He’d gone back that night to look for her, not really expecting to find her. But her car was still parked in the shadows of the driveway.
Bliss House was far enough away from town that the stars were bright above him. They, with the moon, were the only light. He’d walked confidently around the outside of the house, which stood looking solid and stately against the night sky. Rainey’s bedroom was dark, and so was the girl’s. Gerard was comfortable enough at Bliss House, even though he didn’t like the place. The renovation had gone very, very well, as though the house had just been waiting for its close-up, for new paint and new fixtures and shinier floors. Rainey was trying to restore what she imagined was its graciousness, but he suspected that Bliss House had never quite been gracious. It was too severe. If Bliss House had a soul—and he strongly believed that if any house conceived in the mind of a man (or woman) had one, this one did—it was a stone, bottomless pit of a soul.
At the back of the house, he had tried the door to the mudroom. The new handle didn’t budge. There was a nightlight on in the kitchen, but nothing moving inside.
Heading back around to the front, a sound from the bush-hogged meadow far behind the house stopped him. Rainey hadn’t wanted him to deal with the springhouse far at the back of the property. It was a ruin, and he’d gotten the impression that she liked it that way, that she found it romantic. He didn’t really blame her. If there was any person who deserved a little lightness in her life, it was Rainey Adams. But at that moment, he’d still been embarrassed by the way he and Karin had behaved at the party, and didn’t like to think of her.
Now, four days later, digging in the paper- and tool-stuffed console of his truck, he wished he’d paid more attention to what he’d heard out in the meadow. He’d brushed off the sound as the human-like vocalizations of a coyote, but now he wondered if it hadn’t been a person he’d heard. A person nearly hysterical with laughter. The thought chilled him.
Feeling around, he finally came up with a phone. Karin’s phone.
He turned it on, realizing as he did that it was something he’d never done before. How could you be married to someone and not ever touch the phone that they kept with them twenty-four seven? Karin’s phone was her lifeline, but she hadn’t had it with her at the party, and that puzzled him.
Not finding Karin at Bliss House that night, he’d taken her phone from her purse where he’d found it, turned off, in her car. He wasn’t sure what had made him keep it from the police. If they discovered he had it, they wouldn’t like it. They would think he was guilty of something—maybe even Karin’s murder.
He hadn’t turned it on knowing that if the police were tracking her account they might be alerted that someone was using it. And they would find it with him.
The message icon said she had fourteen messages. One of them was a text.
He recognized most of the names as clients and the phone numbers of her coworkers. There was a block of calls to and from Nick Cunetta. Not surprising, since Nick had been one of her closest friends for the past two years. For a time he’d suspected that Nick wasn’t gay, but walked both sides of the street. When he suggested it to Karin, she’d nearly choked with laughter on the wine she was drinking.
“You’re jealous!” she’d said. “Jealous of a man who’s been effectively out of the closet since grad school? Really, Gerry. Your gaydar sucks.” She’d kissed him on the cheek with affection. “But you’re adorable.”
Three calls between them had gone back and forth in the hours before the party. There was nothing he could judge from that. They were always talking, and Nick had been at the party.
Disappointed, he was about to turn the phone off when he thought to open the text message.
WHERE ARE YOU? I’M UPSTAIRS. HAVE TO LEAVE SOON. MOM’S GETTING DRUNK.
The text wasn’t signed, but the sender’s name had been recorded by Karin’s phone: JEFFERSONB.
If there were other texts between them, they’d been erased.
Gerard didn’t need to see any more. He shut the phone down.
Chapter 46
By the time Rainey and Jefferson got back to the house from the hospital, the police were gone. Randolph was still at the hospital, and had asked her to keep an eye on Jefferson, who seemed to be in an uncomprehending daze. She told Jefferson to go upstairs and lie down for a while. He’d been quiet in the car, and obeyed her without speaking.
