Funeral for a Friend

by Brian Freeman

  “What happened next?” Cat asked.

  “I took out all my rage on Devin Card. I was obsessed with what he’d done to her. It killed me to see him stand up there and deny the accusation, when I knew it was true. When I could prove it! That drove me crazy. One night, I followed him, and when he was alone, I jumped him and beat the hell out of him. I almost told him who I was, too. But I already had what I really wanted. His blood. To confirm everything. I had this idea that I could force Card to drop out of the race, just like Andrea wanted, if he knew there was a way to prove what he’d done. But instead, I got the paternity test back, and it was negative. Devin wasn’t my father. I didn’t understand. It made no sense. Andrea was my mother, but if Devin didn’t assault her, who was my father? How could she have been wrong about that?”

  “What did you do?”

  “I broke into Ned Baer’s hotel room,” Devin said. “All I really wanted was to see what information he’d discovered about the party and the rape, because somehow he’d been able to find Andrea when no one else had. I thought I could find a clue to figure out what had really happened. So I began going through his papers, everything he’d collected. That’s when I realized he knew things he shouldn’t have known. Before he came to Duluth, on his very first page of notes, he’d written down the date when Andrea was raped. How could he possibly know that? No one did—not even Andrea. He had a yearbook, and he’d only circled girls who looked like her. How did he know what she looked like? But what really sealed it was a picture I found of him. I could see myself in his face. There was just enough resemblance that I knew. So I took a tissue from the motel wastebasket, and I ran another test. This time, it came back positive. Ned Baer was my father. He’s the one who raped my mother.”

  “Oh, Brayden. I’m so sorry.”

  “I needed to confront him. I couldn’t think about anything else. Imagine him doing what he did years ago—and then coming back to torment my mother all over again. I wasn’t going to let him get away with it. So I called him. I lied and said I had information about the party for his article. We arranged to meet that night.”

  “Here at the Deeps,” Cat said.

  Brayden nodded. “Yes. I got here first and waited for him in the woods. It was such a hot, hot night, absolutely broiling. I watched as he got here and drank beer and went diving in the creek. He kept checking his watch, wondering where I was, but somehow, I couldn’t bring myself to go out and talk to him. And then just when I finally decided I was ready, someone else showed up.”

  “Stride.”

  “Yes. I watched Stride confront him. Ned was such a son of a bitch. Arrogant. A vicious liar, a rapist, and he thought no one knew. Stride was trying to talk him out of exposing Andrea, but Ned didn’t care about that at all. It didn’t matter whose lives he destroyed. After Stride left, I came out of the woods. Ned was pretty drunk at that point. But when I told him who I was, when I told him what I knew, he sobered up fast. At first, he didn’t believe it, but I told him about the paternity test. It was a shock. He didn’t care that I was his son. That wasn’t important to him at all. He cared that I could prove what he’d done. I could ruin his whole life. And I was going to. I told him that. I was going to make sure everyone knew what kind of a man he was.”

  “What did he do?” Cat asked.

  “He pulled out a gun. Pointed it in my face. He was going to shoot me and dump my body somewhere. That was how much he cared about me.”

  “What happened?”

  “We struggled.” Brayden took a deep breath before going on. “We wrestled over the gun. In the fight, he got shot in the head.”

  “So it was self-defense,” Cat said. “He was trying to kill you, and you killed him. Nobody can blame you for that.”

  Brayden stood up on the rocks. He stared over the cliff’s edge at the roiling waters below them. “I don’t know, Cat. Was it really self-defense? I was bigger than he was. Stronger than he was. He was drunk. I should have been able to take the gun away from him without a fight. But I wanted him dead. I wanted revenge for my mother. I don’t remember exactly how it happened, but when it was over, I stared at the body at my feet, and I didn’t feel a thing. Actually, no, that’s not true. I was glad. I felt like I’d finally done something to help Andrea. I’d kept her secret, and I’d made sure the man who raped her was gone.”

  Cat got up from the rocks, too. “Then what?”

  “I was going to take the body away, but I saw headlights. Someone else was coming. So I grabbed the gun and hid in the woods again. This man came over to the rocks—I had no idea who he was—and he found Ned’s body. I figured he’d call the police. But he didn’t. He took away the body. He dragged it back to his car and drove away. I didn’t understand why, but I didn’t care. All I knew was that he’d solved a problem for me. I found Ned’s car parked off Seven Bridges Road and broke inside; I took his laptop, his notes. Then I went over to his motel room that night and cleared it out. I didn’t want anyone to know what he’d discovered. I didn’t want anything that would point the police to Andrea. I figured they’d find the body soon enough, but they never did. Ned vanished. He was gone. The story went out a few days later that the police believed he’d drowned in the Deeps and his body was lost in the lake. Until a few days ago, that was what everyone thought. We were safe. Both of us, me and Andrea. But then it came back to life again.”

  Cat touched his shoulder. “When Stride put out a call for someone to help me with my stalker, you volunteered. Why?”

  “I wanted to keep tabs on the case. I thought you could help me find out what Stride knew and how close they were to the truth. But that was just the beginning, Cat. Believe me. Very quickly, I felt close to you.”

