by Thomas Kies
“No, thank you.”
Aaron was still standing by my side as he shrugged his shoulders and said, “I’m going fix myself something. If you change your mind, let me know.”
Jim watched his brother disappear into the kitchen. “Would you like to sit down?” He gestured toward the sofa behind me.
Is he slurring his words or am I imagining it?
I hesitated before I sat down. “Does your brother live with you?”
Jim placed his glass on an end table and sat down in a recliner, leaning slightly forward, his hands resting on the tops of his legs. “No, Aaron lives in Maine in a place called Darwin. It’s a tiny little town. He’s got a church there.”
“Been there a long time?” How was I going to get around to asking about his time in prison?
“Couple of years.”
Aaron stepped back into the doorway. He’d apparently been listening to us and surmised where I was heading. “Before moving to Maine, I spent a few years at Garner for insurance fraud. I was stupid. But out of adversity comes opportunity. When I was in prison, I found the glory of Christ. And if I hadn’t found the Lord, I’m not sure how we would have gotten through all of this.”
“Our faith is what’s keeping us going, Miss Chase.” Jim sounded tired.
“Aaron said the police have already been here?”
“They talked to me and Aaron for a couple of hours. The first person suspected in a murder is usually the husband.” He pointed to himself with his thumb.
“Aaron said he was expecting the police to come back. If the police were already here, why would they come back?”
Jim shrugged but didn’t answer.
“How did you first meet Lynette?”
He looked up at the ceiling for a moment, finding the scene in his head. “She was raising money for the Women’s Crisis Center. She came to my garage to see if I’d be a sponsor for some event they were having.”
He smiled. “I told her that I would if she’d let me buy her a cup of coffee. The coffee cost me less than a buck. That sponsorship cost me five hundred dollars. But it was worth it. We started dating and we were married a year later.”
“No children?”
He shook his head. “Docs said she couldn’t have kids.”
“Were you disappointed?”
He shrugged. “I always thought I’d make a pretty good dad.”
I held my digital recorder in my lap. “How would you describe your marriage?”
His head dropped a bit. “I thought it was good. But Lynette was complicated. She had two sides. Her good side, she was always out there raising money for somebody—the United Way, March of Dimes, you name it, she was out there.”
I glanced over at Aaron who was standing in the doorway, nodding in agreement. “Deep down, she had a really good heart.”
I noticed that Aaron was now holding a glass.
What was he drinking?
Jim continued, “But she had another side. I think maybe it was why we got along so well, at least at first. I liked to party and so did she. We worked hard and we played hard. Both of us put away a lot of booze. Trouble is, I do stupid things when I drink.”
That’s what he’d said at AA.
“Did you ever hit her?”
He sighed. “Not at first.”
“Not at first?”
He doubled up his hands into fists and then opened them again, letting them rest on his knees. “After the first time, I told her I’d never do it again.”
“But you did, didn’t you?”
He nodded.
Aaron took a seat next to me on the couch and turned to me. “Are you sure I can’t get you something, Miss Chase?” He held up his own glass as an example.
I could feel sweat start to trail down my ribcage and my heart pump harder in my chest.
Was coming here a mistake?
I nodded toward the glass in Jim’s hand. “Is that bourbon?”
Jim held the glass up in a toast he took a healthy swallow.
I looked Aaron in the eye. “Jim’s in AA. Is that a good idea?”
He smiled and took a swallow from his own glass. “We’re home. I’m here to watch out for him. You should be able to relax in your own home, don’t you think?”
I don’t like the way this is going.
I focused back on Jim. “When did Lynette leave you?”
“When she knew that I’d never stop drinking.”
“You go to AA. Hasn’t that helped?”
“Hasn’t seemed to.” He squinted. “I remember you, now. You were at the meeting. Your cell phone went off.”
“Always nice to make an impression.”
Aaron spoke up. “How long have you been sober, Ms. Chase?”
“About a month,” I lied.
“Most times, someone from AA can tell you the exact date when they stopped drinking. Do you remember the date when you stopped?”
I needed to get back on point and then get the hell out of there. “Any idea who might have killed Lynette?”
Jim shook his head. “Did you know that she was having sex with multiple partners?”
“That’s a dangerous way to live,” Aaron added.
“So she was having sex with people other than George Chadwick, her husband? How do you know?”
“It’s a small town.” Jim swirled the bourbon and ice around in his glass.
I had to get this done and get out. “Tell me about last Wednesday.”
Jim stared at me with angry, red eyes. “Wednesday should’ve been our tenth anniversary. I didn’t go into work that day. Instead I got up and watched our wedding video.” He shook his head. “That was stupid.”
“Then he called me,” Aaron said. “I could hear by his voice that he was in trouble so I hopped in my car and drove down so that I could be with him. I was planning on coming down anyway. I always try to be here on their anniversary.”
“So you were here all day? You spent the entire day here in the house?”
Jim shook his head. “Sometime around ten in the morning, I drove down to the liquor store and picked up a bottle of Jack. I sat right there in the parking lot and took a couple of good sized hits. And that’s when I saw her drive by.”
