she had. Then she put her books on the corner of the desk and her laptop in the middle, she kept her notebook with her just in case. She had a small wardrobe in the room with a full-length mirror, and she put all her clothes in there, also what little she had. She changed into the one dress she owned. A short off white, quarter sleeve dress that buttoned all the way down and fell at mid-thigh. She had one other pair of shoes besides her go-to black flats. A pair of tan suede ankle boots, she wore those for dinner because they felt at least a little dressier than flats.

Wren sat down at the cherry wood table between Carmine and Felix. Andy was on the other side of Felix. Darcia was at the head of the table with Lucia on the other end. A man and woman sat across from Wren and Carmine, while Owen and a young girl sat across from Felix and Andy. She assumed the young girl was the maid and that the couple were friends of the sisters. Dinner was mostly seafood, and no one was introduced, which was strange. Lucia had the salad but ate nothing after that. She must’ve been on a diet, but she really didn’t need to be, she was pretty small. They all had casual conversation and Wren found out the couple’s names were Sheila and Roger, and the young girl was Madeline. No one was giving up last names so she couldn’t find out more about any of them online. Except for the sisters whose last name was Blackwood, but she knew that from the name of the B&B.

Darcia was very nice to everyone, including the staff, but she didn’t say a word to her sister the entire dinner, nor at dessert when everyone went to the living room for tea and cake. Wren hoped this all was a one-time thing to welcome them and not something the sisters did for every meal. She would get no writing done that way. After everyone else left or went to bed, Wren stayed up and wandered around the house. She was learning the place thoroughly because she liked to do that. After that first night, things were quiet at the B&B. Carmine and Wren took Felix to tourist spots on the island. Seeing the lighthouse, the shipwreck, a fudge shop. They took a horse drawn carriage, and it was bumpy, fun but bumpy. They hardly saw the staff or the sisters and Wren got a lot of writing done up in her Irish garret. It wasn’t Paris but it felt like an appropriate name for the little room. When spring came, so did more flowers. And so did the sisters. Darcia would leave a lot or work in the garden. Lucia liked to sit out in the yard at a table for two and read or write in a little notebook. Wren would watch her sometimes, wondering what she was writing down. The sisters were never in the backyard at the same time. It was odd but the internet was giving nothing up about them. Carmine called her nosy when she mentioned it to him, so she didn’t have anyone to gossip about it with. She wasn’t on those terms with Andy, and she didn’t want to stress Felix out about their living arrangements, he’d been through enough.

One day she decided the cat had nine lives to spare so she could let her curiosity take her out there to investigate herself. Lucia was out there writing in a notebook again and having tea.

“Those are pretty blue hydrangeas,” Wren said as she approached Lucia.

Lucia looked up from her writing and smiled, then over at the many flowers in front of the little house, “They were here when we bought it, neither of us knew about flowers much but Darcia does the gardening, I find it just about as exciting as watching fish talk.”

Wren giggled, “I hadn’t heard that one.”

“I made it up,” Lucia said, then motioned to the seat across from her, “have a seat, would you like me to have Owen bring you tea?”

“It’s Sunday,” Wren said, the staff was off on Sundays because all of them were catholic.

“I’ve been here a year now and I’m still not used to everything being closed on Sundays,” Lucia said.

“You’re from the south aren’t you?” Wren asked.

“The accent gave it away?” Lucia smiled.

Wren nodded, then looked around, “So… where is Darcia?”

“If this is the third Sunday of the month, she’s on the mainland,” Lucia said, it was.

“Any particular reason?” Wren asked.

“That’s the writer in you isn’t it? You know I just finished your last book, I’ve read all of them now. Next I’ll be reading Mr. Shad’s historical fiction,” Lucia said holding up one of Carmine’s books.

“He’ll be glad to hear that, I think he was getting jealous of all the praise you were giving me and Felix,” Wren said.

“Oh, I didn’t realize, I’m so singularly focused sometimes,” Lucia said, patting her closed notebook.

“I’ve noticed you writing too,” Wren said, “Are you a writer? Or are you just journaling?”

Lucia bit her lip excitedly, “Well, I haven’t shared this with anyone, and Darcia just hates when I brag, but I do write poetry.”

“That’s amazing,” Wren said, it wasn’t as scandalous as she’d have hoped, but she didn’t really know what she was expecting.

“Do you want to read one?” Lucia asked her.