Not knowing what else to do, she went to the kitchen and started to clean. Neither Randolph nor Bertie should have to come back to a kitchen made untidy by a half-dozen cops or a floor stained with blood. As she searched for supplies, she found herself stopping frequently, distracted by the image of Bertie looking small and still on the ambulance gurney, her mouth and nose covered with an oxygen mask.
Why would anyone want to hurt Bertie, who hadn’t even known Karin Powell all that well? Rainey told herself that the detective had to be wrong. There was no connection.
When the doorbell rang, Rainey had just finished scrubbing the tile floor for the third time, trying to get the last of the bloodstains out. But it wasn’t happening.
She hurried to the door in case the doorbell disturbed Jefferson’s sleep.
Looking out the long sidelight, she saw Gerard.
What is he doing here? Did he already hear about Bertie?
“Gerard,” she said, opening the door a foot or so and keeping her voice low.
He looked confused at seeing her. His hands were shoved into his pockets and, for once, he wasn’t wearing a hat. The dark circles beneath his eyes told her he wasn’t sleeping well.
Taking his hands from his pockets, he put one on the door as though he would push it open. Rainey let him inside.
“Where’s the kid? Where’s Jefferson?” He raised his voice to a shout. “I know you’re here, Jefferson Bliss!”
“What in the world are you doing?” she asked. “This is a really bad time, Gerard.”
“This has nothing to do with you.” He paced the hall as though trying to decide where to go next.
Rainey hadn’t seen him since taking the food to his house. He looked much worse, and he was certainly angrier. She stood in front of him, unintimidated. “I don’t know what’s wrong with you, but you can’t be here. Jefferson’s resting and can’t see anyone right now.”
“He’s upstairs?” Gerard went to stand at the bottom of the curving balustrade leading up to the second floor. “Get your ass down here, you son-of-a-bitch!” He looked as though he might spring up the stairs any second.
Rainey quickly took off her plastic gloves and dropped them on a chair. She touched Gerard’s arm, hoping to get through to him. He flinched away.
“Gerard, if you don’t go, I’ll have to call the police. God knows they’ve already been here once today, but I’ll make sure they take you with them. Bertie’s in the hospital, and this family doesn’t need today to be any more of a nightmare. What’s wrong with you?”
She could see he didn’t know what she was talking about. He was focused on one thing and one thing only. Before she could explain, he darted up the stairs, again yelling for Jefferson.
A door near the top of the stairs opened.
“What the hell?” Jefferson came out of his room, naked to the waist. When he saw Gerard, his eyes widened and he turned to run back inside.
But Gerard was faster. He laid both hands on Jefferson’s shoulders and threw him onto the floor as Rainey ran up the stairs after them. She screamed for Gerard to stop. Jefferson was screaming as well, cursing and telling Gerard to get off of him.
Gerard dragged Jefferson farther out into the hallway, beneath the portrait gaze of the first Randolph Bliss’s porcelain-skinned wife, Amelia, and told him to “fucking stand up, instead of acting like the weasely douchebag that you are.” He stepped back while Jefferson awkwardly rose to his feet. Blood coursed from Jefferson’s nose, running onto his mouth and chin. He smeared the blood away from his mouth with his hand and shook it to the floor.
>
“Come on, shit-heel,” Gerard said.
Rainey screamed for Jefferson to get away, but no one listened to her.
“Yes, I fucked her,” Jefferson said. “And you’re a moron if you think I was the only one!”
Rainey was stunned, but when she looked at Gerard, she saw no surprise. He launched himself at Jefferson, whose face had turned mocking. Full of hate. He was shorter than Gerard, but more muscular with a lower center of gravity. He looked ready for a fight.
Gerard launched himself at him, going for his gut.
Knowing that she couldn’t stop them, Rainey fumbled for the phone in her pocket and dialed 911 as she ran down the stairs.
As soon as the dispatcher answered, she gave them the address, telling them whose house it was. The woman kept trying to ask her questions, but Rainey ignored her and told her just to get the police there. Then she hung up.
