by Kate Moretti
“That’s my daughter and my ex. They live in Jersey, and I, uh, well, had some alcohol issues back then. I see her sometimes, but not as much as I’d like.” He tapped the frame. “I’m working on it.” As an afterthought, he added. “That’s her mother.” His voice, as well as his expression, remained unreadable.
Bridget was shocked. She’d never known Tripp to be anything other than a bachelor, but then again, she hadn’t known him a decade ago. She didn’t ask if they’d been married, but it pulled at her. She wanted to know.
A tall, thin man in khakis and a dress shirt came out of a conference room in the back and walked purposefully toward them.
“Hey, Tim. This is Bridget Peterson. Bridget, this is Detective Tim Harper.” They shook hands; his grip was firm but quick. Tripp explained to Bridget that Detective Harper was investigating Nate’s case. Harper led them back to the room he’d emerged from and motioned for them to sit around an oval conference table. He turned the blinds closed and the effect was immediate. The room felt like a closet.
“Bridget, what seems to be the issue?”
“I had a concern over the whereabouts of Lucia Hamm.” She pushed at a ridge in the table with her fingernail. “I’m confused about one thing, though. Is Nate being investigated in a criminal case? I was under the impression that Lucia being eighteen would eliminate any criminal wrongdoing.” She treaded carefully, playing dumb.
Detective Harper leaned back, folding his hands over his midsection. “Well, I can’t outright comment on an ongoing investigation, but in Pennsylvania it is a violation of the penal code to abuse authority given to a teacher at a public institution. It’s called institutional sexual assault.”
“So Nate could go to jail?”
“I can’t say that, Mrs. Peterson. I can only say the investigation is ongoing.”
Tripp shifted in his chair. Bridget wondered how everyone had known about this. It hadn’t been in the paper. She thought of Dale, his nose twitching, almost gleeful over the word rape.
Detective Harper opened his laptop and eyed her over his bifocals. “You want to fill out a missing-persons report?”
“Yes. I think so. She has a history of running away, so it might be all for nothing.” Bridget held her purse in her lap and realized she was gripping the strap, white-knuckled.
“It’s okay, just tell me everything you know or think you know and we’ll decide what to do with the information from there.” The detective furrowed his brow, staring at the screen, and pecked a few keys. “We have to do everything electronically now; you can ask Officer Harris here how much that delights me.” He gave a wan little smile and Bridget tried to smile back. He hit a key and then turned to Bridget. “Go on.”
Bridget told him about Lucia, the things she’d heard at school, the love note, her home life. She told him about the fight in the hallway, the burning paper, the coiling smoke, the way no one but Bridget seemed to believe her. Then again, no one but Bridget seemed to believe Nate, either, but Bridget didn’t mention that to the detective. And she definitely did not tell Detective Harper about the kiss; in fact, didn’t bring up Nate at all. She told him of the first time Lucia ran away, her campsite at the paper mill. She was careful only to include things she’d seen firsthand.
He quietly typed while she talked, asking few questions. When she was done, he gave her a look. “Do you think this has anything to do with Nate Winters?”
“No. I don’t know. I don’t think so. I just know that someone should be looking for her. Or at least care that she’s missing.”
“But have you seen Mr. Winters today?”
“No. Why would I?”
“It was just a question, Ms. Peterson.” He smiled, thin without teeth. “Did you report to the school that you believed Ms. Hamm to be missing?”
“I asked the principal. The secretary. The problem is no one knows how to get in touch with her. Her father’s cell phone is the only one on file and Jimmy’s, well, he’s gone.” She pushed her palms down on her knees. “I went to Tripp’s house to see if he thought I should come to you?” It accidentally came out like a question.
“I see. And neither of you has seen Mr. Winters today, despite him staying with you, Officer Harris?”
Tripp shrugged. “I, uh, actually haven’t really talked with him in a few days, but I’ve been taking all Ratzen’s shifts while he’s away, you know that. I see him when I come home in the morning. He’s still asleep on the couch. The past few days, I wake up, I go back to work. By the afternoon, he’s usually gone. Today, Bridget was knocking on the door and he was gone.”