“Sure,” Wren smiled taking the now open notebook from Lucia. From that day on Wren would join her for tea and chatting. There was a lot of gossip for such a small island. Lucia wrote a lot of love poems that were quite good. Someone was the major object of her heart but she didn’t say who. Wren suspected it was Roger, someone Lucia couldn’t be with because some other woman had gotten in the way. But Lucia told Wren that she’d dated Roger when she had first moved to the island and she found him ‘as romantic as rotting fish’. And that he had finally given up and moved on to Sheila. Wren found Lucia amusing but haunted. She couldn’t figure out what it was. She pried about the sister’s relationship and Lucia said they were different in every way except that they loved each other unconditionally, that they shared. And that they were family at the end of every day no matter how much they got on each other’s nerves. So it wasn’t her either. She seemed to have taken their parent’s death pretty well. Her poetry about that was acceptance. The staff seemed to like both sisters pretty well but complained about wages sometimes. Lucia laughed about overhearing the two young people, Owen and Madeline complaining about her.

“You didn’t get mad?” Wren had asked.

“I was that age once and they will learn that no matter how much I want to give them a million dollars, we just don’t have it to give,” Lucia said. Wren had been in the staff’s shoes more times than she wanted to remember but never on the other side of it. So she took Lucia’s word for it because she seemed nice enough to give anyone the world if she could just get ahold of it. That’s what she felt like, like she was floating around trying to grasp onto something steady. The island was a bad place to do something like that. It was a place to get lost and feel free, not somewhere to settle down and feel grounded.

Saturday the sisters hosted another dinner party, Wren watched the people she’d heard gossip about with fresh eyes. Sheila was not kind to Lucia, especially because Roger was way too kind to Lucia. Wren could see in his eyes that he hadn’t really moved on, and so could Sheila. The two young people on the staff acted like they were on the clock. Stiff and polite without really having a good time. Since the chef had been put on leave since Felix said he didn’t need ‘all that fuss’ over just the three of them. Dinner was brought in from a local restaurant. Darcia and Lucia were getting along, it seemed odd but then again Wren had really only seen them together when she’d first arrived. They had separate interests, separate lives. Maybe she’d caught them on a bad day and misjudged them.

During dinner Carmine talked her and Felix into going out the next day. Wren knew it was a Sunday and that if they left, Lucia would be alone since Darcia went to the mainland on the third Sunday of the month. Staff would be gone because of mass. Wren felt tense about it, even though she had no reason to, she barely knew the woman really. Lucia sensed her hesitation and told Wren she had plans of her own so it was fine. Wren didn’t really believe her but she couldn’t call her on it, so reluctantly she agreed.

Early the next morning on the way out, Wren checked the back yard for Lucia. She wasn’t there. Maybe it was too early, and she was still in bed, Wren went out to the back house and knocked but there was no answer. Darcia must’ve left already to go to the mainland. Maybe Lucia really did have plans, or she was too deep in sleep to hear the knocking. Wren left it alone and went to find Carmine. They all spent the day together exploring the island slowly. Taking it all in, maybe Carmine wanted to do this because it had been two months already and there was only one more left before they would have to decide to stay or not. Late in the afternoon, Wren and Felix wanted to have a dinner out. Carmine said he wasn’t feeling well and wanted to go back to the B&B. They offered to go with him but he insisted they dine out, because he was just going to bed. A couple hours later, Wren, Felix and Andy went back to the B&B. Felix was tired and Andy was bored so Wren offered to play chess with him in the living room while Felix napped.

A while later Darcia went through the house and greeted them politely. But a few minutes after going to her house she returned.

“What’s wrong?” Wren asked.

“Have either of you seen my sister?” Darcia asked, wringing her hands.

“We haven’t been back an hour yet,” Andy shook his head.

“Carmine came back a few hours ago, maybe he saw her?” Wren offered.

“Can you ask him for me, I don’t know him that well. Oh, this is not like her, it’s getting dark,” Darcia said, her bottom lip quivering.

Wren jumped up and went to her, she rubbed the lady’s back, “I’m sure she’s fine,” she swallowed hard because lying was a huge pill, “I’ll go talk to Carmine.”

Wren talked to Carmine and he hadn’t seen anyone but Owen. Which was strange but he had told Carmine he was just stopping by to pick up a check on the front desk that Lucia had left for him. It wasn’t there and he had to get back to his family for Sunday supper, so he’d talk to her the next day.

“He didn’t ask for Darcia?” Wren asked.

“I guess he knew she was on the mainland all day,” Carmine said.

“Strange,” Wren said. Felix obviously hadn’t seen her, he’d been in bed since they got back. Wren wanted to talk to Owen, but he was probably still busy and would hate being bothered on a Sunday. With no one else to question Wren told Darcia they would just have to wait to see if she came home.

