He stopped again at the bottom of the steps. “I thought at first she’d just left for a while, that she’d be back. But sometime—I can’t really remember when—I began to know that she had to be dead. It never came as a revelation. Just grew as a certainty. No word. No financial record. No—nothing.”
He sighed. The sunlight showed more of the gray in his sandy hair. “Pretty soon, I forgot what she looked like. I studied her pictures—I memorized her pictures. I knew I would always recognize the pictures. But I wondered, would I recognize her? The not knowing was maddening. What had I done? Or not done? Had she run off with someone? Had she gotten sick or been hurt? What—”
His rush of words stopped as suddenly as it had started. He shook his head, as if clearing cobwebs and bad memories.
“Thank you for coming down, Avery. I’m sorry to have interrupted your holiday. I wasn’t sure what—well, what the sheriff had in mind.”
“You did the right thing. Be careful with L.J. She’s smarter than you might think. And persistent. I don’t know what today was all about. But she’ll be back.”
He nodded. “They always are.”
He climbed into the Mustang after I unlocked the door for him, but he didn’t comment on my car. I chalked it up to shock.
Outside his brother’s house, cars blocked the driveway and part of the street. “I would invite you in,” he said, “but I’m sure your own family is missing you.”
He closed the car door, leaned over, and waved. I’d quelled my impulse to pat his shoulder before he got out; his reserved manner spoke of someone who preferred a lawyer-client relationship maintained without hugging or mush. What an odd Thanksgiving.
The narrow road that circled through the Lake’s Edge neighborhood climbs and turns at steep pitches. The houses sit back off the road, and trees and shrubbery crowd the drive. Fortunately, I was creeping around the curve from the Bertram enclave when I came upon a walker commanding more than her share of the road. She sashayed along in one of those multicolored bodysuits, arms akimbo, her backside to the hood of my car.
As I pulled around her, on the wrong side of the narrow rutted lane, she stopped, hands on her hips. I immediately recognized Cissie Prentice, a friend from high school.
“If it isn’t Avery gahdam Andrews!” I could hear every overexclaimed word through the closed car window.
She unlatched the door and swung her long, synthetically covered legs into the passenger seat. “What’re you doing in town and not callin’ me?”
Cissie wrapped me in an awkward hug and slammed the car door. “You’re a lifesaver. Take me over to the Legion field so I can take my walk. You can come, too.”
“You want a ride so you can go take a walk?” The Legion field lay about a block and a half’s distance from where we sat. But that was Cissie.
“I heard you were back in town. You shoulda called. Why ever you’d want to come back here’s beyond me. You gonna stay awhile? If you are, I got some plans for us.”
Knowing Cissie and what the tone of her voice implied, the plans were scandalous, but fluid enough that she could write me in—or out—quickly.
I didn’t bother to elaborate on my situation. At the stop sign, I hung a right onto the road toward town, then a quick left to the baseball fields.
“Whatcha doin’ over in my neck of the woods?” She rearranged the band holding her curly blonde mane in a ponytail.
“Meeting with one of your neighbor’s family members. Melvin Bertram. Know him?”
She turned to look at me. Not the self-absorbed, half-cocked attention she usually pays other females. She really looked at me.
“Do tell,” she whispered, wide-eyed.
“What?”
She smacked my arm with a backhand. “Girl, don’t what me. Melvin Bertram? That man killed his wife and everybody in town knows it. And he’s a sight too old for you. What’s he like? I hear he’s got money.”
“I’m not dating him, Cissie. It’s business.”
“Mm-hmm,” she murmured. “I know you, Avery Andrews. He’s nice-looking, I’ve heard. In a graying kind of way. ’Course, he killed a slut. What are the odds he’d do that again? Slim to none, I’d say. You hear they found her body? Come on.” She waved her hand as she climbed out.
“Naw. I got to get back to the house. I—”
“Come on, Avery. A walk’11 do you good. Give us a chance to get caught up.”
She slammed her door and crossed in front of the car to my door, pulling down the legs of her high-cut leotard and scanning the parking lot as she walked.
