The Double Wedding Ring

by Clare O'Donohue

  I hadn’t been back to the city since I packed up my apartment and moved to Archers Rest. I was kind of excited by the idea of revisiting my old hometown, so I went early. Only instead of getting on the subway to Anna’s home in Queens, I planned to walk out of Grand Central and head south.

  “Well, Nell, isn’t it wonderful to see you here.” Bob Marshall sat opposite me just as the train pulled out of the Archers Rest station.

  “It’s a half-empty train,” I said. “Maybe you could find another seat.”

  “No. I’m comfortable here.”

  I got up, and he grabbed my wrist. “Can you—” I started.

  “Sit down, Nell. Talk to me. What can happen to you on a train?”

  As a fan of Agatha Christie and Alfred Hitchcock, I knew the answer was “plenty,” but I sat anyway. “I know about your criminal history, and I know that you were kicked off the force,” I said. “If you’re trying to get me to believe you’re the good guy and I should be suspicious of Jesse, you’re wasting your time.”

  “Fair enough, but I am a good guy. Maybe not by Jesse’s standards, but I’m not interested in causing you any harm.”

  “What exactly do you want?”

  “Your help. I could tell at the shop the other day that you like to help.”

  “What do you need?”

  He narrowed his eyes. “What do you think?”

  “I know about the five hundred thousand dollars that went missing from the drug dealer’s house. If you’re looking for that I can’t help you.” I watched him. He was studying me, thinking, trying to come up with a way to get me over to his side. It wasn’t likely. “If you want my help, I’d like it if you didn’t deny that you’re involved with the money.”

  “You’re a smart lady, Nell, so I won’t insult you by pretending I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He smiled. “But do you mind if I wait two years to say it?”

  “What’s two years?” The words came out of my mouth as it dawned on me. “Statute of limitations will be up.”

  He smiled again. This time wider.

  “And then, assuming you have the money, you can spend the money as you please without caring if anyone knows or not.”

  “I believe that’s the way it’s done.”

  “But you don’t have the money, or else you would never have followed Roger up to Archers Rest.”

  He looked at me, enjoying his game a little more than made me comfortable. “There were other reasons. The scenery is lovely and I did get my sister a nice gift.”

  “By the way, how closely did you follow Roger?”

  “Not as close as his killer, obviously.”

  “Was Roger the other officer in the house on the day of the drug bust?” I asked. “The one who backed up your story about no money being found?”

  “Roger was the other officer, yes.”

  “So you stole it together.”

  He shrugged.

  “The third officer, Findlay, swore there was five hundred thousand missing, but the police believed Roger. Why did Roger’s word carry so much weight?”

  “You never met the man,” he said. “Roger was the best cop, the most by-the-book cop I ever knew. If he said something was true, it was true. And he was a nice guy. Unlike me, he had a lot of friends. Friendship can be blinding.”

  “If he was such a good cop, why did he do it?”

  “Assuming that he, or I, did anything, we’ll never know. Someone killed Roger, remember?”

  “So what’s this about? You came up to Archers Rest following Roger, searching for the money that he kept while you went to prison?”

  “If your theory is correct, it does seem unfair that I went to prison while Roger enjoyed a few more years on the job, followed by a retirement and healthy city pension.” He smiled a little. “Not for long, of course, but at least he died with his reputation intact.”

  “You went to prison because of your bad temper,” I pointed out. “Not because of the money.”

  “An overreaction on my part. I’ve since learned you can catch more flies with honey, Nell. All I want is what’s mine. I’m not interested in anything, or anyone, else.”

  Just then the conductor walked into our car. “Tickets, please. All tickets out and ready to show.”

  Marshall reached into his wallet and took out a twenty-dollar bill. “I was in a hurry to catch the train, so I didn’t get a ticket,” he told the conductor. “I’m going to Grand Central.”

  As the conductor made change, I remembered what Greg had told me early on in the investigation. Roger had purchased a ticket with his credit card, then switched to a rental car in Tarrytown.

  “You’re thinking pretty intently,” Marshall said to me.

  “Am I?”

  “Come on now, Nell. We’re all friends here,” he said. “You’re remembering that Roger took the train from the city, but stopped along the way to switch to a rental car. You can’t figure out why.”

  “He wanted someone to be able to trace his movements. He took a train to Tarrytown because if he just drove his own car, or rented one in New York, he could have disappeared without a trace. He was worried about something, so he was leaving a trail, just in case.” The words popped out of my mouth. I knew Marshall was trying to manipulate me at every turn, and I was helping him. He’d found my weakness—the need to show I could solve puzzles.

  “Thanks for solving that. Why not take the train all the way to Archers Rest?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. Maybe he needed a car for some reason. Maybe he had business in Tarrytown before he continued up.” I looked into Marshall’s eyes. “Or maybe his killer was following him and he just got off the train and changed his plans.”

  He seemed interested but not intimidated. “Interesting theory. Why do you think Roger was heading up to your town in the first place?”

  “I don’t know.” I did know, but I didn’t want to say it.

  Marshall answered for me. “Obviously he wanted to see Jesse. And have you ever asked yourself why?”

