They Won't Be Hurt

by Kevin O'Brien

  Dumbfounded, he sat and watched as Mrs. Singleton pulled her sweater over her head. She had her hair in a ponytail. Wandering over to the window in her bra and slacks, she unfastened the band from the back of her head and shook out her hair. Then she reached back and unfastened her bra.

  Joe watched her take it off. “Wow,” he murmured, staring at her small, shapely breasts. He slid his hand under the covers. He couldn’t believe his luck. He figured, any minute now, it would run out. She’d pull the curtains shut, or maybe she’d somehow spot him in his darkened bedroom across the way, gawking at her and playing with himself. Then she’d be horrified. He kept thinking that Mrs. Singleton had been so nice to him, she’d trusted him, and she was there for a pleasant, wholesome weekend with her young daughter. On top of all that, her husband was an important minister, which meant she was very devout and religious.

  But he couldn’t stop staring. She wiggled out of her pants, and then stepped out of her panties. The way she slid them down her long legs was so graceful—and erotic. Joe could see every inch of her as she hung up her clothes, pulled a nightgown from the dresser, and then even took a phone call. Mrs. Singleton stood there naked by the window, casually chatting on the phone. Joe could even hear the faint murmuring.

  She talked on the phone for at least five minutes. Joe couldn’t hold back. Even after he’d come, he didn’t stop watching her. He waited until she ducked into the bathroom. Then he got up and cleaned himself off.

  When he returned to bed, he saw that she’d switched off the lights in the master bedroom.

  The next day, Joe ran more errands for her and Willow. All the while, he couldn’t look either one of them in the eyes. And all the while, he prayed he’d get another show that night.

  He kept checking the master bedroom window as he got ready for bed. It was early, and he wasn’t a bit sleepy. But he didn’t want to risk missing her. At ten o’clock, he saw the light go on in there, and he spotted Mrs. Singleton in her sweater and jeans. She came over to the window, and then closed the curtain.

  “Shit,” Joe murmured.

  He wondered if she’d somehow figured out that he’d been watching her the night before. He tried to sleep but couldn’t.

  The intercom buzzed at five minutes to eleven. Joe scurried out of bed and snatched up the phone: “Hello?”

  “Joe, could you—oh, damn it—could you come over here right now?” she said. “I—I’ve got this emergency. Please, hurry . . .”

  He threw on his jeans and a T-shirt, tied up his sneakers, grabbed his keys, and ran down the stairs. He stepped outside and saw Mrs. Singleton already waiting across the way with the front door open. She wore a floor-length, pink satiny bathrobe. Her hair was down around her shoulders. She looked frazzled and angry.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked. “What happened?”

  She shushed him. “For God’s sake, don’t wake Willow!”

  He felt stupid for talking so loud.

  “C’mon, hurry,” she whispered. She closed the door behind him and rushed up the stairs. “I can’t get the water to turn off! It won’t stop. It’s in the master bath. I hope you know what to do . . .”

  Joe hoped he knew what to do, too. He didn’t know much about plumbing. But he followed her up the stairs and down the hallway to the master bedroom, where he’d seen her undress the night before. He could hear water rushing.

  He headed into the bathroom, which was white and gray tiled with ultramodern-looking fixtures. Water poured from a waterfall spout into the Jacuzzi tub. Joe quickly bent over the side and gave the spigot a turn. But it just kept turning and turning—and the water just kept flowing.

  “Can you fix it?” she asked, standing over him. Her voice was shrill. “You can fix it, can’t you?”

  “I’m not sure,” he said, feeling panicked.

  “Well, you know plumbing, don’t you? I mean, why would you have taken a job like this if you don’t know anything about plumbing? My God . . .”

  Joe tried pressing in on the spigot and turning—and then pulling at it and turning. Neither technique did any good. The water kept streaming out of the strange-looking spout. Baffled, he scratched his head.

  “Well? Can’t you get it to stop?”

  “I’m trying . . .” He remembered some guy giving him a quick orientation tour of the place back in late August. He’d shown Joe the main shutoff valves in the utility room by the kitchen.

