Текст книги "The Perfect Stranger"

Автор книги: Wendy Corsi Staub

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Текущая страница: 16 (всего у книги 22 страниц)

Too worn-out to fight it this time, she lets it in.

About a month ago she’d called in sick to work and driven into town on a weekday to have lunch with an old high school friend, now a lawyer, about the possibility of a separation agreement. She wasn’t going to tell her parents she was coming; the last thing she wanted was for them to worry about her—and her marriage—on top of their financial mess, now that Dad had lost his job.

Miranda, Beck’s lawyer friend, said she had to stay fairly local because she had a meeting right before lunch and another right after. Beck chose a chain restaurant she knew her mother hated, figuring there was no way in hell she’d run into her parents there. She didn’t.

She ran into her father.

He was walking out just as Beck was hurrying in—late—to meet Miranda.

She was so flustered seeing him that she started stammering—but so, she remembers now, did he.

“What are you doing here?” they asked each other.

Beck told a semi truth—that she’d taken the day off to have lunch with an old friend—and was planning to pop into the house afterward to surprise him and Mom if she had time.

“But I was afraid I wouldn’t,” she said, “so I didn’t want to disappoint anyone.”

“I won’t tell Mom. If you have time, stop over. If you don’t, your secret is safe with me.”

That was when the woman came out of the ladies’ room and walked right up to her father—almost as if he’d been waiting for her.

Maybe he had, Beck realized, when the woman said to him, “All set?”

“Louise,” he said, “this is my daughter, Rebecca. Beck, this is Louise Falk. She’s been helping me with . . . some financial paperwork.”

Beck and Louise shook hands, and then Dad said, right in front of Louise, “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention this to Mom. I don’t want her to worry. You know how she is.”

Beck knew.

At the time, she was so thrown off by having run into her father that she didn’t think to question whether he’d been telling the truth about Louise.

No, it hadn’t occurred to her to question it until her mother lay dead and the police were asking her whether her father might be capable of terrible things.

She’s sworn to them—and herself—that he wasn’t.

Because he isn’t.

He—

“Is the coffee ready?”

She jumps, almost dropping the big white platter, as her father comes up behind her.

“Oh—it’s ready,” she realizes. “Sit down, Dad. I’ll pour you a cup.”

“Thanks.”

Watching him go over to the table and pull out a chair—his chair, the one he’s been sitting in at family dinners for as long as she can remember—she wonders what he’d say if she asked him, now, about Louise.

About whether she really was a . . . financial consultant, or whatever he’d implied.

But if she asks, then he’ll think she has doubts . . .

Do you have doubts? she asked herself.

Yes. Maybe she does.

But even if Louise wasn’t—even if she was his—

Mistress? Dad with a mistress?

The thought seems ludicrous. But even if that were the case, it still doesn’t mean he had anything to do with Mom’s death.

So she can’t ask him. She just can’t. Somebody has to be on his side.

I’m all he has right now, she thinks as she sets the cup of hot coffee in front of him. And he’s all I have.

“We should have just teamed up and rented one car yesterday,” Elena tells Landry on Sunday afternoon as they meet up inside the airport terminal after returning their respective rental cars. “That way, we could have come and gone together.”

“I know! Why didn’t we do that?”

“Because we were both secretly afraid the other one might be a lunatic psycho in person.”

“Oh. Right. I forgot that part.” Landry smiles at her, marveling at how quickly she grew to feel comfortable with Elena in the past twenty-four hours. “I’m really glad you’re not crazy after all.”

“There are so many people in my life,” Elena tells her as they pull their bags along toward the security area, “who would find that comment amusing.”

“Like . . . ?”

“My brother, for one.”

“Why is that?”

“He thinks I’m crazy,” she replies with a wry smile.

Elena, Landry realizes, never really writes much about her family, and she’s barely talked about them at all this weekend.

Meanwhile, I’ve talked about nothing but. She must be sick of hearing about Rob and the kids . . .

