by Nicole Young
“Thanks for the advice,” I said, “but I think I’ll give the guy thing a break for now. My life’s a mess as it is.”
Candice gestured toward a cushy chair. “Have a seat. I’ll go put on the tea.”
“Let me help. You’re always serving me.” I moved to follow her.
She hesitated, then walked to the kitchen with me close on her heels. Gray light filtered through the window over the sink, discoloring the white walls.
“I’ve enjoyed getting to know you these past months, Tish. I want you to know I’ve treasured our time together.” Candice turned a dial on the stove and set the teapot on to boil.
I leaned back on the edge of the counter. “I feel the same about you. I love hearing about my mom and the great times we all had together back in the old days.”
She cracked a smile. “It does seem like it all happened so long ago.”
I felt the bittersweet in her voice. “Things are different now, but the two of us are still together,” I said, hoping to put a pleasant twist on a depressing topic.
She looked at me with a mournful grin. “My biggest regret is that Eva and Art swept you away. I’d planned on being with you. You’d have been like the grandchild I never had.”
I reached out and touched her hand. “I’m all yours now.”
“But the lost years . . . Who could have known what Eva would do when your mother died? It’s not so bad here, is it, Tish? We’re not all evil, right?”
My grandma Amble’s words floated on my memory. “There’re bad people here, Tish. Lots and lots of bad people.”
I shook my head and looked up at Candice. “No. This place is full of good people. And you’re one of them.”
She nodded. “Thank you.” She wiped at her eyes. “I’m just feeling a little misty today. I’m glad to know you care for me. Because I love you so very much.”
On impulse, I reached out and hugged her. Just then the teapot whistled. I jumped back, heart pounding. “That scared me!”
We both laughed, the black mood broken.
She put the tea supplies on the tray. “Let’s sit in the parlor. I can’t stand all this gray.”
She lit candles along the mantel, helping to dispel the gloom. I poured the tea, grateful to be with Candice instead of surrounded by chaos back home.
“So how is Melissa doing?” She leaned back in her chair.
I slumped against my seat. “Good. Maybe a little too good. She seems happy Drake’s dead.”
“Does that surprise you after what she claims to have endured?”
I stared at the swirls in the Oriental rug. “It just seems like she should be more upset. I’m worried about her.”
Candice looked at me in silence. Then she spoke softly. “Do you worry that she killed Drake?”
I nodded. “Yeah. I guess I do. She was supposedly out for a walk when it happened. She could have been the one to do it.”
“How would you feel if it turned out she killed him?”
I swallowed hard. “Wow. What a shock. I know she’d be justified. But murder’s wrong no matter how you slice it.”
Candice didn’t respond.
I rushed to fill the dead air. “I mean, I thought I was doing Grandma Amble a favor when I fed her those pills. But really I was hurting myself. And just think what will happen to Missy if she’s convicted of murder. She’ll lose her kids, her freedom, her future. It’s just not worth it.”
“What if it had been different, Tish? What if Drake had murdered Melissa? Then how would you feel?”
I didn’t hesitate. “Angry. That would be so unfair. I would want Drake to be locked up for good. I’d hope those kids never had to be around him. I’d hope he was miserable for the rest of his life.”
“And yet, Melissa would be dead. Nothing would change that.”
“True.”
“So doesn’t Melissa have a right to be alive? Even if it meant Drake had to die?”
I gave a vigorous shake of my head. “It didn’t have to be one or the other. They could both be alive today. Melissa should have filed for divorce like she said she was going to do. It should never have gotten to the point where murder was the only way to freedom.”
“There comes a point of no return.”
“I disagree. The momentum should be stopped before things ever reach that point.”
“And if they are not stopped?”
“Well, then terrible things can happen.”
“Like murder? Or suicide?”
Her words cut through me, opening lacerations across my heart.
“You should know better than to judge, Tish.”
