* * *
MONDAY, OCTOBER 28, 2013
My neck felt better. That’s the only way to describe it, just as simply as that. My parents’ living room had no curtains—the house was set well back from the street—and I woke early with the light.
I was stiff from the lumpy, makeshift bed. My bandages itched. But I had slept unexpectedly well.
I wiggled my toes. Clenched and unclenched my buttocks, shifted my hips. Then, cautiously, I tested my shoulders. They were sore but loose. Finally I shut my eyes, held my breath, and flexed my right wrist.
I had not taken Vicodin since dinner last night. Twelve hours ago.
I felt no pain.
• • •
WILL ZARTMAN HAD left five phone messages in the thirty hours since I’d left the hospital. I wish I could tell you that I found the willpower to delete them without listening, but I did not. Not that they said much. Call me, would you please call me? Each new message sounded less hopeful than the last.
When the phone buzzed again in the late afternoon, I screwed up my courage and answered.
“Hello, Will.”
“Caroline! I’ve left you half a dozen messages.”
“Five, actually.”
“Right. I gather you’re back to never answering your phone.” He sounded uncertain, trying to gauge how mad I was.
“That’s right. I guess two can play that game.” Pretty damn mad, you cowardly, lying turd.
He cleared his throat. “Marshall said the surgery went very well. How are you feeling?”
“Oh, just dandy.”
A moment passed.
“Look, I know I owe you an apology. Make that several apologies. I heard about the break-in. At your house. I feel awful. I shouldn’t have left you. I’m so sor—”
“I drove by your house, Will.”
“My house? When?” There was no mistaking the terror in his voice.
“Don’t worry. I didn’t ring the doorbell.” Pause. “So. How many children do you have?”
Long pause. “Two.”
We didn’t have much to say to each other after that.
Thirty-six
* * *
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 29, 2013
By Tuesday I was up and walking around.
For the first time in days I got dressed. My jeans hung loose on my hips. My belly was taut and flat. Major surgery and an all-liquid diet were apparently good for five pounds. At breakfast I peeled three kiwis and ate them with a soft-boiled egg.
As I chewed, I practiced turning my head to the right, to look out the kitchen window, onto the magnolia tree that dominates the front yard. Then left, in the direction of the stove and sink. Right and left, back and forth. Dr. Gellert had removed the bulkiest bandages yesterday. All that remained was a thin gauze pad, held in place with flesh-colored first-aid tape. The tape pulled at the hairs on the back of my neck. Otherwise I felt no discomfort.
I checked my e-mail. A message from Georgetown University police alerted students and faculty to a reported theft on the ground floor of Lauinger, the undergraduate library. We were reminded not to leave laptops or other personal items unattended on campus. I wondered whether Al had been on duty. Lauinger sat on the main quad, not a hundred yards from his stone police hut. It occurred to me that I needed to return his jackets.
There was also a brief message from Beasley. The bullet had arrived safely back in Atlanta over the weekend. Lab technicians were working on it. He would keep me posted.
As I cleared my dishes, I caught sight of my reflection in the glass door of the microwave oven. I looked nothing like myself. My face was thin, my skin was pale, and my hair had seen better days. When had I last washed it? Friday? I was not supposed to get the stitches wet, not yet, but I was allowed to wash from the chest down. It would be better than nothing.
In the bathroom, I dropped my clothes on the floor and peeled back the gauze pad. Gingerly I raised my hand to touch the back of my neck. The stitches were raised, lumpy knots beneath my fingertips. They would dissolve on their own as the incision healed. The skin on my neck, meanwhile, was numb. I could not feel my fingers pressing down. Dr. Gellert had told me the area might stay numb for weeks, or it might stay numb forever.
