In Close

by Brenda Novak

  “Like I said, it can all be replaced—except the picture of my mother. With some effort and money, I might be able to get a duplicate, but I doubt I’ll try.”

  She smoothed the hair out of his eyes. “You had a picture of her?” Claire wished she’d seen it. Because he had no family, no roots, he was used to flying solo, which made it hard to become an integral part of his life. “That’s not an easy thing to lose.”

  He ran his finger down her cheek. “It was a mug shot, so probably nothing I’d frame, anyway.”

  A mug shot. Claire had always known there was something wrong with his mother. “Tell me about her.”

  That muscle jumped in his cheek, letting her know he was as sensitive about the subject as ever, but at least he answered. “There’s not much to tell.”

  “Who was she?”

  He shifted onto his back. “Her name was Bailey Rawlings.”

  “And she was—” she snuggled close, resting her head on his shoulder “—a counterfeiter?”

  “Nothing quite so glamorous.” She could hear the dry note in his response to her teasing.

  “A bank robber?”

  “Far too creative. She was a hooker. And a drug addict.”

  Claire leaned up to look into his face. “Well, there you have it.”

  His lips pursed. “Have what?”

  “Only something as powerful as drug addiction could make her do what she did.”

  “That’s how you see it?”

  “That’s how I see it.”

  “You don’t think that’s too forgiving?”

  The dry note was back. The anger he’d felt growing up had slipped deeper and deeper below the surface, but it was still there. “Forgiving her is the only way you’ll be able to move on.”

  He studied her for several seconds, touched the end of her nose. “Does that go for you, too? If your stepfather killed your mother, will you be able to forgive him?”

  She’d been thinking about Tug a lot—as they spoke to the police, as they drove to the hospital, as they waited for the doctor, as they checked into the motel and drifted in and out of sleep—and she kept coming to the same conclusion. “He didn’t kill her.”

  Isaac adjusted his pillow. “Claire, I think you need to be prepared for the fact that he might’ve done just that. All the signs point to him. She was cheating. She’d inherited a lot of money, and he’d get to keep it. He loved her daughters and couldn’t bear the thought of losing them.”

  “But whoever killed my mother also killed David. Tug wouldn’t do that. He—he couldn’t have lived that big a lie. I would’ve known it. Intuitively, if in no other way.”

  “Come on,” Isaac said gently. “People surprise their loved ones all the time. He could do anything if he was afraid he might be exposed. My mother’s drug addiction was powerful enough to make her abandon her five-year-old. Fear of life in prison could certainly motivate Tug to resort to murder. Whoever’s behind David’s death must’ve had a chunk of change, and your father fits the bill there, too. Contract killing isn’t cheap. It’s not as if Les is some hood who’d do it for fifty bucks.”

  “But that means he’s also the one who tried to barbecue us the night before last!”

  “Not necessarily. Les Weaver could’ve been acting alone on that one. He’s tied into this now, too. If he’s ever caught, his own life could be on the line. We live in a capital punishment state.”

  “What about Roni?”

  “We’re back to the evil stepmother being behind it all?”

  “She’s not evil. I mean, I’ve never viewed her that way.” But it was true that Claire had a stronger bond with Tug and that his betrayal would hurt far more, because she’d actually trusted him as much as a girl could trust a father. She’d always been a little leery of Roni because, as good as she’d been, she could never compare to Alana. “I’m just saying she had as much to gain as Tug. And now she has as much to lose.”

  “You talked to Myles. He couldn’t confirm that April ever came forward with her story.”

  “That doesn’t mean she didn’t. Myles didn’t even live in Pineview back then. It was Sheriff Meade she spoke to.”

  “Then why isn’t it in the files?”

  “Because he either didn’t believe her or—” she cleared her throat “—Roni paid him off.”

  Isaac seemed skeptical. “So now we’re talking police corruption on top of everything else?”