But I can’t help it. I miss them.

“The thing is,” Elena says, “I kind of had a hand in raising him.”

“Your brother?”

“Right. And our childhood wasn’t exactly—well, you know we lost our mom when we were pretty young.”

It was a terrible train accident. That, Landry remembers. Elena had mentioned something about it last night, when they were talking about Meredith, how they hoped she hadn’t suffered.

“I bet she never knew what hit her,” Elena had said. “Like my mother.”

“That would be a blessing,” Kay agreed. “It’s what she would have wanted. It was dying that she dreaded. Not death itself. Dying.”

“Don’t we all?” Elena had asked.

Landry didn’t say that she dreaded all of it. Dying. Death.

Because of her family. Rob, and the kids . . . she couldn’t bear to think of them left here to muddle through without her.

Meredith would have understood that. But Kay and Elena don’t have husbands or children; Kay doesn’t have any family at all, and Elena isn’t close to hers. They don’t have to worry about leaving behind people who still need them desperately.

Maybe I’d feel different if I were completely on my own.

“After our mother died,” Elena is saying, “our father kind of . . . checked out. He was a good dad before she died, but afterward, he . . . well, he couldn’t cope with losing her.”

Landry nods as if she understands, and she’s trying to. If something were to happen to her, there’s no telling how Rob—also a good dad—might react.

Nothing can happen to me. He needs me. The kids need me.

Back when she was first diagnosed, that thought ran through Landry’s mind all day, every day. She used to pray that she could at least see her kids through childhood. Now that it’s nearly over—Addison is on the brink of eighteen!—she knows that’s not nearly enough time.

I want to be here for all of it: their high school and college graduations, their wedding days . . . I want to be a grandma; I want to grow old with Rob, I want—

She wants what anyone wants. What Meredith wanted.

To be needed.

Those were the wants and needs she’d written about in that blog, the one they were talking about yesterday.

The TSA agent standing by the roped-off security checkpoint interrupts Landry’s thought process and the conversation. “I need to see your boarding passes and IDs, please, ladies.”

They show their paperwork.

As they roll their luggage into the long line snaking toward the body scan machines, Elena resumes talking about her family. “My dad drank. A lot. And when he did—which was all the time, basically—he kind of left us to our own devices. Sometimes I tried to mother my brother; other times, I was a wild child who should have been reined in. Only nobody did that for me.”

“Are you close to your brother now?”

“I might be if he weren’t overseas. He’s in the military. The nice regimented lifestyle he always craved, poor kid.”

“And your dad?”

“He doesn’t live far from me.”

“Do you see him?”

“Not really,” is the answer, delivered in a case closed tone. “So listen, about next weekend . . .”

Right. Next weekend.

Elena and Kay are coming to Alabama: they’ve already bought their tickets online.

Elena stops pulling her bag to consult her boarding pass, then an overhead sign. “I have to go that way. I’m boarding in a few minutes.”

“I’m going that way.” Landry points in the opposite direction. She’s not boarding for well over another hour, but there seemed to be no reason to hang around the hotel alone—and there’s no reason to follow Elena to her gate.

“I guess this is good-bye then, for now.” Elena throws her arms around her. “I don’t really want to go back.”

“Hang in there, with the Tony thing,” Landry says, remembering.

Last night Elena told her and Kay that she’d blocked his number on her cell phone, so at least he can’t call her anymore.

“Ugh, don’t remind me,” she says now. “I dread seeing him at school tomorrow morning. I really hope this week flies by. Not just because of Tony, or because it’s my last week of work before the summer, but because I can’t wait to see you and Kay again.”

“Same here,” Landry says hollowly, hoping that by then there will have been an arrest and they can all put this nightmare behind them.

Long distance driving, for whatever reason, is somehow easier for Kay today.

Maybe because she’s once again accustomed to being at the wheel after yesterday’s long journey.

Maybe because the funeral—and all the accompanying dread—is behind her now, just as the outskirts of Cincinnati have fallen away in a rearview mirror, showing nothing but the road she’s already traveled.