“Where does he go?”
“I don’t know. I guess the gym. We’ve had a few text conversations, there’s leftovers in the fridge, or whatever.” Tripp rubbed his hands together.
Detective Harper gave a hmmmm and typed a few things on the computer. The clock behind Bridget’s head clicked with the seconds and the silence stretched out, long and thin, and Bridget felt her lungs tighten.
“And you last saw Lucia Hamm when, Mrs. Peterson?” Harper had already asked her this, but Bridget answered again.
“Friday. The argument in the hallway when someone set a paper in her hand on fire.”
“You said Riana Yardley, correct?”
“That’s who the fight was with, yes. Riana claims it caught fire . . . by itself.”
Detective Harper raised his eyebrows and shook his head, mumbled teenagers. Bridget wanted to grip his forearm. These weren’t fifteen-, sixteen-year-olds. They were seventeen, many eighteen. Looking toward the horizon of freedom, Mt. Oanoke already behind them, nipping at their heels. They weren’t looking back. Which is why none of the venom against Lucia made sense. In a matter of mere weeks, they could all choose to never see her, think of her again.
Then again, Bridget had experienced firsthand Lucia’s personal brand of strangeness, the way she could needle a person, get under their skin. But then she heard Taylor’s voice, Sometimes I think it’s all she has. Bridget wondered if Taylor was right, that fear and hate were at least better than apathy.
“Well, Ms. Peterson, Officer Harris, we’ll look for her. Look into it, go to her house. She’s eighteen, so she’s free to drop out of school and leave town. But considering the allegations at the moment, this will be taken seriously, I can assure you.”
That didn’t make Bridget feel any better. It seemed like she was choosing Lucia’s safety over the appearance of Nate’s innocence, which was never her intention. It seemed as though she was being dismissed.
She stayed, stuck to the chair. Waiting, wanting to say something else.
“We’ll call you if we need anything else,” Detective Harper said finally. Tripp guided Bridget out, through the maze of cubicles.
As they were leaving, Detective Harper said something to Tripp, which sounded like, it’ll come together.
They climbed into Tripp’s truck in the parking lot, and Tripp put the keys in the ignition and didn’t turn the engine over. His hand rested on his knee, flexing and unfurling his fingers, and Bridget watched them. His knee was wide, and even through the denim she could see the thick rope of muscle in his thigh, his knuckles digging into it. She watched his face. He looked at her, his eyes big, his face stricken.
“I have to tell you something, Bridge. I couldn’t have said it before, I guess.” He shifted up on his thigh a bit to look at her. “I’m in a spot, though. It’s kind of terrible.”
“I don’t understand.” Bridget said.
“You know how I said I’ve been working doubles all week?”
Bridget nodded.
“Monday night, the desk clerk fielded a call from Nate. He said he was on Route Six and he saw Lucia. And she ran into the woods.”
“Wait.” Bridget shook her head, to clear it. “Nate saw her? Why wouldn’t you tell me this? I never would have gone to the police.” She pressed her back up against the window, the door of the truck, the anger quick and hot beneath her breastbone.
�
�Bridget,” Tripp raked a hand through his hair. “I am the police. You came to me. I had to let you report a missing person. I couldn’t tell you what was already being investigated.”
“You set me up,” Bridget accused.
“There’s no setup. I couldn’t tell you what was going on until you talked to the detective. I could lose my job. I’m trying to do the right things here, but this is . . . complicated.” Tripp scrubbed at his cheek, the stubble making a scratching sound. “I’ve barely even seen Nate, talked to Nate. I’m working so much and when I get home, he’s gone.”
“You’re saying that everyone knows that Lucia is missing already?” she asked, her voice sounding far away, underwater.
“No, not really. The call was suspicious, they called him back a few times but he didn’t answer. Eventually they sent a squad car out but didn’t find anything. They checked attendance records and she had been in school on Monday. She was out on Tuesday, but that’s not really a crime. So until now, there wasn’t much to investigate. Does that make sense?”
“Until me, you mean.”