  “If you’re going to tell me that Jesse was in on your theft—”

  “Alleged theft.”

  “Whatever you want to call it, if you’re going to try to make me believe that Jesse stole that money with you, I won’t believe you. Because it’s impossible. Not only because he’s incapable of that kind of thing, but because he’d left the force by the time of the theft. He was already in Archers Rest, dealing with a dying wife, a young daughter, a new job, and all of the stresses and complications that go along with it.”

  “Suppose you’re right. Jesse is the knight in shining armor; it does bring up an interesting question.”

  “Which is?”

  “Where’s the money? It’s not in Roger’s bank account. It’s not in his house in Queens.”

  “You’re saying it’s in Jesse’s house?” I asked. “You already searched it, didn’t you?”

  That confused him. “You wouldn’t let me in, remember?”

  I hated thinking that this awful man might be telling the truth. If he had searched Jesse’s house on the night of the murder, why come back when I was there with Allie? He was looking for an opportunity to get into the house, and Jesse’s place had an alarm system that rang into the police station. The best way into that house was if someone was there; someone weak and frightened, worried about protecting a child.

  Or if you had a key.

  I thought for a moment about who had keys to Jesse’s house: his mother, me, and there was a set of keys in the front desk at the station in case the alarm ever went off. Anna obviously had a key since she’d let herself in and out while staying at Jesse’s house. . . . I couldn’t think of anyone else, but I was oddly glad Marshall had forced me to focus less on the big picture—my love life, my future at the shop, and life in Archers Rest—and helped me push
my nose close to the puzzle, and into the details that might solve the case.

  CHAPTER 44

  “I’ll see you at the wake,” Marshall said as we got off the train.

  “You’re going?”

  “Roger and I worked together for years,” he said. “It would be rude not to pay my respects.”

  “Won’t your old colleagues be there? Maybe some of the guys who once cuffed you and led you to jail?”

  “Haven’t you learned yet that I enjoy making people uncomfortable?”

  “I guess I have.” Even standing in the midst of Grand Central, with hundreds of people whizzing past with a single-minded focus that only New Yorkers have, I felt uneasy.

  But Marshall wasn’t letting go. He grabbed my arm as I tried to step away. “I know you think I killed Roger, but before you go sharing this theory with anyone, remember his death has prevented me from finding where he put the money.”

  I yanked my arm from his grip. “When you came to Jesse’s house in search of the money . . . If you could have gotten inside, what would you have done? If you did find the money, would you have killed me to keep me from telling anyone?”

  He leaned close to me, putting his mouth an inch from my ear, and whispered, “Interesting question. So if you find yourself in a similar circumstance before this whole unhappy business has finished, you might not want to stand between me and anything that I want.”

  “Was that Roger’s mistake?”

  He grinned. “Maybe it was.”

  I looked him in the eye, hoping I didn’t seem as scared as I was. Bob Marshall was, like all good con men, a chameleon. He had been friendly and easygoing when he believed it would earn my trust, and now he was cold and threatening in the hopes of scaring me into helping him find the money. He could have been hinting that he had killed Roger to make his threat all the more intimidating. Or he could actually have killed him.

  Marshall walked away, heading toward a kiosk that sold newspapers and cigarettes. In other circumstances, I might have followed a suspect and watched where he went, but with this man all I wanted to do was take the opportunity to escape.

  On Twenty-Fifth Street in Manhattan there’s a little piece of home, a quilt shop. It was my first stop after I arrived in the city. City Quilter was large, well lit, and well stocked. There was even a gallery for art quilts as part of the shop. While Someday had some of the same fabrics, I still couldn’t resist visiting. When I’d lived in New York, I’d passed the store many times but hadn’t gone in. I wasn’t a quilter then, but now I was, and perhaps even on the verge of being a quilt shop owner.

  As I walked around the store, I wondered if this was something I wanted for myself. I pulled at bolts of cottons and silks, checked out the ribbons, the patterns, the books. I looked at the displays, the layout. I talked to the staff. Was this my future? I wondered it over and over again as I shopped.

  An hour later, I stuffed my purchases into my already heavy tote bag and walked the streets of a city I once called home. I stopped in a coffee shop in the East Village, the kind that Carrie had modeled Jitters after, and sat drinking a cup of hot coffee and people watching. Did I miss it—the energy and the options that a big city can offer? Did I want to come back? It would mean a life without Jesse and Allie, but it seemed more and more likely that that might be true even if I stayed in Archers Rest. When Jesse thought about the woman he loved, he thought of Lizzie.

  “A green tea.” I overheard a man at the counter ordering. “And a cookie. Are those chocolate chip cookies gluten free?”

  A green tea and gluten-free cookie. Roger’s order on the night he was murdered. It had always bothered me that a man so intent on healthy meal choices would be smoking, but people have far worse contradictions in character.

  Now something else bothered me more. Greg had said the car was clean when we found Roger, except for a notebook and the business card that Jesse had pocketed. But if that were true, something was missing.

  I dialed Greg’s cell. “Hey, Nell. Everything okay?” He sounded almost panicked when he answered. “You need help?”

  “I’m fine. Sorry if I scared you.”

  “No, not you. I’m meeting Kennette’s plane. I guess I’m getting a little nervous about seeing her again after all this time.”

  “You’ll be fine.”

  Greg was an awkward but smart guy. He spent a lot of time studying and worrying, and trying to do the right thing, while Oliver’s granddaughter, Kennette, was a free spirit who simply went where she felt most at home, which was pretty much anywhere. They made a great, if unusual, pairing.

  “I have a question for you,” I said, “if you don’t mind answering something about the case.”

  “At this point anything that keeps me from feeling like an idiot would be great.”

  “You said Roger’s rental car was totally clean.”

  “Yeah.”

  On the day of the murder I’d glanced inside the car, and what Greg was saying fit my memory of it, too, which is why something about it had stuck with me. “So where were the cigarette butts? I saw smoke coming out of the car, but if the car was clean, then where were they?”

  He paused. “Maybe he threw the butts out the window.”

  “But if that’s the case, wouldn’t you have found at least one on the ground when you guys did a sweep of the crime scene? He was smoking when I saw him. Where is the butt of that cigarette?”

  Greg didn’t answer. There was noise and mumbling. “Sorry, Nell. There’s Kennette. I have to go. We’ll talk later.” He hung up.

  I knew Greg wasn’t exactly smooth around the ladies, but he sounded so nervous I was afraid he’d pass out. Kennette’s easy personality would soon relax him. At least I hoped so, for both their sakes.

  As I finished my coffee I thought back to the night I walked past Roger’s car. There was definitely smoke, but had I been wrong? Was the smoke coming from behind the driver’s seat? I tried to picture the scene—the dark street, the open window, the wisps of smoke . . . Maybe they hadn’t been from Roger after all, but from a killer sitting behind him. That would explain the missing cigarette butts. They weren’t in the ashtray because they weren’t Roger’s. The killer was smart enough not to leave them, or any incriminating DNA evidence, behind. And there was, as far as I could tell, only one person in the group of suspects who smoked.

  CHAPTER 45

  The funeral home was crowded when I arrived just after six o’clock. Officers in uniform and plainclothes detectives from what appeared to be every precinct in the city were wandering in and out of the building. Men and women in dress clothing, bundled up against the cold, headed into the place just as I arrived. I took off my coat, and smoothed the pair of black dress pants I was wearing with a gray wool sweater. Though my outfit made me blend in perfectly with the crowd, I still felt quite out of place.

  I wandered through the room full of strangers searching for Jesse. When I finally saw him, he was standing at the casket, looking into the waxen face of his friend. Anna was by his side, holding his hand. I almost turned and left. But I didn’t. I walked up to him and lightly touched his back.

  When he saw me, he let go of Anna’s hand and hugged me tightly. “I was worried you wouldn’t come,” he said.

  “I told you I would.”

  “I know, but you’re upset.”

  “I think this is more important than my hurt feelings.”

  “Which I didn’t mean to hurt.”

  “I know. And it’s not a discussion we need to have tonight.”

  Jesse seemed relieved.

  Anna stayed exactly where she had been while Jesse and I chatted. I turned toward her and smiled sadly. “This must be such a difficult night for you, Anna,” I said. “If there’s anything you need. . . .”

  She was in a simple black dress, with pearls and pumps. The sort of thing a Hollywood cost
ume designer would choose for a grieving widow. She held a tissue in her hand, but she didn’t look like she’d been crying. Maybe I was being unfair. Maybe I just wanted to hate her.

  “I’m just so glad you could make it, Nell,” she said, without actually looking at me. And then she saw old friends over my shoulder and went to greet them.

  Jesse held tightly to my hand and took me around the room, introducing me to a dozen or more people he’d known from his New York days. They all talked about straight-laced Jesse and anything-for-a-joke Roger.

  “They were mismatched in every way,” one man said. “Except as cops. They were both great cops.”

  “Jesse told me that Roger was a stickler for the rules,” I said.

  The man laughed. “The worst. That guy used to bust chops if anyone stepped a toe over the line.”

  This led to a group of officers telling stories about Roger going to almost absurd lengths to follow the law, even letting a thief go when he felt a fellow officer had been too rough. But this was the same man, I reminded myself, who had apparently conspired with Bob Marshall to steal five hundred thousand dollars in drug money, and then kept the whole amount for himself.

  Marshall didn’t show. Maybe he didn’t want to put on a show for his former colleagues after all. But I wasn’t interested in that. I was watching a different drama. I was watching Anna and Ken.

  Over and over, Anna pulled Jesse away from me, needing him for advice or help, or a shoulder to cry on. And while it annoyed me, it was clear it infuriated Ken. When Anna had Jesse’s ear, Ken would circle near them, watching but pretending not to. I didn’t bother pretending, I just stared.

  A woman in civilian clothes came over and introduced herself as the wife of someone Jesse had known in the police academy. She saw that I was watching the three of them, and seemed just as riveted by it. “Interesting, isn’t it?”

  “They are a couple, right?” I asked. “Ken and Anna, I mean.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I heard, too. I just don’t get it. She’s pretty and everything, but I don’t see why the men in her life turn into such puppies.”