  “Not corruption, exactly. Just a favor for a friend he didn’t believe was guilty. Maybe he got rid of his notes because he thought April was an angry teen out to malign an upstanding citizen.”

  “And in return Roni made a large contribution to his reelection campaign?”

  “If you think things like that don’t happen here, you’re naive.”

  “I know they happen. I just don’t think you should rely on April’s story without any evidence to back it up.”

  Claire frowned. “Okay, then, what about Joe as a suspect? Maybe my mother tried to break up with him and he wouldn’t hear of it. They got into a huge fight that sort of…escalated, and he went too far.” She could easily imagine her sister’s claims that Joe had exposed himself as grounds for an argument. He might’ve killed Alana so she didn’t label him as a pedophile, which could’ve ruined his business as well as his marriage and resulted in his own girls being taken away from him.

  “You don’t believe he spent all that time digging in the forest because he’s worried about you, like he said?”

  “By admitting the affair, he could be hoping to cast more blame on Tug. Maybe he was afraid we were getting too close to the truth.”

  “Or that could be the very reason he didn’t come forward at the time.”

  “It wasn’t until he saw me talking to Carly Ortega across the street that he changed his mind. Could be he was nervous about what she was saying to me and it convinced him that he had to handle the situation differently this time around.”

  Isaac made a clicking sound with his tongue. “I don’t know…?.”

  Because he wasn’t aware of Leanne’s part in what took place, and she couldn’t tell him without betraying her sister. But…the more she thought about it, the more convinced she became. Joe had acted strange in the past. He hadn’t even acted all that normal at Peter’s. They weren’t about to let her go until she saw what they wanted to show her. That had spooked her pretty badly. What would’ve happened if she’d acted skeptical instead of devastated by the knowledge that her mother had been unfaithful? Would she still be walking around today?

  “His brother definitely didn’t like that he was including me. He kept saying it was a risk. Like you said, he could’ve meant that more literally than I took it. Maybe Joe was making a last-ditch effort to throw us offtrack.”

  “And here we’d decided he’s so noble.”

  She nodded. This theory also offered an alternative explanation as to why he’d been so “kind” about keeping what Leanne had done to himself.

  “Remember the inconsistencies David listed in the files?” Isaac asked.

  Claire assumed he was about to bring up Leanne’s absence from school. But he didn’t. He’d never said much about it, probably because of what she’d already admitted to him. And Leanne was so young at the time he couldn’t see her playing any meaningful role in the mystery.

  “He mentioned Joe’s lack of an alibi,” he said.

  He was talking about David. “See? Joe had opportunity. And he was working very close to our house that day.”

  Isaac rubbed his hands over his face. “I think it’s time to call my P.I. to see what she’s been able to uncover on Les Weaver. Hopefully, she’ll have details that’ll help.”

  “You’re already expecting results? Have you given her enough time?”

  “The way things are going, there might not be anything left of Pineview if she doesn’t come up with answers soon.”

  Claire wanted to laugh, but it really wasn’t funny. Her house had been trashed, many of h
er personal mementos destroyed. His had been burned to the ground. She was estranged from every member of her family and was losing money every day she didn’t work.

  Isaac was right. What would be left when this was all over?

  With Claire out of town since the fire, Jeremy didn’t know what to do with himself. So many things were changing. He didn’t like it; it frightened him, made him jumpy.

  Usually after work he headed over to River Dell. These days, no one used the old park at the end of Claire’s cul de sac. If he went in the back way, he could hide his car in the trees on the far side and walk along the bank of the creek until he reached her place. Because she didn’t expect anyone to be looking in, and there were no roads with any traffic, she rarely bothered with blinds, except in her bedroom. She pulled those down every night, but he often got to see her finish work at the salon, eat, watch TV, maybe visit with her sister. Sometimes he even followed her to Laurel’s or to the book group.

