Incredulous, she asks him if he thinks her father was capable of killing someone.
“I didn’t know him very well. If I had, maybe I could tell. I’ve dealt with a lot of killers.”
His words chill her. The distance between them is painful, and she’s thrown back to the last days before they broke up. Gabriel had been numb and often silent in his pain. And she had been…God, she’d simply been a bitch. Realizing she’s in danger of letting her guilt derail everything, she reminds herself that he kept the photographs from her. The photos in Kevin’s album were salt on wounds she’d had for decades but ironically were the things she needed to help her heal.
“Why did you hide the photo album?” She watches him carefully, but his face doesn’t reveal anything. “You did it on purpose, didn’t you? You didn’t want me to know he was my brother.”
“I didn’t think you were ready.”
“What a bullshit answer. You let me see the bible but not the pictures? That doesn’t make any damn sense.”
“I thought you might come to it on your own. When you were ready.”
“The guy was living in my house, taking it apart. He was my brother! Who’s ever ready for something like that?”
Mr. Tuttle has returned from his investigation of the house and lies down at Kimber’s feet, chewing something pale and stiff.
“Tuttle, what is that?” She speaks more sharply than she means to and the dog backs up meekly, dropping the crescent of stale pizza crust onto the floor. Bending to pick it up, she sees it’s dotted with live ants. “What in the ever-living hell?”
Gabriel talks as he follows her to the kitchen. The ants swirl down the drain as she runs water over the piece of crust, which she drops into the garbage.
“Listen. I remembered that the name John Merrill showed up on one of the bank papers from Florida. It wasn’t anything critical to the sale, so I figured it was some kind of mix-up and didn’t think anything of it. Then when I saw the name in the bible and the photographs of your father—”
“Did you even recognize my father at first? Most of the pictures are thirty or forty years old. He was sick with cancer by the time you met him.”
“He looked a lot like that picture of him you have in your dining room.”
“What? Wait.”
Leaving him standing in her kitchen, she goes to the dining room, which sits directly behind the stairs. It’s a room she rarely uses because she doesn’t much like to throw parties—especially dinner parties—unless she can order in. But it’s square and neat, with two small stained-glass windows and a larger clear one that fills it with afternoon sun. The built-in oak cabinets have shallow alcoves for displaying silver serving dishes and china that she doesn’t have, but they’re perfect for some of the pottery she’s collected, and for the single, framed photo she has of her father.
Not one to have worried about the psychological effect on the teenage Kimber, her mother cleared their house of all the photos of her husband that she could find, after he’d been gone only a month. She even went into Kimber’s room and took the two photos she had on her dresser. Strangely, Kimber didn’t protest, even though any other incursion into her room would’ve been met with angry shouts. But Kimber had stuck a single photo of herself and her father in a carved wooden box full of costume jewelry her grandmother had given her and Michelle, and didn’t open the box until after she moved her things into her first apartment.
The photo purge. Was that when her mother started seeing Don as more than a friend and her father’s former boss? Or had there been some other reason? She thinks of her mother, crying in Don’s arms at their house yesterday.
The niche where she keeps the photo is empty, as she somehow knew it would be. Kevin took the photo of his father—their father—with him. When he realized he wouldn’t be successful in stealing the house, he must have taken the only thing he could find that he knew connected her to their father.
“Kimber.” Gabriel waits in the hall, looking worried. “I was trying to protect you, and I did a bad job of it. Please, forgive me?”
“I don’t think it matters whether I forgive you or not. There’s nobody left I can trust. Same as it ever was.”
His eyes register the sting. “At least let me help you.” He indicates the mess in the living room behind him. “Do you know where Kevin’s gone?”
“Do you mean did he leave a forwarding address? No. And the SUV is gone too. I told you what that cop at the hospital said. They think it was all some kind of coincidence, that someone else ran Kyle off the road.”
“It probably sounds far-fetched to them, and they do have a point. Kevin doesn’t have any connection to the Christies at all, besides the fact that he’s your brother and you’re Diana’s friend.”