Or maybe it’s simply because she’s surprisingly well-rested.

After wrestling with her thoughts—and uncooperative, unfamiliar bedding—into the wee hours, she’d managed to finally fall asleep, and stay asleep, for a full eight hours, and then some.

She was still sound asleep in her room when Landry called to tell her they were going to breakfast.

“Come on down and join us,” she said.

“I’m not even dressed yet.”

“We’ll wait.”

“I don’t want to hold you up.”

“You’re not. We don’t even have to leave for the airport for a few hours. Come on. Breakfast for three.”

Over pancakes and coffee, they again discussed Meredith, and the Jenna Coeur business. But they managed to laugh a lot, too, and made plans for next weekend. Decadent desserts, Netflix movies, a beach day.

“I can’t wait,” Kay told them. “I’ve never even seen the ocean.”

“And here I was afraid you were going to back out,” Elena said.

“Why would I?”

“You’re afraid to fly.”

“I know, but you’re my friends. Who knows how many more opportunities we’ll have to see each other?”

“Lots more opportunities,” Elena said firmly.

Kay allows her hands to tighten on the steering wheel. Again she wonders, What if . . . ?

No. Nothing can happen to the others, to any of them. It’s going to be fine, from now on. Forget cancer. Forget Jenna Coeur, whoever, wherever, she is. Forget Tony, crazy Tony, Elena’s so-called stalker. Nothing bad is going to happen, not to any of them. Not ever again.

“Whatever you do,” Landry told them before they parted ways, “please don’t mention next weekend to any of the other bloggers and don’t post anything about it online. Just in case . . . you know.”

Yes. They know.

They promised her they wouldn’t say anything.

“I just wish I hadn’t told Jaycee,” Elena mentioned yet again.

“If Jaycee is just Jaycee, we have nothing to worry about,” Kay pointed out.

“And if she’s not . . .”

“We still have nothing to worry about. It’s not like she has any reason to hurt any of us. And it’s not like Elena gave her your address.”

“It wouldn’t be hard to find.”

“But why would she want to?” Kay asked. She shook her head. “I really don’t feel like she’s a threat to any of us. Even if she is Jenna Coeur. That might be a bizarre coincidence, but it’s not like it puts us in danger.”

By the time they parted ways, the others seemed reassured.

Seeing a blue rest stop sign looming through the windshield, Kay puts on her right turn signal. She’s feeling pretty good, but she’s got a long trip ahead and it’s probably a good idea to stop and stretch for a bit.

What a difference a day makes. Now, anything seems possible. Anything at all, as long as she has her friends.

When Landry arrives at the gate for her flight, she sees that there are only a few passengers waiting in the boarding area—and Bruce Mangione is one of them.

He’s sitting reading a newspaper, with empty seats on either side of him. It would be awfully bold of her to walk right over there and take one of them. What if he gets the wrong idea?

He won’t if you tell him about the case.

Her feet are already propelling her toward him, but guilt dogs her when she thinks about Rob. He doesn’t know about the Jenna Coeur twist yet. She was going to tell him when she called home this morning, but the kids were right there, wanting to talk to her, too, and they were all headed for church. By the time they got back, she was having breakfast with Elena and Kay.

She probably could have snuck in a quick call home, but it wasn’t really something she wanted to get into on the phone with limited time. She’ll tell him as soon as she lands, of course.

For now . . .

Maybe she shouldn’t tell this total stranger about it. Even if he is a detective. Even if she did Google his name last night, just to see what came up.

Retired cop, just like he said.

Private investigator and personal security, just like he said. He even has a Web site that lists his credentials, along with his specialties: Missing Persons, Infidelity, Surveillance, Background Checks, Criminal Investigation . . .

Okay. He’s certainly qualified. But it’s not like she’s planning to hire him.

Am I?

Maybe I am.

To do what, exactly, though?

Solve the case?

