by Eden Maguire
'I think about Arizona a lot,' Heather confessed. And Jonas and Phoenix al of them. We families, we're al so different, but we have the one terrible thing in common. And their friends too - you share what we feel.' She paused then and gazed out of the large window overlooking the mountains. Then, without saying anything, she led me from the studio to Summer's room.
I steeled myself not to give way to sadness, to try and be some kind of support to this woman who had lost her child.
'You know how it feels?' she asked suddenly, standing by her daughter's bed looking at more photographs - this time of Summer playing her guitar. There were close-ups of a cloud of golden hair, a glimpse of pale skin, a curve of lips. And there were distant shots of Summer playing a concert, surrounded by bright lights, then behind the scenes: of her joking with me on two of the shots; one of her talking sound levels with Ezra and Parker, who were dressed in their trademark 80
black T-shirts; another of her laughing with Jordan and Logan. It was how we used to be happy.
'It feels like we're al being smothered,' Heather told me. 'Al of us, under a blanket of sorrow and there's no way out.'
'Do you talk to anyone?' I asked quietly, thinking of Kim in her sunfil ed office, amazed that I was standing here recommending a shrink to Heather Madison. 'It might help.'
'Nothing helps,' came the heavy, dul answer. 'Except being with people who know what I'm going through, but without having to speak about it. Then it eases for a while.'
I heard Jon's footsteps in the hal , heading for the studio. He heard our voices and changed direction, bringing cups of coffee on a tray.
'Jon thinks I should start to paint,' Heather told me as he put the tray on Summer's bedside table. 'But I don't have the motivation.'
'He's right.' Painting beautiful landscapes was better than being smothered, better than going down under the weight of the past. 'Don't you ever think it's what Summer would want?'
Heather flinched at my words. 'That's what people say,' she said, struggling to keep her voice steady. 'They say you should let go, move on
- al those shal ow phrases, but they don't know.'
Standing by the window, Jon shook his head. 'Honey, Darina's trying to help.'
'Move on what does that mean?' she asked me.
'I didn't say that exactly. I know it's not easy.'
'Does it mean I should let go? They expect me to turn my back on al those beautiful memories, to forget the most wonderful part of my life, niy reason for living?'
'It's OK,' Jon soothed, going to her and putting his arms around her.
She buried her face in his shoulder and her words came out muffled and faint. 'I'm not moving anywhere. I can't take a single step out of this hel until they find my daughter's kil er,' she sobbed.
81
I took on board Heather's message loud and clear and translated it into: Darina, girl, get it together, solve this thing!
If I'd listened earlier to Phoenix's doubts about continuing, I came away from the Madisons' house knowing that I would push as hard as I could to knit together the strands of evidence to form the right pattern -
no holes, loose ends or dropped stitches. As I drove home, I reminded myself that I only had twelve days left.
Do it! I told myself again.
The hard fact was, I reminded myself, that Summer's case was different to Jonas and Arizona. Back then I'd been pretty certain from the start that the answers were local. Example: I learned early on that Jonas had a love rival in Matt Fortune, a kid who lived in El erton and went to the same school. The question was how to link him with Jonas's accident.
And again, Arizona worked hard to hide it, but once I learned some vital facts about her relationship with Kyle Keppler that he dated Arizona but had a fiancee over in Forest Lake a clear theory about why she drowned in Hartmann came through.
Not this time. However many times I ran through events leading up to
Summer's death, which I did as I lay in bed that night, the story spread out across the map, as far away and as random as Venice, Florida and Pennington, New Jersey.
I got up next morning feeling wrecked, stood under the shower, got dressed and went downstairs in a daze.
'You just missed Hannah,' Laura informed me, 'I told her you were in the shower.'
'Jeez!' Glancing through the window, I saw Hannah getting back into her car. I ran outside and caught her before she pul ed away from the kerb.
'Hey, Darina.' Hannah was another person who looked like she hadn't slept. Her fair hair was mussed and flyaway; there were dark circles under her eyes. *I wasn't sure you'd be in school today,' she said.
