by Polly Iyer
Reece thought he was prepared, but he was surprised how much Carl’s confession hurt. “I would have told you.”
Carl nodded. “Yes, you would have. Because you’re an honest man. You always were. I could only aspire to be as good. I tried to tell people, but they wanted a murderer, and you were their best prospect.”
A vise clamped tight inside Reece’s chest. Some part of him wanted to hug his baby brother, take him in his arms and tell him things would be all right. That he forgave him his silence when it mattered to speak up, if not in court, then at least to tell him what kind of woman shared his bed. Carl had suffered in a different way, but Reece wasn’t at the place where he could open his heart. Maybe after all this was over he’d find the strength, but now, absolution eluded him.
“How many others were fucking her besides those at our table that night?” Reece took out his notebook. He thought he’d never forget the names, but he had a mental block when it came to the trial. He remembered only the impotence that consumed him as he watched his life flush down the toilet. “Mark Cabrini and Steve Yarrow, plus the other guy—” he glanced at the notebook again—Jordan Kraus. The one with an alibi—some girl who said they were together.”
“He was a friend of Steve’s from Tufts.” Carl finger-combed his hair. “Jesus, Reece. Your attorney went over all this before the trial, during the trial, and after the trial. There was nothing there. The girl swore on an affidavit she was with Jordan until three a.m., long after the murder took place.” Carl’s eyes glistened in the sun. “I can’t see any of them killing her.”
“What about me? Can you see me slitting Karen’s throat? Can you see me doing it again to that poor girl in North Carolina?”
Carl raised his voice for the first time. “No. Not then, not now, and I testified to that.”
A couple walking two dogs glanced their way. They hurried along.
Reece turned away and waited for them to pass. “Well, I’m betting my life that someone with us killed her.” He drew a deep breath and forced himself calm. “Did you?”
“How can you ask that?”
“It was easy. Did you?”
“No.”
Carl stared at him.
If he had, why would he tell the truth now? “I knew Cabrini but only met Yarrow a couple of times at the apartment. He brought the other guy, Kraus, once, right?”
Carl nodded and slunk back onto the bench. “I don’t know anything more. I told the truth at the trial except—”
“Except what you failed to mention.” Carl looked miserable, and Reece felt a flicker of guilt for being so hard on him.
“How much would it have mattered?” Carl asked. “You never denied you slept with her that day. What difference would it have made other than to give the prosecution more of a motive? Jealous rage, that was what they would have said. Your lover slept with your brother. Isn’t that enough to make anyone crazy? It’s what they said anyway, without knowing.”
Reece stood and circled the area. “Hurt, angry, yes, but jealousy was never my style.” How could he say that? Not five minutes before he admitted to being jealous of his brother’s life. The life he should have had. “All I know is someone’s trying to frame me again, and the investigator working for Jeraldine thinks it’s the same guy who killed Karen. I need to know where those guys are now.”
“I only know about Mark. He’s an orthodontist in Wellesley. I knew Steve and Jordan through him. They used to come in from the vet school in Grafton when they had weekends off. They could be anywhere now, maybe in practice together. They talked about it. I’ve lost touch with all of them. Mark would probably know. He and Steve were tight.”
“Anything else you haven’t told me?”
Carl shook his head. “No, that’s it.”
Reece stood, ready to leave, and patted his brother on the shoulder. “Thanks for coming. I appreciate your honesty.”
“Twenty years late.” He pulled at Reece’s arm. “Do you hate me, Reece?”
Reece studied his brother. Maybe there were more signs of age than he first noticed. Dark circles ringed his eyes, jowls sagged with the weight of his guilt. “The only hate I have is for the person who’s setting me up.” He looked around, checking if anyone noticed him. “I’d better go.”
“Aren’t you going to ask about Dad?”
Reece stopped, felt the muscles tense in his neck. “No.”