Monday came, then Tuesday, but no Lucia, was this her plan? To run away? Owen still hadn’t gotten this mysterious check that Darcia said she didn’t have a clue about. Owen said it was just from Lucia’s personal account, but nothing more, what was she paying him for on the side? Darcia was beside herself with worry and called the police. But this was an island, there weren’t many places for someone to be. They’d checked with the ferry and the airport and the people there knew Lucia personally, at least what she looked like. She hadn’t been to either place.

“Well, she couldn’t have swam to the mainland,” Darcia had told them exasperated. The police did a walk through of the houses and the yard. They saw nothing but what would there be to find? Besides Lucia, who clearly wasn’t there. Wren thought of the poems and asked if anyone had seen Roger. Owen saw him at mass on Sunday and Andy had seen him on Tuesday riding bikes with Sheila down the road. So they didn’t run off together. Wren wanted badly to look through the house out back. The police already had, but they were looking for Lucia or a crime. They didn’t know Lucia like Wren did, there was something she was hiding. And Wren thought the answer could be in her poetry.

Darcia called everyone she knew over the B&B for a meeting and to form a search party. Wren took the opportunity to question everyone. The only suspicious things she could gather was that Owen had been looking for a check. When she questioned him he said it wasn’t a big deal but she should really ask Roger what he was doing the night of the last dinner party. Because after he had cleaned up and took out the trash, he saw Roger pacing around behind the back yard. So Wren asked Roger and he said that he was just taking a stroll to walk off dinner.

“Without Sheila?” Wren asked.

“She was tired and went home already,” he said. “You know instead of questioning me, you should be talking to her sister.”

“Her sister is a wreck, she’s been worried sick,” Wren said.

“I would be too if I yelled at someone like that and then never saw them again,” he said, looked across the room at Darcia with dark eyes.

“What do you mean?” Wren asked.

“On my stroll, I heard them arguing, well it was more like one was berating the other over something, I took off,” Roger said. Wren looked over at Darcia who was sobbing onto Andy, who looked uncomfortable. Wren knew Roger was lying about why he was back there, he was probably taking another shot to get back with Lucia. But was he lying about the yelling too? Well, why wouldn’t he? She could have rejected him and he could have…no she wouldn’t go there. There was no body, so there was no evidence of that, not yet.

There were two clear suspects, Owen was hiding something about that check. Roger had admitted to skulking around the night before Lucia had gone missing. Then there were less obvious suspects, like Sheila who was jealous of Roger and Lucia. Darcia, who was just kind of grouchy with her sister sometimes, this was a loose motive but still. And even Carmine, who’d came back early and could have been alone on the property with Lucia. But surely not, he didn’t know her that well at all. Unless he was jealous of Wren spending all her time with Lucia instead of him, but he wasn’t that crazy. Was he? Wren hadn’t known him for a year yet, but almost, that was a long time to hide something that sinister inside yourself. Then there were people on the island that Wren didn’t really know. Other staff, the chef could have been mad he got dismissed for several months. The only people she was sure were innocent was herself, Felix and Andy. Because they had been with her all day. And even the night before, Andy couldn’t have gone out there and done something to Lucia with Darcia in the house. They all planned a search for the next day. But after combing the entire island, no one could find anything.

“I’m going to the mainland tomorrow and see if I can’t get a better detective,” Darcia said that night while they were having tea.

“You can’t think of anything she said?” Wren asked, rubbing the back of Darcia's trembling hand.

“No, nothing abnormal, she went to bed and I didn’t see her again,” Darcia said.

“What about the next morning?” Wren asked.

“I assumed she was still in bed when I left, I didn’t check on her, she was fifty years old, I guess I should have, she went to bed early because she wasn’t feeling well,” Darcia said.

“Was she sick? Maybe the lobster didn’t agree with her and she walked out to the beach for fresh air…” Wren said, but stopped before she spoke the conclusion out loud. That the ocean got her.

“She didn’t eat much that night,” Darcia said taking a sip of her tea, and gave a sad smile, “She hated seafood.”

Wren tilted her head, “And she wanted to live here?”

“I’m sure she had her other reasons,” Darcia said.

Wren couldn’t sleep that night. Darcia said that Lucia hated seafood. Hated. Not Hates. Hated. And that smile, Wren had thought it was a sad one but the more she played that conversation over in her mind, the more it became a Cheshire grin. Darcia was going to the mainland, and Wren wanted to get out to that house.

