Reed opened his mouth to ask about that, but Ethan Stone appeared in the office before he could get a chance.
“Speak of the devil,” Ms. Potts said with a broad smile. “Professor, it seems you’ve got the FBI here to see you.”
“Thank you, Nancy.” Ethan Stone stood about six feet tall, with a trim frame and salt-and-pepper hair that just brushed the edges of his crisp white collar. He extended his hand to Reed and gave his arm a firm shake. “Ethan Stone.”
“Reed Markham. Thank you for seeing me on short notice.”
“Of course. Please join me in my office. Do you want anything—water, coffee, tea?”
Reed had long ago learned to take what his interview subjects offered him. “Coffee would be great, thank you.”
“I have a machine at the ready.”
In Stone’s office, Reed immediately saw the framed photo of Trevor that Nancy Potts had referenced. It had a place of honor on the shelf with an African violet sitting next to it. Trevor had been in the tween years—dark hair cut in a basic boy trim, a close-mouthed smile, possibly to hide braces, but no traces of acne yet or the teenage turmoil that would never come. Stone noticed him looking and turned the photo so Reed could have a better view. “His last school picture,” he said to Reed. “His classmates have all graduated now, but Trevor never made it to junior high.”
“I’m sorry. I really do appreciate you talking with me today. I know it must be painful to revisit.”
“Yes. Well.” Stone busied himself with the coffee. “The thing about losing a child is that nothing anyone does can make it any better, but nothing can make it any worse, either. It’s a hole that never fills no matter how much dirt you throw on top of it.” He glanced at Reed. “I know why you’re here. I saw on the news about Teresa’s daughter and I couldn’t believe it. How horrible. I even picked up the phone to give Teresa a call, but I realized I don’t have her number.”
“You don’t keep in touch?”
“No,” he said. “It wasn’t pretty at the end. That dirt you throw to fill the hole? Turns out you get messy in the process. I think we both needed to move on. Do you take milk or sugar?”
Teresa had moved on, Reed noted. New city, new family. Ethan had stayed where he was. “Black is fine.”
They sat on the low-slung leather couch that took up a good part of one wall. “Teresa was young when she had Trevor,” Reed said. “In the middle of her residency, yes?”
“Yes. He was a surprise.” He paused to smile over the rim of his coffee cup. “The best kind.”
“Were the two of you planning to have kids?”
“Actually, no, not at first. I already had a son, Justin, from my first marriage. Teresa was focused on her career. Once she turned up pregnant, though, we got used to the idea in a hurry. We hired someone to do the nursery, and they handled everything but Trevor’s library. Teresa wanted to stock that herself. She loved to sit in the rocking chair and read with him.”
“What kind of mother was she?”
“Busy,” he replied without thought. “Her work is life-or-death, every day. Hard to walk away from that to watch a little boy play in the sandbox or fix grilled cheese sandwiches. But she loved him. Of course she did. We took vacations to the shore and they’d hold hands, jumping the waves in the surf. They liked to do jigsaw puzzles and riddles together. She would design elaborate scavenger hunts for him on his birthday and hide his presents at the end.” He shook his head. “The last one was just a month before he died.”
“The investigation looks to be thorough from what I’ve seen,” Reed said. “What did you think of it?”
Stone set his coffee cup aside as he considered his answer. “At first, I thought it would be over quickly. I didn’t have any experience with law enforcement, but I guess I’d absorbed the typical narrative from crime fiction—the perpetrator is caught, always, and usually in short order. I remember preparing myself mentally for the image of him. For what it would feel like when the police dragged him from his hole into the light of day. I’d always been against the death penalty, you see. If you think about it from a market perspective, it doesn’t make any sense. The death sentence doesn’t deter other criminals from committing their crimes, and it’s not fairly adjudicated. But when it was my child—” His jaw unlocked briefly, quivered twice before he got control again. “I wanted the person responsible to be evaporated from the earth. I didn’t want a molecule of him remaining, you understand me?”
