Chapter Twenty-Two: Open Doors
Though Nancy had led the group out of the stable yard, it was not long before they fell into much the same configuration as before: Joe riding ahead and Frank behind, leaving Nancy in the middle with Vanessa, this time, instead of Daria. The situation, Nancy felt, was more than a little awkward.
"Do you want me to fill you in on our progress?" she offered, after a few minutes had elapsed in silence.
Vanessa's gaze had been fixed ahead, either on the trail or on Joe's back. Now it flicked, seemingly without interest, toward Nancy, who found herself wishing yet again that she could face the other woman's scrutiny in the strength of her own identity rather than in her Nadia guise.
"How long have you two been working together?" Vanessa asked abruptly.
"That depends on how you look at it," Nancy answered, choosing to ignore the subtext. What Vanessa really wanted to know was How long have you been sleeping together?, but Nancy felt no obligation to satisfy her curiosity.
"We've been working cases together off and on since we were teenagers," she said blandly.
"I remember," Vanessa said. "You would call, and he'd be gone."
Was she jealous? Nancy wondered, startled. Before she could even begin to process this idea, Vanessa changed the subject.
"Is it weird, pretending your boyfriend is your cousin?"
"It's just another day at the office for us," Nancy said.
"I guess it would be weirder if he were, like, super affectionate."
Nancy nodded. "Yes, that would ruin the illusion."
"No, I mean in general," Vanessa clarified. "He was never a cuddly person. That must make it easier to do stuff like this."
Never a cuddly person? This was news to Nancy. Even in her platonic dealings with Joe, she had always perceived him as tactile and affectionate. She was beginning to get the feeling that the version of Joe whom Vanessa had dated had been a complete stranger.
"Anyway," Vanessa said, before Nancy could formulate a response. "I guess you might as well fill me in, since we have some time."
That's what I offered to do in the first place, Nancy thought with some irritation. Aloud, she simply said "Sure. We don't have any concrete answers yet, but I can sum up the avenues we've been exploring."
"I'm surprised there's anything much to say after such a short time," Vanessa remarked.
"We've learned to work quickly. And of course having a third person is helpful."
Nancy paused a moment, gathering her thoughts, then began. She gave Vanessa the broad strokes of their investigation, rather than the finer details; in Nancy's experience, when a client asked for an update, they were more interested in a feeling of making headway than in theories, hunches, and what-ifs. The explanation, therefore, did not take up the entirety of the remaining distance, and they were left to lapse back into silence interspersed with more awkward attempts at small talk for some time before Joe halted at the turn-off Daria had shown them earlier.
Finally, Nancy thought, dismounting with profound relief.
"Now what?" Vanessa asked.
Frank held her horse so she could get down. "We have to go a little way on foot," he explained.
They had made sure to bring halters and lead ropes, this time. When they were in sight of the sanatorium they tied their horses and went on without them.
"It's so creepy," Vanessa said admiringly, quickening her pace as they approached the looming building. Even in the middle of the forest she walked with a dancer's self-possessed grace, spine long and straight, toes turned slightly outward.
Nancy and the Hardys hurried after her.
"Hold up," Frank said. "The building itself seems pretty safe, but you still need to be cautious. Try to stay close to us, okay?"
"Fine," Vanessa said dismissively, still staring at the building.
"Van," Joe said, with a slight warning edge to his voice. "He means it. Don't wander off."
"Fine," Vanessa said again, a little more testily this time.
They all crossed the porch and paused in the lobby, listening intently and letting their eyes adjust.
"It stinks in here," Vanessa whispered.
"You'll get used to it," Nancy murmured back.
"Since when does the smell of pot bother you?" Joe asked.
Vanessa swallowed convulsively. She looked, Nancy thought, genuinely nauseated.
"Go outside if you're gonna puke," Joe said.
"I'm fine." She swallowed again. "Let's go."
Though she did not complain about the smell again, Nancy noticed her discreetly touching the pressure point on her left wrist as they started walking.