“We just know that according to your timetable,” Tripp’s mouth slacked, his voice slow and sluggish. “Nate was the last person to see her.”
CHAPTER 23
Alecia, Thursday, May 7, 2015
In another life, Alecia cared about Thursdays. On Thursdays, there used to be happy hours and late nights over Jack and Cokes, cigarettes and boozy, furtive whisperings while her coworker stole kisses from the guy in Content Management, you know the blond one with the cute mole-slash-beauty mark? Followed by slightly embarrassing Friday mornings and furtive, giggling conversations in the ladies’ room until it was Thursday night and time to do it all over again, either with the same guy or a different guy, it didn’t matter either way. They were young then.
But now, Mondays looked like Thursdays looked like Wednesdays, the only difference between them being what was scheduled for Gabe that day. So sometimes Alecia forgot the days of the week altogether. When the doorbell rang on Thursday and it was Vi, Nate’s mom, she didn’t think twice about it. She didn’t think about how Vi should be working—she was a receptionist at a dental office and worked every day, despite her sixty-four years, because the paper mill killed Bob Winters. Just keeled over one day at work; it was the fumes, she’d said to anyone who would listen. Even now, if you got her going, she’d tell you. She had to work, she should have been going into the prime of her life but the mill killed Bob and she had to work.
Had Alecia stopped to really think about it, she would have realized that Vi had a reason for showing up at 9 a.m. on a Thursday.
Violet Winters had been aptly named: in the face of any hardship, she shrank. She wasn’t the kind of person to “make a fuss” and waved off even the biggest inconveniences. She had one son, one child, her light and golden life.
“Where’s Nate?” Vi asked, standing in the hallway, clutching her purse to her chest. She wore scrubs and nursing clogs, even though all she ever did was answer the phone.
Alecia waved her hand toward the door. “He’s out, Vi. Hold on, I’ll get Gabe. He’ll be happy to see you.” Which wasn’t really true; Gabe was only ever over-the-moon happy to see one person.
“I came to talk to you.”
Alecia had no idea what Vi knew, but it hadn’t quite been a week since the paper published Nate’s story and only a few days since Nate was “put on leave,” so Alecia didn’t consider it her responsibility to call her mother-in-law and tell her that her son was sleeping with his student and might be fired. She slotted that in her husband’s column of responsibility and moved on with her day. But here Vi stood, worried and uncertain, and somehow this, too, had become her job.
“Oh.” Alecia turned and walked away from her. “In that case, I’ll make tea.”
Alecia really only drank tea around two people: Vi (Lipton) and Bridget (loose-leaf herbal blends that Bridget invented). She boiled the pot and let it whistle, and meanwhile called for Gabe again. He was in his room, oddly quiet, and Alecia was just so tired that she’d sat on the couch maybe a half hour ago and hadn’t even gotten up to check on him, even though a half hour is way too long to leave Gabe unchecked.
Vi followed her, her footsteps small and silent.
“How are you holding up?” Vi finally asked, and Alecia felt relieved that she wouldn’t have to play detective to figure out what Vi knew.
“Oh you know. Just fine and dandy. I mean it’s a fairly common event when a gal finds out her husband has been sleeping with a student.” Alecia yanked open the refrigerator door and poured milk into a crystal creamer. When she shut the door with her foot, she could see Vi’s face, the way her eyes had widened, horrified, or her mouth hung open, then closed, then open again. Her shoulders had slacked and she leaned against a chair.
“You can’t . . . believe her, can you?” Vi shook her head, but her voice shook, and Alecia almost laughed.
“Of course I can. You can’t believe him can you?” Alecia said this even as she felt the prick of doubt, the same one she’d been feeling for a week now, even when her mouth was insisting Nate was guilty, to Bridget, now to Vi, a few small cells in her brain were shouting with protest. It was a dissonance she couldn’t reconcile, and it was enough to drive her crazy. She’d been wanting someone to prove her wrong, to show her with hard evidence that Nate could not have done these things. But so far, no one had.