  “You need to tell them what happened, Brayden. It was self-defense.”

  “No, it’s too late for that. I killed Andrea. I killed my mother. There’s no going back.”

  “That’s not your fault.”

  “What difference does that make? Instead of protecting her, I killed her. How do you expect me to live with that?”

  “With help,” Cat said.

  Brayden shook his head firmly. He backed away from her and inched closer to the cliff, where the pound of the spray was so strong it rose up high enough to dampen their faces. “No, it’s better like this. Better for everyone.”

  “What the hell are you saying?”

  Then Cat understood.

  “No!” she screamed. She ran up to him and grabbed both of his arms. “No, don’t you do it, don’t you jump. I won’t let you go. Do you hear me? If you jump, I’ll go over the edge, too. I swear it. Are you ready for that? Are you ready for both of us to die?”

  “Cat, let go of me. Please.”

  But she held on even tighter. She felt her feet slipping on the wet edge of the rocks, and she looked down into the beast of the rapids, which growled up at them so loudly she wanted to cover her ears. “I’m not going anywhere, Brayden. You fall, so do I. We leave here together, or we drown together. It’s your choice.”

  “You have a son.”

  “Yes, I do. Just like your mother had a son. Are you going to take me away from him? Is killing yourself worth that much to you?”

  “Cat, stop.”

  He tried to separate himself from her, but she squirmed and held on. Their bodies swayed on the cliff. A hurricane of water cascaded through the canyon, a vortex ready to suck them in.

  “No, I won’t let you go,” Cat insisted. “I am not going to let you do this. Don’t you understand? I’m eighteen years old, and I’m sick of people dying around me. I’m sick of losing everyone. I lost my mother, too, do you remember that? I bring death with me everywhere I go, and it ends right now. No more. I’m done with it. You don’t get to die on me. You don’t get to leave me with that.”

  She laced her damp fingers tightly with his. She pulled his hand and began to walk away toward th
e trail.

  “Are you coming?” she asked him.

  Cat didn’t allow any doubt in her voice, but she was filled with doubts about what would happen next. She knew, if he wanted, that he could break away from her and jump into the canyon. There was nothing she could do to stop him. She knew, too, that her threats were hollow. She wouldn’t follow him over the edge. Not now or ever. She wouldn’t leave Serena and Stride. She wouldn’t give up her life and leave her son behind.

  “Are you coming?” she asked again. “Because I’m ready to go home.”

  Brayden took her hand and brought it to his lips and kissed her fingers one at a time. She held her breath, waiting to see if he chose life or death. Her eyes pleaded with him. He cast a last look over his shoulder at the torrents of the river below them and hovered on the brink, a heartbeat from falling to the rocks.

  Then he gave Cat a broken smile.

  “Okay,” he said. “I can’t say no to you.”

  He came away from the edge and let her lead him from the Deeps.

  43

  “You’re officially cleared in Ned’s murder,” Maggie told Stride. “Brayden gave us a full statement. He supplied all of the evidence he took from Ned’s car and motel room—including the gun. So even Dan was forced to grudgingly admit that you had nothing to do with Ned’s death.”

  “Poor Dan,” Stride said. “What a disappointment for him.”

  “Yeah. I’d like to say we’ll never see him again, but every time I think I’m finally done with him, he comes back. He’s like the road company for Les-frickin’-Mis. As he was leaving, he actually had the balls to ask me out again. Can you believe that?”

  “Coming from Dan? Yes, I can.”

  “Well, I’m just glad this case is over,” she said. “For a lot of reasons.”

  “Me too.” He was quiet for a while, and then he said, “It doesn’t change the fact that I lied to you back then, Mags. I kept you in the dark, and I’m sorry about that.”

  “Apology accepted, boss.”

  Stride shook his head and gave her a wicked laugh. “Oh, no, no, you’re the boss now. I suppose I need to get used to calling you Lieutenant Mags.”

  “Ha. Like I wanted any of this.”

  The two of them sat in chairs pushed into the sand on the beach behind Stride’s cottage. A warm August sun beat down on the Point, and sailboats dotted the lake. Not far away, he saw Serena and Cat walking through the wet surf, as the waves licked at their ankles. Two beautiful women, side by side, hand in hand. He was lucky to have them in his life. He was lucky to be alive at all.

  “I’m going to need help with the job,” Maggie added.

  “You? I doubt that.”

  “I’m not crazy about doing it alone.”

  “Then maybe you should let some other people in,” Stride told her. “You don’t have to be an island.”

  “Yeah. Maybe.”

  “The fact is, I’m not going anywhere, Mags. I’m here if you need me.”

  “Thanks. Boss.”

  Stride smiled, but he didn’t tell her that he felt a wave of relief that the job was hers now, not his. He didn’t know what that meant for the future. He shifted in the chair, and a stabbing pain in his chest reminded him of what he’d been through. He’d been home for several days now, but his surgeon had warned him that recovery was going to be slow. It would be months before he felt like the man he’d been. If he ever felt that way again.