Interesting, Nancy thought. She had seen both Bess and Callie make use of that pressure point in early pregnancy, with varying degrees of success- and had used it herself, once, in a sailboat on a particularly rough sea, with good results.
"Where are we going?" Vanessa asked.
"We need to check out the room that's been occupied," Joe said.
"Can't we look around a little?"
"Afterwards," he said. "It's important that we get a look at that room first, in case we get interrupted. Anything else is extra."
Nancy watched and listened with every fiber of her being, but could see nothing to suggest that another person had been in the building in the hours since their previous visit. There were no fresh disturbances of dust or cobwebs; no doors which had been closed were now ajar; and no fresh supplies had been added to the cache in the little room. The sleeping bag, water, and protein bars all sat just as she had left them.
"Not much to go on," Joe said in a low tone. He stooped beside Nancy, who had squatted to examine the protein bars.
"You can buy this brand anywhere," Nancy agreed.
Frank was inspecting the rolled-up sleeping bag. "Cheap," he said softly. "Either this guy's not an experienced camper, or he's really down on his luck."
"Or she," Nancy said. "Whoever it is, this person is meticulous. Nothing is scattered around, no garbage left behind, there's nothing extraneous stored here..."
"It's a man," Joe said, from across the room..
"How can you possibly know that?" Vanessa asked.
Joe pointed to some discoloration on the wall beneath the window. "Elementary," he said. "I don't know many women who can take a piss out a window."
"Are you saying that's urine?" Vanessa demanded.
"Bingo."
"That's so gross!" she said, wrinkling her nose in disgust.
"But efficient," Nancy remarked, adding that to her mental list of the intruder's traits. He's practical, unsentimental, focused. Or possibly superstitious? Reluctance to walk outside to relieve himself at night could indicate a fearful streak.
"If you have the equipment, you might as well use it," Joe said wickedly. "Too bad there are so many variables. It'd be nice to get a feel for how tall this guy is."
"Variables related to peeing out a window," Vanessa muttered. "I had no idea anyone thought about this stuff."
"Welcome to investigation," Joe said dryly.
Nancy straightened up. "I wish we could take the water bottle to lift some prints," she said.
"Why can't you?" Vanessa asked.
"Too obvious," Frank said. "He'd notice it was gone right away."
"We can dust the doorknob," Joe suggested.
"And leave powder everywhere?" Frank said.
"We'll do it like we did that time in Baltimore."
"I don't have any tissues," Nancy said.
"Handkerchief?" Frank offered, pulling a folded square of cloth from his pocket.
"Seriously?" Vanessa said.
Nancy smiled. "Old habits die hard."
"Aunt Gertrude knows how to make stuff stick in a guy's brain," Joe said.
"Oh my god, Aunt Gertrude. How is she? Terrifying as ever?" Vanessa asked, giving an exaggerated mock shiver.
"She'll never change," Joe said. "Do you have enough room, Nan?"
"It's fine. Go ahead," she said. She had shaken out the handkerchief and was holding it spread beneath the doorknob like a miniature dropcloth.
The whole operation took only a few minutes. Joe collected a few prints and then wiped the doorknob clean and packed up the little fingerprint kit while Nancy folded the handkerchief with the dust neatly captured inside.
"Anything?" Frank asked from behind his brother.
"One or two decent prints," Joe reported.
"What will you do with them?" Vanessa asked.
"I might send photos to a buddy of mine who can run them against a few standard databases," Frank said.
"And we'll hold on to them for comparison," Joe added.
"That's if there's anything worth comparing them to left at any of the crime scenes," Nancy concluded, more for her own and the Hardys' benefit than for Vanessa's. She could see that Vanessa's interest was rapidly waning. "That doesn't seem likely, given the contamination before we got here."
Vanessa nodded dismissively. "Can we look around a little more now?"