It’s not as if there isn’t an entire homicide squad working it. But their main concern is solving the murder, and her concern is . . .

Well, she does want the murder solved, of course. But it’s safe to assume that her own personal safety—and thus, that of her family—is probably more consequential to her than it is to Detective Burns.

Plus, she’s seen enough police procedural dramas and read enough thrillers—fiction and non—to know that private investigators don’t have to deal with the tremendous amount of red tape and bureaucracy police detectives face.

Bruce might be able to find out more information about Jenna Coeur and Jaycee; whether there’s a connection between them—and between Jenna and Meredith.

Landry’s bag, rolling around behind her, gets caught on a chair leg. It thumps, and Bruce glances up.

He starts to look down again, then double-takes and recognition dawns. “Writer mom,” he says, pointing a finger at her. “Landry, right?”

“That’s right. How was your family weekend? Are you on the next flight, too?”

“I am. You’re early.”

“So are you.”

“That,” he says, “should be your first clue to just how much I enjoyed my family visit.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It was to be expected. Hope your weekend was better.”

“I was at a funeral, so . . .”

“I’m so sorry. I forgot. Your friend.” He shakes his head. “That must have been rough.”

She nods and tells him, briefly, about the funeral, but that there were other complications.

He raises a dark eyebrow. “What kind of complications?”

Here goes, she thinks, and gestures at the empty seat beside him. “Do you mind if I . . . ?”

“Not at all.” He tucks his newspaper into the bag at his feet. “Sit down.”

“I just want to ask you a couple of questions. Maybe you can help. You said you’re a detective . . . ”

“That’s right.”

“My friend—the one whose funeral this was—she was murdered.”

“I’m sorry. What happened?”

She explains, trying to make the tale as uncomplicated as possible and realizing there’s no way to boil it down to a simple story. But he listens intently, nodding, leaning closer as the seats around them begin to fill up. She keeps her voice down, particularly when she utters the name anyone would recognize.

“Jenna Coeur?” Bruce echoes, frowning. “The actress? The one who—”

“Right.”

“What was she doing there?”

“Nobody seems to know.” She takes a deep breath. “I was hoping you might be able to find out.”

Chin in hand, he simply waits for her to continue.

She tells him the rest—about the possible connection to Jaycee, about Elena having invited her to the reunion next weekend.

“I’m afraid that I might have inadvertently put my family at risk.”

“You can always just cancel this reunion until some other time.”

“But they’ve got plane tickets, and . . . look, I love the two women I met this weekend. There are very few people in this world I can talk to face-to-face about . . . what I’ve been through, with cancer. And now, about Meredith. We’re all facing the same loss. We’re all in the same boat. I really want to see them again. But . . .” She takes a deep breath. “I want to hire you. I’d just feel better if you could check out Elena and Kay and confirm that there are no surprises in their backgrounds. They’re going to be staying under my roof, with my children in the house. And if you could tell me more about Jaycee, and maybe track down Jenna Coeur in the process—that would be even better.”

“Is that it? Find Jenna Coeur? You don’t want me to, I don’t know, maybe find some long lost relatives while I’m at it? Or, I don’t know, find Jimmy Hoffa and Amelia Earhart and maybe Elvis?”

She can’t help but smile. “No, that’ll do. For now.”

He pulls out a notebook and a pen. “I’ll do what I can. Tell me everything you know.”

She nods, feeling relieved. “It might be better if you took out your laptop. I can show you.”

Meredith was supposed to be the first, the last, the only.

Then came that stranger—Roger Lorton, his name turned out to be. The man who popped up in the wrong place at the wrong time, asking for a light.

They wrote about his murder in the newspaper. Said he was mugged, apparently, while out walking his dog.

No one will ever connect that to Meredith’s death . . . or to me.

And this next one . . .

No one is going to connect it, either, because they’re not going to be looking for a murderer at all.

No one will ever suspect it didn’t just happen.

It’s how it should have been, with Meredith.

If only she hadn’t been so afraid of needles.