I knew she spoke the truth. I couldn’t condemn Melissa for killing Drake. I’d also committed murder. God had forgiven me long before I’d forgiven myself. Still, I knew Melissa would have to pay for her crime as I had. I prayed the judge would be as lenient with her as mine had been with me.
“Before you think anything bad about Melissa, I want to tell you a story, Tish. A story with a very sad ending. A story of ruined lives and crushed dreams.”
A yellow caution light blinked furiously in my mind. Emotional overload seemed only moments away. I stood. “I don’t want to hear it, Candice. I’m sorry. I have to leave.”
She reached out and grabbed my hands in a steel grip. “Sit and listen. There isn’t much time.”
I shrank down into the chair, submitting to the urgency in her voice.
“I was raised down the peninsula, five or so miles south of Port Silvan,” Candice began. “Our house was small. Five of us in two bedrooms. Often, my brothers or my father would find their way into my bunk. But that was not to be discussed. That was not to be acknowledged. I never spoke of it after Mother explained that men were just that way and I should give it no mind.”
I shuddered as she drew me into her picture.
“Indoor plumbing was a luxury my parents couldn’t afford. But that was no surprise. My father was the town drunk. He’d gone to seminary as a charity case, hoping to become a priest. He claims my mother was the devil come courting, a seductress that lured him to his doom, then flaunted her pregnancy so the priests would force him to marry her. And so he punished her for her sins day after day until she was nothing but a hollow shell.”
Candice spoke with a soft, singsong voice, as if she were telling a bedtime story written by the Brothers Grimm.
“So you see,” she continued, “when Paul LeJeune came to the peninsula, I saw him as my savior. Yes, I knew why he was in Port Silvan. To grow marijuana. Silvan Green, they call it. The finest north of the Rio Grande. But I could close my eyes to his illegal activities if it meant a safe, clean bed and food on the table. Of course, we grew other cash crops and raised cattle as part of the farming operation. There was real dignity in being his wife.”
I wanted to block my ears. I didn’t want to hear anything that would make me judge Candice, not even things that had happened long ago.
She must have noticed my inner struggle. She raised her voice a fraction of a decibel. “But a few years into our marriage, times got tough. The law cracked down on marijuana growers on the peninsula. It was hard to hide the plants from helicopters. Paul got caught and did a short jail stay. He asked me to care for the plants while he served time. I barely argued with him.
“I kept things going until he got home. It was hard to put the business back in his hands. I’d done well and made good money with some new connections and growing techniques. But my personal success cut to the core of his manhood. He became abusive, beginning with mild verbal slights. It wasn’t long before those slights became insults. And the insults, character assassinations.
“Then one day he hit me. But it was nothing worse than what I’d grown up with. Maybe I had it coming, like he said. So I forgave him. Another day, it happened again. I let it go. Once, he slapped me on the face so hard, I spit blood. But I turned the other cheek, like any good Christian. And he hit that one too.
“Time went on and he’d driven me back to the kitchen
like a proper wife. I took up photography to give myself something to do. One day it occurred to me to start documenting Paul’s activities. Maybe I’d become dissatisfied. Maybe I was bored. Maybe I was getting a conscience. Maybe I wanted revenge. Whatever it was, I secretly snapped photos of the crops, the trades, the dealers, the drop-offs, the pick-ups. I had the goods on an entire drug network. And one day, I ran. I’d heard your grandfather gave shelter to battered women. So, up the steps of his lake home and into his arms I went.
“He fell in love with me, and I with him. But my marriage to Paul would always be there, keeping us apart. Your grandfather begged me to divorce. But with the beliefs my parents had drilled into me from birth, my marriage was an irreversible mistake that God required me to live with no matter the cost to my soul.
“One day, I went back to my house. I can’t remember why. I wanted to get some things I left behind on my first escape. Paul was there. He was in the garage, putting seeds into soil and setting up heat lamps. Sid was there too, helping him. Paul saw me and followed me to the bedroom.
“‘Whore,’ he said.” Candice’s voice dropped eerily low to mimic her husband. “‘Did you come to steal from me to pad your love nest?’ I didn’t answer him. That made him angrier. He grabbed my arm.”
