Page 69 of The Dead Come to Stay
“All right, let’s say Ava found him intriguing,” Green said. “Ava wasn’t the woman who just turned up at the Abington Arms.” She had a point. But MacAdams had an idea.
“Tula gave us reason to believe he was ready to do a runner again.” MacAdams dropped Foley’s picture down to the cleared space on the board. “Everything changedsix months ago. So let’s start there: six months ago. Foley sells his house. That’s approximately, by Struthers’s estimate, when he stopped drinking and smoking. It’s also when Foley starts cominghereto Abington, according to his hotel records.”
MacAdams moved a photo of the now-seized butty van next to Foley.
“Why here?” MacAdams next drew down a photo of the posh hotel. “Abington Arms has been known for its... privacy, let’s say. We need to take a long look at the regular guests, especially those that overlap with his stay.”
“You think it’s related to the art deal?” Gridley chewed the end of her pen. “I mean, it’s a good place to hide a love affair, but it meant he could hide his real identity fromher,too. By Foley’s admission, they’re going to have a baby. You think he means to cut and run?”
“A hotel willing to protect your privacy is good for all sorts,” MacAdams said, somewhat grimly. “But I don’t think Foley planned to abandon this new lover like he did Tula Byrne.”
MacAdams had started to sweat, despite the fan’s feeble attempts to circulate air. He hadn’t had time to print new photos, so he drew a picture of a locker, and one of a shoe in dry erase marker.
“At Foley’s flat, everything was disposable.”
“Boring, even,” Green added.
“Just so. Everything except the clothes he was wearing—or, I suspect, planning to wear. And over at the Abington Arms, the locker held a different suit of clothes, fancy attire for a womanand fifteen hundred in cash.” MacAdams rubbed the marker between his hands as though trying to start a fire. “They each had a fine set of clothes waiting for them, almost like a bug-out bag. Where were they going?”
“Vacation?” Andrews asked.
“A cruise?” suggested Gridley—but MacAdams shook his head.
“Honeymoon,” he said. “Very possibly as Mr. and Mrs. Connolly.”
“But Ava is already married,” Green said. “Oh. Shit, he’s leavingAvafor someone else.”
MacAdams tapped his nose. “He knows he’s in trouble, right? So he invents not one identity buttwo.Both of them were going to flee. But something didn’t go as planned.”
“Yeah, he got murdered,” Andrews said.
“Yes, butbeforethat. The mystery woman never picked up her gown from the locker; he didn’t get his shoes or suit from his flat.” MacAdams closed his eyes hard enough to restart the distant pounding from his head injury.The plan had been put in motion.Foley had packed in a desperate rush, toppling shaving cream, grabbing only his shirt. He had come to Abington, perhaps to pick up his girlfriend, but she didn’t arrive. In fact, she onlynowcame looking for her locker. Why wait? Unless you were afraid.
“We need to find Foley’s girlfriend,” MacAdams said. “Because I think whoever was targeting Foley means to target her next.”
Green had been following along, but with increasingly stiff posture.
“You haven’t said this out loud yet, but you’re going to. If Ava is the jilted lover... then she might have murdered Foley before he could leave her.”
MacAdams thought about Ava; above the fray somehow, protected by wealth and position, seemingly beyond mortalemotions. But he also thought of her fierce protection of her maid, and that ever-cool self-possession.
“It’s not our job to guess,” he said. “It’s our job to suspect, and to follow through. Right now, Foley’s lover is our priority. Because I suspect she might be in danger.”
He meant the mystery woman; of course he did. But without meaning to, he was also thinking about Jo Jones.
Chapter 21
When the knock came, it startled Jo out of heavy slumber. She fumbled about, forgetting she was on the sofa, and craned her neck to catch a glimpse of the clock. Was it Gwilym already, picking her up for dinner? The knock repeated. She should jump up and answer it, but the particular couch crevice in which she found herself seemed too good to endanger.
“It’s open,” she said.
“Whyis it open, Jo?” asked... James MacAdams.
Jo rolled herself to sitting and blinked sleep out of her eyes. He was standing in her doorway in short sleeves. She’d never seen him in short sleeves and stared like he’d walked in naked.
“Well, I’m home and it’s daytime,” she started.
“And asleep. With the door unlocked.” He crossed the room and crouched to be at eye level. “You said you’d quit that.”