  “What good are you?” she snapped. “What are we paying you for?”

  “Let me—let me try this . . .” Joe said. She was making him so nervous. He hurried over to the double-sink vanity and opened the cabinet doors. He found some pipes with valves in the corner closest to the walk-in shower.

  “How’s that going to help?” she went on. “Stupid! Do you have any idea at all what you’re doing? My God, how am I going to explain to my husband why I hired you?”

  Joe was shaking. He wanted to tell her to stop yelling at him. He reached into the cabinet and twisted the valve. He reminded himself: righty tight-y, lefty-loose-y.

  “If you can’t do a simple . . .” she trailed off. “Well, I’ll just have to call a plumber, and at this hour, getting him to come all the way out here, it’s going to cost an arm and . . .”

  The water went off with a surrendering squeak.

  Joe let out a sigh.

  After all the gushing water and her screaming, the sudden silence was lovely.

  Neither of them said anything for a few moments.

  Sheepishly, he glanced up at Mrs. Singleton. She was shaking now, too. The front of her robe had come loose, and he could almost see her breasts. “I’m so sorry, Joe,” she whispered. She had tears in her eyes. “I didn’t mean to talk to you like that. My husband usually picks whoever looks after the grounds here. This is the first time I’ve done the hiring, and I thought . . .” She shook her head. “I had no right to speak to you that way. Please, forgive me . . .”

  Joe closed the cabinet and straightened up. “Then I’m not fired?” he asked timidly.

  “Oh, no,” she said, shaking her head. “You must think I’m horrible . . .”

  “It—it’s probably just a washer that needs replacing. . .”

  “Will you ever forgive me, Joe?” she asked, stepping closer to him. She put her hand on the side of his face. “How could I be so mean to such a sweet, handsome man? Say you don’t hate me . . .”

  He opened his mouth, but he couldn’t talk. He was getting aroused, and he was terrified she’d notice.

  But she took hold of his hand and slowly brought it up to the front of her robe.

  Joe let her slide his trembling hand inside the robe to cup her soft breast. He let her lean in and kiss him on the lips.

  And when she began to rub the front of his jeans, he didn’t pull away.

  They had sex on her bathroom rug that night.

  The next day, he went online and looked up the brand of bathroom hardware the Singletons had in their master bath. He figured out how to change the spigot. All he needed were some water pump pliers. But he couldn’t find any in the utility room, so he used a wrench. It turned out the spigot was just loose—a lot of fuss for nothing.

  Mrs. Singleton was alone for her next surprise visit to the summerhouse. They made love in the kitchen, the living room, and the master bedroom. It was strange being in the bed she usually shared with her husband. Afterward, Joe used the bathroom, where they’d had their first encounter. He went looking for a Band-Aid to replace one on his arm that was coming undone. He never found any Band-Aids. But he found a pair of water pump pliers in one of the cabinet drawers.

  He never asked Mrs. Singleton about it.

  Of course, he had to tell Vic about his secret affair with the mistress of the house. His friend claimed to be happy for him, but he was annoyed by the possibility that Mrs. Singleton might be dropping by more frequently. “Tell her to let you know ahead of time when she’s coming,” he insisted. “Tell her you want to know so you c
an look forward to her visit. Anticipation and all that shit . . .”

  Joe told her. So during Vic’s visits, at least they got advance warning when Mrs. Singleton was on the way.

  Whenever she brought along one or two of the kids for the night or a weekend, she was more discreet about where she and Joe made love, but not very. Joe never had much say in it. Mrs. Singleton called all the shots. While her children played or slept in the house, she and Joe had sex in the woods, in his quarters above the garage, in her car, in the boathouse, and even in Mr. Singleton’s study—on his leather sofa. Joe remembered that time especially, because while they were doing it, he could hear the kids down the hall, laughing at some TV show.

  She was almost as reckless as Vic.

  It was a small island, and everyone knew everyone else’s business. He’d been worried about Vic before, and now he was worried people would somehow figure out what was going on with Mrs. Singleton and him.

