Dearly Beloved

by Wendy Corsi Staub

  He’ll never forget the way she did it. They’d been taking a walk on the frozen, deserted beach at Scituate, just the two of them. He had been thinking about how lucky he was to have her, toying with the notion that next year at this time, they might be married, or at least engaged. After all, he’d known from the start that Jennie was the woman for him. It was only a matter of time, as far as he was concerned, before they made a formal commitment.

  So there he was, daydreaming about what Jennie would look like in a wedding gown—antique, no doubt, with rich ivory lace and a train—when she’d suddenly pulled her gloved hand from his and stopped walking.

  Startled, he’d turned to ask her if something was wrong. And the moment he saw the look on her face, he knew. He hadn’t been expecting it. In fact, if anyone had asked him mere seconds before whether Jennie would ever break up with him, he would have laughed and said, “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  But there it was. A somber, distant look in her lilac eyes that said it all even before she did.

  Not that she said much.

  Just that she had done some thinking and she couldn’t see him anymore.

  He’d asked questions, but she’d refused to answer them, only repeating what she’d already said, as though the lines were from a script she’d over-rehearsed. So he’d protested, then argued—or at least, tried to. Jennie hadn’t argued back, had only closed her mouth resolutely and stared straight ahead.

  So that was it. They were through.

  And it had happened on New Year’s Day, no less, as though she’d reevaluated her life and made a resolution to get him out of it.

  Why, Jennie? he’d asked her countless times that day, has asked himself countless times since.

  Why did you leave? he wonders again now, peeling the label off the beer bottle and discarding the shreds of sticky paper on the hardwood floor without thinking.

  All I want is an explanation.

  But that’s not true, he realizes a moment later. He wants much more than that.

  He wants Jennie back.

  And I’m not going to give up, he vows, finishing his beer in one long swallow, until she’s mine again.

  More than anything, Danny Cavelli wants Theresa Benedetti to be home tonight. As he dials her phone number, conscious of Cheryl’s frightened eyes on him, he prays for Theresa to be there. But it’s not likely. Not on a Saturday night. She usually hangs out at the Knights of Columbus on weekends. And tonight they’re having their annual pre-Ash Wednesday Mardi Gras Night.

  “It’s ringing,” Danny informs Cheryl, who nods and pats his shoulder. He’s perched on the edge of their bed again, just where he was when Sandy called.

  It’s been over a half hour since then. He kept waiting for her to call back, not wanting to tie up the line in case she tried. But the phone has been silent, and he finally decided he can’t wait anymore. He has to try and find her.

  Please God, let Theresa be home. Please God, let Theresa be home. Please God, let—

  “Hello?”

  “Theresa?”

  “Yeah,” she says in a scratchy voice that doesn’t even sound like her. “Who’s this?”

  “It’s Danny, and I’ve got to—”

  “Danny who?”

  “Cavelli. Sandy’s brother. I’ve—”

  “Oh, hi, Danny. What’s up? She’s not sick, is she? Because I just found out I’ve got strep—”

  “Theresa,” he interrupts, “listen to me. Do you know the name of the inn where my sister’s staying on Tide Island?”

  There’s a pause. “Sandy told you she went to Tide Island?”

  “Yeah,” he says impatiently. “And I need—”

  “I thought she wasn’t going to tell anyone. She said your father would freak out.”

  “He did. Theresa, I mean it, you’ve got to listen to me. I need the name of the place where she’s staying. You’ve got to tell me.”

  “Why?” she asks suspiciously. Theresa and Sandy have been best friends since they were toddlers, and Danny realizes that she knows Tony Cavelli too well. Well enough to instinctively want to protect Sandy.

  “It’s a long story. Just tell me, please.”

  “I don’t want to get Sandy into trouble. She—”

  “Theresa, she’s already in trouble!” Danny explodes. “For God’s sake, tell me where she is!”

  “Why? What happened?”

  Danny shakes his head, and his eyes meet Cheryl’s. Then he glances at the clock on the nightstand behind her. Too much time has passed since Sandy called. He has to find her, before it’s too late . . .