“Really? You don’t think that’s enough? He’s a criminal. And just because he shows up in pictures with my father, it doesn’t prove he’s my brother. It’s hardly DNA evidence.” Though she knows that with all the half-eaten food in the kitchen and the garbage from the bathroom…Hell, there are stains on the sheets. Similar stains on a dress had sunk a presidency. Then there’s the toothbrush she found and stashed in her glove box. They could test that. But even if she discovered Kevin wasn’t her biological brother it wouldn’t make much difference. He could still blackmail her. Also, Don is still vulnerable. What her mother doesn’t know would wreck their marriage, if Don hasn’t wrecked it already.
“What did he say to you the day they found Jenny? Did he say anything about your father?”
Sunshine. He called me Sunshine, like he knew I would hate it. That face too close to hers. Mocking. “You are the expert on people dying from terrible falls.”
“He was just giving me a hard time. Making fun of me because he got me in trouble with the police. Like he was screwing with me.”
“He didn’t say what he was here for?”
“Oh God. I didn’t tell you, did I? Shaun discovered Kevin stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from an old man in Florida and left him to die. That’s why he went to prison. But they didn’t find all the money, and we think—Shaun and Troy and I—that Kevin gave it to my father to keep for him. Then my father left Florida. All this mess…” She shakes her head. “I hope he found the stupid money and took it with him.”
Gabriel is incredulous. “Seriously? You think the twenty thousand we found is part of it?”
“It’s got to be. What do you think we should do with it? Take it to the police?” She hasn’t thought about this. It might open her up to too many questions. “Maybe we should just burn it.”
“Burn it?”
“Yes, burn it. Why not? It’s blood money. It’s caused enough trouble.”
“I don’t know, Kimber. He could come back for it. He has to know you have it.”
“Well, you have it, right?” Kimber brushes past him. “I don’t want to deal with this right now. I don’t even want to deal with you right now.” One more man with secrets. It’s like they’re magically drawn to her, or she to them.
In the kitchen, she grabs one of the giant garbage bags she keeps for leaves and begins to stuff takeout and pizza cartons and empty water and juice jugs and candy wrappers into it. The debris looks like something an eighteen-year-old pothead, not a muscular cyclist, would leave behind. Animated by anger and the knowledge of all the things she can’t tell Gabriel, even if she wants to, even if she forgives him for hiding the photos, she begins to fill the bag with filthy dishes: plates and flatware, glasses crusted with milk and juice, a pan on the stove with a scorched interior. She sweeps everything she thinks her brother might have touched into the bag with a noisy clatter. Her breath comes hard. It doesn’t matter that they are all her things. They’re defiled now. Ruined.
She lifts the electric teakettle from its base and starts to put it in the bag.
“You really think that guy is a tea drinker?” Although she guesses Gabriel thinks he’s being funny, there’s no hint of a smile on his face.
“I don’t care.” She shoves the kettle into the bag and yanks the base’s cord from the wall socket. After it goes into the bag too, she casts around for more things. But by now the bag is full and won’t hold anything else. She puts a tie around it and drags it to the back door.
“What about the police? All this could be evidence.”
“The police were already here with a federal marshal. I think the marshal dusted for fingerprints upstairs. They didn’t seem to be too interested in anything but sending Kevin back to Florida to bust him for breaking his parole.”
“What if the police decide he killed Jenny or want to investigate him for Kyle’s accident?”
Kimber shakes her head. “The medical examiner already declared Jenny’s death an accident. Diana saw it online Saturday morning.” Mentioning Diana’s name fills her with nervous dread.
“Do you want to go to the hospital tonight? I’ll go with you.”
“No.”
“We can get dinner, maybe take some to Diana.”
“Her family is there. I want to—” She glances around the kitchen. “I want to stay here.”
Gabriel comes a few steps closer to her. She can feel his empathy. Or sympathy. She’s never really understood the difference.