Above her there wasn’t much sound except for the grunts of the two men who seemed to be bent on killing each other. It was like some strange, bloody performance art. When she called up to them, again begging them to stop, her voice sounded shrill and lonesome in the big hall.
But by the time the sound of the sirens reached her, the men had separated. Jefferson sat slumped in his bedroom doorway, breathing hard, his head bent to his chest. Gerard had started down the staircase, only to stop, sinking down to sit, marking the pristine white wall with his blood and sweat as he rested his head against it.
Chapter 47
“You’re damn lucky I didn’t take the afternoon off like I planned,” Nick said, following Gerard down the courthouse steps.
“Save it,” Gerard said over his shoulder. He was moving slowly, still stiff from the fight. “You didn’t do me any favor getting me out of there. They could have kept me overnight for hitting the son of a bitch. It was worth it.”
Nick laughed. “You made quite an impression on our friend Rainey. Imagine having to call the cops on your handsome contractor.”
Gerard stopped at the bottom of the steps. It was evening, and the cooling air felt good on his skin, though he wouldn’t have given Nick the satisfaction of saying so. After refusing medical attention beyond a few swabs of disinfectant and some small bandages, he’d spent the entire afternoon in police custody for the first time in his life. It wasn’t the only first of the day—he’d never ridden in the back of a police car or been handled roughly by a cop either.
“Listen,” he said. “She almost didn’t have to. They’ve been watching me since they questioned me about Karin. They were there two minutes after she got on the phone. You know they think I killed Karin.”
“Your temper’s not a big secret from me,” Nick said, serious.
“Fuck you,” Gerard said.
Nick smiled, but it was weak. “I know Karin’s death wasn’t your fault. Not directly, anyway.”
Before Gerard could respond, Nick held his hand up.
“You listen. Karin was my best friend, and I knew things about her. Shit she wouldn’t tell you in a thousand years. Why she continued to love you even after she figured out there were plenty of men who understood and appreciated her better than you did, I’ll never know.” He continued in a voice that was a remarkable imitation of Karin’s own: “He’s my soul mate, Nick. I belong with him.”
Instead of angering him, as it was probably meant to, Gerard found himself unable to reply.
“Maybe she was doing that punk mama’s boy you beat the shit out of,” Nick said. “All I know is that she was stressed out like I’ve never seen her, and scared. I think half the reason she stayed with you is she saw you as some kind of white knight who would always save her no matter what she did.”
“Until now?” Gerard said. “This time I fucked up and let her down. That’s what you’re saying?” His hands balled into fists at his sides. Punching Jefferson Bliss had given him a sick kind of satisfaction. It was something he was afraid he could get used to, and Nick was handy. “Our business is over. Send me a bill.”
“You’re damned lucky his daddy talked the kid into not pressing charges. You screwed with the wrong mother’s son. And on a day when that mother—also my friend—was in a coma.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t know that, did I? It doesn’t change the fact that Jefferson Bliss was probably the one who got Karin pregnant and killed her.” He looked for surprise on Nick’s face and saw none. “You knew she was pregnant. Of course you knew.” The words felt like lead in his mouth.
Cuckold. Asshole. Fool.
“What happened?” Gerard continued. “If she really did tell you everything, you knew we planned for the pregnancy to go ahead. It was not a problem for me. I certainly didn’t kill her because of it.”
A well-dressed tourist couple on an evening stroll stepped off the curb to walk around them. The woman glanced back at them curiously after they were past. Gerard, his face badly bruised and his lip swollen, nodded at her out of habit, and she quickly turned away. He looked at Nick.
“Well?”
“I told you I don’t know for sure. I think she was scared of something,” Nick said. “She had her reasons, but she wouldn’t tell me what they were.”
