Half Life

by Helen Cothran

  “It’s a theory, that’s all. I believe that Pete and Matthew met at the protests and hooked up. Cornwell found out about it. Matthew’s relationship with Pete would have threatened the life that Cornwell was building for himself.”

  “All that suggests that Cornwell murdered Pete. But Cornwell is dead.”

  I sighed. “Shit. It kind of shreds my theory, doesn’t it?” I thought for a moment. “Or does it? I mean, the reparative therapy could still be the catalyst. You said the drug found in Cornwell’s car was crystal meth?”

  Trent nodded.

  “Isn’t that the drug of choice in the gay community?” I had done several books on drugs and was conversant on the subject.

  “Well, not exclusively, of course, a lot of other people use meth, and people in the gay community use all kinds of drugs, but yeah, I see your point.”

  “Who sells drugs in Desert Rock?”

  Trent laughed. “I can’t tell you that! The few we’ve known about and could catch are in prison. Those we know about and can’t catch are still dealing. I certainly can’t tell you their names. It would jeopardize our investigations. Plus, it’s illegal.”

  I was disappointed. Trent had bent the rules for me in the past. “Not even a hint?”

  “No. I really can’t.”

  I tapped my foot, thinking. My theory was too promising to be derailed by legal formalities. Surely I could discover who deals meth in this town. I snapped my fingers. Bingo!

  “What?” Trent eyed me suspiciously.

  No way was I going to share my thoughts on this one. “Nothing,” I lied. “Just running more theories through my head. With Cornwell dead, who’s the next best suspect?”

  He narrowed his eyes at me. “You’re obviously spinning theories you’re not sharing with me, Sam. So, why don’t you answer that one.”

  “Okay. Try this on. We were assuming that the same person who killed Pete also killed Cornwell. But what if Cornwell killed Pete? Who then would want Cornwell dead?”

  “I get where you’re going with this. Matthew Thornton. He would be angry that Cornwell killed his boyfriend. Maybe Cornwell’s agitation in the last few days had to do with Matthew threatening him.”

  “I’ve seen Matthew twice. Both times he looked upset, very depressed. Despite the alleged father-son relationship he and his therapist were supposed to have enjoyed, Matthew looked like he couldn’t stand Cornwell, was actually sickened by him. I thought it was odd at the time, but now it looks downright incriminating.”

  “Makes sense,” Trent said, but I could tell he was still convinced that the drugs were the reason for Cornwell’s murder. He was just humoring me.

  “And let’s not forget Faith Thornton. She would clearly have viewed Pete as a threat to her marriage. A marriage built on the assurances of Cornwell that Matthew was ‘repaired,’ a homosexual no more.”

  “But in that case, you’re saying Faith killed Pete. If she could get Pete out of the way, Matthew’s homosexual tendencies are put to rest. Her marriage and family are saved. So, why kill Cornwell?”

  I thought about it, shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe Cornwell found out that she killed Pete?”

  Trent scratched his chin, stubble rasping against his nails. “I’m having a hard time visualizing Faith Thornton killing two men. I know her. She’s a good Christian woman, a good mother.”

  “I know. It seems improbable. But mothers protect their families. And believe me, the woman is protective. Maybe the theory is far out, but I don’t think we should rule it out.”

  Trent smiled, obviously amused that I said “we,” as though I were officially on the payroll. Still, he had come to respect my investigative instincts after I solved the wind farm case. With a tremendous sigh, he pulled his feet from the desk and stood up. “Despite the coffee,” he said, “I’m tired as hell. But I’ve still got work to do.”

  “Going to go at it the whole night?” I asked, also getting to my feet. I was no dummy, he was politely indicating that I should leave him to it.

  “Looks that way. We have a shitload of paperwork to do, among a thousand other things. Remind me of this when I complain that Desert Rock is a boring place to be in law enforcement.”

  “Be careful what you wish for.”

  “Or you may very well get it,” he finished, the fatigue in his voice making him sound old.