“Who?”
“Lynette, behind the wheel of her fancy new Lincoln Navigator.”
“What did you do?”
I watched him bite at his lip. “I followed her.”
“Were you driving your Mustang?”
He nodded.
“How long did you follow her for?”
“A couple of hours, she got her hair done, did some window shopping in Westport, went to the Stop-n-Shop. And then she went home.”
“What did you do next?”
“Then I came home and I waited for Aaron.”
Aaron spoke up, “I got here about six-thirty that night and at that point, Jim was already passed out on the couch. He woke up around ten so I made him some dinner and then we prayed together.”
“So you were here the entire evening?”
“Yes, ma’am,” Jim said quietly.
“You were here all night? You didn’t see Lynette at all?”
“We were here.” Jim’s eyes narrowed and his voice dropped to almost a low, malicious whisper. “Why, did you hear something different?”
What the hell was I thinking? I was in a dark house with two men, one or both of whom might be killers and they were sitting there getting hammered right in front of me. My heart thumped away at my ribcage in a swift drumbeat of escalating fear.
“No.” I didn’t sound convincing. “No, I just want to be accurate.”
“We were here, Miss Chase,” Aaron confirmed.
“Is that what you told the police?”
“Why would we tell them anyth
ing different?” His voice was almost a snarl. He picked up his glass, took a big swallow, then tapped the bottom of it against the top of the end table with irritation.
This was stupid. Go.
“Of course, you wouldn’t.” I put my recorder back in my bag and stood up. “Gentlemen, once again, let me tell you how sorry I am. You’ve been very helpful.”
They both stood up. “Thanks,” Jim mumbled. “Stop by anytime.”
Aaron smiled at me, “I’m sure we’ll be seeing each other again.”
Holy Jesus, not if I can help it.
***
The air outside Jim Brenner’s home was oppressive, the epitome of hot, hazy, and humid. But I was thrilled to be in the sunshine and away from that house.
Were the Brenners lying to me?
Was my source lying?
Somebody wasn’t telling the truth. I expected it was the Brenners. They were anticipating a return visit from the cops. They knew that sooner or later, the police would find out about the confrontation at the sex club.
I looked down at the shirt I was wearing. It was soaked with sweat, sticking to me like a second skin. I was thankful that I’d decided to put on a bra this morning.
If I hadn’t wanted a drink before, I wanted one now.
Once inside my car, I reached into my bag for my cell phone. I intended to call Mike Dillon and tell him what I knew. As I drove away, I noticed again how pristine and shiny the Tahoe looked. It had been recently cleaned and I’m betting that it was thoroughly cleaned.
And then I wondered about the boat. Had that been washed and detailed as well?
What in hell would Mike Dillon find now that the Brenners have had a chance to get rid of evidence? But the cops had already been there and were apparently satisfied with their alibi.
Pulling up to a red light, I saw that there was a message on my phone. Hitting the code, I held the receiver up to my ear and listened.
As hot as the afternoon was, the message chilled me to the bone.
I heard Kevin’s daughter, Caroline, as she said in a voice that was cracking with emotion and clearly afraid.“Hi, Genie. I thought you should know that right after you left, Dad got really sick. I called 911 and they took him to the hospital!”
Chapter Sixteen
The first time I’d ever been in an emergency room was when I was fourteen years old, waiting with my mom while three doctors and four nurses did the best they could to sew my father back into one piece. It’s what happens when a man slides under an eighteen-wheeler going sixty miles an hour on his motorcycle.
It’d happened near the Westport exit on I-95 when a Saab abruptly changed lanes forcing a truck to slam on its brakes. The truck jackknifed. My father was right behind as the eighteen-wheeler twisted and careened out of control, metal against metal screaming in overheated agony, tires and axles disintegrating under cataclysmic, kinetic stress. Dad tried to avoid disaster but his synapses had fired way too late. The bike ditched and he skidded along the highway on his side, sliding in a cloud of sparks under the moving, buckling truck trailer until he was on the other side, and lying in a bloody heap in the breakdown lane.
But for fate, the truck should have crushed my old man. The cops said it was a miracle that he was still alive when they’d found him.
The spectacle might have been visually impressive, but it left my father with two broken legs, a punctured lung, a ruptured spleen, a mangled arm and shoulder, a fractured skull, a sliced aorta, and only faint heartbeats away from death.
My mother and I stayed in the ER for seven hours straight, waiting to see if my old man would live or die. I’m not sure, but I think it’s the last time in my life that I ever prayed for anything. I bargained with God with everything I had. If God would just let my dad live, I’d give every dime I ever earned to the church, I’d read the Bible from cover to cover, I’d build schools in Africa, I’d become a freaking nun.
At some point, after a hellish night, just before dawn, I looked up from where I was sitting, uncomfortably dozing in a hard plastic chair, and saw young Kevin Bell standing in front of me. He’d hiked five miles from his house to the hospital. His hair was matted, water dripped off his face, and his windbreaker and jeans were soaked through to his skin. He’d walked all that way in a driving thunderstorm.
He’d walked all that way just for me.
