Jessica checked her iPhone again. It was 5:59 P.M. Where was Ted? She called up the keyboard and texted a quick message:
at the common where are u?
“Hey, Jessica.”
She looked up from her iPhone. Rhonda was standing there, hands in her jacket.
“Hey, Rhon,” she said. A few yards away she saw Ellen Nickerson talking to one of the two ghost employees standing next to her. Ralph. Was that his name? And she thought, What difference does it make? In a month he’ll be off at another branch, on a track for upper management, just like we were dreaming about. But we’re stuck here and he’s heading out. Lucky boy.
Amber Brooks was on the other side, wiping at her eyes, talking and sobbing with two other young women, probably classmates from the time when Amber was in high school.
But no sign of Percy Prescott. Big surprise.
“Some turnout,” Rhonda said. “I doubt you or I will get such crowds when we have our funeral.”
“I don’t think we’ll be in a position to complain.”
It was good to have Rhonda next to her.
But Ted . . .
“How are the kids? Still in jail?”
That phrase startled her. In jail? What was that all about? Did Rhonda know something about the police visit yesterday?
Jessica took a breath. Overreacting, she thought. In jail. Rhonda was just gently teasing about whatever punishment she and Ted had given the kids.
“Not yet,” she said. “But Ted and I are working on the appropriate punishment.”
Rhonda said, “Really? Didn’t know you two were such softies. Heck, if I had pulled a stunt like that when I was their age, I wouldn’t have been able to sit down for a week.”
Jessica gently nudged her friend. “Even with that extra padding you carry around down there?”
Rhonda nudged her back. “If you weren’t my best friend, I’d be pissed off at that. But still, remember the last time we were at something like this?”
“Yeah, that memorial service for Larry Miles. Though I have to admit, I wasn’t sad at the time.”
“Neither was I.” Rhonda reached over and briefly rubbed Jessica’s back with affection before going on. “Yeah, for some reason he hated me, right from the start. I still don’t know why. Maybe I reminded him of his mother, or a schoolteacher. And I knew he was doing everything to get me fired, just when my family needed my job the most. Even with you and the others sticking up for me.”
“I didn’t understand it either, but it was still awful when he had that climbing accident. Even jerks like him don’t deserve to die like that, up in the air, your crampons falling apart.”
It seemed Rhonda was going to reply when there were whispers of “It’s time, it’s time,” and little flares of light popped up as people around Jessica started lighting their candles. She did the same. Rhonda had trouble with her candle, so Jessica lit it for her.
“Thanks, hon,” Rhonda said. “You know, it’s such a pretty sight. Too bad we’re all here because of such sad news.”
Jessica thought, yes, Rhonda was right. It was a pretty sight, the people on the common, all residents of this small Massachusetts town, coming out to mourn the death of one of their sons. Even with the number of people crowded around the bandstand, there was just the slightest murmur of voices. The traffic going around the common seemed to have slowed in recognition of what was going on on this stretch of grass where hundreds of years earlier the farmers and merchants of Warner had first drilled to defend their people and land.
“Poor Bruce, poor Donna,” Rhonda whispered.
Who? Jessica thought, and then she was briefly ashamed. Bruce and Donna Warner, up there on display in the bandstand, ready to do their part in their son’s memorial.
“I can’t believe they’re here,” Jessica whispered back. “If I lost Emma that way, I wouldn’t be able to leave my bed for a month.”
“Or Craig, I’m sure.”
Jessica spoke quickly. “Yes, of course, Craig as well.”
The minister went up to the microphone, tapped at it a few times, blew into it, and his voice echoed across the common. “My friends, my parishioners, my neighbors, I’m Reverend Earl Wessex of the Episcopal Christ Church of Warner,” he said, his voice low and soothing. “This is a night of sorrow, of remembrance, of mourning, but also it’s a night for our shocked and stunned community to come together. Please, let us bow our heads, no matter your creed, and join together in the Lord’s Prayer.”
The voices of the crowd murmured the familiar words: “Our Father, which art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven . . .”
The candle above Jessica’s hand flickered, making her skin look like old parchment, and as the prayer was slowly recited, Jessica looked away from the bandstand and observed the crowd around her. More familiar faces. Ellen Nickerson was still standing with the ghost employees, holding court, the two young men next to her, ensuring that she was taking note of their attendance.
Amber Brooks had her head buried in her hands and was quietly sobbing as her friends flanked her, gently rubbing her shoulders. And—
There was Emma.
It was odd, but seeing her out here, Jessica gave a shudder of relief. Her girl was holding a candle in one hand, her other hand blocking the wind to keep the flame alive, the light making her hand looking delicate and translucent. She was with a tiny knot of her fellow runners, and Jessica knew she might be making things up, but it seemed as if the other girls were gathered around her as her friends and supporters, as if Emma were the leader.
