In the Waning Light

by Loreth Anne White

  “Because otherwise it will mess with your campaign?”

  “Like I said, don’t get me wrong. I’m a cop. I’m a good cop. Something is off here. If it ties back to Sherry’s case, I want to know about it.”

  “You’d reopen the case?”

  Something flickered through his eyes, but they remained mostly hidden under the brim of his Stetson. “You’re implying there’s reason to reopen it?”

  She swallowed. “I’m saying things might not be what they seemed.”

  “Because of what was in those files.”

  She said nothing.

  “If there’s something in there that—”

  She took a step closer to him. “I’ll tell you what,” she said quietly, her eyes locked on his. “You get me an interview, on the record, with your father, and you can sit in and hear exactly what is in those files.”

  His mouth firmed into a grim line. She turned and marched back to the truck, climbed in, her heart thumping.

  Noah got out of the truck, shouldered his backpack, and made for the school entrance. Meg watched him. He walked slowly. He walked alone. Others running and laughing around him. Small for his age. Delicate and pale against some of the other wild-haired boys who bounced around like big and boisterous puppies.

  “What’s going on with Geoff?” she said quietly to Blake, now that Noah was out of the truck.

  “I’m not sure.”

  She glanced at him. “Why was he out last night?”

  “You heard as much as I did—he’s got his own dragons to slay here, Meg.”

  “Why now?”

  The heat of irritation darted through his eyes. “I told you—he’s getting married. He wanted to deliver the news in person. While he’s here he’s dealing with his own past.”

  “I feel like there’s something you’re not telling me.”

  He caught her eyes. “Nothing that isn’t personal between me and Geoff.” He reached down, put the truck in gear. An uneasy feeling sank into her stomach. Blake erected subtle walls when it came to his brother. It made her realize just how much she wanted to trust him. Wholly. It worried her that she didn’t. What ate even deeper was Geoff. It was strange seeing him again. It wasn’t that she didn’t like him—she’d always been fond of Geoff. But something felt off in her gut when she met his eyes, and she couldn’t quite articulate it.

  Blake pulled out of the school lot. Kids on foot and on bikes and skateboards were flooding down the sidewalks toward the school. They looked like colorful jelly beans in their winter jackets. One bounced a basketball. Meg’s mind went back to Noah, walking alone. With the image came an acute memory of herself in high school and how she’d felt the day she’d finally returned after her sister’s death. A teen with a murderer-father in prison. She’d felt fragile, unreal, like a thin specter of the kid she’d been before Sherry was killed. As if people could see right through her to the other side.

  “You’re having a rough time with Noah,” she said.

  He snorted.

  She turned in her seat. “You want to tell me about the other night?”

  “Not really.”

  His comment rankled. “You need to be careful with him,” she said crisply.

  His eyes flared to hers. “Like I don’t know that?”

  “Look, clearly this is personal for you, but I don’t want to be part of the problem. Perhaps it’s better if I—”

  “What, Meg, if you what? Noah is more upset about his uncle being hauled off by the cops than he is with you being in the house right now. Until Kovacs arrests those guys, or until you get some … bodyguard to look after you, I’m it, okay? That’s just the way it’s going to be.”

  Her jaw tensed. Her blood pressure rose. She held her mouth, watched a mother pushing a baby in a stroller. The mother was yelling after two girls, sisters, she guessed, who were wheeling down the road ahead of her on bikes. Jonah’s words from that day in the corn maze rustled through her mind.

  Are you happy, Meg …

  “You know when I was happy?” she said, staring at the sisters. “When I was Noah’s age. I was happy at this same elementary school. I was happy in my own skin—when I was nine, ten, eleven, maybe even when I was twelve. I had the innocence of a child, yet I was old enough to take the boat out myself, ride my bike anywhere I wanted in town, not lock it up. I was free. Before the hormones kicked in, and all the girl-clique nastiness. And the inconvenient dawning that you’re not pretty enough. Or popular enough. And with that awareness comes the self-restriction, self-consciousness. Self-hatred.”