The next day, once Darcia had left, Wren forced Carmine into going out with her to break into the little house.

“You know this is a crime, right?” Carmine asked looking around to make sure no one was around, as Wren picked the lock on the little house.

“It’s not that bad if I don’t steal anything,” she said.

“And you wouldn’t?” he chuckled.

“I’m not a thief,” she hissed.

“You would take something if you thought it was evidence,” he said. She didn’t argue but only because the lock had popped and not because he was right, she told herself.

They crept inside and she shut the door behind them. The house was small, really small. The living room area had wicker furniture, and a TV. There was an open floor plan so the kitchen was right there behind the chair. All open and visible. There were three doors on the wall opposite the refrigerator and sink. Well they had to start somewhere. They looked through the very normal looking house. There was a bathroom, with older woman supplies and medicines, no poisons or hard drugs. Though Wren knew regular pills could be used badly in some cases, she memorized all the pills in the cabinet, though there weren’t many. These were healthy ladies. It was mostly vitamins, supplements, nothing too dangerous there logically but her eyes caught the calcium tablets. They were harmless but something in her subconscious was screaming at her to connect the dots.

The bedrooms were so obvious in who they belonged to. Darcia had just the basics, a powder blue bedroom with all the essentials and nothing else. There were floral decorations but those were minimal. Lucia’s room was colorful, in purples, teals and pinks. She had art on her walls and newspaper clippings on a corkboard. She seemed very interested in the Plassey shipwreck. Wren was looking for one thing more than anything else. If it was here, she would know Lucia didn’t run away. The longer she couldn’t find it, the better she felt. But then she saw that one of the paintings on the wall were crooked. She went over and lifted it. Nothing on the wall, no hidden safe. But then on the back of the painting, attached with a magnet to the metal frame, was the notebook. The poems.

Wren got it and took off. Darcia wouldn’t know it was missing if she didn’t even know where it was to start with. Carmine saw it in her hands as she came out of the bedroom and shook his head.

“Shut up,” she told him. It would take a while but she made him sit with her at the little table out in the yard to read the poems. She read them out loud to him.

“These are all just mushy love poems,” he scoffed.

“Have some respect,” Wren said.

“She’s not dead,” he said.

Wren flipped to the last poem, “Well we don’t know that do we?” She read the poem to herself and gasped, “this one is new.”

“And hopefully the last one,” Carmine said.

Wren glared at him, then started reading it:

“Before me, you were the only flower

But I grew brighter

So you tried power

I wished for your love

But he did not

It’s been so long

We haven’t forgot.

I’m still looking

And now you know

So I guess I have to go…”

At this Carmine held up his hand, “See? She left.”

“That’s not the end,” Wren said, then continued.

“Before the storm can do

All the damage it wants to

I won’t let the ocean take me away

Because of the memory of love I will stay

I am a flower so I want to grow

But in the end we all know

Poets create to heal their hurt

Gardener’s nails are packed with dirt.”

“That’s pretty shitty poetry,” Carmine laughed.

“Stop it!” Wren stood up, “You’re not taking this seriously at all.”

“It doesn’t sound like much to me,” he said.

“Well, it does to me,” Wren said.

“Oh yea? What?” he asked.

Wren looked at it again, “I don’t know yet.” He gave her a smug look and she let out a frustrated grunt and took off.

Wren spent the rest of the evening pacing in her room. Chewing her thumbnail and repeating three things. “She hated seafood, hated.” “Dirt and Calcium.” She repeated those things over and over and kept looking down at the little house. At the little table Lucia used to sit and have tea with her. This one was personal. At some point Darcia came home and walked out to the little house. Wren watched her go in, a while later she came out in gardening gloves with a trowel. She started on the hydrangea’s, the pink ones in the back of the garden.

“PINK!” Wren shouted. “Pink? Pink, pink,” she said to herself. She repeated that word all the way down to the first floor where Felix, Andy and Carmine were sitting in the living room reading. She stopped in the center of the room, and they looked up at her, “Pink!” she said, pointing toward the back yard.

“She’s lost it,” Carmine told Felix.

“No, no I haven’t, they’re pink, they were blue, it’s March,” Wren said.

“See? Lost it,” Carmine said.

“It all makes sense, she HATED seafood, not hates, hated. There are calcium tablets and the dirt, the gardener, the hydrangeas are pink,” Wren said.

Felix struggled with standing up brushing off Andy's help, “Andy will you get Wren some tea and Carmine you help me to the kitchen, and we can talk about this calmly.”