“Come with me to see him. He’s in a private nursing home, The Willows. You remember that place, don’t you? When we were kids we used to ride our bikes there to feed the ducks in the pond. There’s an exit from his room leading outside to a patio. It’s at the end of the building, near the woods. I’ll go inside and let you in. No one will see you.”
Reece moved toward the exit. “No.”
“I thought you didn’t have any hate left.”
Standing in that spot, feet welded to the ground, Reece felt as if the world had stopped turning on its axis. Would he ever be truly free? “I guess I lied.”
“Come on,” Carl said, his voice soft, almost pleading.
But the hurt and betrayal went too deep and ate at the root of all Reece had become. “I can’t.”
He turned and almost ran to his car, emotion in danger of spilling out. His shaking hand wrestled the key into the ignition, and he pulled out of his parking space without checking the rearview mirror. A sheriff’s car sped past him, oblivious to the man in the Honda Civic with sunglasses, a ball cap, and the anxious feeling of unfinished business twisting his insides.
He reached Portsmouth and called Carl from an outdoor phone at a quick stop. “Were the cops looking for me?”
“Yes. They were waiting at the business when I returned. I said I hadn’t heard from you.”
“You wouldn’t be lying to me, would you, Carl?”
“Am I to pay for holding back about Karen for the rest of my life? Yes, I was protecting myself, but I thought I was protecting you too. What do I have to do to earn your trust?”
Reece thought about that. “I don’t know. Trust has been an occupational hazard. Forgive me if I don’t give it easily.”
“You’re my brother, Reece. I love you. I still want to protect you.”
“Gotta go. I’ll be in touch.”
“Wait—”
Reece hung up, immobile for a moment, letting Carl’s words sink in. Could he ever really trust anyone again? Then he thought of Dana and knew he could. He’d learned the game the hard way, and now his obsession to find a killer took priority over everything else. If only he could avoid the authorities a little longer.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The Closet
Frank Vance heard the word Police and said, “Lana, get her into the closet.”
Dana didn’t know what that meant. Surely the police would look in every closet if they were looking for her and Reece. Lana took her arm and led her into the master bedroom before Frank finished the sentence. She opened the closet door and pulled the clothes bar forward. The whole wall moved out and then rotated on a revolving floor panel to reveal a small room.
“Get in,” Lana said. “I’ll get your bags.”
Dana followed instructions and squeezed into the tiny cubicle. Lana returned with both overnight bags and shoved them inside, along with whatever things lay around the room.
“You’ll be fine. It won’t be long.” Lana pushed the fake closet back and closed the door.
Why did Frank have a secret room? Then she recalled that one phone call summoned a phantom to exchange their pickup with a “clean” car. Frank might be out of prison, but he obviously hadn’t quit the shady exploits that could put him back inside. The closet was the reason Frank was so sure the cops wouldn’t find her and Reece if they came looking.
Dana sat in the dark and waited. After a while, voices filtered through from the other side of the closet door. Holding her breath, she couldn’t make out the words. Maybe these old buildings didn’t have much closet space or granite counterto
ps, but they were solidly constructed. Perspiration beaded on her forehead, and breathing became difficult. Fifteen minutes later, the sounds disappeared and the door opened.
“It’s safe now,” Lana said.
Dana reached back to grab the bags and knocked the top off one of the shoeboxes stacked behind her. Even in the filtered light she saw stacks of money stuffed inside. She handed the bags to Lana and noticed the Russian’s frown. “I didn’t see a thing,” Dana said.
Lana didn’t say a word, but she nodded to Frank when they returned to the living room.
“Guess who they were looking for?” he asked.
“Reece didn’t think they’d make the connection so soon.”
“It’s all in the records. As soon as Reece disappeared, they had every contact he’s made since he popped out of his mother’s womb. You too, probably. They’re staking out his brother, so I hope Reece figures a way around them. From the sound of it, your ex-husband has a hard-on for my boy.”
“Yes, I imagine he does.”
Frank sipped from the glass of water Lana placed on his side table. “Aren’t you going to ask about what’s in the closet?