  27

  The last thing I wanted to do was talk to Gabby Castillo—I got a pain behind my right eye just thinking about it. Nevertheless, there I was at Coffee Buzz on Saturday afternoon waiting for her and Eddie to arrive. The place was quiet, the morning crush long over. It was just me and the other caffeine junkies who probably tossed and turned all night wondering why they couldn’t get a good night’s sleep. Sipping on an iced coffee white with cream, I watched a woman wearing a bright orange beanie and red sweatpants tear pages out of a magazine. It’s not as though she was tearing out recipes or something—when the pages came ripping out, she promptly tossed them on the ground. Mike and Sonia paid her no heed. After all, she was Millie, a Coffee Buzz regular and a fixture in town.

  When Eddie had called and asked if I’d meet him and Gabby, my first reaction was “hell no.” But Eddie convinced me. Apparently Gabby had gone ballistic when he told her we had cleared Raul. In a fit of pique, she had demanded that he set up a meeting with me, probably so she could lodge a formal complaint that I hadn’t fulfilled my end of the bargain. A bargain that consisted of me working my ass off for free to prove that an innocent man was guilty, just to satisfy some familial grudge. As I sat there sipping my coffee, I visualized Miss Perfect’s face contorted with rage while she threw a tantrum like the big baby she was. I suddenly saw that this was going to be fun.

  At exactly two o’clock Eddie and Gabby walked through the door. Eddie veered off to get coffees, and Gabby steered straight for me. She plunked her butt in the chair across from me and slammed her Coach handbag on the table with enough force to make my iced coffee burble in the cup. Her perfume wafted around me like a toxic cloud, completely obliterating the rich earthy scent of coffee that makes Coffee Buzz so pleasant to sit in. She wore a red designer sweater that set off her shiny hair and flawless skin. Her diamond stud earrings caught the light from the window, nearly blinding me. I looked at her mildly, pleasant smile on my face.

  “Yo, Gabby, what’s up?” I said jauntily. I could feel anger radiate from her like heat from a sand dune in August.

  “What’s up,” she glowered, “is that you’ve screwed up. I told you to prove that Raul killed Pete. And what do you do? You go make up this f-upped story that he couldn’t have because he was out dumping crap in some canyon.”

  I smiled, but now I had to force it. I had underestimated her ability to irk me. “It happens to be true, Gabby.”

  Her pretty face scrunched in disgust. “Yeah, right. Eddie told me how you went out there and saw Raul do it. What does that prove? Only that Raul was out there the night you were there. Not that he was out there the night Pete disappeared.”

  I felt my enjoyment of the encounter erode further. How dare she talk to me like this? I wasn’t a detective, she hadn’t hired me, for God’s sake. But I kept the smile on my face because I didn’t want to give her the satisfaction of knowing she got to me. She was insufferable! “I’m sure Eddie told you,” I said as if she were stupid, “we have a witness.”

  She snorted like a horse. “Yeah right, Eddie’s low-life brother Miguel. Who would believe anything he says?”

  Eddie walked up at that moment with the coffees. I saw a hitch in his step when she said it. When he sat down he slammed a coffee down in front of her, splashing amber liquid on the sleeve of her two-hundred-dollar sweater.

  Gabby snatched a napkin off the table and dabbed at her sleeve. “Damn it, Eddie, be careful!”

  Eddie’s face was hard and taut. “I already told you, Miguel’s not lying about this.”

  Ah, so they had already been fighting about it. I felt suddenly warm insi
de.

  Gabby scowled at him. “Really? You’re really sticking with that? Your brother is not exactly a paragon of virtue. If Miguel is all you’ve got, I’m not buying it.”

  Eddie’s his eyes narrowed. “You don’t have to believe it,” he said calmly, carefully. “But I do. Miguel makes bad decisions, true, but he would never lie to provide a murderer with an alibi. He’s not bad like that.”

  Gabby turned away from him and rolled her eyes. This did not endear her to me. How dare she treat Eddie with such condescension? One would think that she of all people would understand his loyalty to his brother. But there was the rub—she loved Pete so much, she was so obsessed with his disappearance, she could not empathize with anyone else. My irritation with her bubbled over into anger. I said, my jaw tight, “I don’t care what you believe, Gabby. The case has taken a turn, anyway. It’s now clear that Raul never had anything to do with Pete’s disappearance. Bernard Cornwell was found shot to death in his car Thursday morning.”