“Come on.” She opened my door. “Serves you right for not calling me earlier. And, law, we gotta get rid of some of that turkey dinner.”
Where she had hers stored, I couldn’t tell. I was thankful I’d discreetly disguised mine under a cardigan sweater and not paraded it about in hot pink and black spandex.
Cissie performed some impressive stretching moves that looked like she was coming on to the hood of my car.
“Cissie, I’m not really dressed for an athletic endeavor—”
Cissie’s snort cut me off. “Relax. The walking’s nothing. The really athletic stuff won’t start until later, if all goes as planned.”
I followed her gaze across the creek to where the walking trail wound into the woods. Rounding the bend out of the woods, a tall man strode, effortlessly swinging a set of hand weights. His hair, thin where he’d begun to bald at the crown, stuck up in damp spikes. He looked like a middle-aged exercise ad.
Cissie rested a warning hand on my arm, waited until he’d begun his next loop around the path, then she started across the footbridge. “We’ll pass him a couple of loops. Then you can head on home.”
Cissie always approaches females more directly than she does males. I couldn’t say female friends—I’m probably the closest she has, and we really aren’t friends.
“So, tell me about this Melvin Bertram. He’s cute? Not as cute as Michael Driggers.” She grinned her barracuda grin.
“So that’s his name. What’s he do?”
“One of the new engineers up at the nuclear plant.”
“Single?”
She gave me a withering look. “I don’t hunt down married men.”
“Just stumble across them now and then.”
“A’vry, honey, if you’d loosen up a little, you wouldn’t be gettin’ those worry wrinkles between your eyebrows. Did he do it?”
“Huh?”
She snorted, exasperated. “Kill his wife.”
“I don’t know. We really haven’t worked that into the conversation.”
“Well, ask him, silly. You’re a lawyer. Wouldn’t you know if he was lyin’?”
I didn’t bother explaining to her that I wouldn’t know, which was unfortunate, since all my clients probably lie to me about something.
We walked at an easy pace. I figured Cissie wouldn’t want to break a sweat—or be too tired to run her prey to ground should she be forced to drastic measures.
“You goin’ out with him? Or is it strictly business? Silly question. Everything’s business with you, isn’t it?” She poked me with her manicured finger.
“Strictly business, Cissie.”
“You gettin’ any, then?”
I changed the subject. “You think it’s possible she committed suicide?”
Cissie strolled along, uncharacteristically quiet for about three steps. “Possible, I guess. Spread her legs for anything, all the way through high school, what I heard. My older brother knew her. Gawd, I hope not in the biblical sense. Sure surprised everybody when she hauled Melvin Bertram down the aisle. Everybody started countin’ months, Kevin said, ’spectin’ a bun in the oven. But no—”
Cissie began swinging her arms athletically, but didn’t really pick up the pace any. She’d spotted her quarry through the trees where the path curved around the most distant ball field.
As we passed him, she flashed him whatever indecipherable siren signal women like Cissie k
now. I couldn’t tell if he’d caught it, but I suspected he had. Cissie didn’t launch many spars that missed.
After he was safely past, she quit flinging her arms about. “Suicide? I don’t know. Would a girl like that kill herself? What do you think, she just drove herself into the lake?” Cissie shuddered. “What a dreadful thought. Seems like there’d be an easier way, duhn’t there? I mean, if you were considerin’ it at all.”
I thought about the rusted hulk of a car, the redstained water inside, that fright-house skull floating into focus, then disappearing.
“Yeah,” I murmured, then just walked for a moment in silence. Finally, to change the subject, I asked, “So, what have you been up to lately?”
Cissie sighed. “You’ve been gone awhile. You shoulda come home to visit more. My divorce was final a few weeks ago. You handle any divorces? The first one hit me a lot harder. By this second one, I knew what was comin’. And it wasn’t so scary. ’Course,” she snorted, “this time, there was money comin’. Cleveland had the time of his life while we were married, I can tell you. He had this trick of slidin’ his hand down my belly while he was inside me and touchin’—”
“Cissie.” I held my hands out to call a halt.