  “You were always beautiful,” he snapped. “That’s just crap.”

  “But it’s real crap. It’s the stuff of bullying crap. It’s the kind of crap that causes kids to kill themselves, be shamed on the Internet.”

  He glanced sharply at her. “What are you saying? Is this about Noah?”

  “Kids should be happy, Blake.”

  He stared at her, almost crossing the center line before his attention shot back to the road and he corrected the truck.

  “If I’m going to stay in your house you need to tell what was behind that bombshell Noah dropped the night we were having pizza. Tell me about Allison,” she said.

  He moistened his lips, took the turn that led to her subdivision a little too aggressively, hands tight on the wheel.

  “Fine. What Noah said was true, if framed a little harshly. It was rebound sex with Allison. She got pregnant after what we both thought would be a one-night stand. Doesn’t mean I don’t love him.” He took a deep breath. Exhaled.

  “So that’s why you married, because Noah was on the way?”

  “I came back to see my dad for Christmas, during a stint between tours, after Iraq, and I guess I was looking for something I couldn’t find once I got home. I missed what we had, Meg. You were gone. The place felt hollow. I was struggling. I ended up morose at the High Dive, that old bar down in Chillmook. Allison and some of her friends were there. We all got drunk. She’d just come off a nasty relationship and we commiserated. We ended up together that night, and the next I knew, our boy was on the way. So yeah, we decided to tie the knot for the kid. I stayed with the army, and she stayed here in Shelter Bay. She moved in with my dad at the marina. She and Bull kind of split the house in two.”

  “She didn’t want to go live with you on base, or off?”

  “No. She was not interested in the military-wife life. She hated the idea of living somewhere away from the sea and her family while I was deployed. Besides, I think Allison was relieved to have me gone for long tours, quite honestly. She had my name; Noah had my name. And I think she was seeing someone else very discreetly. She pretty much took over the running of the marina, and truly enjoyed it. Bull, of course, loved it, loved her. She cooked his meals. I didn’t feel as though I was abandoning her. She was better off here than on some anonymous base. Noah had his granddad. And I convinced myself that I was doing something noble, serving our country. War. Medic. Helping soldiers hurt in battle. Brutal shit—but it was concrete. Guys got blown to bits and were bleeding out, and I could fix them enough to keep them breathing, to fly them out. Get them to hospitals, home. I could see, feel, that I made a difference.”

  “And it continued like that, until Bull died?”

  He nodded. “Then came Allison’s diagnosis. It was fast.” His voice hitched. He swallowed, turned down her road. “I quit the army, came home to get to know my son. To try and make a family with him.” A soft snort. “Never thought I’d be a single dad raising a son at the old marina.” He was quiet for a long pause. “Funny how history repeats itself. How it lies in wait. No matter how you try to outfox it.” He cast her a look. And the subtext hung: Now she, too, was back here. Digging up the past and all the raw feelings and complications associated with it.

  “Oh shit,” he said as they neared her house. “Cops are still here.”

  “It’s not unusual for men to look at porn, LB.”

  “That’s not porn.” She w
agged her hand at his computer, two hot spots turning violently red on her cheekbones, her eyes shining bright and wild. “That’s … sick. How could you? You’re sick, you know that? You’re disgusting, a deviant. I can’t believe that I let you touch me.”

  “You don’t.”

  “Oh, oh, so that’s your excuse? Is that your justification? You can’t have sex with your poor paraplegic wife who can’t get turned on, so you must resort to that filth? Is this who you really are?”

  His pulse thudded against his eardrums. A buzzing was starting in his head. Perspiration prickled his skin. He needed to get out. Get away. He needed to get the hell away. He couldn’t. He couldn’t run. He had nowhere to turn. Prisoner. Trapped.

  “Is that why you married me, Henry? I’m some sort of placeholder? A cover? Is that where you went the other night—to indulge your sick inclinations? Those are boys in those photos and videos on your computer. How old are they? Eleven? Twelve? What you’ve got on there is criminal.”

  He took an abrupt step toward her. She cringed back into her chair, suddenly silent and wide-eyed in shock. Scared.