A look passed between Frank and Joe. It seemed to Nancy that the two men carried out an entire conversation in the space of that one silent moment. Then Frank stepped forward.
"Sure," he said to Vanessa. "I'll walk with you. Regroup in 15, guys?"
"Ten-four," Joe replied.
"Look out for ghosts!" Nancy added teasingly.
"If we see any, we'll send them your way!" Frank retorted.
Joe grinned at Nancy. "I hope we do meet a ghost. A talkative one," he said.
"I'm not sure ghosts make good witnesses," Nancy said, smiling back.
"Anything makes a better witness than an empty building," Joe told her.
"Let's see if we can get this empty building to talk a little," Nancy suggested.
As it turned out, Joe was right. The building had very little to say for itself. The two detectives quickly completed a methodical search of the rest of the ground floor, but found nothing more than an old structure, dry bones quietly gathering the dust of decades. There were no other signs of recent occupancy, no further clues to the mysterious intruder.
"Frank wouldn't let me go upstairs," Vanessa complained, when they had all gathered again in the lobby area.
"We didn't go up there, either. It's too risky," Joe told her.
"Since when is 'too risky' in your vocabulary?" Vanessa shot back. She did not wait for an answer. "Are you ready to head back? I want a shower. As cool as this place is, it's super gross."
Nancy looked at Joe, who looked at Frank. Nancy knew that they were all thinking the same thing.
"Стоит ли устанавливать камеры в ее присутствии?" Joe said quickly, still looking at his brother.
"Я не вижу проблемы," Frank said.
"Excuse me?" Vanessa said.
Nancy did not like to admit it, even to herself, but she felt left out as well. I wish I knew more than a few words of Russian, she thought, raising an eyebrow at Joe.
"¿Tenías una pregunta sobre las cámaras?" she asked, grasping at the only word she thought she had recognized. You had a question about the cameras?
Joe nodded. "Yeah, sorry. ¿Crees que, um, deber... ¿Deberíamos pedirle que salga?" he asked. Do you think we should ask her to go outside?
"Entonces ella sospechará." Then she'll be suspicious.
There was a moment's hesitation, like a held breath- then the exhale.
"What the hell," Joe said. "Okay. We're going to set up a couple cameras before we go."
"Is that all?" Vanessa said. "Jesus, you didn't have to go into spy mode just for that."
"We would appreciate it if you didn't mention them to Vince," Frank said gently.
"Are you kidding? You can't still think he could be involved. You've seen how much he cares about this place." Vanessa looked irritated, now.
"It's just a precaution," Nancy said.
There followed a brief period during which the three detectives absorbed themselves in the technical work of planting the cameras for maximum coverage with maximum concealment. Vanessa spent this time hovering nearby, watching with poorly-concealed impatience.
"So are you going to be, like, monitoring these?" she asked, watching Joe boost Nancy up to fasten the first camera into its hiding place.
"No, they're not that high-tech," he said. "These are just basic motion-activated trail cams."
I don't know how he can sound so casual while holding an entire adult person on his shoulders, Nancy thought, amused and impressed all at once.
"So how will you know what's going on?"
"We'll have to come back tomorrow, get the SD card out of the camera, stick it in a laptop, and review the footage," Joe said.
"Why are you going so low-tech?" Vanessa asked.
"There's no wireless service in here, and if we set up a hotspot it'd be pretty obvious. I'm assuming our intruder has a smartphone, at minimum," Frank explained.
Joe lowered Nancy lightly back down to her feet. "It's not a streamlined setup, but it's better than nothing," he said.
"Wouldn't it be easier to just do a stakeout?" Vanessa asked.
"We could, and we probably will, but we're going to start with the camera," Nancy said, watching Vanessa sneak yet another look at her phone's time display.
Are you that bored, or do you have somewhere to be?
"Oh," Vanessa said.
"The camp property is huge," Joe called, from where he and Frank had begun working on the second camera. "It makes more sense to use cameras to narrow down our focus areas before we start trying to physically cover them."