  “Bernard Cornwell?” she spat. “What the hell does he have to do with it? You’re not still talking about that stupid reparative therapy crap are you? What does this have to do with Pete?”

  I ground my teeth so hard my jaw muscles nearly erupted out of my cheeks. “If you’d shut up for half a minute, I could tell you.”

  I waited to see if she would open her mouth again. She didn’t, but her face turned red with the effort of holding back. After thirty seconds of silence, during which I could hear Millie’s steady ripping behind me, I resumed. “It stretches the imagination to think that Cornwell’s murder has nothing to do with Pete’s disappearance. Two murders in three weeks’ time in a sleepy town like Desert Rock? The two victims were on opposite sides of a contentious protest. They knew of one another. They both knew Matthew Thornton, Cornwell’s “ex-gay” and Pete’s boyfriend.” I saw Gabby’s mouth fly open to protest my assertion that Pete was seeing Matthew, so I added quickly, “You’d have to be a simpleton not to think Pete’s disappearance didn’t have something to do with Cornwell’s murder.”

  Gabby bristled at the word “simpleton.” She huffed, “If that’s true, then Raul must have killed Cornwell, too.” She sat back and crossed her arms as if her argument were irrefutable.

  “God, what is it with you and Raul? I get the family history, but you are absolutely out of your mind about this!”

  Gabby glowered. “Raul is an evil person. I know him better than anyone. And you don’t know squat about my family if you think Raul didn’t do this.”

  I looked at Eddie to see if I could gain some calm by watching his usual placid demeanor, but his lips were stretched thin and his eyes flashed as he glared at Gabby. I was thrilled to see that Eddie hated the way she talked to me. The clear antagonism between them felt invigorating. I said, “Haven’t you been following what I’m saying? Your brother may be a very bad man, and he may have made Pete’s life hell, but he didn’t kill him. No amount of wishing it were so is going to make it so. I’m telling you, we have a viable alternative theory. Or don’t you really care what happened to Pete? Is punishing Raul all you care about?”

  Eddie didn’t wait for her to respond. He sat up straight and said, “Sam is going to look into this because she cares about finding out the truth. This is Sam’s case, it doesn’t matter what you believe or don’t believe.”

  Gabby looked stunned. She cocked her head back on her neck as if facing strong winds. Her eyes watered and her mouth did some goldfish-like gulping but no words came out. Then I saw her lips compress and she began to glare at Eddie, her pupils contracting into tiny specks. She had seen that Eddie defended me—against her.

  And Eddie was right. It was my case. I wasn’t doing it for Gabby or even as a favor for Eddie any more. Someone was out there killing people, and I was determined to find out who. Gabby was just an annoying distraction.

  I felt emboldened to ask her a question that I knew would piss her off. “When they found Cornwell’s body, they also found drugs in his car. Did Pete ever do meth?”

  Her mouth opened so big I could see her tonsils. “What the hell are you talking about? How dare you! Of course my brother didn’t do meth. Of course he didn’t!”

  The repetition was interesting. Was she trying to convince herself? It was enough to encourage me to pursue the line of questioning. “Gabby, come on. Meth is popular with gay men.”

  She glowered at me. “I’m telling you he didn’t do drugs. What is your problem, can’t you understand simple English? How can you be so insensitive! My brother’s dead!”

  I thought she was going to cry, and I instantly felt bad. As much as I couldn’t stand her, she had just lost her brother. Once again I had proven that I was not a model of tact and sensitivity. I decided to let the matter drop. I had another idea for investigating the drug angle anyway. As I thought about this, I noted that Eddie had not put his arm around Gabby or put his hand over hers to comfort her. She noticed this, too, and sort of sunk into herself like a balloon deflating. I should have felt worse for her, but this disconnection between them cheered me right up.

  With a feeling of renewed vigor, I grabbed my purse and stood up. “Eddie, call me later? Maybe we can play tennis or something.” I couldn’t resist pounding another stake in her eye.

  Eddie’s face softened when he looked up at me. His eyes still looked angry, but they warmed when they met mine. “I’ll call you. And, Sam? Thanks.”

  I smiled at him, tossed my head at Gabby, and walked out of there.