I wondered about the arteries in my neck. The muscles. Whether they were shifting by fractions of an inch, filling in the space where the bullet had been. After a minute I sat down on the edge of the bathtub, loosened the straps holding on my wrist brace, and took it off. My right forearm was visibly thinner than my left. The muscles—never impressive to begin with—had shrunk over months of disuse. I picked up the brace, refastened the straps, folded it in half lengthways, and tucked it in the cabinet beneath the sink. I had the feeling I would not be needing it again.
Thirty-seven
* * *
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2013
My house on Q Street smelled heavenly.
I moved back to my own home four days after the operation. By then it was obvious to everyone, even my mother, that I was perfectly capable of caring for myself. In my absence, Martin’s wife, Laura, had let herself in and scoured the place with Windex and Pledge. The table in my kitchen gleamed. She had vacuumed the carpets, scrubbed the windows, even laundered the sheets and made up my bed. The heavenly scent floated up from vases of flowers that she had arranged in every room. Peonies. The dark pink ones, my favorites. Where on earth had Laura found them in October? I resolved to be nicer to my sister-in-law; I would owe her some serious babysitting time for this.
Dad had also been busy. He had hired a locksmith to install new dead bolts on all the doors, and a glazier to fix the basement window. My bedroom door he had replaced himself, adding a sturdy lock that could be opened only from the inside. He presented me with a new ring of keys and two spare sets, adding that he would be back in the morning, both to look in on me and to meet the electrician.
“The electrician?”
“Thought it might be wise to put in floodlights. At your front door, and around the back of the house. I ordered the motion-sensitive kind. Anybody steps within a few feet of the house, it’ll trigger them.”
He looked so worried that I put my arms around his waist and kissed him. “Dad. I’ll be fine now.”
“Call before you go to bed tonight, let us know you’re all right?”
“Promise.”
“And set your burglar alarm.”
I gave a sharp, rueful laugh. “Don’t worry.”
After he left, I made another tour of my house, checking every lock, turning on every light. All was in order. There was no trace of last week’s nightmarish events.
The doorbell rang as I was climbing up to my bedroom to unpack. I froze. Crept back down the stairs and tiptoed to the front door. Through the peephole I could see only the bald top of a man’s head. He was holding something large and shimmery; I couldn’t make out what it was.
Ding dong ding dong.
“Who is it?” I called, my voice squeaking with fear, not sure if I could be heard through the locked door.
“FTD. Delivery.”
“Just leave it on the step.”
“Need your signature, ma’am.”
I coughed loudly. “I’m sick.” Cough. “Contagious. And, um . . . I don’t want the Dobermans to get out.” In addition to my father’s security precautions, I was going to go online tonight and order a bunch of those BEWARE OF GUARD DOG stickers to slap on every window.
I thought I heard the man sigh. He bent down, and then my peephole view was blocked by the shimmery blob. What was that? From the curb came the sound of a car engine starting and pulling away. I waited several seconds, then sneaked into the living room and peeked out the window. No one was on the front step, or anywhere in sight. I yanked the door open to find a huge bouquet of silver balloons, weighted down by a basket stuffed with chocolate. Inside the b
asket was a note:
For Sweet Caroline
Get well soon and then come see us.
Your Devoted Admirer,
Leland Brett
• • •
I WAS SMILING and carrying the balloons into the living room when I noticed a bag tucked in the corner of the hall. A paper shopping bag, the kind with handles, half-filled with mail. Laura must have tidied up everything the postman had pushed through the letter slot this past week.
I dumped the contents on the coffee table. Four catalogs from Pottery Barn, a store where I had never shopped. A coupon for a free entrée on my birthday from Mai Thai, the neighborhood Thai restaurant. Bills from Washington Gas and AT&T. And a thick manila envelope, postmarked Atlanta and mailed five days ago.
I ripped it open. Inside was a handwritten note from Cheral Rooney.
Dear Caroline,
I am writing and hoping this finds you well. I expect you saw my quote in the newspaper, about how much you and S.R. look alike. I enclose the article in case you missed it. I was embarrassed to be interviewed, to tell the truth. My mother always said a lady should only appear in the newspaper three times: when she’s born, when she marries, and when she dies. Times change though.
