onight, we’ll do it. A hotel? The backseat of this car? Whatever you want, I’ll give it.”
Kate’s heart was pounding in her throat. “Scotland?” she whispered.
He looked away and seemed to be trying to make a decision. He put the car in gear. “Scotland, it is.” He looked back at her. “Tonight is for fun.”
“Yes,” she agreed. “We need some laughter.”
Jack took the curves of the English country roads like a driver at Daytona. Beside him, Kate leaned back in the plush leather seat and smiled. Just a few more days and maybe... She glanced at him, saw the seriousness in his eyes.
The restaurant Jack had found for them was nice. White tablecloths, heavy silver. Next door was a pub that had a sign announcing the band.
“Eat first, dance later,” he said as he held her chair out for her.
They ordered English beef.
“Now?” Kate asked.
Smiling, Jack handed the envelope to her. Carefully, she ran her finger under the tab and lifted it. There was a single sheet inside.
Tonight. Midnight. The beginning of forever.
She handed it to Jack, then blinked back tears. “Nadine went to him but he wasn’t there. All these years, she’s not known what happened to him.”
“Maybe not. I still think she could have hit him over the head. Maybe he did accept her father’s money.”
“If Mr. Howland was in Hawaii that night, then he had to have offered the money before that. Sean would have left then. He wouldn’t have been so cruel as to wait to tell her on the night they were to leave together.”
“I like to think not. How’s your dinner?”
“Great. Excellent. You?”
“Perfect. So what are the others plotting to do?”
Kate shook her head. “I can’t figure it out. It’s all very hush-hush. I think there’s to be a play. We’re all to act out what happened that night. I heard Nadine tell Teddy she was too fat to wear the dress she wore that night.”
“Nothing like mother love, is there?”
“I understand. I’m a lot bigger than my mother.”
“You are perfectly sized. Truly perfect.”
The way he said it made her blush.
“I guess we’ll find out tomorrow.” Jack sounded dismissive, as though he’d heard all he wanted to about the Pack at Oxley Manor.
It was as they were about to leave that they saw Meena—not her incarnation as the dumpy Willa—enter the restaurant with a man. The lawyer, no doubt.
Jack put his hand up to shade his face. “And it’s another possible murderer and a body hider.”
“You are horrible!” Kate said but she was laughing.
“Is there a back way out of here?” he asked the pretty waitress. He nodded toward Meena and Eddie. “They’re her parents. We don’t want to spend the night listening about the good ol’ days.”
“Sure,” she said. “Through the kitchen.”
“You’re incorrigible.” Kate took his hand as they ran through the kitchen and out the back.
“Horrible and incorrigible. I’m batting a thousand tonight.”