  And then? He didn’t know.

  “What’s going to happen to Brayden?” Stride asked.

  “It doesn’t look like the county attorney is going to file murder or manslaughter charges against him. She thinks a jury’s more likely to conclude that Brayden acted in self-defense. There’s no forensic evidence to suggest otherwise, and Curt told you that he sold Ned the gun. That reinforces Brayden’s story that Ned was the one who pulled the weapon. And Ned isn’t exactly a sympathetic victim, what with him being a rapist and blackmailer. We’ll work out a plea on lesser charges related to the obstruction, but I don’t think it will mean jail time. He’ll be forced to resign from the force, though.”

  “What about Devin Card?”

  “We got test results back to confirm that Andrea was Brayden’s mother and Devin was not his father. He’s holding a press conference about it tonight. I suppose this will give him a bump in the polls.”

  “Don’t be so sure,” Stride said. “Assault or not, Devin and Peter were sleazy, awful boys in their youth. Voters don’t like that.”

  Maggie checked her watch and got out of the chair. She stared at the water, which she’d done a million times, but to Stride, she looked older now, more weighed down by the world. Whereas he felt free enough to float away.

  “Anyway, I better go. Meeting with K-2.”

  “Welcome to my world, Lieutenant,” Stride said.

  “Yeah. Thanks for that. You need anything?”

  “Not a thing,” he told her.

  She waved at Serena and Cat on the beach. She put on her sunglasses, but before she headed back across the dunes, she squatted in front of his chair. If this hadn’t been the cool, cynical Maggie Bei, he would have sworn there were tears choking her voice.

  “Take all the time you need, Stride. Get stronger. Then you come back to me, okay? I like having you on my island.”

  He leaned forward with a wince and kissed her cheek. “Keep your feet off my desk.”

  She gave him a grin and trudged up the grassy hill with her hands in her pockets.

  Stride waited for Serena and Cat, enjoying their smiles from a distance. The days since he returned home had made both of them look free, too, as if they’d all been given a second chance. They wandered away from the water and joined him, sitting down in chairs on either side of him. Sand clung to their wet bare feet. Cat leaned over and put her head on his shoulder, and Serena took his hand. The three of them sat there in silence, with the waves rolling in and out, leaving sparks of sunlight in the surf. To their left, the city skyline sprawled across the hillside. On the horizon, he could see an ore boat muscling through the water toward the lift bridge.

  It was a perfect Duluth day.

  “I’m going over to Drew and Krista’s,” Cat said, when half an hour had passed. “I told them I’d watch Michael for the evening.”

  “Have fun,” he told her.

  “Do you need anything?” she asked, which was the question he now heard fifty times a day.

  “Not a thing,” he said again.

  “Did you hear about Brayden? Looks like he’s going to be okay.”

  “He is. Thanks to you.”

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  “One of these days, Cat, you’re going to realize how much you do.”

  The girl shrugged as she got out of the chair, as if she didn’t believe what he said, but he knew she was secretly pleased. She tilted her chin and closed her eyes against the sun, and the breeze rustled her chestnut hair. Looking like that, she was an adult, ready to take on the entire world. Then, with a smile that was girlish again, she bent down and put one hand lightly against Stride’s chest with her fingers spread wide, and she cupped her hand behind her ear, as if listening to something.

  “What are you doing?” he asked.

  “Heart’s still beating,” she said. “Just checking.”

  “Oh, go away.”

  Cat giggled and ran away like a teenager, her hair flying. His eyes followed her until she disappeared over the dunes back to the cottage.

  Then he was alone with Serena.

  He was alone with his wife.

  She took out something from her pocket, and he realized it was a suncatcher, shaped like a dragonfly, its wings spread, its tail like tiny jewels.

  “Keepsake?” he asked.

  “It belonged to Andrea,” she said. “I asked Denise if
I could have it.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know, I felt like I wanted something to remember her by. We were more alike than I ever would have thought.”

  Serena held it up to the sunlight, where he saw the glass glinting in purple, orange, pink, and blue.

  Stride smiled. “Forgive every sin.”

  The perfect day went on. They needn’t say anything more to each other. The sun cast shadows over the beach as it waned, and the people began to turn into silhouettes. He felt Serena’s hand around his in a light, loving touch. Soon enough, they’d have to get on with life. Soon enough, he’d need to think about what came next. But not now. Not yet. He’d never really understood the idea of living for every moment as it happened. He’d always been too busy thinking about the next one to stop the carousel. Until he was shot. Until he died. Then, when he opened his eyes in the recovery room and saw Serena standing over him, he’d finally understood what an incredible gift a single moment could be.

  Stride savored the colors he saw, the liquid blue of the lake, the chocolate brown of wet sand, the gold of the dunes. Color was so much better than the deadness of black and white in his dream. Even so, he found that he kept going back to that experience. When he closed his eyes, he could picture the faces he’d seen, each in their own private world. The dream was always with him. If it really was a dream. If it wasn’t something else altogether. A part of him couldn’t be sure.

  What had happened to his soul at that moment when his heart stopped?