Candice’s face twisted with hate as she relived the scene. “‘You filthy, low-life slut.’ He’d been drinking. I could smell it on his breath. ‘You don’t deserve to live.’
“He wrestled me to the floor. I screamed the whole time, right up until the stockings he’d pulled from my dresser drawer were tight around my neck and I couldn’t breathe. I think I passed out. When I opened my eyes, Sid was slapping my cheeks trying to get me to wake up. Paul was groaning over on the floor and holding his face. Sid had punched him to get him off me.
“‘Thank you, Sid,’ I said to him. ‘You can go now.’
“‘You sure you’re going to be okay?’ He was so polite and kind. I nodded yes. Then Sid left the room. I took out the pistol that I kept in my top drawer. You never know when a drug deal might go bad. I loaded it. Then I pointed it at Paul. He looked at me and started laughing. ‘You crazy wench. I’m going to kill you.’
“‘Kill me if you can,’ I said. Then I pulled the trigger.”
My hands gripped the arms of the chair. I felt as if I had been in the room with Candice. As if I’d witnessed the chilling death of her husband. Great desperate gulps of air supplied oxygen while I looked for the nearest exit. “I have to go. I have to go. Don’t tell me any more.” I staggered toward the front door.
She stood and came after me. “Please, Tish. Hear me out. This isn’t a story about me. It’s a story about Melissa.”
I stopped and closed my eyes. “I don’t want to hear it, Candice. I don’t want the burden. I don’t want the responsibility.”
“Let me tell you. You’ll feel better about Melissa once you know.”
35
I walked on weak legs back to my seat. I clasped my hands firmly in front of me and sat down. “Whatever you’re going to tell me is just hearsay,” I said, hoping I could convince myself and any court of law. “It’s nothing more than gossip. You made it up, for all I know.”
“If that makes you feel better,” Candice said.
She settled into her seat, ready to tell the rest of her morbid tale. I couldn’t bear to hear the inevitable story of Melissa killing Drake in order to save her own life. And yet I adjusted to ease the crick in my neck as Candice continued.
“When he heard the gunshot, Sid came back in the bedroom. I don’t know what came over me. I thought he’d try to hurt me when he saw what I’d done to Paul. So I shot Sid too. It was awful. I hadn’t meant to do it. I guess some self-preservation instinct came over me. Now, of course, I had to hide what I’d done. So I dragged the bodies to the garage and set the place on fire. I went back to your grandfather’s house. I showered, then cooked supper. We had a wonderful last meal together. But I knew he could never love me after what I’d done. So later, when we heard the news, I pretended to be angry with him for setting the fire. I left in a rage. In the end, the investigators called the whole thing a botched drug deal. And that was that.”
I watched her thin fingers move delicately with the story. My emotions wavered somewhere between sympathy and contempt. If her goal was to make me empathize with Melissa’s deed by telling me her own sordid experience, I wasn’t sure she’d found success.
“I spent many long, lonely years after that, Tish,” Candice said. “I was in agony over my actions. I’d broken my own heart. It is a life I would never wish on anyone.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “That’s why when I heard Drake was out of jail, I arranged to meet him in the grove. I shot Drake so that Melissa could live.”
I gulped and gasped and sputtered and spewed, sitting up in my chair in case the vomit rising in my esophagus should decide to erupt. Candice killed Drake? A couple minutes passed before I could see straight. Now, with indignation exhausted, I sat mute, shaking my head.
“Don’t judge me too harshly, Tish.” She reached her hands forward, palms up, as she pleaded her case. “It was done only out of my great love for you and the hope that your friend would have a better life than I.”
“What am I supposed to do now, Candice? You tell me this stuff and . . . what? Am I supposed to keep quiet?”
“I trust you’ll do what’s right, whatever you decide.” She stood and picked up a black box from the floor near the fireplace.
A spasm of fear came over me. I wondered if she felt the need to kill me too now that I knew her secret.