“But you don’t understand,” Wren said.

“I know, you figured it out, but you need to calm down and get it straight before the police come and you have to explain it to them,” Felix smiled.

The police officer that was on Lucia's missing person’s case was called. All the suspects and interested parties were gathered into the kitchen.

“So, I have it figured out,” Wren said.

“Okay, what do you think?” the officer asked.

“Lucia is under the Hydrangeas,” Wren said.

“Excuse me?” Darcia asked.

“You new at gardening?” Wren asked her.

“Yes, I mean, sort of,” Darcia said.

“Yes because a longtime gardener knows that hydrangeas change colors. Not for no reason, mind you. You see in the summer time, they can change from blue to pink. But it’s not summer right now, so can anyone tell me what can cause them to go from blue to pink in the spring?” Wren asked and looked around. Everyone looked at each other.

Wren clasped her hands together, “Okay, I’ll tell you, hydrangeas are blue in acidic soil, and pink or red in a higher alkaline soil. At a pH of around 7 or above. Do we know what makes soil more alkaline?” Wren looked at everyone, but even the police officer shook his head. She sighed, “Okay, well a decomposing body…”

“Now wait a minute!” Darcia said, standing up from the table.

“Let me finish, please,” Wren said calmly. Darcia pursed her lips and sat down, shaking all over with rage. Wren glared at her, “as I was saying, a decomposing body generally makes soil more alkaline during the initial stages of decomposition. This is mainly due to the release of nitrogen-rich compounds like ammonia, which increases pH often reaching 8 or 9.”

“Is this science class, what is your point?” Owen asked.

“Lucia was paying you and Madeline from her own pocket to make up for your wages, wasn’t she?” Wren asked them. They looked at the floor. That was the answer to that suspicion, Lucia was just being kind.

“You found that out didn’t you?” Wren asked Darcia.

“So?” Darcia said crossing her arms.

“And you were mad, but that wasn’t what pushed you over the edge, was it? It was these,” Wren said holding up the notebook of poems. “You read these, and only you understood what… or I mean who, they were about.”

“They better not have been about Roger,” Sheila said.

“They weren’t,” Wren said, Sheila looked relieved but Roger looked sick. Wren continued, “Even though you should know that Roger was trying to get her back. The night I suspect she was murdered, he was back there trying to talk to her but she was busy. Busy fighting with her sister over a teenage boyfriend.”

“What?” Roger spat.

“Yes, isn’t that right Darcia,” Wren held up the poems, “Are these about Martin?”

“Who is Martin?” Carmine scoffed.

“He was Lucia’s boyfriend, but Darcia wouldn’t let them be happy. She was too jealous, because he didn’t want her, he wanted Lucia. And she broke them up. Lucia was too kind and eventually forgave her overbearing sister but she never got over Martin,” Wren said.

“She was obsessed and crazy,” Darcia said.

“She found out that he was on the Plassey shipwreck, she looked for him everywhere online and that was the last time anyone saw him, he was on this island,” Wren said, “that’s why when she was free of your parents keeping her close to them and to you, she came here but you literally followed her.”

“She couldn’t make it on her own,” Darcia said.

“You never let her try, because you wanted to hover around her, making sure to stop any chances of her being truly happy,” Wren said.

“How do you know all that?” Sheila asked.

“It’s all in these poems, the ones Darcia was too jealous to give a chance, too scared they were going to be good, right?” Wren clenched her teeth.

“But if she killed her, how did she do it?” the officer asked.

“Oh that’s the thing, our conversation last night about seafood, Darcia said Lucia HATED seafood, past tense, I couldn’t let it go,” Wren said.

“So she hated it, so what?” Darcia said.

“She hated it because she was allergic,” Wren said, “And no one allergic to something is going to eat it willingly.”

“Right, so how did I supposedly make her eat shellfish?” Darcia asked smugly.

“You didn’t,” Wren said. The whole room groaned, Wren held up her hand, then held up something else in her other hand, a bottle of calcium supplements, “you got her with these.”

“Calcium? That’s your proof?” Darcia chuckled, “I’m over fifty, of course I take calcium.”

“But she can’t… couldn’t, at least not these ones. Because these are made with oyster shells, if you put a few of these in someone’s tea that’s deathly allergic to shellfish, they could die, and you knew just how allergic she was didn’t you?” Wren asked.

“I’ve had those supplements for a long time, it doesn’t prove anything,” Darcia said.

“Nope, but I bet we can prove something if we do a little digging,” Wren said, holding up a pink Hydrangea.