  “Theresa, she called me, and she sounded terrified. Like some guy was doing something to her,” he says desperately. “She didn’t say what.”

  “Some guy was doing something to her?”

  “And then she screamed, and I heard someone yelling at her.”

  “What?”

  “Tell me where she is, Theresa. You’ve got to.” His voice breaks, and he runs a hand raggedly through his hair. Every muscle in his body is tensed, and his fingers ache from being coiled into tight fists.

  “It’s the ivy . . . no, the rose,” Theresa says, “the Rose-something Inn. No, I think it’s the Something-rose Inn. It’s something that makes me think of a fairy tale. . . .”

  “Oh, Jesus Christ,” Danny mutters, then automatically clamps his hand over his mouth. Angie Cavelli would faint if she heard that.

  “The Thorn-rose!” Theresa shouts triumphantly, despite her hoarse throat.

  “Is that it?”

  “I don’t know.” She sounds hesitant. “Something like that . . . The Bramble Rose?”

  “The Bramble Rose?”

  “That’s it. I’m positive. Danny, you really think she’s in trouble? Because there’s something else you should know.”

  “What is it?”

  “She was placing personal ads in a magazine. You know, to meet guys.”

  “Sandy did a sleazy thing like that?”

  “And that’s why she went to Tide Island,” Theresa continues. “To meet someone.”

  “Who?”

  “Some guy. I can’t remember his name, but he’s rich, and he’s a lawyer—no, a doctor. She got this great letter from him, inviting her to the island.”

  Danny is too stunned to reply to that. How could his sister be so stupid? How could she go away for a weekend with a total stranger?

  Beside him on the bed Cheryl watches him, asking, “What? What is it?”

  He looks at her and shakes his head, fresh worry coursing through him. He’s going to find out who lured his sister out to Tide Island; and if the guy so much as laid a hand on her, Danny’s going to beat the crap out of him.

  “He’d better not hurt her,” he tells Cheryl, and Theresa, clenching his hands into fists.

  “But if she called you, Danny, she was probably afraid of him,” Theresa points out.

  “Yeah, well, a lot of times when Sandy calls me to bail her out of something, it turns out to be a false alarm,” Danny says, even though he knows in his heart that this time, his sister is really in serious trouble. The memory of her terrified voice, and the way the call was abruptly cut off, makes his blood run cold.

  “You’re right,” Theresa says optimistically. “She was probably just over-reacting to something when she called you.”

  “Yeah. Thanks for helping me out, though,” Danny says.

  “Let me know what happens, okay, Danny?”

  He hesitates, then says, “Sure. I’ll have Sandy call you. Bye.” He hangs up the phone and turns to Cheryl, struggling to ignore the fist of fear that’s clenching his gut. “I’m going to call the inn on Tide Island and find out what’s up.”

  “Everything’s probably fine, Danny. Don’t worry until you have to,” Cheryl says, patting his arm reassuringly.

  But Danny can hear the anxiety in her voice. And as he dials the number for directory information, he can’t help bleakly wondering if there’s anything he can do even if e
verything isn’t fine.

  After all Tide Island is miles away, out in the ocean, and there’s a wicked storm brewing. If Sandy really is in some kind of trouble, she’s on her own.

  The satin pumps are scuffed from her struggle with Stephen, Sandy notices vaguely as she stands with the toes exactly lined up at the edge of the white runner. She clutches the bouquet of roses he forced into her hands and tries to convince herself that everything will be fine if she just keeps doing what he tells her to.

  “Okay, ready?” he calls from the front of the room where he’s fiddling with the tape player.

  She nods; and when he looks up sharply, as though to make sure she’s acknowledging him, she calls weakly, “Ready.”

  “Good.” He presses the play button, then takes his place at the head of the runner. “Now, wait for my cue,” he says, as if he’s a high school drama teacher directing a musical revue.