“No. It’s none of my business.”
Frank grinned. “I like you, Dana. Most women would have panicked when the police came, but not you. You followed instructions, cool as a cucumber, as my old mammy used to say. You’d have made a great crook. What do you do, anyway?”
“I write suspense novels.”
“Ha, no wonder. Now you have firsthand experience for your heroine.”
“Right. When the cops are searching for her and her lover, they’ll hide out in the house of a bagman who has a hidden closet stashed with his ill-gotten gains. How does that sound?”
Frank’s laugh segued into a hacking cough, but he regained control quickly. “I’m only a stopping-off point, a safe bank in the transfer of money from one place to another. But I like your style, girl. Lana, sweetheart,” he said, his voice now more gravelly, “bring out the good Russian vodka. The three of us are gonna get shitfaced.”
By four in the afternoon, they were. Dana couldn’t remember drinking hard liquor in the daytime. A couple of Bloody Marys or screwdrivers at lunch, maybe. Like fine wine, good vodka went down as smooth as satin. She was certifiably crocked.
Frank, on a roll, reeled off stories ranging from gut-wrenchingly funny to pitifully sad. Sometimes he had difficulty speaking, a combination of his illness and his damaged throat. Dana knew why Reece loved him so much. She also knew Frank was trying to take her mind off the possibility that Reece might be caught.
“He won’t be,” Frank assured her. “Reece is thinking clearer now. I can see it.”
Dana didn’t want to put Frank on the spot or make him betray a trust, but she wanted to know things about Reece’s time inside. Not about the things that would humiliate him, but about how he survived. She didn’t need to ask, although with all the vodka she’d consumed, she felt less inhibited than usual and probably would have asked if Frank hadn’t started reminiscing.
“He’s brilliant, you know. There were men inside who hated him for that and others who took advantage, like me. I wasn’t the only one he taught. Guys like me, in trouble most of their lives, were in trouble partly because we didn’t have an education.” Frank drained his glass of vodka and cleared his throat. “When you can’t read, you’ll always be on the bottom rung of the ladder, working menial jobs. That leads to making money in other ways, not usually legal, which leads to dealing with people who drag you deeper into their worlds of violence and crime. It’s a natural progression, or maybe regression would be a better word.”
“But you learned, and here you are, doing illegal things by the looks of it. I’m not judging. Just saying.”
“I did get a straight job when I got out. Was doing good too, but then I got sick. The treatments took a toll. My boss wanted to keep me, but the chemo made me so weak, I was worthless. I needed money, Dana. Living while dying is expensive. I had friends who set me up. I didn’t have Medicare then. I have it now, and a little social security, but I don’t need to tell you how little I get after spending half my life behind bars.”
“You did what you had to. Like I said, I’m not judging.”
“That’s what Reece is doing now. Things he has to do. He’s come a long way.”
“What do you mean?”
Lana had filled Frank’s glass, and he sipped. “He came to prison from a different world. Experienced some things no man should. He spent some time in solitary, and that changed him.”
Dana’s heart skipped a beat. “Why?”
“One time, a guy who hated him went too far. Reece got his fill and struck back. He was like a kid who’d finally snapped after being bullied his whole life. Reece beat the shit out of him. I mean beat the bastard to the ground. Personally, I thought he needed to do that. I watched and let it happen. They put him in solitary.” Frank put the cannula to his nose and breathed deeply a few times. He didn’t remove it. “I thought it’d make him stronger in the long run, but after he came out, he drew into himself. For a while I couldn’t reach him. I didn’t realize how confinement affected him. Four walls closing in. No sun. Some can take it. Others can’t.”
It explained why Reece slept under the stars. “Was that the only time?”
“No. It happened twice more, but for a different reason. After this incident, his haters had new respect for him and stayed away. They didn’t want to wake the sleeping giant again. But he changed. Got harder.”
The phone rang. Lana answered. She spoke a few words, then held the phone out to Dana. “It’s Reece. He wants to speak to you.”