Of course Vi would believe her son. Of course she would have gotten the story from him. She looked wildly around the kitchen, craned her thin, veiny neck toward the living room, and Alecia realized that Nate had told her part of the truth, but not the whole truth. Not the part where he wasn’t living here.
Vi patted her blond hair, a round bowl cut that looked like a helmet, her short, squared fingernails flittering. “He’s my son. Of course I believe him. He’s always been this way, sticking his neck out for people that don’t deserve it.”
Alecia gasped, thinking at first that Vi meant her, but realizing too late that Vi meant her—Lucia what’s-her-name, the sexy weirdo.
“Vi, I can assure you that Nate enjoyed this particular charity act, whatever it was.” She busied herself gathering sugar and spoons and set them up on the kitchen island. All this civility over such an ugly conversation that Alecia had run out of patience for.
“Alecia!” Her lip trembled and her eyes, limned in red, twitched. Alecia realized then how fragile Vi looked, how pale, how shaky.
“Vi, I’m sorry . . .” Although she wasn’t really sorry at all. Alecia squared her shoulders, and with her palms on the cold Formica countertop, said, “If you want to find Nate, he’s probably at Tripp Harris’s house. Remember Tripp? The Mt. Oanoke cop? He’s staying there for a while.”
“You kicked him out? Now? He needs you, Alecia. He needs you to believe him. He told me that; he cried.”
“I believe he cried to you, Vi. I really do believe that.” Alecia stirred her tea, blew across the top to cool it, but Vi remained standing, unmoved.
“He didn’t tell me he moved out. He just told me what the papers were saying, what that slut”—Vi spit the word out, her eyes pinched shut at the violence of it—“was saying. She’s lying. You have to realize that.” Her voice was edging louder, maybe the loudest Alecia had ever heard it in her and Nate’s eight years of marriage.
“Violet, listen to me. Your son might not be guilty of everything they’re accusing him of, but he’s guilty of some of it. I cannot figure out which parts of his stories are true when he is here in this house. Do you understand? I’ve found credit card statements and Instagram posts and evidence that something was going on, but I can’t be alone with my thoughts, my own brain, with him rattling around here pleading his own case twenty-four-seven. Until I know more, he’s out. He’s staying with Tripp and we can talk in a few weeks when I’ve got my own head on straight. I have a son with special needs who demands my attention fourteen out of twenty-four hours a day. He comes first.”
“That’s the trouble, though, with you and Nate,” said Violet. “Nate has never come first. Not since Gabe was born. Not one day since he was born.” She pointed her finger at Alecia’s chest, her mouth pinched, angry. “You can’t forsake your own marriage.”
“He is your grandson. He is not like other boys. He needs more than most kids. He needs his mother—”
“He needs his parents to be married! You are sacrificing your marriage to your child! Can’t you see that, Alecia?” Big, fat tears dripped down her cheek, her chin trembling. “You are sacrificing my boy for your boy.”
“Your boy is a liar. And maybe an adulterer. And maybe, in the state of Pennsylvania, a criminal.” Alecia shouted this last part and felt immediate regret. Violet wilted, her fingertips gripping the countertop. It was too much confrontation, a wintery blast of reality on her velvety cheeks.
A crash, followed by a piercing wail came from upstairs. A second later, the doorbell rang, a long and insistent tone, followed by a sharp rap on the glass pane.
“What the hell?” Alecia put her hand to her forehead, just for a second to calm her buzzing brain. “Violet can you get the door, I have to see what happened to Gabe.” The crying had stopped but Alecia hurried past her.
Violet moved through the kitchen, the living room, and the front hall, hot on Alecia’s heels. Alecia was halfway up the steps when Violet said, “Oh dear God, Alecia.” And the tone in her voice stopped Alecia cold on the seventh step. She turned around and Violet’s face was even paler, had that been possible.
Her mouth seemed not to move when she said, “It’s the police.”
• • •
For whatever reason, Gabe had been trying to align his toy construction vehicles along the top of the window molding. He’d balanced himself between the desk and the metal radiator in Alecia’s bedroom and it was a wonder he didn’t crack his head open when he fell. She calmed him, kissed his cheeks, and led him back downstairs.