They stood by the street, evening falling around them. Gerard was exhausted. He felt as though he were living some alternate reality, in a town he didn’t know, among strangers. He thought of Ellie at home. She’d missed dinner and certainly needed to get out of the house.
Nick changed the subject. “As soon as they figure out who assaulted Bertie, everyone will forget this little incident. Judge Bliss is a reasonable guy, and with you just losing your wife, and considering what you found out about Karin and Jefferson, you had a decent excuse.”
“I should apologize to Rainey,” Gerard said.
“Not right away. Give it some time. There’s enough going on. They’re not sure Bertie’s going to make it. Life is pretty raw for that family right now. It’s bad enough Rainey lives in that damned house with her freak show kid. You couldn’t pay me to live in that murder hole for five minutes.”
“No. I’ve got to talk to her. I want to make her understand.”
“You’re going to understand yourself right into a jail cell. Seriously.”
Gerard shook his head. “I don’t need your permission, man.”
Nick sighed. “Fine. If you insist on going out there, at least let me go with you. I owe Karin that much. We’ll take your truck, and you can drop me back here.”
Chapter 48
“Is Bertie going to die?”
Ariel and Rainey sat at the kitchen table. The food Rainey had brought home from Gourmet Away sat untouched on their plates.
Rainey answered carefully, not wanting to give her false hope. “She was in a coma for most of the day, but that was her brain’s way of protecting itself.” Hesitating, she added, “You know how it works. They put you into one with drugs, remember?”
Ariel’s face darkened. “I don’t remember that. You know I can’t remember.”
Rainey reached out to touch Ariel’s hand. This time she didn’t move it away.
“I know, baby. I think Bertie’s going to be okay. She’s just too full of joy to let this . . .” She struggled for the words. “To let this terrible thing mean the end of her sweet life. Bertie is Bertie. Everyone likes her. I can’t believe that someone could do this.” Her voice broke on her last couple of words.
It was Ariel’s turn to comfort her mother.
“She’ll be okay, Mom. It has to be okay.”
Rainey couldn’t know that Ariel was thinking more of Jefferson than his mother.
After she’d gotten the call from her mom about Bertie, Jefferson had texted her:
I THINK MY MOM’S GOING TO DIE. SOMEONE TRIED TO KILL HER.
She had answered him, but never got a response. No matter how weird and secretive he’d been, he didn’t deserve to have his mother die.
Her mother’s tears reminded her of the first days she’d been awake, when her mother had told
her that her father was dead. Ariel wanted to believe—to truly believe—that it was really her father who was here in the house with them, and not some other thing, like whatever had pushed her down the stairs and tried to hurt her in the ballroom. Or what was behind the door in the tunnel. The huge house was crowded with terrifying possibilities. Even the thought of seeing her father again frightened her. A little.
When the front door knocker broke the silence, they both jumped.
“God,” Rainey said. “I hope that’s not the police again. I can’t deal with them anymore today.”
Ariel stood. “I’ll make them go away.”
Rainey started to get up, but Ariel put her hand on her mother’s arm.
“It’s okay,” Ariel said. “Drink your tea.”
Rainey sank back down onto the hard chair, grateful for its solidity. She didn’t even watch Ariel leave the kitchen.
Gerard hardly recognized the injured girl that only a few weeks earlier had hidden behind her mother in the upstairs hallway. Her attitude was the difference: she seemed taller, and walked without self-consciousness. She wore a silk dressing gown that looked like it should belong to someone much older. But it didn’t look like something Rainey would wear. It covered her scars, but she didn’t seem to be hiding them intentionally. Her hair was styled in a way that did a decent job of hiding what she didn’t want anyone to see. Now he had a better idea of how truly lovely she had been before the accident.
Nick held out his left hand for her to shake, and she took it. “We haven’t met,” he said. “I’m Nick Cunetta. A friend of your mom’s.”
“I know who you are. No worries. Mom’s in the kitchen. You guys should probably see her in there.” She pointed to the open paneled door.
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