And now to the big question: Would the current situation alter his feelings toward Gwen? His plans? Should it? He’d waited such a long time for…
Headlights flashed around the curve in front of him. The vehicle slowed, its driver spotting the flare. It U-turned and pulled onto the shoulder, beams blinding in the rearview and side mirrors. Matt stepped out of the Jeep.
A woman walked toward him, moving in a deliberate but cautious manner, as a cop does when approaching a stopped vehicle. When she came closer, he saw she had closely cropped black hair and a pretty, fine-boned face; she wore a dark suit and had her right hand thrust inside her shoulder bag, as if it might contain a gun.
“Need some help?” she asked in a guarded but friendly tone.
“I’m out of gas. Can you give me a lift to the nearest service station?”
“Sure can, but I’ll have to ask to see your license and registration first. Detective Rhoda Swift, Soledad County Sheriff’s Department.” She flashed her identification at him.
He got the rental papers from the Jeep, removed his license from his wallet.
The detective examined them in the headlights’ glare. “British Columbia, huh? Nice country up there. What brings you to Soledad County, Mr. Lindstrom?”
“I’ve taken a job here, as a photographer for the Spectrum.” As soon as he spoke the words, he realized he’d made a bad mistake. John Crowe, not Matt Lindstrom, had taken the job.
“Good publication. How’s Carly these days?”
“Prickly as ever, but fine.”
Rhoda Swift smiled faintly and said, “Well, Mr. Lindstrom, let’s get going before the sun comes up. I was headed north for Green Valley Road, but I can just as easily take Old Schoolhouse out of Santa Carla.”
“I don’t want to make you go out of your way—”
“Insuring the public’s safety is what we’re here for. Green Valley’s a better road, but Old Schoolhouse is more direct to where I’m going. I’ll deliver you to the service station there, and they’ll give you a lift back.”
Matt barely had time to get his seat belt fastened before Rhoda Swift accelerated onto the highway, clearing the Jeep’s bumper by scant inches. He glanced at her, and she grinned wickedly—a good, fast driver who took pleasure in showing off for her passenger.
There was a police radio mounted beneath the dash, its mutterings indistinguishable to him. Swift turned down its volume, and he was about to ask her about her job when she reached for the mike, keyed it, and said, “Yeah, Valerie, what’ve you got for me?”
A pause, then a sigh. “I’ve told him my cell doesn’t work on this side of the ridge…Okay, patch him through to me.” She rolled her eyes at Matt. “Men! Yes, Guy…I told you—Oh, never mind…The meeting ran longer than I thought it would, but I’m on my way. Just have to deliver a motorist in distress to a service station first…Don’t worry, I’ll be careful…Yes, dear.”
As she hung up the mike, Rhoda Swift laughed softly.
“Overprotective husband?” Matt asked.
“Overprotective gentleman friend. He’s a New Yorker, spends part of the year at his vacation home near Deer Harbor. When he’s in Manhattan, he thinks nothing of wandering the streets at two in the morning, but should I be driving one of our rural byways at night, his mind conjures up all sorts of peril.”
“Men like to think we’re fierce protectors even when we’re not, I guess. Where’s Deer Harbor?”
“On the coast, north of Signal Port.”
“One of our reporters was covering a story in Signal Port today.”
“That would be the Dawson case. Hugh Dawson, owner of the Sea Stacks Motel. Miserable cuss, and last night his wife finally decided she’d had enough of his abuse and shot him. I’ve just come from a meeting with the D.A. in Santa Carla; we’re in agreement that it was justifiable homicide.”
For the remainder of the trip into town Matt chatted with Rhoda Swift about the county, learning more about the coastal area, which, by virtue of being cut off by the ridgeline, seemed a world unto itself. When she dropped him at the Chevron station at Old Schoolhouse Road, she said, “Welcome to Soledad County, Mr. Lindstrom. Take my advice, and fill up often from now on.”
“I will. And thanks for the lift.”