  “And you,” he said, his voice low, very quiet. “Why did you marry me, LB? Because of my apparent low sex drive? Because I never bothered you with my needs? Because I was safe? Because, believe me, no other man was going to waste his virility, his youth, on someone like you, some needy woman with a host of weird insecurities, with a whacked-out spinster sister who hovers over you like some guilt-ridden raven because she happened to be driving drunk all those years ago and caused the wreck that put you in that chair, and now I have to tolerate her in my own house. She’s always damn here, lurking and snooping about. I can’t stand it!”

  Blood drained from her face. Her knuckles whitened as her fingers clawed the armrests of her chair. She began to shake.

  “You want that baby?” he said, eyes lancing hers. “Then you shut your mouth, understand? You don’t tell a soul what you saw. Or you know as well as I do that Holly and her family will renege on their adoption deal.”

  She wheeled her chair closer to him, her eyes crazed. “No. Let me tell you what’s going to happen, Henry. I’ll keep quiet, and we’ll get baby Joy. And then, when she’s a little older, you will agree to a divorce, and you will get the hell out of our lives.”

  He stared at her, his meek Lori-Beth, all iron-willed in her desperation. “And how are you going to raise a child on your own?”

  “I have Sally. You will pay child support.”

  “Get out of my office.” He locked the door behind her. He paced. It was falling apart. It was all finally falling apart. And it could all be traced back to that day—that’s when it all went wrong. Meg Brogan should never have come back. She was picking at the delicate threads that had bound into a tight and solid web over the years, and she was unraveling their lives, one by one. He had to do something. A half plan began to form in his mind.

  He deleted all the files LB had found on his computer. He’d need to get rid of this system to be sure, but for now it was the best he could do. He set his briefcase on his desk, opened it, and then took his gun cabinet keys from the top left drawer of his desk. He went to his gun cabinet to get his pistol.

  Shock washed through him—his cabinet was unlocked. He never left it unlocked. He flung open the doors, and his mouth turned dry.

  His .22 hunting rifle and scope were missing.

  Blake pulled up behind the cop cruiser parked on the street. Meg felt color drain from her face as she saw the blood-painted words in daylight.

  Go Home Bitch. Fuck off, Bitch. Killer’s daughter!! White trash. Gonna kill you, Bitch.

  The blood leaking down her walls was stark, even more visceral in the bright light of day. Crime scene tape across her gate billowed slightly in a fresh breeze.

  She grabbed her tote, flung open the truck door, dropped down to the road, and marched up to the cruiser parked in front, her hair drying into wild spirals and lifting in the wind.

  A male deputy got out of the cruiser. “Ma’am, s’cuse me, you can’t go in there.”

  “This is my house. I need to fix up this damage, repair the windows before the next storm front, or at least get the holes boarded up. When can I get back in?”

  “I’m sorry, I can’t say. We’re not done yet with the scene, ma’am.” His eyes were unreadable behind reflective shades. Blake came up to join them. He touched Meg’s elbow, bringing her down.

  “All we need is the truck and camper, okay?”

  The deputy hesitated.

  “It’s not part of the scene,” Meg snapped. “Kovacs was willing to let me take it last night.”

  “Hold on one second.” The deputy got into his cruiser, made a call. When he got back out, he said, “You’re clear to take the rig.”

  “Well, thank you. If you could remove the tape over the gate?” Meg said curtly, digging into her tote for her truck keys as she marched toward the gate. But as she reached it, her phone buzzed. She fumbled for it. “Meg Brogan.”

  “It’s Dave Kovacs. You have thirty minutes?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “My father. He’ll be ready for you in thirty minutes. He’ll talk on the record.” He gave the address for a house in Chillmook. “I’ll be waiting outside.”

  “What about Geoff—what’s happening with him?”

  The call went dead.

  Her gaze shot to Blake. “Ike Kovacs—he’ll see me in half an hour.” She fiddled for keys.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going to see Ike—”

  “We. We are going to see Ike. You’re not doing this without me. Come. I’ll drive.”