“A’vry, honey, you need to loosen up. You’re missin’ out on a lot. Cleveland was a pig, but if I can teach that trick to somebody else—you just wouldn’t believe.”
I shook my head. I was glad somebody else was having some fun; it kept the universe in some kind of balance.
“Okay, Avery, we’ll have to visit some other time.”
She stooped to adjust her glow-in-the-dark gel shoes, strategically displaying a lean haunch to her prey. I wished I could stick around, take some notes. Cissie always said her all-girls’ college experience made all the difference—that’s where you learn to hunt men, she said. I’d made the mistake of going to a school where the men were plentiful, and I had thereby failed to develop either skill, craft, or instinct.
I strolled the short distance to the footbridge and my car before I hazarded a casual glance back at Cissie and her engineer. He stooped on one knee, apparently adjusting her shoe for her. And she stared down, her ponytail looped across her shoulder, posed like a predator exulting over its fallen prey. Sheer poetry in motion. I hoped he was ready to learn some new tricks.
The rest of the afternoon at Mom’s house passed quietly. Well, as quietly as it can when Clemson wins a bowl game. Following a nap on the sunroom sofa, I ate leftovers, despite the fact that I’d pledged after lunch never to eat again.
That evening, I slung my satchel into the backseat of the Mustang and headed toward North Main and the mountain road.
Main Street took me past my great-aunts’ house and, two blocks down, past the Garnets’ house. Where the four-lane divided street narrowed to two lanes, I passed the sign marking the turn to Garnet Mills.
The sun had long before dropped from sight and the mountains loomed ahead, dark and solid, topped with the feathery shading of leafless winter trees against the darkening sky. Surprisingly little traffic moved through town, and the two convenience stores on the north edge of town were dark and empty, closed for the holiday.
Deep in my chest, I felt the percussive thud, like a bass drum. Then I heard the sound. In almost the same instant, my rearview mirror caught the flash of the explosion—a white-hot orange flash, followed by more sound. Or the sensation of sound. I couldn’t be sure which.
I took the next left turn, on reflex, not sure what I could do, but certain something had happened. Through the treetops and past a hodgepodge of small houses, I glimpsed flames. I cut back one block and over another street. Garnet Mills. I drove past the first parking lot and loading docks. The flames seemed fiercest at the front of the plant.
The plant sat slightly downhill from the road, so the roof lay visible—or what remained of the roof. A gaping hole full of flames was centered about where I remembered the reception area. Nothing moved, except the smoke and flames.
I seemed to be the only person around. Alone with an inferno. I reached automatically for the place where my car phone had hung in my BMW.
But I cracked my knuckle against the gearshift of the Mustang and remembered I didn’t have a car phone anymore. I wrestled with the gearshift and reversed the car in the road, backing onto the shoulder of the narrow lane to go for help.
Then I heard the sirens.
At first, the fire seemed to be everywhere. But, as the shock wore off, I saw that it had confined itself to the one-story office section of the building, attached to the sprawling manufacturing plant. Flames shot out the roof as I pulled in front, and the fire burned bright and hot.
I yelled, but saw no movement inside. The heat kept me at a distance. No cars stood in the small front lot or along the street where the Mustang’s headlights shone. Probably no one working on Thanksgiving night.
I backed away, across the ragged pavement, as the fire trucks rocked down the narrow residential street toward me.
The firemen jumped into action. A couple of them I recognized, even under their hats and heavy gear. One yelled something at me. I waved back, gesturing toward the building and shrugging my shoulders dramatically.
He came closer, grabbing my elbow and yelling into my ear. “—see anybody inside?”
I shook my head.
“How’d it start?”
I yelled over the surprisingly loud sounds of the fire. “I just heard a sound. An explosion, I guess. From Main Street.”
He turned, shouting instructions as men reeled hoses off the truck.
I walked back to my car, reached inside to click off the headlights, then leaned against the front fender, waiting for my legs to quit shaking.