You asked to see a photo. You said you deserved to know the truth, even the bad parts. I went back and forth on whether to send these to you. Then I decided you are right.
Sincerely,
Cheral
P.S. Your mother loved you very much. Don’t you ever forget it.
From the envelope I shook a crumpled newspaper clipping and several faded photos. These, small and square, had a wide, white border, the way photographs were printed when I was a child. I picked up the first one and studied it. Blinked.
Standing there, with his arm around Sadie Rawson Smith, was a man I recognized.
Thirty-eight
* * *
I had to squint. I’d only met him the one time.
Ethan Sinclare looked young in the photo, but his features were unmistakable.
The second picture showed Sadie Rawson and a young Cheral, posing in profile with matching pregnancy bumps. The third was the original of Boone and Sadie Rawson flipping burgers at a backyard barbecue, the one that ran in the Journal-Constitution in 1979, the one that had brought tears to my eyes two weeks ago, when Jessica Yeo had unearthed it from the archives. It must have been Cheral who provided it to the newspaper in the first place. The last image was blurry and shot from a strange angle, as though the photographer had not wanted to be detected. It showed Sadie Rawson lounging on the sand in a bikini, reading a magazine, her eyes hidden behind huge sunglasses. A few feet away, a deeply tanned man sat watching her. I couldn’t swear to it, but it looked like Sinclare.
I fanned out the four photos, the clipping, and Cheral’s note on the table.
It didn’t make sense.
I fetched a glass of water from the kitchen, then sank back onto the sofa. It took a minute to locate Cheral’s phone number.
“Hey, honey, I’m glad to hear from you. Did you get my—”
“You said Sadie Rawson’s lover was named Tank.”
“He was.”
“But this photo you mailed me . . . I know this man. His name is Ethan Sinclare.”
“I know that, honey. I told you, Tank was his high school nickname. From the football team. It’s what we all called him. I don’t know whether he still goes by it. I’m happy to say I haven’t seen that psychopath in thirty years. But . . .” She stopped. She seemed to have just processed what I had said. “But, Caroline, did you say you know him?”
“He came to my hotel. In Atlanta. The same week I met you.”
She gasped in horror. “Did he try to hurt you?”
“No! He was nice. He bought me breakfast. He actually—I wouldn’t have let him if I’d known—but he picked up the entire bill for my hotel room. Three nights at the St. Regis.”
She grunted. “I didn’t say he was poor. I said he was a damn psychopath.”
“Cheral, you must know that the police checked out Sinclare. It wasn’t him. Couldn’t have been.”
“Sure, sure. Why, because there’s no proof that he and Sades were having an affair? And because he had an ironclad alibi?”
I raised my eyebrows. “Those aren’t trivial points, Cheral.”
“I gave the police that photo of him ogling her on the beach. He was in love with her, it’s totally obvious.”
If she was talking about the picture I now held in my hand, I was not convinced. All it seemed to prove was that he appreciated a woman who could fill out a DD-cup bikini. If every man who fit that description was a killer, I was in trouble.
“The whole alibi thing . . . I don’t know how he pulled that off,” she admitted.
“What was his alibi, anyway?”
“He said he was with a client all day. You know he’s a prominent lawyer here? At one of the big Atlanta firms?”
“Yes. He told me that.”
“God, I can’t believe you spoke to Tank. That arrogant, lying pig,” spat Cheral. She took a moment to collect herself. “Anyway, his story was that he was in his office downtown, with a client, at the time the murders were committed. The client backed him up. It was . . . What was his name? A banker or something. Some sort of businessman.”
“So, your theory . . . your theory is that they were both lying? Sinclare, and his banker client, too?”
“I don’t know. I just know—I know this, Caroline—it was Tank Sinclare that killed your mama and daddy.”