  “My camper.”

  He hesitated. “Okay, we’ll back it out of the drive, park it on the street. We can pick it up on the way back, when we fetch Noah from school.”

  “I have an appointment at noon with Lee Albies, also in Chillmook.”

  “We’ll have time.”

  She wavered. She was being sucked into an undertow.

  “Meg, we had a deal.”

  CHAPTER 16

  Meg set her recorder on the coffee table, in the center. Ike Kovacs eyed it. Ruddy faced and corpulent under a shock of white hair, he was crammed into an overstuffed sofa beside his wife, Phyllis. The sofa was covered in a cabbage rose print that made the retired sheriff look comical, and uncomfortable. Blake sat in a chair to Meg’s right. Dave, in uniform, leaned against the wall, almost out of her line of sight, crossing his arms over his chest, as if physically declaring his contempt.

  Outside, clouds boiled puce over the sea. Nice view. Nice retirement house. Ike and his wife were clearly sunned out and happily weathered from their recent bonefishing trip in Florida. But tension lay thick, almost hostile, in the pretty living room. It sliced Meg. This family had once been so close to hers.

  “I’m not the enemy, you know,” she’d told Ike earlier, as he’d reluctantly welcomed them into the house.

  “You’re making yourself one by digging this up,” Ike had retaliated. “Wouldn’t have had your house attacked otherwise.”

  Meg took a sip from the water glass that had been placed in front of her by Phyllis. The others had mugs of coffee that sat untouched. She cleared her throat, leaned forward, and pressed the record button. Heat seemed to fill the room instantly. “I’m just going to start at the beginning,” she said. “No judgment. Just questions.”

  Ike shifted, looking as though he’d been strapped against his will into the floral couch.

  Meg spoke for the recorder. “Sheriff Kovacs, is it customary for a sheriff, essentially an administrative position, to personally take the investigative lead on a murder case?”

  Ike’s eyes flashed to Dave, his cheeks reddening with indignation. Meg waited. Ike cleared his throat. “What is this about? What are you insinuating?”

  “It’s a question that has been asked, and will be asked again about the case.”

  “No, it’s not common. I took the lead because
I was a damn good friend of your father’s. Your family was good upstanding folk,” Ike said. “Things like that—they’re not supposed to happen to folk like the Brogans. Not in Shelter Bay. Not in Chillmook County. It was an affront, an attack on Jack and Tara. On everything that we all stood for and believed in.”

  “So it was personal.”

  “Hell yes, it was personal.”

  “It got you fired up.”

  “Megan”—Phyllis leaned forward, her brow creasing in distress—“is this really necessary?”

  Ike’s hand shot up, quieting his wife. “I have nothing to hide.” His gaze bored into Meg’s. “She’ll see that I did everything in my power to charge Ty Mack and have him put away. I deeply regret that I was not able to do it before your father took the law into his own hands, Megan. I tried.”

  She took another sip of water, feeling Blake’s attention keenly. She’d asked him to remain silent during the interview, but she could see him fidgeting.

  “You were all members of the same church.”

  “What’s that got to do with anything?” Phyllis said, her voice going high.

  Again, Ike’s hand shot up to still her. “You know that we all went to the same church, Megan, but your father’s view on justice, an eye for an eye, was his interpretation, not mine.”

  She met his gaze. “You also attended the Oregon state police academy with him.”

  “When he was twenty. I was two years older. We graduated together. He was hired on by the Portland police. I started as a rookie right here, in Chillmook County. Been here ever since.”

  “Why did my dad leave the Portland police?”

  Ike cursed softly under his breath. “You can find that out for yourself—got nothing to do with me, or Sherry’s case.”

  “But you do know why?”

  “Hell yes.”

  “Because he was a hothead? Because he lost his temper and got violent with a suspect on more than one occasion?”

  “Some people have their hearts in the right place, but are not suited to law enforcement.”

  Meg rubbed her brow, making notes as questions rose in her mind. She looked up. “My dad was also drinking pretty heavily during his Portland period.”