by LS Hawker
Brady’s town house was nicer than she would have imagined. Although selling keys to criminals on the side probably helped.
She pounded on the door, praying that he was home. He was, and he opened the door shirtless with a bottle of Pepsi in his hand. When he saw Nessa, the look of happy anticipation drained away from his face.
“Mrs. Donati,” he said, clearly terrified that she’d changed her mind and was going to turn him in.
“Brady, I need to ask you a question.”
“What is it? I haven’t sold any more keys, I swear.”
“No,” she said. “It’s not that. I’m going to show you a photo of my husband, and I want you to tell me whether he’s the man you sold the key to. All right? Can you do that for me?”
Brady looked wary, as if she was setting some sort of trap for him. “I guess,” he said, hunching his shoulders and crossing his arms to shove his hands into his armpits.
She pulled up a photo on her phone of John with Daltrey on his shoulders, but the light was good and you could clearly identify his features.
Brady took the phone from her hand and scrutinized it. “This is your husband?”
“Yes.”
“That’s not the guy.”
A shrill of terror bloomed in her gut. “You’re sure?”
“Definitely. That’s not the guy. The guy I talked to had a beard.”
“Well, picture this guy with a beard. What do you think now?”
Brady shook his head. “Still not him. Definitely not. His coloring’s all wrong. This guy has brown eyes, right? The guy who bought your keys had darker hair and he had . . . different eyes. Weird eyes.”
“Weird how?”
“I don’t know. Just weird.”
That was the same word Allen the drug dealer had used.
“Is there anything else you can tell me about the guy?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Thank you, Brady. Sorry to have bothered you.”
He closed the door and Nessa shivered, even though it was in the low nineties. She drove home and made a list of everything that needed to be done. She decided not to tell her in-laws about John until they returned with Daltrey. This was news better given in person. She then spent the day trimming and tending to the hops vines. She’d been following the advice on a hops-growing website she’d found, and they seemed to be doing well. It did her good to work outdoors, which she did until late afternoon, and she found her thoughts straying to Marlon all day long, thoughts she kept batting away. It was probably quite normal after a spouse’s death to obsess about the first semi-suitable mate that crossed your vision.
But that wasn’t fair. Marlon wasn’t just some guy. She knew him, she respected him. She trusted him.
Her phone rang, a number she didn’t recognize, and she let it go to voicemail. Then she listened to it.
“Mrs. Donati, this is Shanae Klerkse from Child Protective Services calling to make an appointment to interview Daltrey. Please call me back at your earliest convenience. Thank you, and have a nice day.”
That could definitely wait.
About five, her phone dinged with a text from Isabeau.
Consider this my two weeks’ notice. However, I will stay on until you find a replacement because I’d never leave that poor little boy alone.
What the actual hell? Nessa texted back, What’s going on? Is something wrong?
No reply.
Nessa resent hers. Still no answer, even fifteen minutes later. So she called Isabeau’s phone but it went straight to voicemail.
“Isabeau, it’s Nessa. Can we talk about this? I’m worried that something has happened. Can you please let me know? Please. Oh, and by the way, Detective Dirksen came by to let me know they think they’ve found John in Tuttle.”
Nessa was sure that last bit would pique Isabeau’s interest enough to call and find out the details.
But it didn’t. There was no return call.
It was an awfully strange coincidence that the only two people semi-close to her had been turned against her in less than twenty-four hours. And there was only one person Nessa had accidentally told about Marlon’s suicide attempt.
But Isabeau idolized Marlon. Didn’t she? How well did Nessa really know her?
Goose bumps covered her skin.
But what had she done to Isabeau to anger her so much? Was there some connection between the two of them that she was unaware of?
Had Isabeau called the student newspaper?
Seething, infuriated, Nessa called Isabeau’s number again, and as she expected, it went to voicemail again.
“Hey, Isabeau, you lying sack of shit,” Nessa said. “Just so you know, I know why you’re quitting. It’s because your work here is done. It’s because you’re the fucking troll. You called the K-State student paper and told them about Marlon’s suicide attempt. I know it’s you, because you’re the only one I’ve ever said anything about it to. I don’t know what we did to make you want to destroy us, but I’m on to you. And I’m going to the police.” She hung up and waited.
Immediately her phone rang.
“I’d never do anything to hurt Marlon,” Isabeau yelled into the phone.
“Well, you did,” Nessa said.
“I didn’t call the paper, for God’s sake. I’m not the troll. You are. You set this whole thing up to get attention. You killed your husband because he was a pain in your ass. You emailed my dad’s best friend’s wife, you bitch.”
Nessa was speechless. For a moment, she didn’t know what Isabeau was talking about, but then she thought back to their heart-to-heart talk on Saturday night. Which was the same night she’d let the information about Marlon’s suicide attempt slip.
The same night.
“Wait a minute,” Nessa said, her brain buzzing as if she were receiving an incoming transmission.
“I’m hanging up now,” Isabeau said.
“I think . . . hold on. Please just hold on for a minute.”