“I’m glad you came today,” she said. She held the box out to me. It was the size and shape for storing photos. “This is for your grandfather. Would you please see that he gets it?”
“Why don’t you give it to him yourself? I’m sure he’d like to hear the story from you.”
Candice shook her head. “Things are already snowballing, I’m afraid. I have to leave today. I’m going to be doing some traveling. Canada, I think.” She shoved the box into my arms. “There are a lot of things to put to rights before death comes calling. Please see that your grandfather gets this.” She tapped a finger on the box, then reached up and clasped my face in her hands. “I love you, Tish.” She kissed my forehead, then turned and left the room.
I looked at the box sitting on the passenger seat. A few errant raindrops had spattered the top like tears. I could barely fathom what Candice had done. It was a relief to know my grandfather hadn’t had anything to do with that fire so long ago, but now I was in anguish trying to figure out my own course of action. In this case, perhaps it would have been better to let sleeping dogs lie. I certainly did not want the duty that came with the information now swimming in my head.
I turned down my drive. The multitude of potholes reminded me that the road was due to be graded, along with a million other things that still needed to be done. I pulled up to the house. Sam’s VW was missing, along with Joel’s car. I sandwiched my vehicle between Gerard’s truck and Brad’s SUV. I took a deep breath and got out.
Brad stepped off the back deck. I watched him come my way bringing the warm body I longed to hold, the lips I wanted to kiss, the eyes I could get lost in.
“How are you?” he asked.
I walked around to the passenger door and took out the black box. I blinked against the light rain. “My life just keeps getting better and better.”
He slammed the car door for me and followed me inside. I set the box on the counter. I turned toward the noise in the great room. Hannah rode past on Gerard’s shoulders, whooping and screaming in glee. I couldn’t help but smile at the pair despite the gruesome knowledge tucked in my brain.
I crossed my arms and leaned against the edge of the counter. “So where’s the rest of the crew?” I asked.
Brad crossed his arms and leaned next to me. “Samantha took Melissa to town. They have to pick out a casket and handle some other details.”
I nodde
d. “How is Melissa taking all this?”
“It’s like she won the lottery.”
“Oh.” If I hadn’t known the true assailant, I would have suspected Melissa’s guilt even more.
“A little strange, don’t you think?” Brad said.
I shrugged. “Drake threatened to kill her. I guess she’s just excited someone got to Drake before Drake got to her.” I stared at the dirty dishes on the sink. If I told Brad what Candice had told me, he’d know the right thing to do. I opened my mouth.
Brad intercepted. “What do you know about your cousin Joel? Sam really seems to like him. But he has a pretty lame alibi for yesterday morning. Says he went for a drive.”
“Joel? He’s a great guy. And he can cook. What are you getting at?”
“I think him and his brother, maybe even your grandfather, are involved in off-limit activities. It’s more intuition than anything. Makes me wonder if one of them had something to do with Drake’s death.”
I gave a vigorous shake of my head, ready to defend the only family I had. “No. Couldn’t be. My grandfather does investigations on the side. Maybe Joel and Gerard help him out. I’m sure there’s nothing illegal going on.” A rerun of the day in the woods with Gerard trading drugs with the camo-dude plagued my mind.
“Something doesn’t add up. I just can’t put my finger on it.” He scooted closer to me. “But enough about them. How about us, Tish?” He tipped his forehead against mine. “Are you interested in giving it a go?”
I choked on saliva. This week I found a dead body, discovered my friend was the murderer, and saw Brad for the first time in forever. And he wanted to know if I was ready to dive back into a relationship?
“Umm, yeah. Sure. Why not?” I said.
“Okay. I guess that’s a yes.” He slid his arm around my shoulder. “I can’t believe how much I’ve missed you. I was pretty lonely when you left. I got up here as quick as I could.”
“That’s right. The trials. How did those go?”
“Guilty. Both of them. Fraud, concealing evidence, murder one, you name it.”