“I do.”
“I built up all this anger and then there was no target for it. The investigation went on, seemingly endless. They interviewed Teresa’s patients. My fellow professors. My students. Our neighbors.”
“Your son,” Reed added, and Stone’s face darkened, quick as an April sky.
“Yes,” he said. “They had a particular focus on Justin, despite lacking any evidence. We had to engage an attorney to protect him from their bizarre fixation that he murdered his younger brother.”
“One of his fingerprints was discovered on the plastic bag.” Reed didn’t have to specify which bag—the one used to smother Trevor.
“Yes, mine, too. And Teresa’s, and Carol’s, and even Trevor’s. It was a disposable grocery bag. We kept them around in the kitchen pantry to reuse as necessary.”
Reed had read the reports. Justin, at the time of the murders, had been unwelcome in the Stone home at Teresa’s insistence. He’d left rehab after only six days and was crashing with fellow addicts in the city. The detectives wondered how he’d left fingerprints on a bag when he hadn’t been around much prior to the homicides. “How did Justin get along with Trevor?”
“He loved him,” Stone shot back. “Trevor worshiped the ground his big brother walked on. Who wouldn’t enjoy that?”
“I read that Justin took your remarriage somewhat hard.”
“He was five. Five-year-olds want their mommies and daddies to be together forever. Justin adjusted. We had a number of good years after Trevor was born. He—he was happy.”
The spiral into addiction suggested otherwise, but Reed didn’t challenge. “What’s Justin doing today?”
“He’s a sales manager for a home appliance company. He’s good. He’s clean. I don’t want you bothering him with this, understand me? Imagine having your little brother murdered and the cops think you’re the one who did it. He already hated himself so much that he tried to drown his own brain in a toxic miasma of drugs and booze. And then to be suspected of such a monstrous crime … Justin worked damn hard to carve out a life for himself, and I won’t have you people destroying it.”
“I’m not here to destroy anyone. Just trying to get a sense of the facts.”
“Justin didn’t do this. That’s a fact.”
“I’d still like to talk to him.”
“You can’t.” Stone stood up abruptly and went to his window. “He’s—he’s traveling at the moment. Won’t be back for several days yet.”
Reed didn’t have several days. He decided not to belabor the point and shifted gears. “You were in Boston recently for a conference. Is that correct?”
“Yes, at MIT.” Stone turned around again, but he remained wary, on guard. His body posture was closed off and defensive. “I gave a talk last Friday, had dinner with colleagues Friday night, did a little sightseeing on Saturday, and returned home yesterday morning.”
“You didn’t see Teresa or Chloe at any point?”
“No, of course not.” He pointed at Reed. “Wait. You don’t think I took that girl?”
“I don’t have any reason to think that. But I’m sure you appreciate we need to examine every possible angle right now.”
“Did Teresa say something to you? Did she accuse me?”
“No one has accused you of anything,” Reed said mildly.
“God, I would never. The thought is abhorrent.” A stain of color appeared across his cheekbones. “I would never do anything to harm a child.”
“Okay, I hear you. When did you last sp
eak to Teresa?”
He didn’t have to think about it. “Six years ago. We ran into each other at a café in Berlin, if you can believe it. I was there on business and she was vacationing with her family.”
So he knew she had a daughter. “That’s ironic,” Reed said aloud. “How did it go?”
“It was awkward. I spotted her before she saw me, but they were standing between me and the door, so there was no way to make a quick exit. We had to say hello.”
“Is that all you said?”
“More or less.” He forced a tight smile. “One might even call it an achievement of sorts, after all the bitterness from before.”
“What were you bitter about?”
“Losing Trevor, naturally. The police never caught anyone, so there was no one else to blame but each other. She was supposed to have been home that afternoon. She didn’t get a sitter.”
“Was that unusual?”
“Not completely, no. He had just turned twelve and was fine being home by himself for short periods of time. But Teresa’s job at the hospital kept her away for hours. She might not have been back until midnight.”