She looked up at the sky, listened to the insects droning, and it morphed into a cacophony of electronic static.
“Isabeau. The troll has bugged the house.”
“Oh, of course he has,” Isabeau said, sarcasm dripping from every word. “Because you’re so important that—”
“Just listen! We talked about both of those things on Saturday night. In the living room. Remember? Your affair and Marlon’s suicide attempt.”
Silence on the line.
“Isabeau?”
“Yeah, I’m here,” she said, her voice empty of the earlier venom. “But—wait. Is there anything else that’s come out that might have only been mentioned in the house?”
“Let me think,” Nessa said, looking out over the hops vines. It came to her almost immediately. “Remember when you found the Facebook and Twitter accounts, and how on one of them, the troll said that Daltrey didn’t speak because of vaccines?”
“Yeah.”
“I’ve never mentioned that in my blog, that Daltrey hasn’t started speaking yet. I’ve never talked about it on the radio either, because . . .” Because she wasn’t her mother, using her children to get attention, to try to become famous, to get sympathy. “I’ve never mentioned those things.”
“When was that?” Isabeau said. “What day was it that the troll made that comment?”
“I’ll look it up.” But this wasn’t really the issue at hand. Not really. It was the fragile, delicate trust she’d given and received with Isabeau, and she had to rescue it. “But—you really thought I’d get in touch with that wife and rat you out? Did you really believe that?”
“Well,” Isabeau said slowly. “You were the only one I’d told. I was so shocked to get that email after all this time, and I’d just talked to you about it a few days ago.”
“I want you to know that I would never betray you. You’re—” Nessa gulped, but forced herself to go on. “You’re the best friend I’ve had since I was a teenager.”
There was a beat of silence as Nessa’s heart lay naked and quivering on the ground, unprotected, exposed. What would Isabeau do with it?
“Wow, Nessa,” Isabeau finally said. “That means a lot, coming from you. You’ve become one of my best friends too. I really mean that. I know it’s hard for you to let people get close to you.”
“Thank you, Isabeau,” she said, her eyes tearing up.
“I’ll be home tomorrow.”
“See you then.”
After Nessa clicked off, she went back into the house. It felt different to her, as if her sanctuary, the house itself, was listening, digesting her for the nourishment of the troll. She tiptoed into the living room, and then realized how ridiculous she was being. No one would care how hard her feet hit the floor when she walked.
She looked around the room, trying to imagine where a person might hide a bug, and what would it look like? She’d seen them in movies but didn’t know how accurate her vision of such a thing would be.
She started with the bookcase, pulling each book off one by one, looking inside front and back, riffling the pages. She felt along the surfaces of the bookcase. Felt and looked underneath. Scrutinized each knickknack. Tipped over the floor lamp and looked at the bottom of it. Turned over the wing chair. Pulled out the cushions. She repeated this process with everything in the room, methodically looking over every surface.
And then she came to the coffee table, which she cleared off and looked beneath it. Stuck to the underside was a one-by-one-inch flat black square. She stared at it, her nerves on fire. If she touched it, would the troll know?
Nessa sat back on her heels and thought. Then she pulled out her phone and snapped a photo, which she attached to a text message that said, I found this on the underside of my coffee table. Is it a bug?
She waited, staring at her phone, watching the dancing dots that signaled Mac was texting her back.
Yes. Attach portable speakers to your phone and turn on some loud music. Then get a knife and remove it carefully. Bring it to our house, keeping the music with you and loud. You’ll lose the signal from the transmitter about ten yards from your house. We’ll worry about finding the transmitter later.
Nessa was almost overcome with the desire to start whispering obscenities into the device, to assault the ears and guts of the asshole listening in. She fetched her speakers and plugged them into her phone, then cranked “Fuck You” by Cee Lo Green, hoping the sheer volume of the song left the listeners’ ears bleeding. She left it playing near the bug, went to the kitchen and got a knife, then returned and eased the blade beneath the edge of the bug. It popped off into her left palm. She set the knife down, then picked up the speakers and her phone with her right hand and went out the back door.
Nessa estimated that the garage was about twenty yards from the house, but she kept the music going as she set the bug on the passenger seat and started up the Pacifica.
And then something insane happened. Green’s jubilant bravado and the tune’s funky groove infused her with a defiant, carefree joy that transcended this shitstorm she called her life. A joy she hadn’t felt in many months outside of her son’s presence. She drove under the shield of this joy all the way to her neighbors’ house with the windows down, the heat and humidity and smells of the woods and the fields filling her senses.
Just for this moment, she was in control. She was acting instead of reacting. Just for this moment.
She pulled up to Mac and Lauren’s house and turned off the music, and she had to calm herself down so she wouldn’t look like a complete wack-job. Ziggy and Tosh were jumping on the hosed-down trampoline, their shorts and dreadlocks dripping.
“Hi, Nessa,” they both called as she got out of the car.
Nessa just waved, even though she assumed that the bug was no longer transmitting. Better not to take chances.
