My heartbeat quickened and I took half a step toward him. “Who did, Lonnie? Who else had a ghost costume?”
He shrugged. “Ari Solomon and Crenshaw did, for sure, and maybe some others. It was s’posed to be a contest—see who could get the biggest reaction, scare the most
people. But the way we was all split up, it was hard to get an audience together, you know? But Tyler and me, we got you all going, didn’t we?” He smiled, clearly pleased with himself.
I bit down on my lip to keep from gasping at the news that Mark had taken a sheet with him to Rothmere. “How did you smuggle in all this beer and stuff?” I asked.
“Backpacks,” Lonnie said, looking at me like I was a moron. A black sedan cruised past and Lonnie shot it a glance. He shuffled his big feet. “Look, I gotta be hitting the road.”
“Are you evacuating?”
A funny look came over his face. “You could say that. I’m evacuating permanently.”
“You’re leaving town?”
“Yeah. Aunt Retta thinks it’s smarter for me to move on, to get away from my . . . associates.” Fear flickered across his face at the mere thought of his business partners. “I’m going to live with my Aunt Cora. She’s a parole officer in Portland. Aunt Retta says that the path I’m taking, I’m gonna have me a parole officer before long, so I might as well live with one.”
“What about football?” I asked. “Your scholarship chances?”
He shrugged strongly muscled shoulders. “Aunt Retta says it wouldn’t hurt me none to repeat my junior year, so I’ll have two years to play in Portland. The scouts’ll find me. Maybe I’ll play for Oregon, instead of Georgia.” His faith in his football prowess was so complete that he took it as a given he’d get recruited by an NCAA Division I program. I didn’t think I’d ever had that much confidence in any of my abilities.
“I hope it works out for you,” I said, offering my hand.
After a moment’s hesitation, he shook it, swallowing it in his callused hand. “Can you tell Miss Althea I’m sorry?” The hint of nervousness in his eyes told me he found Althea almost as intimidating as the people he was leaving town to avoid.
“Sure thing.”
“And your neighbor, for the pumpkin?” He nodded toward Mrs. Jones’s veranda. “I thought you lived there.”
“And you thought I’d enjoy pumpkin guts exploded all over?”
A shadow of the cocky smile appeared on his face. “My homeys thought you were too nosy, you know? Talkin’ ‘bout the cops, an’ all. And that trick with the toilet bowl cleaner and tinfoil is bitchin’.”
“You almost gave her a heart attack.”
Lonnie had apparently exhausted his supply of apologies. “You’ll let Aunt Retta know I came by?”
I nodded. “Good luck, Lonnie.”
His long, athletic stride carried him to the red pickup in just a few steps. Gunning the engine, he reversed down the driveway and sped west toward I-95. He had a long road in front of him, and I wasn’t just thinking about the interstate.
Even before the pickup was out of sight, my mind was sorting out what Lonnie had told me. Mark Crenshaw had taken a ghost costume to Rothmere. On the face of it, it looked like Braden’s best friend had pushed him down the stairs. But why? And how? Lindsay said she and Mark had been together the entire evening. It took only a nanosecond for me to realize that Lindsay would lie for Mark. Okay, so that left why. Of course, Ari Solomon had a sheet with her, too, and there might’ve been others Lonnie didn’t know about. I hadn’t come across any hint of motive for Ari to want to kill Braden. Her mother, however . . . Could Tasha have taken Ari’s ghost costume, snuck from the kitchen to the main house, and pushed Braden? Would Ari lie to the police for her mom? Very possibly. Teen girls would either lie for their moms or try to frame them, depending on how their hormones were acting up. I’d felt both ways about my mom at various times between twelve and sixteen. But how would Dr. Solomon have worked the timing, showing up on the landing just as Rachel left Braden alone? I growled with frustration.
The wind rattled the trash cans behind Mrs. Jones’s house and I walked in that direction as I thought, planning to stow them in the garage before Horatio hit. Hurricane winds could fling garbage cans around like pebbles, hurling them through windows or bowling them down streets to damage cars. Grabbing their handles, I dragged them toward the garage. Mrs. Jones didn’t have a car anymore—she’d quit driving a couple of years back, much to the relief of pedestrians who’d thought they’d be safe on the sidewalk—and the garage housed only a mower, some tools, and plastic tubs full of stuff Mrs. Jones couldn’t bring herself to give away or trash. Stowing the cans, I wondered if Braden had suspected Mark’s dad was abusing him and his mother. Maybe he’d even witnessed a punch or a beating.