Dana took the phone, her heart thundered like a teenager with her first boyfriend. She didn’t know what to expect, but he sounded okay.
“How are you?” he asked.
She told him about the police coming and the secret closet. She told him she was half in the bag. He laughed. “I love you,” she said to quiet at the other end of the line. “Did you hear me?”
Reece took his time answering. “I’ve lost my voice. Those three words took it from me.”
“I mean it. Never in my life have I meant anything so much.”
“I don’t want you hurt, Dana. I couldn’t stand it if anything happened to you. I’d rather go back to prison.”
“Nothing will happen. Now, tell me, where are you?”
“On my way to see an old acquaintance. I’ll call you later.”
“Okay.”
“How’s Frank?”
She looked across the room at the two people with her and smiled. “He’s okay. I love him. Lana too.”
“He’s something, isn’t he?”
“I love you, Reece. Be careful.”
“Stay safe.”
Dana could have left the room, but she had no secrets from these people. Along with Jeraldine and Clarence, they were Reece’s best friends, and now, along with Harris, they were hers.
Tears spilled from her eyes.
“He’ll be all right, Dana,” Frank said. “His head’s on straight. Maybe for the first time since he went to prison. He has a reason to go on, and there’s nothing stronger than love to inspire a man. I know.”
Lana sat on the arm of Frank’s chair. They were holding hands, and Dana wanted to cry. Some things in life didn’t seem fair. Premature death, for one.
And good men falsely accused of murder.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Reality Bites
Harold County, North Carolina
Robert’s heart raced; his blood pressure soared into dangerous territory. The nerve of Wright coming into his office and accusing him of being an accessory to murder. How dare he? And to cite Harry Klugh.
He wiped the sweat dripping into his eye. Well, he could stop his bullshit indignation. No one was in his office to notice. He was in trouble and knew it. Klugh was unstable, a nutcase. That was why Robert used him. He had no ethical base from which to operate. The man nev
er asked questions. He read between the lines. No telling what he’d do if the police grilled him. He’d say Robert hired him, that he only did what Robert wanted. But he never told Klugh to kill Lurena Howe, only to get evidence that tied Daughtry to Rayanne Johnson. Even the bartender at Rudy’s identified Daughtry as an occasional customer.
Damn. If it ever came out he told Klugh to get evidence, his career would be in the crapper. Bribing a witness was a federal crime. If anyone should know that, Robert should. Then he considered the charge of murder—a bigger federal crime.
He rose from his desk and walked the room. He thought more clearly in motion. Got the juices flowing and the sticky shirt off his back.
But wait. Wright was only guessing. How could he know anything for sure? Klugh wasn’t a novice. He wouldn’t take someone out and leave a witness. No one saw him.
They couldn’t prove a thing. Still, he couldn’t take any chances. He needed to call Klugh. How did Wright know he met Klugh? Who saw them together in the diner? Then he thought about his calls. He’d never called Klugh from the office, but Klugh had called Robert. They could get a record of the calls.
So what? He didn’t deny knowing Klugh. Could someone have overheard their conversations? What did he say when they talked? Nothing. He didn’t say anything. He talked to him in person about getting the evidence. When he called, they spoke cryptically. He wasn’t stupid, though Klugh had a few screws loose.
He’d have to think about what job he hired Klugh for. That was what he told Wright. What job? Think, Robert. Think.
Walking around in circles made him dizzy. He felt nauseous. Maybe I should go home. Call Klugh from a payphone. That’s what I’ll do.
He went into the bathroom he insisted the county put in his office and looked in the mirror. Jesus, he looked ready to stroke out. Sweat beaded his hairline. Thin people in good shape weren’t supposed to sweat like this. He splashed water on his face, wiped it off, and used the damp towel to scrub the back of his neck. Maybe he should change his shirt. No, he’d go home, take a shower. He adjusted his suspenders and slipped on his suit jacket.