  Sandy knows better than to try to run this time, even if she had the strength. She’s weak and her legs feel bruised, particularly between her thighs. The thought of what he did to her upstairs fills her with revulsion, and she forces the memory out of her mind.

  She takes a deep breath as she stands there waiting, telling herself to calm down. If she panics, she’s dead.

  Maybe literally.

  The thought immediately overwhelms her with a renewed sense of alarm that chokes her throat with bile and makes her want to pass out. She forces it back, clutching the bouquet in trembling hands and watching Stephen from behind the layer of illusion veil he arranged over her face.

  Just pretend you’re playing bride, the way you and Theresa used to do when you were little. Just pretend it’s a game. . . . Pretend he doesn’t have that knife tucked into his tuxedo pocket.

  He’s insane—that much is clear. But Sandy has no idea why he’s making her go through this grotesque charade.

  Why me? she wonders desperately again. Why after all these years?

  She’d almost forgotten Stephen Gilbrooke, having resigned him to some distant corner of her mind reserved for storing the memories of particularly unpleasant adolescent experiences. It had been a shock to recognize him here, to realize that he hadn’t forgotten her . . .

  Far from it.

  Apparently, her rejection had a major impact on him. Major enough to make him want revenge.

  Sandy feels sick again, and it’s all she can do to remain standing as the first strains of music waft from the portable stereo across the room.

  “All right,” Stephen says, holding up his index finger, then pointing it at her. “Now.”

  Sandy gingerly takes the first slow step forward with her right foot, then glides to meet it with her left and pauses. It’s the walk she first learned when she was a junior bridesmaid at her brother Tony’s wedding, the walk Stephen showed her just before he went to start the music. He had been fairly bouncing along the white runner when he demonstrated it, saying, “This is how you’re going to come to me, okay, Lorraine?”

  She hadn’t corrected him. He kept mistaking her for someone else, someone who had obviously rejected him, just as she had.

  Sandy wonders now, as she makes her way fearfully down the aisle, who Lorraine is, where she is now, and whether Stephen freaked out on her, too.

  Did he force himself on her?

  Is he going to rape me again when I get to the end of the runner?

  She watches him fearfully from behind her veil and she keeps walking because if she doesn’t, he’ll hurt her. She knows that he will. Even though he’s acted relatively calm, even gleeful, ever since he brought her back downstairs, she’s glimpsed the deranged expression in his eyes, and it terrifies her.

  “Come on, Sandy,” he calls above the rhythmic strains of the wedding march. “Pick up the pace.”

  She does, although everything inside her is screaming for her to back away, to run away. If there were any possible way to escape, she would try it.

  But there’s not.

  And the thought of Stephen chasing her again, and catching her and violating her, makes her physically ill. Anything would be better than that.

  She’s almost reached him now. She is close enough to see that his mouth is set grimly, that his eyes look glazed as he stares at her, as though he’s seeing someone else.

  Lorraine—who is she? Sandy wonders again, taking another deep breath, trying desperately to stay calm as she forces herself to draw nearer.

  The moment she’s within arm’s length, Stephen reaches out and hooks his elbow around hers.

  Startled, Sandy bites her lip to keep from crying out. He walks a few more steps alongside her until they reach the edge of the runner. Then, as the music ends, he lets go of her arm, turning her to face him.

  “Lorraine,” he says softly, reaching for the wisp of veil covering her face. “I’ve been waiting for this moment for so long.”

  Sandy stays absolutely still and silent despite the violent thudding of her heart in her ears.

  “I love you,” he says and lifts the veil, leaning toward her as though he’s going to kiss her. His eyelids start to drift closed, then open again abruptly as he zeroes in on Sandy’s face.

  “You’re not Lorraine!”

  Sandy numbly shakes her head.

  “Where is she?”

  “I . . . I don’t know, Stephen,” she says in a small voice, wanting to beg him not to hurt her again, but knowing, from the crazed look in his eyes, that he wants to.

  “Where’s Lorraine?” he asks again, dropping the veil back over her eyes.