We hugged each really tight. I remember that I started to cry and couldn’t stop. We sat next to each other in those hard plastic chairs for hours, Kevin holding my hand the whole time. I don’t know why, but feeling his warm skin on mine helped take my fear away. He was my best friend.
My dad died on the operating table.
Since then, I’ve been in and out of a lot of emergency rooms. It’s usually part of some story I’m working on. I try to stay detached, but I’ve never been able to shake the feeling that Death was sitting there in one of those waiting room seats. You couldn’t see him, but he was always there.
Life was in the ER, too, but she was in where the action was, working with the doctors and nurses.
I suspect that when Death decides it’s time to take someone, he walks into one of the cubicles where the doctors are struggling to keep someone’s heart beating. Then, even though Life has put up a good fight, Death slides her off to one side. He smiles his skeletal grin, inexorably embraces the patient with his long cold arms, and bestows a final, icy kiss.
I don’t like emergency rooms because, in the end, you can’t negotiate, bribe, or trick Death into leaving you or a loved one alone. When it’s your time, it’s your time.
***
The emergency room waiting area had changed a lot since I was fourteen. It had become more “friendly.” The chairs were certainly more comfortable than I recalled. There was a flat-screen TV on one of the walls. There were toys for small children in a brightly colored plastic box on the floor.
But the magazines were still out of date, which made me really nervous.
When I got there, a half dozen people in twos and threes were sitting quietly around the room.
Caroline was seated alone in a corner. She was staring out a window that overlooked a courtyard.
“Hey, honey,” I said. “How’s your dad?”
She turned and looked up at me. I could see the red rims around her eyes. Her face seemed even thinner and paler than before. Caroline looked absolutely haunted. “I don’t know.” Her voice turned high and squeaky. Then her lips quivered, her face reddened, and she hid her tears behind a crushed-up ball of over-used tissue.
I leaned down and put my arms around her shoulders. She stood up and we hugged each other, much like what her father had done for me so many years before.
Just this morning, Kevin had told me that Caroline hadn’t cried since her mom died. He’d thought that maybe his daughter had been squeezed dry, that Joanna’s death had left the girl in a permanent state of shock.
But here she was, sobbing uncontrollably in my arms.
I knew what she was afraid of. She’d already lived through the tragedy of losing her mother. Being in an emergency room again for her dad was plain horrifying. Death wasn’t a stranger to this little girl.
I dried her eyes with another ball of used tissue, but this one I found at the bottom of my bag. “What happened, honey?”
She swallowed. “Right after you left this afternoon, Dad came into the house and fixed himself a drink. He and I talked a little bit about how you guys had gone out to Connor’s Landing to pick up a deposit check. He showed it to me, he was really proud. He said to keep an eye on the time because we were going to Poco Loco for dinner in a couple of hours. But all the while he was talking to me, I could see sweat was dripping off his forehead.
“I asked him if he wanted me to turn up the air conditioner. But he shook his head, wiped his face with a paper towel and then took his drink into the living room. I
’d stayed in the kitchen to get some ice water from the refrigerator when I heard him fall.”
I felt fear clutch at the hairs on the back of my neck. “He fell?”
She slowly nodded. “I ran in and saw him struggling to get up off the floor. He couldn’t get to his feet. His face was really red and all scrunched up like he was in a lot of pain. He had one hand over his stomach like it was hurting really bad, so I took his other hand and tried to help him, but he couldn’t straighten up. He let go of me and just lay on the floor, groaning. I dialed 911. He kept trying to tell me not to call an ambulance, that he was okay. He just needed a few minutes and the pain in his stomach would go away.”
“But it didn’t.”
“It always has in the past, but not this time,” Caroline whispered.
“This has happened before? Has he seen a doctor?”
That was when I realized that Aunt Ruth was standing behind me. “Kevin hasn’t been to a doctor in years,” she stated flatly.
I spun to see her staring at me with an expression of both disdain and fear.
“Hi,” I offered, not knowing what else to say.
“To answer your question,” Ruth said, “yes, this has happened before. But it’s never been this severe.”
Caroline explained, “He gets the sweats and really bad pains in his stomach, sometimes so bad that he goes to bed and stays there for hours until it goes away.”
“But he hasn’t seen a doctor?”
Ruth told me what I should have known anyway. “He has health insurance but it’s at some insane deductible.”
I felt ashamed at the simplicity of her answer. “But there are free clinics,” I argued. “He could have come into the emergency room. By law they have to treat him.”
Ruth gave me a tight-lipped smile. “He knows that. And I offered to pay his way to see my doctor. But Kevin’s stupid pride won’t let him accept charity.”
Yeah, that was Kevin. Independent to the point of being self-destructive.
“How long has this been going on?”
Caroline answered, “I don’t know. Maybe three months? It’s not like he’s going to tell anyone.”
“The last few weeks, Caroline’s called me twice when Kevin was in a lot of pain,” Ruth said. “I came over and suggested that we take him to the hospital…strongly suggested. He was adamant, even when it was obvious he was suffering. He’d shake his head and tell me that was okay. Just give him a minute and he’d walk it off.”