  Joe had become friendly with Martha at the Last Sunset Café. But she was kind of a gossip. She indicated that Scott and Sherry Singleton had gone through several caretakers. He remembered her talking under her breath to him at the counter while he had his usual Cheese and Ham Scram: “There’s already been a lot of stuff on the news about that so-called church of theirs. But I think something truly weird is going on at that house. Mark my words—sooner or later, I’ll wager sooner—there’ll be a big scandal.”

  “What are you talking about?” Joe asked, though he wasn’t sure he wanted to hear the answer.

  “I’m just saying,” she replied. “Somebody’s doing something they oughtn’t.”

  Later, as Martha gave him his check, she asked: “Not that I miss him, but I haven’t seen that friend of yours in a while—Nick or Rick or whatever his name is. Are you still hanging around with him?”

  “Ah, no,” Joe lied. “I was never really that friendly with him.”

  “Good, because I think he was bad news.”

  Joe realized, in many ways, she was right. While he’d needed Vic at the country club, in the outside world his pal was a major burden and not worth all the trouble he caused.

  Joe’s favorite times at the compound were when he was there alone. He remembered an afternoon, during one of Mrs. Singleton’s visits, when she’d had to attend some party on the island. She’d left the youngest, Connor, in Joe’s care. He and the boy had gone into town for ice cream and then had walked on the beach. That had been a good afternoon.

  But for the most part, he’d grown tired of both Vic and Mrs. Singleton. He was grateful to both of them for everything they’d done for him. But he couldn’t keep up the balancing act—with these two people coming and going. He hated deceiving Mrs. Singleton about Vic’s too-frequent visits. Mrs. Singleton and Vic were such risk-takers, and yet Joe had a feeling he was the one who would end up screwed.

  Vic was getting more and more resentful of the Singletons, whose use of their own home cramped his style and sent him into hiding. He also seemed jealous of the hold they had over Joe—especially Mrs. Singleton.

  As Thanksgiving approached, Joe was instructed to get the house and grounds ready for the whole Singleton family—right down to the special-order cornucopia centerpiece he was supposed to pick up at Lopez Village Market. Although he’d glimpsed Scott Singleton having an argument with a man in the driveway two weeks before, this would be Joe’s first time actually meeting the man—the man whose wife he was screwing.

  So he dreaded the Thanksgiving weekend with the Singleton family. It didn’t help that Vic showed up on the previous Tuesday and vowed to stay so he could talk to Scott Singleton about working at the compound alongside Joe. It was a ridiculous idea. He was a fugitive from justice, a criminal. No one was going to hire him. He’d been getting by on some money he’d “borrowed” from an acquaintance after escaping from the country club. Joe had been worried that his friend would start stealing things from the Singleton house to hock for extra cash. But so far, he hadn’t noticed anything missing.

  He finally persuaded Vic to leave Wednesday morning—just a few hours before the first wave of family members were due in. But Vic hinted he might be back to have a “serious talk” with Singleton.

  Joe was expected to do a lot of driving back and forth that weekend, but the minivan died on him in the driveway on Wednesday afternoon. The garage had to tow it and didn’t have a loaner, so Jae Singleton’s boyfriend had to run all the errands. Joe kept remembering that night in the master bathroom and what Mrs. Singleton had said about how her husband and some friend had hired all the previous caretakers before him. He remembered her asking him when she was freaking out over the plumbing mishap, “What good are you? What are we paying you for?” Now, with the minivan out of commission, he imagined Mr. Singleton asking him the same question.

  Singleton didn’t say much to him at all on Thanksgiving Day. He called him into the dining room with the kitchen help for the dinner prayer, and he got his name wrong. That was as close as they came to talking. But on Friday night Singleton buzzed him on the intercom and said he wanted to see him in his study.