. . . . . . . . . . . .
They rode back to the stable through a truly beautiful summer evening, all balmy air and golden light sifting down through thick clusters of green leaves.
Quite a contrast from this morning's rain, Nancy thought appreciatively.
There were no attempts at conversation, this time. Everyone seemed lost in his or her own thoughts.
When they reached the stable, Vanessa handed her horse over to Chris without a backward glance. She smoothed her hair and straightened her shorts, which were a completely impractical choice for horseback riding, and looked a little surprised to see Nancy and the Hardys beginning to untack their own horses.
"Well, that was fun," she said. "But I really need to get going. Please do let me know what you find out from the- " here she lowered her voice substantially - "cameras."
"We'll be in touch," Joe promised. "Pass me that curry comb, Finn."
Something flickered briefly in Vanessa's eyes. Hurt? Anger? But it passed as quickly as it had flared up, and she walked away without another word.
. . . . . . . . . .
The door to their cabin was already unlocked when they got back.
"Don't look at me. I'm sure I locked it," Frank said immediately.
Nancy and Joe were already in motion, propelled by a spike in adrenaline into wordless teamwork: Joe poised to push the door open, Nancy circling silently toward the back of the cabin in case any intruder decided to retreat through the bedroom window.
Nothing happened. Only a breathless few moments of silence, and then Joe's face appeared in the window, waving her inside.
"Clear," he said, when she met him in the living room. "Frank's checking the perimeter."
"Bug check?" Nancy suggested.
Joe nodded. "I'll take the bedroom."
Together, they made a thorough search of the cabin. Frank re-joined them just as they finished.
"Bugs?" he asked.
"Negative," Joe told him. "Ninety-nine percent sure. I'm assuming a signal jammer is out of the question?"
"Completely out of the question," Frank agreed. "And on that note, I do have a call to make. May I- ?" He gestured toward the bedroom, asking if he could make his call privately from in there.
"Go ahead," Joe said.
Despite their search having turned up nothing intrusive, Nancy's sense of unease lingered. The cabin felt too small, too confining. She grabbed a glass of water and went outside to sit on the steps, and was not surprised when Joe joined her after a few minutes had passed.
"Figured I'd clear out before the phone sex started," he said, dropping down on the step below hers and tossing her one of the two oranges in his hands.
"A wise decision," Nancy said, hiding a smile. It was typical of Joe to mask genuine respect for his brother's privacy behind a ribald comment.
Silence bloomed between them for a long moment, rich with the aromas of earth and heat and pine needles, the scent of citrus underlaid with a whiff of cigarette smoke. The man sitting beside her was Joe, but was not Joe, all at once. Smoke and spearmint, an unfamiliar musky note from the hair product he had been using, the glint of a heavy ring on his finger and the false snake tattoo's beady eye staring at her from his arm- it all made Nancy feel a bit lonely. She wanted to pull him inside, to strip off his clothes, pull him into the shower, and find her Joe again beneath the layers of disguise.
The impulse reminded her, again, of the seeming disparity between her idea of Joe and Vanessa's idea of Joe. "Emotionally unavailable," Vanessa had called him, and "Never a cuddly person;" neither of which was true, in her experience. And while it had stung at first to hear Vanessa describe him with such casual intimacy, Nancy found that the more she thought about it, the less it bothered her.
I don't love her constant reminders that they have history, she thought, but I am glad that I didn't get that version of Joe. I'm glad I got the version who has matured and healed.
"Penny for 'em," Joe said softly, nudging her knee with his.
Nancy shook her head. "Not important," she said. She resumed peeling her orange. "Was Vanessa anorexic, Joe?"
He looked surprised. "That's what you're thinking about?"
"No, not really. It's a tangent."
"I'm not sure she was ever formally diagnosed," he said, flicking a piece of orange peel into the dusty grass.
The slight evasion told Nancy everything she needed to know. She nodded without comment and did not probe further.