The firefighters played water on the outside and roof of the manufacturing building. Most of their efforts seemed focused on keeping the fire contained rather than putting it out.
I couldn’t do anything to help. After a few minutes, I headed up the mountain rather than watch, feeling helpless. The smell and the sounds and the raw fear and awe stayed with me into the next morning.
Six
I slept late and awoke to the acrid smell of smoke and a raw, burned scratch in my throat. The fire scene from the night before—and my disturbed dreams—hit me with the force of a stream from a fire hose.
I’d dumped my clothes on the porch of the cabin and stood under the shower until the hot water heater emptied. After that, I’d warmed a cup of milk, thinking somehow it would neutralize the taste in my mouth as well as dispel the chill that permeated me.
But the next morning, the smell and the taste singed my every breath. The cabin felt chilly, but I certainly didn’t want to build a fire. I bundled on a turtleneck, a heavy sweatshirt, ski tights, and jeans. And I kept moving.
Looking first in the refrigerator, then idly through the cabinets, I couldn’t decide on anything to eat. Finally, I grabbed some Fig Newtons and a Coke and headed toward the lake’s edge.
My grandfather’s cabin sits backward, with the back door facing the gravel and grass drive where I had parked the Mustang, and the front facing the lake. Considering that the cabin had been built for enjoying the view rather than receiving callers, its backwardness made sense. Inside, with one large living area and two small bedrooms tucked to one side, it didn’t matter which door one entered. A deep porch ran the length of the cabin’s front, the tin-roofed overhang sheltering its rough-hewn lap siding from heavy rain and hot summer sun. A path, scarcely more than a footfall’s width, ran jaggedly to the lake, to where an old johnboat lay upside down.
I propped myself against the boat’s bottom, hoping I wouldn’t disturb any snakes that had taken winter refuge underneath. The blue-black water mirrored the trees around the lake, a soft contrast to the images from the night before. I could still smell the smoke.
I’d set aside today to work on the cabin. The day after Thanksgiving would be quiet around the courthouse and, I hoped, the jail and the magistrate’s office. If
Harrison Garnet wanted to get in touch with me, he had my parents’ phone number. Why hadn’t he called? He didn’t seem interested in my advice, so why had he hired me in the first place? I’d begun to doubt that my trial qualifications or availability had attracted him. Maybe he’d wanted somebody who didn’t know as much about him as the local boys did. That was not a reassuring thought.
Keeping busy around the cabin would be no problem. Narrowing down exactly what I could do—or had the time or inclination to do—was a problem.
Did I reseal the wax ring under the toilet and risk dropping the bolts under the house because I couldn’t lift the toilet alone? Rescreen the windows? Or wait until closer to summer? Replace the rotten boards on the front steps and porch? That job would take more time than I had, since I’d have to drive to town to buy pressure-treated lumber and borrow a circular saw.
I settled on replacing the broken windowpanes—five in all—that had been boarded over. Along the porch railing, I arranged the glass, putty, and glazier’s points I’d bought earlier in the week, then tackled the window beside the door first. The plywood piece nailed over the hole came off with loud protest, and removing the dried putty required meticulous, mindless chipping.
I could never make a living at this, given how slowly I work. But, when I surveyed my handiwork, I realized I enjoyed a job where I could actually see what I had accomplished. As I worked, I realized that I envy people who could sit back at the end of the day and say yep, I did that.
I couldn’t dig out all the stubborn old caulk, but, when I tested the pane, it fit well enough. I’d just started to bead in a line of new caulk when car tires crunched in the gravel drive and stopped out of sight around the other side of the cabin. Carrying the caulking gun, I swung off the porch, an easier path than walking through the cabin.
Sheriff L. J. Peters pulled herself from the front seat of her cruiser, one hand on the top of the door and one on the doorjamb. Extricating all six-plus-feet of her bulk, even from something as roomy as a Crown Vic, required effort. She brushed her fingers through her cropped black hair and set her brimmed hat on her head before she spoke.
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