Her big eyes clouded. “No problem. A couple of years ago I didn’t give a stranded motorist a lift, and I very much regret it. I try to make up for it every time I can.”
The encounter with the sheriff’s detective had calmed Matt. After the Chevron station attendant returned him, with a supply of gas, to the Jeep, he drove to a small motel near the county courthouse in Santa Carla and took a room. As soon as the government offices opened the next morning, he was there and, with the help of a kindly clerk, began researching the public records.
The house on Drinkwater Creek, it turned out, belonged to Carly McGuire. She’d bought it in 1983, the same year she bought the Soledad Spectrum. By his estimate, Carly couldn’t be more than forty-five, which would put her in her twenties at the time of the purchases—large purchases for one that young. Money there. Perhaps she was a trust fund baby.
He had no name for the child he’d seen with Gwen, so he asked the clerk to show him how to access birth records by the parent’s name. No child had been born to Ardis Coleman or Carly McGuire in Soledad County during the four-year period when he assumed the birth would have taken place. Adopted, perhaps?
One question answered. More raised.
He headed back to Cyanide Wells.
“So you think you can just show up at your leisure, do you, Crowe?” McGuire stood outside her office door, arms folded, expression severe.
“Car trouble,” Matt said. “Sorry.”
Boss trouble, he thought. Big time.
“You can fix my piece-of-shit truck in half an hour, but something goes wrong with that fancy Grand Cherokee that keeps you away all morning?”
“I said I’m sorry.”
“Your assignment sheet’s on your desk. Get cracking.”
God, what did Gwen see in the woman?
“Got time for that drink this evening?” Matt asked Severin Quill.
The reporter looked up from his keyboard. “You could probably use one right now, after the contretemps with Attila the Hun.” He looked at his watch. “I have to attend a press conference in Santa Carla at two. Why don’t we meet at Rob’s Recovery Room at five-thirty. You know where that is?”
“Uh-uh.”
“Just south of the Talbot’s Mills exit on the east side of the freeway.”
“Kind of far from here.”
“Yes, but it’s on my way back. Plus, it’s seedy enough that Attila wouldn’t deign to set foot there.”
“Are we hiding from her?”
“Not exactly, but her policy of separation of work and private life makes for uneasy encounters here in town.”
“I’ll see you at five-thirty, then.”
Rob’s Recovery Room was a country tavern, and fully as seedy as Quill claimed. The bar was gouged with initials and other penknife graffiti; the upholstery of the black leatherette booths had been eviscerated in places. The customers were mainly men with work-hardened hands and weathered faces, wearing faded clothing and baseball caps with logos. Whiskey and something called Knob Ale seemed to be the drinks of choice. After Matt shouldered through the knots of patrons by the bar, he asked for a Knob, no glass, and took a booth from which he could survey the crowd.
On the surface, the atmosphere was convivial. The men laughed and joked and made suggestive remarks to the lone busy waitress; a trio of women occupied the booth next to him, and their conversation was punctuated by shrill giggles. But soon he began to detect a curious hollowness to the sounds and noticed that the smiles stretched people’s lips but didn’t reach their eyes. When voices rose in anger near the door, the thin, sallow-faced woman to Matt’s left winced and said to her companions, “Doug’s gonna be a handful tonight; I just know it.”
“Got his notice,
did he?”
“Yeah.”
“What’re you guys gonna do?”
“My brother thinks he might be able to get him on at the mill where he works up in Washington. But things’re bad there, too.”
“Fuckin’ tree-huggers.”
“Yeah, but they’re not the only ones to blame for what’s happenin’ here. Maybe if the mill had a better manager it wouldn’t be failing.”
“Wrong, honey. The manager follows orders from the top, and what they’re orderin’ him to do is shut the place down. They’ll make more money that way than if they ran it proper. Ain’t that always how it is? The people who’ve got money get more, and the rest of us…Well, that’s how it is.”