'I'l be there around midday for the rehearsal. I have to see someone
first.' 82
'Cool. I guess it can wait.' She pushed the lever into Drive.
'Real y? Five minutes back you thought whatever it is was important enough to detour down my street and knock on my door.'
'Yeah, but maybe I'm being crazy.'
For once, Hannah didn't seem sure of herself, so I slid into the car beside her. 'Go ahead share,' I insisted.
'So tel me if I'm being weird, OK.' 'Speak, Hannah!'
'You remember that guy on Summer's site, the one who got mad because he couldn't buy a ticket?'
'JakB.' Who could forget his neon skul icon and his sick messages? 'He showed up on my doorstep.'
My jaw fel open. 'When? How?'
'Last night. Don't ask me how he figured out where I lived, but there he was, hammering on my door tel ing me he wouldn't leave until I gave him entry to the concert.'
'What part of "no" does this guy not understand?' I wanted to know. 'So what was he like, this JakB?'
'Creepy. Pale, like he never goes out in the daylight. He has long, greasy hair.'
'Don't tel me - he's skinny and he wears a black T-shirt with a goth motif.'
'An exploding skul with a bul et hole,' Hannah shuddered. 'And if he reached out and touched you, his hands would be clammy. You know the
type.'
'You told him no?' I checked. 'The tickets are sold out, period.'
'I told him. But he said he already knew it and he was here for a backstage pass, a job on security - anything that would get him into the concert.'
'You told him no,' I said again through gritted teeth. The guy was harder to get rid of than a rash.
'That's when the abuse began. I was home alone and he started practical y trying to break down the door.'
'Jeez, Hannah! Did you cal the cops?'
'He grabbed my phone before I could do it. He wouldn't stop yel ing
how he was Summer's biggest fan and anyway she wants him at her concert.'
'Oh no,' I groaned. I wanted to block my ears and not hear the rest. 83
'She, Summer wants him there!' Hannah repeated. 'JakB talks to her,
Darina. He believes he has communication with her from beyond the grave.
I calmed Hannah down and told her no way was she overreacting.
JakB was one scary, crazy kid and she should drive straight to school and inform Miss Jones about what had happened. ' Show her the comments on the website, say that he tried to force entry into your house - tel her to hand the whole thing over to the principal and then you stay out of it, you hear?'
'Or we could ignore it,' she suggested, stil doubtful.
'Hand it over,' I insisted. 'By the way, you didn't give Crazy Guy his backstage pass, did you?'
She stared at me with some of her old fiery energy. 'You think I'm
nuts?' she said as she drove away.
I cal ed after her that I would see her at rehearsal and check that she'd done what I'd said.
But right now I had an appointment with the deputy sheriff.
'Hel o, Darina. You look like you didn't get much sleep,' he told me when I walked into his office.
'People always tel me that,' I grunted. 'It's great for my self-esteem.' 'Sit. Do you drink coffee? Or Coca-Cola?'
'Neither, tha
nks.' It was my first time in a sheriff's office and I sat awkwardly across the desk from Henry Jardine, taking in the framed diplomas on the wal and the family photograph - of him, wife and two kids - propped against his computer.
'So how did you know Dean Dawson?' he asked, sifting through some
paperwork on his desk.
'Not me exactly. It was more my stepdad actual y.' 'Yeah your stepdad, Jim Wright. I know him.'
Smal town! And it seemed Jardine's total recal had kicked back in. Or maybe he'd checked me out before I arrived, read the file on me as one of the chief witnesses to the Summer shooting and put al the pieces into place.
'Dean was the kind you can't afford to lose - good cop, al -round
good guy. He'd stil be working on the Madison case if he was around.' 84
Thanks for the smooth lead in, I thought. 'I visited with Summer's mom and dad yesterday,' I told him. 'It's so sad.'
'I plan to pay them a visit myself,' Jardine said, slipping the papers into a transparent plastic file. The deputy sheriff obviously liked a tidy desk.
'To talk about the possible Fichtner link?' I asked eagerly. 'You don't let that one go, do you?' he smiled.
I sat frowning on the edge of my seat, thinking Don 't patronize me!
