The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year

Maggie is trying to light a fire in the fireplace when Ethan knocks. She opens the door, and he scolds her for not asking for the password. He reports that Maggie’s room is the only one that was searched. He asks if she read the notebooks, which she did; Eleanor’s new book is all about “a woman who fakes her death and runs away because someone is trying to kill her” (197). Maggie doesn’t know how the story ends, though, because the last notebook was missing from Eleanor’s stack. She is shocked by the care and concern that Ethan now shows her.

Ethan gets in bed with Maggie so they can keep warm. (She tells herself that’s the only reason.) They compare terrible Christmas stories, culminating in Maggie’s story of when Colin and Emily sent her to the cellar for more wine, and she got locked in the dark for two days. She says it wasn’t a big deal and that it was her fault. Ethan realizes that this incident is why she now hates small, dark spaces. She says it wasn’t “that bad” because she eventually passed out, likely from dehydration. He is shocked that Colin and Emily let Maggie blame herself and didn’t take her to the hospital afterward. He says that he would have torn the house apart looking for her.

The current situation isn’t Ethan’s worst Christmas, either. He says that when he was 13, his mom left to buy wrapping paper and never came back. A week later, she sent a letter saying she couldn’t take it anymore. His mother loved Eleanor Ashley; before she left, she and Ethan would read her books together. Now, Ethan admits that he lied about not being familiar with her work. After his mother left, his father burned all their Eleanor Ashley books and acted as though Ethan’s mother had never existed. Maggie realizes that Ethan has developed his smooth public persona because that’s who he needs to be in order to survive. He is almost asleep when she tells him that she wants to make out.

Suddenly, they are kissing. Maggie confesses that she likes him, and he says, “Finally.” While gazing into his blue eyes, Maggie suddenly remembers the envelope that Eleanor received in the mail: the blue one with the medical symbol on it. She suggests that they search Eleanor’s office for it.

They grab their flashlights and rush down the hall. They cannot find the envelope in Eleanor’s study, but when Maggie shines her flashlight at the wall shelf full of magnifying glasses and prisms, she notices one little light that doesn’t move when she changes position. She realizes that it’s a camera, just like the one Eleanor wrote about in The Nursery Crimes.

Maggie is elated that she found a camera that Eleanor must have hidden. Ethan realizes, however, that they cannot play the video without power. They agree not to tell anyone about it, and Maggie swears not to let it out of her sight. When her stomach growls loudly, Ethan tells her to go back to the room while he finds them something to eat.

When she gets back to her room, Maggie remembers that her laptop still has battery power. She finds an adaptor and plugs in the nanny cam. As she watches the recording, she sees herself leaving Eleanor’s door. The hallway remains dark for a while, with the tea tray just visible to one side. Then a shadow falls, and Eleanor opens the door and takes the tray from someone. When that someone turns around, Maggie sees Ethan’s familiar smirk.

When Ethan returns to the room, Maggie is gone. He notices the laptop’s light and stares down at his own face on the screen. Realizing that he looks guilty, he knows that Maggie must hate him right now. Then Ethan realizes that the nanny cam is still sitting there. He knows that Maggie never would have willingly left it there, so he races down the hall and threatens to start breaking things—including heads—if Dobson doesn’t help him.

Inspector Patel says that Ethan threatened an officer. Ethan calls it a threat.

When Maggie regains consciousness, she recalls seeing the footage of Ethan handing Eleanor the poisoned tea tray. She is now in the greenhouse with her hands tied behind her back. Even Maggie cannot find a way to blame herself for her predicament; she assumes that Ethan must be responsible. She is glad that she still has her flashlight.

Ethan realizes that Maggie didn’t just run from him; she is missing. He runs toward the back stairs. Looking out a window, he sees the beam of a flashlight pointed at the sky and has a flashback to Aspen and the night he found the car in the snow. When he returns to the present, he realizes that the light is coming from the greenhouse.

The door to the greenhouse is no longer wedged closed. When Maggie sees Ethan, her eyes go wide, and she tells him to stay away. As he unties her, he asks who did this to her and sees blood on her temple. She goes into shock, accusing him of poisoning Eleanor and lying. He admits that he lied about seeing Eleanor that night but insists that he would never poison her. She doesn’t believe him. She is not even sure they were shot at; it only sounded like bangs to her. Maggie is very pale, and her pupils are enlarged; she has a concussion. Suddenly, Ethan sees another flashlight beam outside and realizes that the door has been jammed shut again. A fire starts, and the smell of gasoline fills the air. Ethan and Maggie lunge for the trapdoor.

They tumble down the ladder just as an explosion ignites above. Ethan looks like he has just lived through a nightmare. As the heat rises, they run. Ethan is determined to avoid the main house, and Maggie points out that the fire won’t spread there because of the snow. Promising to protect her, he puts his arms around her, and they keep moving.

Inspector Patel points out that there are several hours in which no one can account for Maggie and Ethan’s whereabouts. It was below freezing outside, so she doesn’t believe that they just wandered around the tunnels and kept warm.

Ethan and Maggie find a cottage. Ethan wants to make a run for the duke’s Range Rover, but Maggie reminds him that the bridge is out and that the blizzard has created white-out conditions. It occurs to him that he could get to a phone, call his father, and arrange for a helicopter to come to the manor. He will probably have to go back to work for his dad, but he won’t lose Maggie. He confesses that he loves her. They make love.