But I respected that; I had to spare her that final ordeal. I tried to make her death as painless—and as quick—as I possibly could.

Maybe it was the wrong choice. There’s no way of knowing.

You can’t second-guess the past; you can only keep moving ahead.

The same thing will happen with this next target.

It’s a simple process of elimination; a step that might be unpleasant to anticipate and carry out, but is absolutely necessary for the greater good.

The thing that really infuriates Tony Kerwin is that all along he was just trying to do Elena a favor—make that favors—and how did she turn around and treat him?

Yeah. Like crap.

As he scrubs himself in the shower after his early morning gym workout, he runs through the mental list of everything he’s done for her.

She owes him, man. Owes him big-time.

Driving her home on Friday night when she was skunk-drunk—favor number one.

Seeing her safely inside—favor number two.

Granted, maybe he shouldn’t have moved in for a kiss, but he just couldn’t help himself. The chick is hot. He’s been thinking about her ever since he took her out last fall, trying to figure out a way to get her interested in him again. Playing hard to get didn’t do the trick, but he was hoping a good hard kiss might.

It did, which led to her bedroom—and favor number three, he thinks with a smirk.

And then favor number four—not commenting after he found the prosthesis in her bra and the angry scar where her breasts should have been. Who knew she was hiding such a deep, dark secret?

“Cancer?” he’d asked when he found it.

Either she pretended not to hear him or she really didn’t. She was pretty wasted.

He dropped the subject—for the moment, anyway—and got back down to business—favor number five.

That was followed, the next morning, by favor number six—driving her to the airport up in Boston, and by offering favor number seven—picking her up from the airport last night.

First she flatly—and rudely—refused him, then she avoided his calls all day Saturday. To top things off, by Sunday she had apparently blocked his number on her phone, because every time he tried to call her, he got a recording: “The number you are trying to reach has calling restrictions that have prevented the completion of this call.”

It took him a few calls to realize what she’d done, and every time he heard the message—which gave way to an immediate dial tone—he was increasingly infuriated. Not just with her, but with himself. He’d gone out of his way, and for what?

Ungrateful bitch.

Although—he does feel a little better now that he at least knows why she made up that story about having a boyfriend last fall, after he took her out on their one and only date—unless you count Friday night’s hookup.

He doesn’t.

He’s an old-fashioned romantic. He can’t help it. He wants to wine and dine her—well, he wanted to. Not anymore. Not after the way she treated him.

And here he’d been willing to give her the benefit of the doubt, even after she lied to him back in the beginning.

He’d known all along that she wasn’t really seeing someone else. He’d followed her around long enough to know that she was home alone most nights, or out with her friend Sidney.

He’d actually thought she made up having a boyfriend because she was trying to get him to stop asking her out. Now he knows it was obviously because she’d been ill with breast cancer. She probably thought he’d be turned off by that; by her scars.

I wouldn’t have been. I would have made her feel beautiful. She didn’t give me a chance.

Damn her, anyway.

Now it’s Monday morning. He has to go to work and see her there.

Is he looking forward to that?

Hell, no. Good thing this is the last week of school.

He steps out of the shower, rigorously towel dries himself, throws on a pair of shorts, and heads for the kitchen. He’ll get dressed for work later. Plenty of time for breakfast in front of the TV, where he’ll catch up on the latest Red Sox trade.

Standing at the counter, he peels a couple of bananas and tosses them into the blender for his daily smoothie. Then he adds four raw eggs. Plenty of protein—that’s what you need to start the day.

Too bad Elena chose to keep her breast cancer a secret from him. If he had known, he could have been giving her healthy tips like that. He could have had her on a solid fitness regimen and—

Feeling a rush of movement behind him, he starts to turn around, only to feel a piercing jab, like a bee sting, in his neck.

What the hell?

By the time the gloved hand pulls the syringe out of his body and tucks a tortoiseshell comb into the back pocket of his shorts, Tony Kerwin is lying on the floor dying an agonizing death.