"I wish we knew for sure whether Frank had remembered to lock the door," she said instead.
"This is Frank we're talking about," Joe said.
"I know, and ordinarily I wouldn't question him," Nancy said.
"He does have a lot on his mind right now," Joe conceded.
"Honestly, I've felt as though someone is watching me ever since we got here," Nancy confessed.
Joe glanced over, his gaze shrewd and compassionate. "I know what you mean. This place has a weird atmosphere."
"Who do you think would want to go through our cabin?"
Joe shrugged. "Nothing is missing or disturbed. We'll have to wait and see what happens next."
Nancy bit into an orange segment and chewed slowly, savoring the burst of bright flavor on her tongue. There was no point, really, in discussing the case, since they would just have to go over it all again with Frank. She closed her eyes and tipped her face up to the sky, basking in the last of the sunlight. She would have been content to remain that way, indulging in stillness and quiet. Joe, however, seemed restless. He hummed a few bars of something, stopped, started over, stopped again, and finally spoke.
"Long day," he observed.
Nancy nodded without opening her eyes.
"The whole thing with Andrea went much more smoothly than I expected," he said.
"Yes, you mentioned that she wasn't your biggest fan," Nancy said. "Why was that?"
"No reason in particular. She's protective."
"Understandable," Nancy murmured.
"Apparently she was a fan of yours, though." Nancy could hear a smile in Joe's voice now. "Can you still do it? The danse des petits cygnes?"
Surprised, Nancy opened her eyes. "I have no idea," she said. "Probably not. It's not choreographed for a solo performer, anyway."
Joe jumped up, wiping his hands on his jeans. "Okay. Teach me."
"You're joking."
"Come on. It could be fun."
"I'm too tired for fun," Nancy complained- rather unconvincingly, since she was smiling and getting up while she said it. "All right, Hardy. I hope you've been practicing your pointe work."
Frank poked his head out of the cabin some time later, interrupting a ballet rehearsal more chaotic and fun than any Nancy had participated in before.
"I'm changing careers, Finn," Joe called out, flourishing one hand dramatically above his head.
"Trading in your camera bag for a leotard?" Frank called back. He looked completely unimpressed.
"I think I have the legs for it," Joe said. "The toes, not so much," he added ruefully.
"It takes a lot of practice and very different shoes," Nancy said, wiggling her own aching toes.
"Want to be the third cygnet?" Joe offered.
Frank shook his head. "I just came out to ask if anyone's hungry."
"I am," Nancy said.
"Me too, if you're offering to cook," Joe added, heading toward the cabin.
"I'll throw together a pot of chili, if you'll make cornbread to go with it," Frank said. He yawned.
"Oh, no. Don't start that," Nancy pleaded. "It's contagious."
"The yawning, or the chili?" Joe quipped.
Frank glared. "Very funny."
"Sorry," Joe said, not sounding particularly sorry.
Nancy had paused to lock the door behind them and to allow their bickering to run its course. Now she caught up to the brothers in the kitchen, where Frank was dicing an onion and Joe was rummaging through the cabinets, presumably in search of a mixing bowl.
"Top left, I think," Nancy suggested. "How's Callie?" she added, turning toward Frank.
"If she were anything other than fine, would I be standing here?" Frank said, without looking up.
"I suppose not," Nancy said, trying not to let her surprise at his blunt tone show.
"I'm sorry," he said, scraping his diced onions into a pot.
"It's okay," Nancy told him. "It's been a long day."
"Which doesn't justify taking out my frustration on you," Frank said.
"Guess I was wrong about the phone sex," Joe said. "You'd be a lot less frustrated if you'd- "
"Hey, Joe? Shut up," Frank interrupted. His face had gone an interesting shade of pink, but there was no real hostility behind the words.
"Shutting up, sir," Joe said obediently.
"That's better. Less talking, more cooking."
Nancy offered Joe a measuring spoon, which he declined.