By six-thirty Severin Quill had not appeared, and Matt was growing weary of the bar scene. He had decided to give him another fifteen minutes, then pack it in, when he heard the bartender call, “Is there a Matt Lindstrom here?” Automatically he rose and went to take the receiver the man held out to him.
“Well, Mr. Lindstrom, what do you have to say for yourself?” Carly McGuire’s voice, low and furious.
“How did you…?”
“Find out your real name? Funny story. Sev Quill went down to the county seat for a press conference at the sheriff’s department about a murder case he’s covering in Signal Port. He got to talking with the investigating officer, and she told him she gave a lift last night to a Matt Lindstrom, who claimed he’d taken a job as a photographer for this paper. Sev knew something was wrong, so he came to me and told me where I could find you. I know who you are and who you’ve come here to hurt.”
Damn! He hadn’t had any choice but to reveal his true name to a law enforcement officer, given his lack of identification as John Crowe.
McGuire went on, “I don’t know how you found Ardis or what your plans are, but I’m putting you on notice: You are to stay away from her, our child, this newspaper, and me. If necessary, we’ll get a restraining order against you, and if that doesn’t work, I own a handgun and I’m not afraid to use it.”
Anger of the sort he hadn’t felt since Saugatuck flared. “What does Gwen have to say about that?”
“Ardis doesn’t know you’re here yet. I plan to tell her, but she’s fragile, and I’ll have to handle it carefully. My first order of business is to protect her and our little girl. And that means keeping you away from them.”
“This is none of your business. It’s between Gwen and me.”
“What is it I said that you don’t understand? Perhaps you’ve never heard of a restraining order?”
“I wonder if a judge would look favorably upon a woman who deliberately disappeared and left her husband under suspicion of murdering her. A woman who sat back and allowed his life to be ruined.”
“You’re not listening to me, Mr. Lindstrom. I will do anything to protect Ardis and our daughter. Is that clear?”
“Is that clear? You bet. Am I going to roll over for you? No way.”
McGuire hung up on him.
He slammed down the receiver and went outside. Leaned against the Jeep, shaking with rage. Gwen had a fierce protector in Carly McGuire, but not fierce enough. No one had been there to protect him fourteen years ago. No reason it should be any different for Gwen.
The house on Drinkwater Creek looked much as it had the night before—windows lighted, but only Gwen’s SUV in the parking area. He entered the property by the same route, clutching his Nikon. Again he sighted on the windows, but this time he saw no sign of Gwen or the child.
Around him the shadows were deepening. Springtime scents drifted on the warmish air—freshly growing things, pungent eucalyptus, and something sweet that he had always associated with his first love. Behind him he heard the rush of the creek, the hum of tires on the pavement. Before him the house’s windows glowed, but without motion. As he waited, staring through the telephoto, unease stole over him. The house seemed too quiet…
He slipped out from the trees’ shelter and sprinted across the open ground between them and the kitchen window. A half-full glass of red wine sat next to a cutting board; a knife and a heap of green beans lay on the board, some of them trimmed. The table was set with three placemats and napkins, but the cutlery was scattered across it.
His unease was full-bown now. He moved to the living room window. No one there.
After a moment he went around the corner to the front door. It was ajar. He stepped inside, waited until he could make out lines among the shadows. A small table lay on its side, a broken lamp beside it. A rug was bunched against one wall.
A chill took hold of him. He stood very still, listening. No sound except the rush of the creek in the distance. No one moved here. No one breathed.
After a moment he felt beside the door for a light switch, flipped it on. He was in a hallway, rooms opening to either side. Terra-cotta tiled floor, puddled with red. Red on the bunched-up rug. Red smears on the beige wall…
Sound of a vehicle on the road. Engine cutting out by the footbridge. Quick steps on the path.
He reached for the light switch, but his arm felt leaden, and his hand fell to his side. He was about to step into the doorway behind him when a voice exclaimed, “Oh, my God!”