  He’d gone to her place as soon as he left Hank’s yesterday and today, but both times he’d found her house locked up and empty. He wasn’t sure when she might return. The firefighters had finally put out the forest fire; it’d taken them most of two days. But Isaac wasn’t around, either. Claire had to be with him.

  If she was with me, I’d never bring her back. It’s too dangerous here.

  He drove through town a couple of times, then stopped at the store to spend the change someone had left on one of the tables he’d bussed at Hank’s. Fortunately, he wasn’t hungry because he didn’t have much money and there wasn’t any food at home. He’d been smart enough to have a burger for dinner, even though it was only four o’clock when he finished work.

  He could afford a candy bar, but after he ate it he couldn’t think of anything else to do. Tuesday afternoons weren’t all that eventful in Pineview. Add to that the fire, and how worried everyone had been about it spreading—and the whole town was tired. Everyone seemed happy to go straight home, although it wouldn’t be dark for four and a half hours.

  Jeremy put on his brakes as he passed the Kicking Horse. There were a few cars in the lot. He could always come back later. Maybe things would pick up. But it wasn’t a place he usually went. He’d avoided it in the past because he hadn’t wanted to run into his father. He avoided it today because he didn’t want to run into his father’s friends.

  That left him with no distractions. And he was running low on gas. Time to head home whether he wanted to or not.

  “Hi, Dad,” he called as he walked in. His father couldn’t answer, but playing this game had worked last night. It felt better to pretend. Pretending meant he could be nice and his father would be nice in return. It also meant he didn’t have to face what had really happened.

  He kept that up for an hour or so, told his father all about his day and Claire being gone and the fire getting put out, but eventually he ended up pacing outside the door to the crawl space. He needed to go under there to make sure he’d done a good job burying the body. He’d tried to check last night, but it’d been too soon. He’d merely stood by the door and cried.

  It was still too soon, but he couldn’t let it go any longer. He also wanted to check that he hadn’t left anything behind. His father used to say he’d forget his head if it wasn’t attached to his body.

  Gathering his nerve, he quit pacing, unfastened the locks and opened the door. But he barely poked his head inside. A quick peek was all he could stomach.

  Fortunately, he couldn’t detect anything other than the dank odor he smelled every time he went under the house. He figured that meant his father had enough dirt on top of him. He couldn’t see much of a mound, either, even when he pointed a flashlight right where he’d done the digging.

  He shifted his light to the suitcase. He should’ve buried Alana at the same time, but he’d been so tired. And he kept picturing her with empty sockets and clumps of hair falling off her scalp and feared he’d have nightmares about zombies if he disturbed her. The last thing he wanted was to wake the dead.

  Breathing a tentative sigh of relief, he closed up the crawl space and went back to the living room. Everything looked okay here, too. He’d returned the gun to its cupboard above the fridge and cleaned up the blood. He’d scrubbed the living room some more last night. It seemed as if every time he sat down he spotted another drop of red somewhere, but he didn’t see any now. The only thing that worried him about the living room was the bullet hole in the wall. He didn’t know how to fix it. He’d tried to cover it with a picture, but he couldn’t hang a picture so close to the ceiling. There wasn’t room.

  That hole’s so small. Who’s going to notice?

  Eager to escape the living room almost as much as the crawl space, he climbed the stairs. He’d never been allowed in his father’s room, not since his mother walked out on them. His father had made a habit of locking the door whenever he left, but Jeremy had known how to pick that lock since he was twelve.

  Tonight, the door stood wide open. No lock-picking needed.

  With the owner of the house gone for good, Jeremy was tempted to move out of the basement, away from all the things he feared. He had his own little cemetery going, just like the one in town—without the headstones and flowers. But if someone found out he’d switched bedrooms, it could give his father’s absence away.

  He sat on the bed, staring at the clothes hanging in the closet, the hamper, the cast-offs on the floor, the bottle of cologne on the dresser, the messy pile of newspapers on the nightstand with the reading glasses on top. Jeremy had slept on the couch last night, but maybe he’d sleep here tonight. Just one night. He wanted to go through the photo albums hidden up in the attic above his father’s closet. One of those albums contained pictures of his mother.