  28

  Sunday morning dawned crisp and clear. Birds soared in the windless sky and sang in the trees. I found myself singing, too, as Lacy and I walked out the front door to meet my next-door neighbor Hattie for a walk. After the encounter with Eddie and Gabby yesterday, I felt an irrepressible joy. Lacy picked up on my good mood and danced at the other end of the leash. When we saw Hattie, the fierce beast whined and strained and wiggled with delight.

  I took a break from my singing to whistle at Hattie. “Looking good!” I said to the octogenarian. Hattie, my mother’s best friend for decades, dressed as if going to a wedding even if she were only popping off to the store. On this day she wore a white designer track suit. She never left the house without lipstick or the jewelry that her late husband gave her. Even her walker was adorned with purple streamers to keep it from looking too institutional.

  In contrast, I wore a pair of ripped sweat pants and a tatty hoodie. As for Lacy, she needed a good brushing and had twin drool stalagmites hanging from her jowls.

  Before setting out I checked Hattie’s walker for loose screws as I always did. The ritual appeased her fear that the contraption would fall apart without notice and send her sprawling to the pavement. I had noticed in the year I’d been back in Desert Rock that she had become frailer. But though her body was losing steam with every passing year, her spirit was vigorous, and her mind as sharp as ever.

  We walked for a half hour in the bracing air, the morning sun warming our skin. As usual, Lacy did her best to tangle herself up with Hattie’s walker. Hattie discussed with great forbearance the foibles of our reading group, in which she was the youngest member besides me. They were chronically late to our meetings and acted as though the book under discussion was just a pretense. The real point of the reading group, apparently, was eating the desserts everyone brought. The ladies dissected every walnut and chocolate chip like it was fresh out of Cordon Bleu. Hattie, who had worked as Desert Rock’s librarian for forty years, was driven to distraction by the group’s flagrant disregard for all things literary. I listened to her mild complaints, watched for pot holes and other hazards, and hummed my latest i-Tunes purchase.

  “My,” she said, interrupting her recitation of the reading groups’ faults. “You certainly seem cheerful today.”

  I was a bit put off with how she said it, as if I were usually Eeyore or something. But she was right, I did feel cheerful. “Thank you, Hattie, as a matter of fact, I am feeling pretty darn good. I tol
d you that Eddie was starting things up again with that hideous Gabby Castillo? Well, I just saw them yesterday, and things didn’t look so copacetic. Eddie seems thoroughly disgusted with her, which any normal person would be.”

  Hattie frowned. “I’m surprised at you, Sam. You are happy that Eddie feels bad.”

  Ouch, that didn’t feel good. Hattie had misunderstood. “No, that’s not what I mean. Of course I don’t want Eddie to feel bad.”

  “But you just said he looked upset with Gabby. You suggested that their relationship is falling apart. He must feel sad. You, on the other hand, are happy as a clam.”

  Put that way, I sounded like a selfish jerk. Hattie wasn’t being fair. And it was so unlike her to directly call me out. Her usual style is round-about. I didn’t like her thinking ill of me and set about to defend my position. “Honestly, I don’t want Eddie hurt. But Gabby is awful for him. She hurt him before, and she’s going to hurt him again. I just think it’s better for Eddie to take the hit now, before he’s too far in.”

  Hattie said, “Did I ever tell you about my sister Agnes?”

  Oh no. Hattie was about to embark on one of her allegories. This was more her style than the directness she had used earlier. I was tempted to say, yes, you’ve told me dozens of stories about Agnes, all of which were designed to impart some bit of advice you are too classy to offer up directly. But I loved Hattie, and this was her way, so I just prepared myself to figure out the point of her story even though I was sure I didn’t want to hear the gentle criticism that was coming.

  “When we were growing up, Agnes had a best friend named Mary Beth. They met in the fourth grade and became inseparable. For a while they did everything together, they rode horses, sped around on their bicycles, played badminton. Most of the time Mary Beth came to our house because our mother loved having the house filled with children. Mary Beth became one of our family. She was three years older than me, but after a time she and I began to spend more time together. She loved to sit inside and read books, as I did. Agnes, who would rather be outdoors than curled up in a chair reading stories, began to get jealous. You know how girls can be.”