"Today felt productive, overall," she said, watching Frank take the spoon to measure spices. "Though I think I need to learn some Russian before we tackle another case together."
"Sorry about that," Joe said. "I didn't mean to cut you out."
"Stick with Spanish, next time. I can figure out enough to get by," Frank said.
"I was really hoping to find something more useful in the sanatorium," Nancy confessed.
"Our cameras will capture something," Frank told her.
"I know, but I hate waiting."
Joe slid his pan of cornbread into the oven. "Did you send those prints to Adam yet?" he asked, wiping up the spilled flour from his work space.
"No, not yet," Frank said. "And I didn't learn anything useful this afternoon, unless you count the fact that one of the contractors was drunk on the job."
"Probably not relevant," Nancy said, thinking about it.
"From what I could tell, it's habitual. The other guys seemed pretty adept at working around him." Frank shrugged. "What about you?"
"I learned nothing at the lake," Nancy volunteered.
"I spent my afternoon playing Uno and inhaling toxic chemicals," Joe said, in a martyred tone.
"That must have been so difficult for you," Frank said, deadpan.
Joe grinned. "You know I hate Uno," he said. "Anyway, I'm not sure I gleaned much, either. The staff don't seem too concerned about the vandalism. Our boy Chris's brother is a little…"
"Unconventional?" Nancy suggested.
"I was going to say paranoid," Joe said. "He seems to think Google Maps is some kind of ninja black ops mission. And that they're the ones behind the break-ins."
Frank actually laughed at that. "We'll have to look into that theory," he said.
"I think we should try to meet Tom Lesley," Joe said.
"How can we do that without tipping him off that Vince's place is under investigation?" Frank looked skeptical.
"We could send someone else," Joe said.
"What about Chet and Nova?" Nancy said, with sudden inspiration.
"That could work," Joe said.
"What could work? You want to ask them to book a room there and do some snooping?" Frank said. Nancy was unsure whether he had known about Chet's relationship with Nova before this moment, but he had not batted an eye over the information.
"When you put it like that, maybe it was a dumb idea," Nancy said, deflating a bit. "I'm not sure Chet would go for it."
"Nova would," Joe said.
Nancy nodded. "That's true."
"Can't hurt to ask Chet. He usually comes through," Frank said. He gave the chili a stir, put a lid on the pot, and sat down at the table. "May I have the prints, Joe?"
Joe was in the process of texting Chet. He passed the prints over to Frank with his free hand.
"He's injured, so he doesn't have much else to do right now," he told Nancy. "He might surprise us."
Nancy slid into the seat between the brothers and scooted her chair closer to Joe so she could get a better look at his phone screen. Chet had yet to respond. She rested her head on Joe's shoulder and waited, and was gratified when Joe raised a hand to toy with a lock of her hair.
"I'm still not used to the color," he murmured, giving it a gentle tug.
"I know. I'm surprised every time I see my reflection," Nancy said.
His phone buzzed.
You want me to do what? Chet demanded.
We'll cover expenses, Joe typed back, without removing his other hand from Nancy's hair. She settled a little closer, treasuring the affectionate gesture.
We just started dating. Is it too soon for this kind of thing? Will she be freaked out if I invite her on an overnight thing? Is it weird? You're making this weird.
"Oh, poor Chet," Nancy said, smiling a little. She sat up, raising her head off Joe's shoulder. "I can feel his blood pressure rising from here."
Call it a mission, not a date, Joe sent.
How is that less weird
Come on. You know she loves being involved in this shit.
There was a long pause. Nancy imagined Chet typing, backspacing, typing again, overthinking every aspect of the scenario. Then a final message appeared.
I'll think about it.
"That's practically a yes, from Chet," Nancy said.
"I won't push him anymore. He'll get back to us," Joe said. He got up and peered into the oven, checking his cornbread.
"While we're exploiting your connections," Nancy said, looking to Frank, "do you think you could get us access to Elizabeth Langley's autopsy results?"