Beamer Beasley was right. Cheral’s theories sounded harebrained. They wouldn’t stand up in court for five minutes. Certainly not against a silver-haired, silver-tongued attorney such as the man she was accusing.
So why was I now sitting here, turning things over in my head, going back over every word I had exchanged over scrambled eggs and sriracha sauce with Ethan Sinclare?
• • •
“I’M NOT SURE how this changes anything,” said Beamer Beasley, when I tracked him down buying waffle fries at a Chick-fil-A on Howell Mill Road. “I mean, I know your mama’s ex-neighbor thinks Ethan Sinclare did it. She’s been yammering on about it for thirty-four years.”
“I really wish you had told me that,” I complained. “All you said was that Sadie Rawson might have had an affair. You never mentioned his name.”
“You never asked,” he barked down the phone line. “Last thing I want to do is drag a respectable man’s name through the mud, drag him into Ms. Rooney’s loony conspiracy theories. Ethan and Betsy Sinclare are well regarded here. He’s on the board of directors of the Alliance Theatre, and the Atlanta Botanical Garden. He organizes an annual golf tournament to benefit veterans, for God’s sake. He said he didn’t do it. He has an alibi. We checked it out. There is nothing to indicate he was at the Smiths’ house that day. End of story. Frankly, he was probably out of your mama’s league.”
I bridled at this last comment, but held my tongue. “Was he one of the suspects who had a gun?” I demanded instead.
“Was he what?”
“Last week, you told me that back in 1979 you questioned two suspects who owned guns. Was Ethan Sinclare one of the two?”
“Ms. Cashion.” Beasley sounded weary.
“Call me Caroline, for Pete’s sake.”
“With your permission, I’ll stick with Cashion. Police protocol. To do with respect and professional distance and all that. And to answer your question—”
“Doesn’t matter. I think I already know the answer. Do me a favor, though? Check where Sinclare was last Wednesday night. The night my house got broken into.”
Thirty-nine
* * *
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 31, 2013
My mother arrived before nine, bearing lasagna. Two deep pans of it, one sausage and one spinach.
What I was in fact craving for breakfast was a croissant jambon fromage from Pâtisserie Poupon. If I’d known she was driving over, I would have asked her to pick one up on her way.
I wouldn’t have said no to a Vicodin, either. I now regretted having told Dr. Gellert not to bother refilling my painkiller prescription. Last night I had tossed and turned in bed, feeling as though a thousand tiny needles were stabbing my neck. I decided to view this not as a setback, but as a positive development: the numbness must be receding. My skin and nerves were knitting back together. Still. This morning I was tired and sore.
I was also worried. The photos of Ethan Sinclare were unsettling. During the night, as I’d writhed around on my mattress trying to escape the needle-knives, I had homed in on the weirdest part of my breakfast with him. He had denied knowing Sadie Rawson well. He had presented himself as a tennis buddy, closer to Boone. But Cheral Rooney had told me that Ethan and his wife socialized with my birth parents. Even if Cheral was flat wrong about there having been an affair, even if she was loony, as Beasley seemed to think, I’d seen the beach photo myself. Sadie Rawson resplendent in a bikini. There isn’t a beach within a hundred miles of Atlanta; at the very least they’d all taken a weekend trip to the coast together. Why had Sinclare lied?
With supreme effort I put a smile on my face. Mom was burrowed into my freezer, trying to clear space for one of her lasagnas.
“Your freezer’s packed to the gills,” she muttered. “What is all this stuff?”
“Here. Let me help.” I squeezed past her and started rearranging Tupperware tubs of chicken soup.
Mom stood watching. All of a sudden, she squealed. “You’re using your right hand!”
I looked down in surprise. It was true. I was throwing frozen soup blocks around as though it caused me no trouble at all. Tentatively, I stretched my right arm straight and rotated my wrist in a full circle clockwise. Then counterclockwise. I hadn’t been able to do that for more than a year.
The Bullet Page 20