  “I don’t know,” Sandy repeats, hearing the hysteria creep into her voice.

  Stephen’s right hand is moving toward his pocket . . . the pocket that has the knife.

  Sandy’s head is filled with a buzzing sound and she sways as though she’s going to faint. Struggling to stay alert, she watches him reaching into the pocket, sees him produce the deadly blade.

  He runs his fingertips over the handle almost lovingly, then looks up at her again.

  “Lorraine, I don’t want to do this,” he says in a near-whisper. “But you’ve left me with no choice.”

  “Stephen, no!” Sandy protests, reaching for the veil so that she can show him, again, that she’s not Lorraine.

  But it’s too late. Horrified she sees the silver blade slashing at her, feels the sudden stinging pain as it slashes her on the forearm.

  She screams when she looks down and sees her own red blood spilling over the sleeve of the dress, dripping down onto the skirt.

  “Shut up!” Stephen hollers and raises the knife again.

  “No!” Sandy howls, reaching blindly forward to stop him.

  But the blade descends rapidly again, and again, even after she’s collapsed in a heap on the floor, vaguely aware of what’s happening to her.

  He’s killing me, she thinks incredulously. I’m dying.

  The last thing she’s aware of before blackness descends over her is the brilliant flash of a camera and Stephen’s gleeful voice saying, “Smile for your wedding portrait, Sandy!”

  Chapter 9

  The rain stings Jasper’s face as he hurries toward the back door of the inn, relieved that his grim task is over. He’s disposed of Sandy Cavelli’s belongings just as Stephen told him to—buried her suitcase in the deep pit he’d dug earlier in the dunes behind the inn, concealed by the tangle of beach grasses.

  It took longer than he thought because of the weather—his hands were numb and clumsy because of the cold, and the wind made it difficult to work efficiently.

  But the weather is a blessing, too, Jasper thinks as he nears the inn. Because of it, the wave-battered beach is deserted.

  No one in their right mind would venture outside tonight, Jasper thinks, then realizes he’s outside himself. His lips curve into a tight smile at the irony.

  But, anything for Stephen, he tells himself, quickening his pace over the rough, muddy ground.

  He owes everything to Stephen Gilbrooke, his only friend
in the world for as long as he can remember.

  They’d met back when Jasper was still going by his real name, Arnold Wentworth—one of the Wentworths of Philadelphia. He’d been miserable at prep school until Stephen came along. The other boys constantly made fun of “Arnie,” as they insisted on calling him—tripping him in the halls and teasing him in falsetto voices, telling him that everyone knew he was “queer,” so he might as well admit it.

  But Arnold refused to—wouldn’t even admit it to himself, back then. Even though he’d had those strange, unacceptable feelings since childhood. It had started out as mere admiration for other boys, usually the strongest, smartest, most popular ones in his class at the private school near his parents’ mansion. But it rapidly progressed into a series of crushes, and then full-fledged obsessions, where Arnold could think of nothing but what it would be like to kiss the object of his affections on the lips, to touch him in places that made Arnold blush with mingling pleasure and shame at the mere thought.

  His father, Grayson Wentworth, had been a football star at Princeton in his youth, and he was horrified that his only child was not only uncoordinated and clumsy, but a “sissy,” as he called Arnold. He had long since given up on trying to make a “man” out of his son, but regarded him only with disgust from the time Arnold was five years old.

  Meanwhile, Arnold’s mother, who spent her days at home drinking gimlets and her nights on the town drinking straight vodka, could have cared less about her husband or her son.

  It was a blessing for Arnold when the Wentworths decided to send him away to school in New England, having virtually washed their hands of him.

  One day, during his first semester there, Arnold found himself taking a shower in the dormitory bathroom, right next to his current obsession, Gregory Sloane. He’d struggled not to stare at Gregory’s naked body so tantalizingly close to his own, but he couldn’t resist stealing glances.

  The next thing he knew, as he was furtively stroking his hard, soap-slicked penis while he stared at Gregory, the other boy had suddenly turned and caught him in the act.