“Just don’t, Gabriel.”
“It might not be safe here. You don’t even have a key to the door.”
“There were two on the table in the front hall.” She laughs as she slides her favorite woven placemats into a fresh garbage bag. “How’s that for a joke? Changes the locks and leaves me the keys!”
“I don’t think it’s a joke. You could be in danger.”
“He won’t come back here.” She makes the words sound resolute, though she’s uncertain. At least if he does return, she’ll be ready for him. The revolver is back in her beside table.
“I’ll stay here and sleep on the couch, or in the guest room. I don’t want you to be alone.” Gabriel’s not begging or really even asking. It’s obvious he’s made up his mind. The strange thing is that—even though she’s frustrated with him—it’s okay with her. She doesn’t really want to be alone in the house. Not yet. But she has to stay here tonight because she knows that if she puts it off, it’ll put her one step closer to leaving it forever. Kevin will have won, wherever he is.
Chapter Forty-Nine
Kimber wakes, startled by the ringing of the doorbell and Mr. Tuttle’s barks, to find she fell asleep on Gabriel’s shoulder as they streamed Hello, Dolly!, an old Streisand film. Gabriel, though, is not asleep, and he gives her an awkward smile as she sits up, apologizing. Mr. Tuttle dances, still barking, at the front door. The film is only half over, and the coffee table is dotted with half-empty boxes of Chinese food, ordered after they cleaned up the living room and kitchen and hauled out the trash.
Outside the sun hasn’t disappeared completely, but it’s later than she imagined it to be. The clock on the mantel, which has incredibly remained undamaged, reads quarter till nine.
When the bell rings again, Gabriel looks at Kimber. “I don’t think he’d ring the doorbell at this point, do you?”
Kimber shakes her head. “Doubt it.”
“Want me to get it?”
“No. It’s probably Brianna. She said she’d come by.” She goes to the door and opens it without checking to see who it is.
“Hi! Oh my God. You really did get back into your house. Is that guy gone?”
Looking past Brianna, Kimber doesn’t see a car out front or in the driveway.
“How’d you get here?”
Brianna blushes. Today she’s dressed as a kind of mix of Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz and Madonna circa 1985, with a faux-leather, white bustier covering her blue-and-white gingham, puffy-sleeved shirt. On her feet she wears red, knee-high Converse whose red laces must be yards long. But her makeup is more Katy Perry in Vegas. In addition to the heavy eye makeup, she has a fake beauty mark, high on one cheek, which sparkles with blue and silver glitter.
What will Gabriel make of you, little girl? Gabriel is notoriously conservative when it comes to how he imagines young women should dress.
“Tuttle, hush!” Instead of quieting, the dog’s barking gets more frantic. “I’m sorry.” Kimber picks him up in her arms. His body is rigid and trembling, but the barking slows. “He’s not used to being here.”
“No problem. He probably smells my boyfriend’s husky. His hair is still all over my stuff.” Brianna brushes at a sleeve. “The GPS totally missed your address, and I parked, like, halfway up the next block. Sometimes I think Google is out to get me. I’m sorry. Is that not okay?”
Kimber smiles. “Why would that not be okay? Come on in.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know you had company.” She steps inside and smiles shyly at Gabriel, who is still seated on the couch. He nods.
“Here’s the mail and the papers you wanted. They’re in a folder.” When she bends to put the bag down, Mr. Tuttle growls and curls a lip to show a tiny canine tooth.
“Stop.” Kimber squeezes him lightly to get his attention. She knows she should invite Brianna to sit down and offer her something to drink. But the truth is that she doesn’t want more people around. It’s hard enough having Gabriel there.
“You’re great to bring it over.” Kimber looks at Brianna’s outfit, puzzled. “Didn’t you say you were coming by after you went to the gym?”
“Well, I might have gone to the gym that has barstools and half-price margaritas from six to nine.”
“That sounds like the best kind of workout.”