Jardine recognized the resentment in my expression and reined in the
smile. 'Something else came up, something you might like to think about, linked in a roundabout way to your buddy Zak Rohr.'
Zak? How did we get there?
'Zak has an older brother, right?' 'Brandon.'
'Brandon keeps bad company, just like Zak. And while I agree with you that Zak was more or less there for the ride when Mil er and Stafford burned down the janitor's store, I can't say the same for his big brother.'
'So you won't charge Zak?' I asked. Any scrap of good news was
worth clinging on to.
'Not this time,' Jardine agreed. 'But focus on his big brother for a second. Brandon is in with a bad crowd - we both know that for sure. He has a particular buddy named Oscar Thorne, currently in detention at a Denver correctional facility for a drugs deal gone wrong. Thorne wasn't the main mover in the operation, but he was in deep enough to get a twoyear sentence.' Jardine noticed I was having trouble fol owing his thread.
'Listen. These drugs people crawl over this town like any other. They deal on street corners, in the leisure centres, down the shopping mal , sometimes in broad daylight. And there are times when things turn nasty then the guns and knives come out.'
I was starting to nod, beginning to make connections.
'Now we get to April thirtieth last year,' Jardine went on. 'We put a cordon around the mal within ten minutes of the shooting, and guess who was in Starbucks drinking coffee at the same time as you?'
'Oscar Thorne?' I guessed. 85
'Right. We searched him for drugs but for once he was clean. However, we did learn something interesting. Under questioning, Thorne admitted he was a marked man. He'd screwed up a big deal the previous week and now the main guys, the importers, were gunning for him.'
'But,' I argued before Jardine could get to the end of his account, 'the
guy who shot Summer wasn't a drug dealer, he was a psycho, shooting at random ...'
'Listen,' he said again. 'Try this - the drugs boss sends a hit man after Thorne. Hit man tracks Thorne down to the mal , spots his target drinking coffee, takes aim from twenty metres, gets ready to pul the trigger.'
'And suddenly Summer walks into his line of fire,' I gasped.
'Civilian casualty,' Jardine said. 'Col ateral damage in the
international drugs war.'
I needed to see Brandon to ask him about Oscar Thorne.
Jardine had been clever, I realized. He'd let me in on the insider information because he wanted to make use of my link with Brandon. 'I want you to ask him about Thorne,' he'd told me. 'And come back to me with any new facts got it?'
What could I do? I had to agree.
But the first thing I did after leaving Jardine's office was to drive to school. It was ten minutes before noon and I headed for the theatre round the back of the main block.
Something was happening in the entrance - a smal group had
gathered, a couple of guys were fighting. As I got nearer I saw it was Logan and someone else. The second kid wore a black T-shirt. He had his back to me and I couldn't make him out.
'What happened?' I asked Christian Oldman, who was standing next to Parker Simons.
In the middle of the action, Logan socked his opponent on the jaw. The other kid landed face up, flat on the ground. I looked down at his short, straw-coloured hair and his shades lying beside him on the ground.
It was Ezra Powel .
'Logan went crazy,' Parker cut in. 'Ezra was supposed to be discussing sound levels for his solo with him. He must have said something bad. Logan hit out.' 86
'That's so not like Logan,' I muttered. We were talking about Mr Sensible, remember.
Ezra was down and Logan was on top of him, raising his fist to hit
again. Seeing that Logan was about to land himself in big trouble, Christian stepped in, grabbing Logan's raised arm and wrenching hard so that Logan toppled backwards. This gave Ezra time to get on to his knees and let Parker step in to help him to his feet. On the way up, Ezra grabbed
his shades and put them back on to cover the strawberry birthmark under
his left eye. I knew he was self-conscious about the mark and wasn't surprised that he seemed more focused on concealing this than the fact that he'd been socked on the jaw by Logan.
'Fight's over!' Christian told Logan, keeping hold of his right arm. Christian is a county-level junior boxing champion, by the way.
By this time Jordan came running. 'Logan, what in God's name did he say to you?' she demanded, getting in between Christian and Logan. She saw me and drew me in. 'Logan total y lost it back there.'