He whirled and stared into Carly McGuire’s eyes. Their pupils were huge black holes, and the blood was draining from her face. Her gaze jumped from him to the puddles on the floor, to the stains on the rug, to the smear on the wall, and back again.
“You bastard!” she screamed. “What have you done to her?”
Carly McGuire
Friday, May 10, 2002
Ardis’s former husband stood in a circle of light in her front hallway, staring at her as if he couldn’t comprehend the meaning of her words. Her eyes again moved to the bloody smears on the wall, and she felt a growl rising from deep in her throat. She launched herself at him, pushing off on the balls of her feet, intent on doing him serious damage, but at the last second he feinted to the left, caught her from behind, and pinned her arms between them. His rough, strong hand covered her mouth.
He’s killed Ard, and now he’s going to kill me!
“Be quiet,” he whispered. “Whoever did this may still be in the house.”
She struggled against him, but he tightened his grip and dragged her into the living room. In the mirror above the mantelpiece she saw his face: pale under its tan, its planes honed sharp by tension. And his eyes…
He was afraid, too.
Without taking his hand from her mouth, he said, “I did not do this, Carly. You’ve got to believe me. I did not do…whatever was done here tonight.”
Of course you’d deny it, you bastard.
“Think,” he added. “You called me at Rod’s at—what? Six thirty-five? There wasn’t enough time for me to drive here and cause this kind of damage before you arrived.”
She calculated. Thirty minutes max. Thirty minutes to drive here and kill a woman. Her woman. And what about Natalie? Where was she?
Slowly Lindstrom took his hand from her mouth, turned her so she faced him. “Look at me,” he said. “Do you see any blood? Whoever did this would be covered in blood.”
She shook her head, stepped away from him, sank, weak-kneed, on the edge of the sofa. Lindstrom moved toward her, and she snapped, “Get away from me.”
He backed off, his expression watchful.
She perched on the cushion’s edge, poised to spring should he make another move toward her. “If you didn’t cause that”—she motioned at the hall—“what’re you doing here?”
“I wanted to talk with Gwen.”
“Talk?”
He looked down at his feet. “All right, confront her.”
“And?”
“The house seemed unnaturally still when I got here. The door was partway open. So I came inside. A minute or so before you arrived.”
“And you think whoever’s responsible might still be in the house. So why didn’t you stay outside and call nine-one-one? And why are you talking in a n
ormal voice?”
“I just said that to make you stop fighting me. There’s nobody here but us. I can feel it. So can you.”
Nobody alive, anyway…
“Carly,” he added, “we ought to search the house.”
For a body. Or bodies.
She took several deep breaths and pushed up from the sofa. “You go first, so I can keep an eye on you.”
Ard’s office, across from the living room: compulsively neat, as always.
Kitchen: no sign of a struggle except for the flatware strewn across the table. Setting the table was Natalie’s responsibility…
Don’t go there.
Formal dining room, seldom used, but Ard loved the cherry-wood table and silver candlesticks…
All in order.
“Bedrooms?” Lindstrom asked.
“That way.” She pointed him toward the hall that led to the house’s other wing, motioned for him to precede her.
Guest room: tidy, waiting for visitors who seldom came.
Her at-home office: as chaotic as the one at work.
Back in the hall he asked, “Where does this door lead to?”
“Natalie’s room. Our little girl.” She steeled herself, pushed it open, stepped inside.
No girlish pink or yellow for Nat. Instead, bright-green walls with stencils of jungle animals, and a dark-blue ceiling with her favorite constellations painted in silver Day-Glo.
“She could be hiding,” Lindstrom said.
Carly nodded, crossed to the closet while he checked under the bed. Together they searched the few nooks and crannies but found no trace of Nat.
Finally they moved along to the last door. Beyond it was the master suite with two baths and a fireplace. It had seemed too large when she’d bought the house, a lone and lonely young woman, but now it often seemed too crowded…
“Carly?”
Even though she knew she must, she did not want to go into that room. What if Ard was lying dead there and Lindstrom had lured her on this search with the intention…?
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