"Why?" he asked.
"Vince puts up his walls instantly whenever we mention the missing girls. Maybe he's just defensive about this property's history, but maybe it's more than that. What if he learned something during the renovation process? What if he's covering something up?"
Joe's eyes widened. "She was found miles from here. Do you think he could have moved the remains to avoid drawing a police presence to the camp?"
"Speculation," Frank interjected.
"It's plausible," Nancy argued. "And either way, the autopsy results could be enlightening."
Frank shrugged. "I can ask. No promises."
"Thank you."
. . . . . . .
Conversation turned to other things over dinner. Nancy, who felt awash with information and yet, somehow, also completely in the dark, appreciated the reprieve. After the meal she and Frank washed the dishes and cleaned up the kitchen while Joe, who seemed restless, went out for a stroll through the campground.
"All quiet," he reported. "Maybe I should do another perimeter check in a few minutes."
"Or maybe we could get some sleep?" Nancy suggested.
"Sounds good to me," Frank agreed. He yawned widely.
Nancy looked at Joe, who was still restlessly prowling the cabin. Only his shadowed eyes betrayed his weariness.
"At least get a few hours," she said gently. "We can take turns on watch if it'll help you rest."
Joe shook his head. "You're right. We all need a little rest."
"I hate to say it, but Joe and I should probably bunk together tonight," Frank said.
"I was going to say the same thing," Nancy said. "We need to keep up appearances in case our intruder decides to pay us another visit."
"Do you want the sofa bed or the water bed?" Joe asked.
Nancy laughed. "They're both so tempting," she said. "But I think I'll take the sofa tonight."
She took the first turn in the little pink bathroom, performing a hasty version of her evening ablutions and changing into soft cotton shorts and a camisole before returning to the living room. There she curled up on the pull-out sofa bed, doing her best to avoid the pressure points where the metal frame lay beneath the thin foam pad.
The brothers were talking in the next room while they got ready for bed, their voices pitched courteously low. Nancy could not make out the words; the sound washed over her, voices mingling like melody and counterpoint and then fading into the distance as she began to doze- only to jolt back to consciousness some time later, when Joe's voice rose in a frustrated, plaintive request.
"Would it kill you to lie still? It's like trying to sleep in a canoe!"
She heard fabric moving against fabric- Frank sitting up in bed, she guessed, or turning over carelessly- and then Frank's voice, low, vehement.
"This fucking mattress is the worst fucking thing I have ever tried to sleep on."
Nancy pressed a hand against her mouth, trying to stifle her laughter at Frank's uncharacteristically vicious profanity.
"I can hear you," Frank called.
"I'm sorry," she called back. "I did warn you. It's a terrible bed."
"Why are you both so high-maintenance all of a sudden?" Joe grumbled. "It's not the worst place we've ever slept. It has clean sheets, for god's sake."
"Clean-ish," Nancy mumbled drowsily, forgetting Frank's preternaturally keen hearing.
"Clean-ish?" Frank repeated, and then, in a groan, "Oh, my god, tell me you didn't have sex on these sheets."
Joe was quiet for just a beat too long before he said "Nope. No sex."
Frank swore again. "What did you do?"
"It was only hand stuff," Nancy said. In her exhaustion, this seemed like a reassuring thing to say. But Frank did not seem reassured. He made a wordless sound, a kind of inarticulate protest against everything that was happening to him, and then- if she were interpreting the noises right, in the dark- lobbed a pillow at her. It fell harmlessly to the floor between the rooms.
Joe, whose anger never lasted long, was laughing now. "Do you feel better?"
"No," Frank said.
"Can you at least lie still while you sulk, or do you need a lullaby?"
"I think you owe me a lullaby," Frank said, petulance and reluctant laughter in his voice.
The song Joe started to sing was not technically a lullaby. But he sang it softly, slowly, in a voice like silk dragging across her skin.
Nancy slept, and she dreamed.