'Let go of me,' Logan told Christian, who eased his grip but kept a warning hold.
'What did Ezra say?' Jordan wanted to know. Like me, she'd never seen Logan lose his cool before.
'Nothing. Something about Darina. He's a loser. Nothing!' 'Something about me?' I demanded.
'That's al you're going to get,' Christian advised, final y deciding that it was safe to let Logan loose because by this time Parker had led Ezra away to a safe distance. 'Ezra wound Logan up is al .'
'Fight over,' Lucas Hart confirmed. 'Time to get back to rehearsal.'
As people drifted into the auditorium, Jordan and I grabbed a moment with Logan, who was stil breathing hard. 'So?' Jordan demanded.
'Come on, Logan, what did Ezra say about me?' We sandwiched him and held him back in the doorway.
'Ezra's a dumb idiot,' he muttered.
'Er, excuse me!' Jordan shook her head. 'Ezra Powel may be a geek and a wimp, but no way is he dumb.'
'He has brains coming out of his ears,' I agreed. 87
'So he came across with the know-it-al routine. "Do the solo this way, not your way. Your way sucks! "'
'I thought it was me he insulted?' I spread my hands, palms upwards. 'So why hit him?' Jordan stil wanted to know.
'He stepped over a line,' was al Logan would give us, rubbing his knuckles where they had begun to hurt. 'I guess I'm stressed out,' he muttered. 'Do me a favour, you two. Drop it.'
After this, it wasn't a great rehearsal. People were on edge, forgetting lyrics and missing their cues. We al worried Miss Jones, who knew nothing about the fight, though she'd heard through Hannah about JakB's recent craziness.
'Maybe the situation is too hard to handle,' she confided in Hannah, her principal assistant. 'As we get near to the anniversary, emotions are bound to be running high.'
'True,' Hannah agreed. She said maybe it would be cool to finish early today and try again tomorrow.
So by three-thirty p.m. I was out of the school grounds and aiming to fulfil my ambition to have a serious talk with Brandon at his house.
I hope he's home, I thought. And I hope Sharon is not. My heart was beating fast as I drove down their street, glad when I saw the Harley parked in the Rohrs' drive.
Brandon heard me arrive. 'Hey, Darina,' he said in that flat tone which
was hard to read. Surprised? Irritated? A little bit glad even? He stood on the porch, tapping the rail, one foot dangling over the step. 'Don't tel me
- let me guess. Something went wrong with the car.'
Yeah, whatever.' I was happy to let him think what he wanted. *1 only
come cal ing when I need a car technician. But no - actual y I want to
talk about Zak.'
What did he do now?' Brandon backed under the porch and jerked his head an invitation for me to come into the house.
I fol owed him in, beating off memories of the times I used to cal here to see Phoenix. The place looked the same - plain furniture, worn-out rugs, hardly any pictures or lamps. The TV was switched on with the 88
sound down in a corner of the room.
'Zak isn't in any more trouble,' I told Brandon. 'And you'l be happy to know that he's off the hook over the fire incident. I have it from the horse's mouth.'
'Wow, Darina, you're a magician. One wave of your magic wand and it's happy ever after.'
I was ready to turn round and walk out, except Zak wasn't the real reason I was here. 'What is it with you, Brandon?' I chal enged. 'Why do you always put people down?'
'It's genetic,' he said with a faint laugh, eyeing me in that way of his
which suggested strongly that he wouldn't be wasting time talking to me
if he hadn't made the deathbed pact with Phoenix. 'So which horse's mouth are we talking about exactly?'
'A cop down at the sheriff's office - Jardine, the one who made the arrest. He's now ready to accept Zak didn't play any part in setting the fire.'
'And he's your best buddy?' Brandon taunted.
'No, actual y ...' I began then I switched tack. 'OK, so why am I letting you get under my skin. I don't owe you anything.'
'Not even an explanation,' he agreed, turning his back to take his jacket off a hook. Then he seemed to hesitate. 'Is that the only reason you came - to tel me about the law's sudden show of leniency towards my kid brother?'