“But surely you would have been home by then.”
“Too late,” he said, hoarse with regret. “They’d been there a couple of hours already by the time I returned. I called nine-one-one right away, but there was nothing they could do for Trevor.”
“I am sorry.”
Stone’s shoulders rose and fell. “Our lives were ripped to shreds. You’re here to observe the tatters, to sift through the pieces one more time, as though that will change anything. I hope you find Teresa’s daughter. Maybe, somehow, you’ll even solve this case. But you’ll understand, I hope, that I won’t be waiting by the phone.”
“I do understand. And I hope you understand that I’ll need the names of the colleagues you had dinner with, just to follow up. The faster we eliminate you, the sooner we can move on.”
Stone’s mouth was a hard line. “That’s what they said last time and yet here I am again, answering all the same questions.” But he rose, went to his desk, and jotted down the names on a notepad. He ripped off the paper and handed it to Reed. “I trust you can see yourself out.”
Reed left Stone’s office but didn’t head for the exit. He detoured past the main office, where Nancy Potts greeted him with a cheery wave. “Why, hello again. Did you and Professor Stone have a nice chat?”
“We did.”
“Isn’t he the sweetest man?”
“You mentioned earlier … something about him having an unfair burden of troubles.”
“Some people,” she said with a sympathetic sigh. “If it weren’t for bad luck, they’d have no luck at all. Don’t you think?”
“What sort of bad luck did Professor Stone have?”
“Oh, losing Trevor was the worst of it. No question there. But just last winter, he broke his arm skiing. The year before that, it was his ankle. Just plain stepped off the curb wrong—can you imagine?”
Reed nodded. This wasn’t the boon he’d hoped for when he circled back to talk to her. “That is unfortunate.”
“Yes, and then there was that awful student who accused him of groping her.”
“Oh?” Reed perked up. “When was that?”
“Mmm. Five, maybe six years ago? The university investigated and it turned out she made the whole thing up because he gave her a failing grade. The students these days, they are the most spoiled, entitled—”
“Do you remember this student’s name?”
“Kennedy,” she replied, her mouth drawn in a sour moue. “Kennedy Harris. I remember thinking what a dishonor it was for her to have the same name as one of our greatest presidents. The school expelled her, and good riddance, I say. Professor Stone is so popular, I don’t know why she ever thought she’d get away with it.”
“That is quite the run of unfortunate incidents,” Reed said.
“Tell me about it. There was also that one time someone set his car on fire.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I know! Unbelievable. Right here on university property, too. Probably some other student who didn’t do the work but expected a four-point-oh average anyway.”
“When was this?”
“Oh, a long time ago now.” She tapped her chin, thinking back. “More than ten years for sure.”
“Before or after what happened to Trevor?”
She lit up as he helped her remember the timing. “That’s right. It was before Trevor.”
“Right before?” Reed couldn’t imagine so. He hadn’t read anything about it in the reports.
“No, a while back before that. A month, maybe? Could be longer. Professor Stone would remember, I’m sure. You could ask him.”
“Oh, I will. Thank you.” Reed smiled and wished her well. He would no doubt have more questions for Ethan Stone, but first he had to find some better answers.
16
They had been partners only three months, but Ellery knew if she showed up at Dorie’s condo before 7:00 A.M. then she had better bring coffee. She carried a Dunkin’s cup in one hand, its lettering as pink as the new morning sky. Ellery knocked, and Dorie appeared a few minutes later, sleepy eyed and dressed in gray sweats, with a trio of wagging dog tails following behind her. “Has there been a break?” she asked, instantly alert when she saw Ellery.
“Nothing concrete.” Ellery handed her the coffee and began greeting the dogs, who had lined up in turn to receive ear rubs. She explained about Ashley’s attempt to ferret out “Ty” by playing Chloe’s character in the video game. “He said he saw her at the Y.”
