Only the room where Tim had situated the Sinclairs and their guests remained. I stepped through the doorway and finally got my first look at our witnesses.

They made me think of Bram. Presented with the family and their pristine house at the summit of Tern Island, he would have seen perfection. To Bram, perfection was synonymous with danger. In the context of a murder case it alarmed me, too. Nothing about this place was flawed, and that uncanny fact had preoccupied me throughout my search. Every room I’d entered was magazine-ready, and the living room was no different. On the mantel sat a mindfully arranged autumn vignette of hefty pewter candlesticks, gourds, and pheasant feathers. Fresh-cut mums burst from vases on mirrored tabletops. Heavy valances in neutral tones were shaped like the bustle of a nineteenth-century skirt. Classy. That’s how I’d describe the place. And the family fit right in.

Like Camilla’s, their clothes were casual but perfectly tailored—dress shirts overlaid with cashmere sweaters, pants with centerline creases sharp as the blade of a knife. A woman with short dark hair and fat diamond earrings reclined artfully on a settee as if gracing the cover of Vanity Fair. A handsome man with coffee-colored skin leaned against the window beyond which trees strained against the storm. It was open a crack to let in a wet breeze, and sheer curtain panels billowed around him like smoke. The youngest of them all, a teenage girl with rosebud lips and shiny chestnut hair, looked like she could have been a celebrity’s little sister about to make it big herself. An equally striking man who was surely her father sat by her side. Against the high-polish backdrop of the house’s antique furniture and the fire that crackled happily in the hearth they were exclusivity personified. There was one exception, one person who didn’t belong in this picture of privilege and wealth, and I’d have bet anything her name was Abella Beaudry.

Abella’s eyes were ringed in red. Here was the source of the sobs I’d heard earlier. The woman looked dazed, as if she’d taken—or was given—something for the shock. Out of everyone, she alone wasn’t dressed. Her hair was a mess, her pink pajamas wrinkled. Even from across the room I could see the fabric on her hip was stained with blood. Jasper’s girlfriend had our missing man’s DNA all over her, and she hadn’t done a thing about it.

Camilla had taken my advice and gotten herself some tea. She was still ashen, but compared to Abella she looked absolutely hearty. Overall, the rest of the family came off surprisingly well. There was a serving tray on the table that held a plate of sliced cake, a coffee urn, and a pitcher of cream. Several of the mugs were in use. Were it not for their voices, kept respectfully low, and the poor, pathetic girl in their midst, it might have been just another rainy autumn day at the river for these American aristocrats.