Mac came out of the back door. He beckoned her to the Adirondack chairs and held out his hand. She put the black plastic square in it.
“Wow,” Mac said. “I’ve never seen one like this before.” He turned it over. “I’ll take it apart and see if it has a SIM card. The bug might be tied to a cell phone number, in which case, we can find your troll, or at least his cell phone number. Then maybe the cops can track him through his phone.” He looked up at Nessa. “Are you all right?”
“If you can figure all that stuff out,” Nessa said, “I will be.”
Thursday, June 30
NESSA SPENT THE endless day working on her computer, waiting for Daltrey and Isabeau to reappear. At three P.M., she heard tires crunching dirt and gravel outside and looked out the window. It was Linda and Tony, right on time.
She ran outside and saw that Daltrey was dead asleep in his car seat. Then she remembered what she had to tell her in-laws.
Nessa stuck her head in the driver’s side window and told Tony to keep the car running so Daltrey could keep napping because she had something to tell them.
Tony paled as he got out of the car. She hugged them both and broke the news about the body in the lake. Tony cried, of course, and Linda even teared up.
“It’s going to be a couple of weeks before they can determine if it’s John,” Nessa said. “So I know this is hard, but if you want to start thinking about arrangements, I think we should have the memorial in Russell, don’t you?”
The grateful expressions on their faces broke Nessa’s heart. They hugged her again.
“I’m so sorry,” Nessa said, and cried. “I tried to keep him clean, I just—”
“It’s not your fault,” Linda said, smoothing Nessa’s hair.
“Do you want to come in?” Nessa said.
“No,” Tony said. “We want to get home before dark. Would you call us when you find out . . . anything?”
“Yes,” Nessa said, then got Daltrey out of the car. He opened his sleepy eyes and grinned at her.
“Hi, baby, how are you?” she asked.
He signed “Fine,” and Linda sighed.
“I tried,” she said.
“It’s okay, Grandma,” Nessa said. “Thank you for everything.”
Tony wrestled the car seat out of the car and deposited Daltrey’s little suitcase on the ground. They got back in the car and drove away.
“I missed you so much,” Nessa said. “Did you miss me?”
He nodded energetically.
“Are you hungry?” she said.
He shook his head and squirmed to get out of her arms. She put him down and he ran to all the outbuildings, touching each one. He stopped at the hops vines and pointed before coming back to her.
They went inside and Isabeau drove up half an hour later. The joyous reunion between Daltrey and Isabeau did Nessa’s heart good. Then Isabeau threw her arms around Nessa. She talked about her camping trip to Waconda Springs and said they should take Daltrey there before the end of the summer, because he would love it.
The three of them watched a Disney movie until Daltrey’s bedtime, and then Nessa tucked him in. “See you tomorrow, sweetie,” she said.
He signed “Good night.”
Downstairs in the living room, Nessa beckoned to Isabeau to join her out back.
“I don’t want to talk about this inside in case there’s another bug in there,” Nessa said. They sat on the deck chairs.
“So what did you find out?” Isabeau said.
“First tell me what happened with your dad’s best friend.”
“Well,” Isabeau said, “they ain’t best friends no more. Dad punched him in the nose.”
Nessa actually laughed.
“Yeah. My folks are pissed. They’re trying to talk me into pressing charges against him, but
I don’t know.”
“You should consider it,” Nessa said.
“Okay. I will. So what did you find out?”
They discussed the body in the lake and what it could mean. Nessa told her about her exchange with the locksmith, saying it wasn’t John who bought the keys, and about the bug—that Mac was taking it apart to see if he could figure out who it belonged to.
“Wow,” Isabeau said. “That is so messed up.”
“I know.”
Nessa looked at the clock on her phone, dropped it into her purse, and stood. “I’ve got to go,” she said. “But I’m really glad you’re home. And that you’re not quitting.”
Isabeau smiled.
NESSA DROVE UP to the dark station parking lot and killed the engine. Otto’s Vespa was parked there.
It was a starry night, and Nessa threw her head back to take in the constellations, Cee Lo Green’s voice growling in her head, and she smiled. The wind blew hot and steady across the field.
She used her key to get into the station, which was dark—just how Otto liked it. Her phone pinged as she relocked the front door from inside. She pulled her phone from her purse and looked at it.
Got the phone number from the SIM card, the text said, and for a minute she didn’t know what that meant until she saw it was from Mac. Another text followed it, displaying a phone number. She didn’t recognize it, but she didn’t recognize a lot of phone numbers. On a whim, she decided to call it. If it was John’s final phone number, maybe she would hear his voice on the voicemail.
The satellite feed was playing the indie-alternative station. Nessa opened the on-air studio door, and there sat Otto in front of the glowing board and computer monitors.
She tapped the number and pressed her phone to her ear.
Over Robbie Robertson’s “Somewhere Down the Crazy River,” she heard—was it an accordion? What the hell? An accordion playing “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” She started to laugh, as Otto turned toward her and pulled his own phone out of his pocket.