“You dragged your little sister into this mess?” Dorie put a hand on her hip. “I thought we had covered Boundaries 101 back at the start. Maybe you need a refresher course. Lesson one: Don’t bring civilian family members into active investigations. Especially if they’re minors.”
“She got us a real lead on this Ty kid, faster than the tech boys would’ve done it. I checked, and there’s only around a dozen YMCAs in the Boston area. I say we start with the ones closest to the Lockharts’ house and work outward.”
“Do the Lockharts look like Y people to you?”
Ellery blinked. “What do you mean?”
“I mean they probably swim at some fancy country club with yachts in the pool. Which of those centers is closest to Margery’s house? If Chloe’s spending time at a YMCA, it’s probably with the nanny. That’s your better bet.”
“I don’t know which Y is closest to the nanny.”
“Get your butt in here while we figure it out. Be quiet, though; Shelly’s still sleeping.”
Ellery had left Ashley still sleeping as well. She’d ended up giving her sister the bedroom while she camped out on the couch. Ashley had protested, but Ellery didn’t mind the sofa. She spent a lot of her nights dozing in front of the gray light of the television, its soft droning entertaining her brain long enough for it to find its way to sleep. Coben had kept an old metal bed at the farmhouse, where he had tied her to it when he didn’t have her shut in the closet. The mattress stunk from the blood and sweat of the girls who had suffered there before her, a fetid stench that haunted her dreams. She ran her body to the point of exhaustion some days but still couldn’t sleep. The doctors gave her pills. They asked her if she had nightmares. It was more that she could never again see bed as a welcoming place. How was she supposed to surrender herself each night in the space where she had nearly died? The only way to manage it was to pretend it wasn’t happening, which was what she did when she was on the couch.
Dorie reappeared dressed in a formfitting suit and sensible loafers. “I didn’t know you had a sister,” she said.
“Neither did I.” Dorie’s eyebrows rose, but she didn’t pester Ellery for details. This was why their partnership worked. “According to the almighty Google, the closest YMCA to Margery Brimwood is one in Roxbury.”
“Your call on whether we take Tremont or Warren,” Dorie said as she grabbed
a protein bar and her coffee. “This hour, they’re equally jammed.” Boston filled up with cars by 6:00 A.M. and the crush did not abate until almost 10:00. Ellery wished it were practical to take the subway for her job. It sure would be faster half the time.
As they sat idling in commuter traffic, Dorie called up Margery to ask about her possible attendance there. She put the call on speaker so Ellery could hear, too. “Yes, my granddaughter takes swimming lessons there on Tuesday afternoons,” Margery said. “Sometimes when her mother has to work, I take Brianna for the lesson.”
“And Chloe comes with you?”
“Yes. She sits and does her homework.”
“Right next to you? The whole time?”
“Well, she’s outside the pool area sitting on one of the benches, but I can see her through the windows, sure.” She hesitated. “Except when I’m in the changing rooms with Brianna. She’s just five, you know, so she needs help getting in and out of her bathing suit. Why?”
“We’re following a lead on the young man pictured in the photo with Chloe on her phone. We think he might know her from the Y. Do you recall Chloe talking with anyone while you were there?”
“She’s chatted with a few kids from time to time, I suppose. Nothing that stood out as unusual or improper. I mean, they’re all just kids.”
Dorie and Ellery exchanged a look. They’d both stood over a four-year-old boy shot in the head during a drive-by. The shooter turned out to be just sixteen years old. “Thank you, Mrs. Brimwood,” Dorie said. “You’ve been very helpful.”
Ellery parked her SUV in the first available space by the YMCA and Dorie dropped a couple of quarters in the meter. “You think they’re ticketing this early?”
“City needs the money more than I do.”
They located the manager, a brown-skinned woman with kinky hair and lots of freckles who introduced herself as Freida Maxwell. Her T-shirt had Electric Mayhem, the band from the Muppet show, pictured on the front and she had a smile as big as Dr. Teeth himself. “How can I help you, Detectives?” she asked from behind the high counter.
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