  But he decided to rest until he felt more like himself.

  Scooting toward the pillows, he was about to curl into a ball like he’d seen Claire do so often after David’s death, when the loud jangle of the phone startled him.

  He jumped off the bed, but he wasn’t sure whether or not to answer. He didn’t want to talk to anyone.

  Would that make whoever it was come to the house?

  That was a risk he couldn’t take…?.

  Rounding the bed, he snatched up the handset. “Good evening. Salter residence.”

  “Who’s this?”

  “Jeremy. Who’s this?”

  “No one you need to be concerned about. Where’s Don?”

  This wasn’t how people normally acted when they called. Jeremy’s hands were already beginning to sweat. “Downstairs.”

  “Good. Get him.”

  “I c-can’t.” Jeremy wiped his free hand on his jeans. “He, um, he’s indisposed at the moment.” His father had taught him to say that if he was in the bathroom.

  “You mean he’s shitfaced again?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Oh, for God’s sake, is he drunk?”

  Jeremy didn’t answer. He hated to actually lie…?. “He can’t come to the phone,” he repeated. “But I’d be happy to give him a message when he wakes up, if you’d like.”

  There was a slight hesitation. “I’m not sure it would be worth my while.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because you can’t remember from one minute to the next, can you?”

  That wasn’t nice. Why would anyone say that? Jeremy hadn’t done anything to make this person mad, had he? “Who is this?” Jeremy asked again.

  “You don’t need to know. I’ll call back.”

  But that voice. Jeremy was pretty sure he recognized it. “Deputy Clegg?”

  There was no answer. A dial tone suddenly hummed in his ear.

  26

  Nancy Jernigan, the P.I. Isaac had hired, had discovered some interesting details about the incident in Les Weaver’s office. Most notable was the fact that the dead man’s wife, Shannon Short, claimed they’d been expecting a loan from her parents, which would’ve relieved the financial stress that had supposedly caused
her husband, James, to take his own life. That, together with her insistence that Les had asked James to bring his gun to the meeting because he was interested in buying it, raised some questions. Les’s motivation in the murder wasn’t as clear, but Nancy felt James’s business partner could’ve put him up to it. Apparently, Ted Abrams blamed James for the failure of their business and was determined to collect on the life insurance set up to protect him in the event of James’s death.

  “So James was worth much more to Abrams dead than alive.” Claire had lowered her window to enjoy the warm evening air while Isaac drove. The wind whipped her long curls around her face, but she didn’t mind. Despite everything, she seemed happy just to be with him, and he felt the same.

  “Exactly. And Les might’ve facilitated that. For a fee, of course.”

  “I’m shocked that he doesn’t have a criminal record, that he’s been able to skip out of everything he’s suspected of doing.”

  “We’ll get him eventually. Nancy’s working on it.”

  “What about Weaver’s wife?”

  They’d been discussing what Nancy had told them almost the entire ride to Pineview. “What about her?”

  “Maybe she’ll talk if she realizes what he is.”

  “I bet she wouldn’t believe it. He keeps everything from her. He didn’t even want her to know I was at the door.”

  “But she can tell us whether or not he was home two nights ago.”

  “Let’s wait and see what else Nancy digs up. Then we’ll decide where to go next.”

  They passed Trudie’s Grocery, which signaled the edge of town, but Isaac wasn’t happy to be back. It’d been good to have a respite. He figured life could be worse than having Claire all to himself for a day and a half. In another four minutes they’d reach Big Sky Diner, where they were meeting the sheriff for dinner. Laurel had suggested they come to the house so she could see Claire, too, but they didn’t want to talk about attempted murder in front of the kids, and Laurel had quickly conceded that it wouldn’t make appropriate dinnertime conversation. This wasn’t personal. They didn’t need a friend; they needed a sheriff.