  Joe was convinced Singleton knew all about his shenanigans with Mrs. Singleton. Or maybe he’d heard from someone in town that his new caretaker had a friend who had pretty much made the Singletons’ second home his second home. As Joe got ready for the meeting, he remembered the last time he’d been in the study for more than just a minute or two: It was when he and Mrs. Singleton had had sex on the leather sofa. Also Vic used that study quite often. Joe wondered if maybe Mr. Singleton had noticed something was broken or missing.

  Joe walked into the study with a tight knot in his stomach. Nodding toward the leather sofa, Singleton told him to sit down. He poured him some fancy imported dark beer and talked about the good work he was doing. Joe kept waiting for him to lower the boom. But instead, Mr. Singleton started asking about his spirituality and saying he needed insurance for the soul. Joe wasn’t sure what the hell that meant. But Mr. Singleton’s phone rang, and he said he’d swing by Joe’s apartment in a few minutes to finish their conversation.

  Joe remembered walking back to his quarters over the garage.

  The next thing he knew, it was early morning but still dark out. He saw the extra car parked near the garage and Jae Singleton’s boyfriend lying in a pool of blood on the driveway.

  The police questioned him for hours and hours. They put him up at a hotel on San Juan Island. He wasn’t under arrest, just a “person of interest.” Joe was truthful about almost everything he told the police. But he didn’t tell them about the affair with Mrs. Singleton. He also lied about Vic, and claimed he hadn’t seen him since they’d been in the psychiatric institute together. It was a stupid lie, and Joe knew it. Several townspeople must have spotted Vic from the times he’d eaten out, gone for a beer run, or come and gone on the ferry. Joe also figured the police would find Vic’s fingerprints all over the Singleton house.

  Joe had been ready to come clean and tell the police everything. But then Vic snuck into his hotel room and practically forced him to flee. Joe felt sort of helpless around him. He couldn’t stop his friend from getting him into deeper and deeper trouble. Mrs. Gretchell was right about that. Joe remembered being terrified when Vic had hijacked a ride from that man and later practically killed him. In fact, until he’d seen the news yesterday morning, Joe had thought the poor guy was dead.

  Now he could hear the TV blaring in the family room. It sounded like a soccer match or something. He wished he were back on that beach with Connor Singleton.

  Hell, he’d settle for being back in that hotel room on San Juan Island. Then maybe he’d have another chance to straighten things out with the police.

  He shifted restlessly on the living-room sofa, and took another look out the window. Was Sophie right? Would Vic lose it and end up killing some poor, innocent delivery guy? Joe felt sick with dread. He couldn’t control Vic, and he knew something horrible was going to happen in this house—maybe to one o
f those kids upstairs.

  Vic would be the one to do it, and, of course, Joe would blame himself.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Tuesday—4:02 P.M.

  Bellingham

  The Google logo came up on the computer screen.

  In the search box Laura typed Eric Vetter.

  Western Washington University’s Wilson Library had four “guest” computers in the Reserve area. All Laura had to do was show the young man behind the circulation desk her photo ID and promise to give up her spot after an hour if someone was waiting. But there was only one other person using the computers: a young, stocky East Indian man who snacked on Good & Plenty while he jotted notes in a spiral notebook.

  Laura had just checked MapQuest.com for Martha’s address, and she was in luck. The directions were pretty simple, and she was 1.5 minutes from the ferry terminal. Laura could still make it home by eleven tonight if she didn’t linger too long at Martha’s house.

  Maybe Martha could explain why Doran Wiley had gone kind of crazy at the mention of the name Eric Vetter. Laura remembered Doran’s exact words: “Who told you that I knew Eric Vetter? I didn’t know him. I never even met the guy.” It struck her as odd that he seemed to be talking about Vetter in the past tense.

  Now that she saw the first Google search result, she understood why. It was a Seattle Times article from October 23. The headline read:

  Divine Light “Minister”

  Eric Vetter, 51,

  Dies in Fire

  The photo of Vetter showed a handsome, though wizened, square-jawed man with short grayish hair. He looked very sporty.

  He had perished when a blaze swept through his weekend cabin in the woods outside La Conner. The article quoted a press release from the Church of the True Divine Light: