Echo Bridge

by Kristen O'Toole

  Echo Bridge

  By Kristen O’Toole

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Prologue

  When Anna Valance left the Channel 4 studio, she didn’t notice the tall, gangly black-haired boy who was following her. But then, Anna hadn’t noticed very much of her surroundings for almost a year. Not since her younger sister Courtney had been murdered by her boyfriend. Allegedly.

  Though the boy sat next to her on the El, Anna had her eyes closed against the rush hour crowd. She didn’t even open them when he jostled her elbow as he stood to leave the train. It wasn’t until she reached her stop and hooked her arms through the shoulders of her leather tote bag that she saw what he’d left behind: a package—a large brown international mailer—with her name on it. Anna glanced around at the people in the train car, wondering where the package had come from and if it was safe to pick up. Her curiosity had always been far greater than her fear, and Anna grabbed the package and shoved it into her bag as she got off the train. In her apartment, she tossed it on the kitchen counter and poured herself a bowl of cereal, which served as dinner on nights like this one, when she came home too tired and too late to feel like cooking and too broke to order a pizza. In other words, Anna had cereal for dinner every night. She crunched her cornflakes and eyed the package, turning the day over in her mind.

  Anna was a production assistant on “Heartland Headlines,” a tabloid show dedicated to salacious crimes and domestic scandals, and as an ambitious junior employee, she had been working her butt off. Until Courtney had disappeared into the Souhegan River one night just before last Christmas. Since then, Anna had checked out, doing the bare minimum of tasks to keep her job, which wasn’t hard, since her bosses gave her grief a lot of leeway. Anna spent most of her time reading articles about her sister and the boyfriend and legal briefs of cases where murder charges had been brought without a body. Technically, she could have called it research. Courtney’s murder was exactly the kind of story “Heartland Headlines” would cover.

  Edward Parker, 19, was on trial for the murders of Courtney Valance and Hugh Marsden. The year before, all three had been popular, talented seniors at Belknap Country Day School in Belknap, Massachusetts—Anna’s own alma mater. Courtney and Ted, as he was called, were high school sweethearts. Anna had met him two Christmases ago. He’d seemed nice, if a little too jock-next-door for her taste. According to the DA, Courtney had been having an affair with Ted’s best friend, Hugh, and Ted had killed them both. Hugh’s broken neck was initially ruled an unfortunate accident, and for a few weeks, he was mourned by the Country Day community and served as a cautionary tale against partying too hard in the region’s private schools. But then Courtney’s clothes were found in the Souhegan River, just downstream from the Country Day campus. The police were already entertaining the idea that Ted had killed Hugh and that Courtney knew it—their accounts of the night he died didn’t match up. Ted was charged with both murders, but Courtney’s body had never been found. Popular opinion held that she’d been washed out to Boston Harbor by the heavy fall rains that had brought the level of the Souhegan and Charles Rivers to record highs. The thought made Anna shudder. That Courtney’s body had never been found left a question mark at the end of everything.

  Anna had barely spoken to Courtney for weeks before she’d disappeared—she’d just started the PA job and had been lucky to find a few hours to sleep and shower. The last time they’d talked, Anna had known Courtney had wanted to tell her something—but she’d been exhausted and exasperated and just trying to get her mother on the phone for their obligatory alternate Tuesday night catch-up. Then she’d heard that a Country Day kid had died—Hugh Marsden. She’d meant to call Courtney and ask if she knew him, how weird school must be even if she didn’t, if she’d gone to the funeral. Their mother had left her voicemails telling her Courtney needed her. But Anna had thought such a long, involved conversation ought to wait until the weekend. On Sunday afternoon, maybe, she could afford to spend a couple of hours on the phone. And then Courtney was gone.

  She rattled her spoon in her empty bowl—her apartment was too quiet, sometimes—and set the dish aside. Picking up the package, she slit open one end of the mailer with her thumbnail, and pulled out… a book. The dust jacket was from an old copy of The Crucible, the same edition that had sat on the shelf in her childhood bedroom back in Belknap since her junior year of high school. Anna felt as if a cold draft had slipped out of the envelope as well. The night that Courtney had disappeared, she had starred in Country Day’s production of the play. She’d used Anna’s copy of the book for her research. Anna flipped back the cover and saw to her surprise that her own name was written on the inside flap—it wasn’t just the same edition; it was actually her copy of The Crucible.

  And inside the front cover, there was a note scrawled across the first page in her sister’s long, loopy handwriting:

  A—

  I wanted you to know. Don’t come after me.

  —C

  Anna swallowed, her throat suddenly scratchy and dry. Her knuckles went white as she gripped the book. Courtney was alive.

  But where had she gone?

  Don’t come after me.

  Perhaps not downstream to Boston Harbor, after all.

  Chapter 1

  Up until the very end, I’d always thought of Ted as one of the golden seniors at Belknap Country Day: broad, blond, captain of the soccer and lacrosse teams, keeper of a 3.7 GPA, and generally well-liked and admired. He drove a Range Rover handed down from his older brother, and his dress code button-downs came from Pink and Ralph Lauren. At first glance, you’d think he must be that same rich jock you’ve seen since Hollywood discovered the youth market and started making movies about high school. But he wasn’t. He was funny and generous and kind. He looked after his younger teammates and helped teachers rearrange their classrooms. In the movie of my life that used to play in my head at all times, where age and era were no object, Ted was played by Brad Pitt, circa Legends of the Fall. And at the end of our sophomore year, he’d dumped Elaine Winslow—lean, blond, blue-eyed, All-American gorgeous; nationally ranked golfer; widely recognized as the most beautiful girl in school, even by some of our teachers—to go out with me. So you knew he had taste.

  From a distance, Ted and Elaine had seemed like a natural fit, with their matching coloring and the easy, modest way they each handled their athletic accomplishments. But the way Ted told it, when he and Elaine went to the school production of Othello and I emerged in my white accordion-pleated chiffon gown and began professing loyalty and duty to my husband and father, that was it for Ted. There could be no one else for him but me. If a boy ever tells you it was your Desdemona that got him, you should probably think long and hard about that before you start blushing and giggling, even if he does have broad shoulders and a smile like a spotlight. He showed up backstage after curtain call on the third and final night of the performance with a dozen of those red-tipped white roses, and I completely forgot whatever ideas I’d had about Paul Patte
rson, who played Othello and had put word out that he wanted to hook up with me at the cast party.

  Ted had only broken up with Elaine the day before. Supposedly, she was devastated. She retreated from the crowd of friends she shared with Ted after that, hanging out mostly with her younger sister and acquiring a new boyfriend, Marshall Rye. He was on the ski team and part of no single clique, but he was friendly with everybody and so was a lock for the “Citizenship Award” at the end of the year, when we would all vote for who was basically the nicest person in our class. Even so, Elaine and I avoided each other, and on occasions when we couldn’t, we each caught the other giving the side-eye. We were both so different, it was impossible not to make comparisons. She was Grace Kelly and I was Sophia Loren.

  But the role of Ted Parker’s paramour had been re-cast, and I’d gotten the part. He came to every single performance of all of my plays junior year. The unspoken trade-off was that I went to all his games and cheered like a good girlfriend. I could not have cared less about Belknap Country Day’s athletic record, but I did care about Ted. He took it hard when the team lost, which meant he’d be distracted and edgy until the next game. He was much more fun coming off a victory, clapping younger players on the back and accepting congratulations and compliments with a modest duck of his blond head and an adorable blush creeping up his perfect jaw. So out of my love for him, it was “go get ’em, BCD soccer!”

  They beat Charles River Academy one Friday, late September of senior year. It was a blue and gold afternoon that, as Ted drove us to the victory party, was slipping into one of those crisp, starlit New England nights that I still miss, in spite of what happened on that particular one. The party was at Melissa Lewis’ house, which was in one of the newer developments in town, where the houses were large but lacking in character, and there were rules about holiday décor and yard maintenance. Belknap is on the border between metro Boston’s suburban sprawl and farm country. As a result, the town is an odd mishmash of strip malls and split-levels with quaint mom-and-pop shops and historic homes featuring plaques noting the pre-Revolution dates of construction. As far as setting a mood, Belknap posed a problem: were we in a John Hughes movie or a Thornton Wilder play? Granted, this was not a concern plaguing my friends as we gathered around the keg on Melissa’s deck, but I was an actress and film connoisseur; atmosphere was important to me. I never got to choose the soundtrack in Ted’s car, though—he drummed the wheel in time with John Mayer. Live.

  “Coach thinks we have a good chance to make the state championships,” he said, putting his right arm up on my shoulder while he made a turn. “Some of this year’s rookies are seriously talented.”

  “That’s great,” I said.

  “And the Cornell recruiter is coming to the Middlesex game in two weeks.”

  “You must be psyched,” I said. “You beat Middlesex last year, right?”

  “Well, they have some seriously talented rooks, too. But the same scout saw me against St. Paul’s last year, when I scored three goals in a single half. So my prospects are good. At least, that’s what I’m told.” Ted was looking at me out of the corners of his eyes. College wasn’t a conversation we’d had yet, exactly.

  “Well, I’m sure that’s a load off, with the college app frenzy coming up.”

  “Listen, Court. It’s a four-hour drive from Ithaca to the city.”

  “I know, Ted,” I said. “But you won’t exactly have your weekends free, with two varsity sports. And I haven’t gotten into Tisch yet.” I sighed. I loved Ted—I mean, I certainly thought I did then. But I had three older siblings; I had been schooled in long-distance relationships, and what happened to high school sweethearts who tried to keep it going in college.

  “They’d have to be crazy not to take you. You’re a star.” He pulled up in front of Melissa’s house and pulled me into his big arms, burying his face in my black curls. “I’m not going to let a few miles get in our way. We’ll work it out.” He brushed my hair behind my ear.

  “Okay,” I said, turning my face up for a kiss. “I trust you.” We climbed out of the car, and he went around back to his boys and the keg, while I went upstairs to find Melissa and Hilary.

  Mel and Hil. To be honest, that day at Melissa’s house I thought we’d all go to off to college and I’d never talk to either of them again, but now that I know I really never will, I miss them a little. They were together so much you could be forgiven for thinking they were conjoined twins, although they didn’t look anything alike: Melissa was long and lean, with a year-round tan and cropped blonde highlights that never showed a hint of her dark roots, while Hilary had an unruly carrot top she was forever ironing flat and swishing over her shoulders and bad skin peeking through expertly applied make up. In my mental movie, they were played by two mediocre up-and-comers with pretty faces, great headshots, and resumes full of small parts in bad horror movies and those sad TV shows networks run in the summer when no one’s watching. Outside of high school, I might not have chosen Melissa or Hilary as friends. But they fluttered around Ted and his friends like the proverbial moths around a candle, so we’d naturally fallen in together when I started going out with Ted sophomore year. Besides, Melissa, at least, was fun sometimes.

  They were upstairs in Melissa’s parents’ bedroom, taking shots of vodka and observing the party through the open French doors of the balcony that overlooked the deck and backyard. Melissa’s mother and stepfather were at Canyon Ranch in the Berkshires for the weekend.

  “Hi, bitch,” Melissa said, and poured me a shot. She was sitting on the floor, still wearing her field hockey uniform, though she’d taken off her shin guards.

  “Hi,” I said, and took the shot. “How was your game?”

  “Oh, whatever, the stupid junior on goal blew it. Not that anyone cares about field hockey.”

  “True,” I said, pouring myself another shot. “How about you, Hil? Still trying to do away with urban blight?” If you didn’t play a sport at Belknap Country Day, you were required to do some other after-school activity. It guaranteed you would be a well-rounded college applicant. Hilary did community service at a soup kitchen and women’s shelter in Roxbury.

  Hilary was lying on Melissa’s parents’ bed, aiming a remote at their flat screen, flipping channels with the sound off. “Ugh. I am so over it. I mean, don’t get me wrong, Lucy’s Lunches does really important work. But if we don’t cut every piece of pie exactly the same size, or someone gets a single extra grape, those bitches totally freak out,” said Hilary. “Plus, the smell of that place is starting to make me gag.”

  “Your generosity of spirit is inspiring,” I told her. I wandered over to Melissa’s mother’s vanity table and opened her jewelry box, holding different earrings up to my lobes in the lighted mirror.

  “Did you have rehearsal?” asked Melissa. She shed her knee socks and scratched at the red welts the ribbing left behind.

  “Doesn’t start till next week.” I picked up a tube of mascara from the vanity and marveled at the idea of my own mother with purple eyelashes. Then I leaned into the mirror and put some on.

  We were performing The Crucible and I, as Country Day’s perennial star of the stage, had been cast as Abigail Williams. I was pleased: great play, great part, great opportunity to show off my chops for my application to NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. An alumnus would attend the opening performance, which would serve as my admissions audition. As far as I was concerned, it was the only college worth attending in the entire world.

  I would have liked to attend college, even for a semester.

  As if reading my mind, Melissa said, “Don’t worry, Court. You’re a shoo-in for Tisch.” She wandered into her mother’s walk-in closet and shed her field hockey skirt and jersey, dropping them on the floor. She came out again wearing a sleeveless shift of camel suede with a lot of black fringe on the short skirt.

  “What do you think about this for Revelry?” she asked. The Rivalry Revelry was our version of Homecoming: two days of
matches against Green Hill Prep, capped off by a semi-formal dance.

  “It’s hot,” said Hilary.

  “It’s Phillip Lim,” said Melissa.

  “That dress is wearing you,” I said. “It should be the other way around.” This was my mother’s phrase for clothes that were trendy but didn’t fit well.

  “What does that even mean?” Melissa rolled her eyes and walked out onto the balcony.

  I followed with the vodka bottle, and Hilary dropped the remote on the yellow satin comforter and joined us. The three of us leaned on our elbows against the railing and observed the party below. I set up the shot glasses and poured.

  In the backyard, Marian Hayward and Selena Mitchell, whom everyone called the Glitter Girls because of the stupid sparkly makeup they both wore, were playing badminton. Benji Andrews, a junior who was on the soccer team with Ted, and Jake Hobart, who was Belknap’s number one skier, were sharing a joint in a pair of lawn chairs, watching. Benji’s girlfriend Lindsay Stevens lay in the grass with her bare feet propped up in his lap. A few guys were kicking at the brush beneath the trees at the edge of the yard, looking for kindling for the fire pit, which they’d light after dark. On the deck, Hogan Riley, whom everyone called Horse, was setting up Melissa’s stepfather’s poker table, and Hugh Marsden, Ted’s best friend, was manning the keg and talking to a gaggle of sophomore and junior girls whom Hilary, Melissa, and I hated on general principle—that general principle being that these girls were a lot like we were and were competition for the attention of our guy friends. Melissa hawked up a substantial loogie and managed to land it in a sophomore’s hair. None of her friends noticed, but Hugh did, and he looked up and winked at us as he refilled the girl’s cup.

  Hugh motherfucking Marsden. That was how I would come to think of him, but that day on the balcony, with the sun slicing through the trees on its way down and Hugh grinning up at us, he was just another member of our crew. Hugh was a year older than we were because he’d been recruited for the BCD hockey team and made to repeat ninth grade when he moved down from Ontario. There were rumors he’d go pro after graduation instead of going to college. He was also quite the Romeo, which had always baffled me. He had that thick-necked build that’s borderline fat, and his dust-brown hairline was already receding in two points over his temples, which he tried to disguise by keeping his hair military short. I’d heard girls claim it was his personality that made him attractive, but that didn’t make much sense to me either at the time, and it sure as hell doesn’t now. In the movie in my head, Hugh was played by Ben Affleck, an actor whose appeal I understood on an intellectual level but didn’t personally feel in my gut. Hugh was kind of crude and often drank too much, but neither of these qualities made him stand out in our crowd. He wasn’t stupid, exactly, just lazy—except when it came to hockey. He was like somebody’s cut-up older brother. He was one of us.