They stand, awkward for a moment. Onscreen, Streisand is yelling at a grouchy Walter Matthau. It seems to Kimber that Streisand yells at someone in all of her films, and she wishes they’d streamed a Korean horror film on Netflix instead. But she and Gabriel agreed that real life has been alarming enough over the past week.
“I guess I should go.” Brianna bounces on her toes. “Sensitivity training tomorrow morning, and I have to get the doughnuts. They should make people take turns, don’t you think? It’s not really fair.”
Kimber thinks it’s probably in the sales admin’s job description to get doughnuts for staff meetings. God knows she and the other sales people bought enough bagels and doughnuts almost every day of the week to take to clients’ offices. “I guess so. Probably.” No use trying to explain something to someone she may never see again. The thought strikes her as a little cold, and she reconsiders. “If I don’t come back, we can still go to lunch sometime.”
Brianna brightens. “That would be great.” She starts toward Kimber to give her one of her quick, enthusiastic hugs but jumps back with a nervous giggle when Mr. Tuttle, now standing beside Kimber, growls again. “I’ll see you soon.” At the door, she turns back. “Thanks again for the sweater. And if things get complicated and you don’t want to come into the station, I’ll be happy to bring stuff by here.”
“That’s really nice of you. Thanks.”
“Sure!” Before closing the door, she says, “Since you’ve got your own lawyer right here, he can make sure they don’t screw you over. Bye!”
Even with the door shut, Kimber hears Brianna giggling as she hurries to her car.
There is something wrong with that woman. But what could she possibly have against me?
“What was that?” Gabriel turns down the television.
“That was Brianna.” Kimber takes the box containing the athletic shoes out of the shopping bag. She’s glad Brianna kept the sweater.
“What’s she supposed to be? Is it Halloween already?”
“Brianna’s kind of a free spirit, but she’s good at her job.”
“Are you sure about that? Didn’t you say that her mistakes might be part of why you’re having problems at the station?”
Inspecting the shoes, she sees that only one of them is properly laced, so she takes the other one out to lace it up as well. “Probably. I can’t even think about that right now. I’m just so glad to be here, you know? It feels like m
aybe something’s about to go right.”
“You deserve it. You want to finish the film or just go to sleep?”
“I’m okay to finish it. Hey, sorry I didn’t introduce you. I kind of just wanted her to leave, you know?”
A shadow passes over Gabriel’s face, and she realizes that she’s stumbled. Shit. What if he thinks she’s embarrassed to be seen with him?
She doesn’t know quite what to say, so she returns to the couch, putting a bit more distance between them this time.
They finish the film in silence.
Later that night in bed, with Mr. Tuttle snoring beside her, a strange thought drifts through Kimber’s mind and settles for a moment before dispelling like a dandelion blown apart by the wind: How did Brianna know the man sitting on my couch was a lawyer?
Chapter Fifty
Mr. Tuttle’s staccato nails dance across her bedroom floor, bringing Kimber out of a deep sleep. Or is there something else? The wind plays at the windows. Thunderstorms are in the forecast.
“Tuttle, come here.”
He scurries to jump onto the sturdy wooden box she’s put beside the bed so he can climb onto it.
“What’s up?”
He licks her face, his breath not quite as fetid as she’d been afraid it would be. Michelle had been allergic, but even after she was gone, her mother never suggested they get a dog, and Kimber was afraid to ask. Her grandparents certainly didn’t want a dog around. They were cat people and had two Siamese named Martini and Olive, strangely whimsical names bestowed by two people she never heard tell a joke.
Did the Merrills have a dog? She can’t remember seeing a dog in any of the photographs.
Thirsty, Kimber gets up to get a drink from the bathroom. Mr. Tuttle trots over to the closed bedroom door.
“I don’t want to go out. It’s way too late to go out. Is that what’s going on?” She sighs. Damned little dogs. She’s always heard they had bladders the size of thimbles.
“Okay. Fine. But only because I don’t want you peeing on my floor.”
The Stranger Inside Page 26