And Craig? She couldn’t see Craig.
Damn it, she still didn’t see Ted. Should she text him again?
Principal Michael Glynn went up to the microphone, rustled his paper, coughed, and said, “My fellow residents of Warner, and friends of Sam, and his family, I think it’s appropriate to read this tonight.” He held up the paper and started reading. “This is from A. E. Housman, written back in 1896. ‘To an Athlete Dying Young.’” The stanzas came out of the sound system, echoing across the town common.
The time you won your town the race,
We chaired you through the market-place;
Man and boy stood cheering by,
And home we brought you shoulder-high.
Listening to Principal Glynn’s firm voice and hearing the stanzas, Jessica had a memory of an English class back in high school, Mrs. Simpson reading the poem and leading a discussion afterward about how this poem had been published and passed along during the First World War, when so many young Englishmen were being slaughtered in France. Back then—paying more attention to Bobby Thornton sitting in the rear, leaning back in his chair, grinning at her—she thought Mrs. Simpson had been exaggerating. But not now. Not tonight.
Sobs and wails broke out as the words written long ago came over the sound system and the young athlete posed forever up on the bandstand, the polished surface of the mounted photo flickering from all the candlelight around it. And poor Bruce and Donna Warner, clasped together in mutual mourning and grief, were no longer a separate entity, no longer Mom and Dad, but now one unit, forever known as Grieving Parents.
Now you will not swell the rout
Of lads that wore their honours out,
Runners whom renown outran
And the name died before the man.
More sobs and cries.
Then, a . . . giggle? A muffled laugh?
She couldn’t see anything nearby, but Jessica noticed some folks turning. She stood on tiptoe and saw Percy Prescott standing near a row of shrubbery at the other side of the common, with another young man next to him. The young man had a paper bag in his left hand, brought it up, and took a sip of something, then passed it over to Percy. Percy took a good-sized slug and then whispered something to his friend, and the friend burst out laughing and then covered his mouth. A few sharp whispers from folks standing nearby shut them up but didn’t hide the pleased smiles on t
heir faces.
Rhonda asked, “What’s going on?”
“Percy and a friend seem to be enjoying themselves,” Jessica said.
“Oh, no,” Rhonda said.
“Oh, yes,” Jessica said.
“But on a night like this . . .”
Jessica said, “I guess it just goes to show you it takes all kinds.”
Rhonda’s candle then flickered out, and Jessica leaned over and relit it. Wax had puddled on the round slip of cardboard.
Principal Glynn stopped talking and then—
A touch of her right elbow.
“Mrs. Thornton? A moment?”
She quickly turned, her hands suddenly going cold.
It was Detective Doug Rafferty.
In the warm light of the candles his face looked open and friendly, but Jessica didn’t want to move. But she also didn’t want Rhonda to hear.
“Sure,” she said. She took a few steps, thinking, What’s going on, what’s going on, what’s going on, and she stopped and tried to gauge what was happening behind that calm and smooth police detective’s face, but nothing was obvious.
“Sorry to bother you,” he said. “I was here at the service and I saw you and thought I’d save a phone call.”
“Makes sense,” she said, the words just coming automatically.
Jessica took a few steps more. Up on the bandstand Principal Glynn was still talking.
Detective Rafferty said, “I was hoping I could talk with you tomorrow.”
“About . . .”
“Mrs. Thornton, you know what I’m investigating. Please.”
Now she felt guilty, under pressure, the calm eyes of the detective holding her still, like a predator seizing its prey with only its look, like a snake before a field mouse.
“Okay,” she said. “I’ll see what time works for Ted.”
“I’m sorry, maybe I didn’t make myself clear,” Rafferty said. “I meant I wanted to talk to you alone, without your husband.”
“But—”
Rafferty said, “Something’s come up in our investigation and it would be best for all of us if we could speak face-to-face. It would be extremely helpful.”
The words seemed to come out automatically again. “All right then. Tomorrow.”
“Good,” he said. “What would be a good time?”
“Ah . . .” She imagined going to Ellen Nickerson and saying, Excuse me, Ellen, do you mind if I take some time off at about eleven A.M.? The police are investigating the murder of Sam Warner and they want to talk to me. You okay with that?
“Lunch?” she said.
“Excuse me?”
“I have forty-five minutes for lunch,” she said, thinking desperately whether this would work. “I could walk over and meet you at the station.”
“Sure,” he said. “That would be fine. Would noon work?”
Her usual lunch break was from eleven forty-five to twelve thirty. All right, no lunch tomorrow. Jessica couldn’t see how she would have an appetite anyway.
“That would be great, Detective,” she said.
“Very good, Mrs. Thornton, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
At the bandstand Principal Glynn was finished, and he gestured to Bruce and Donna Warner. Bruce took a half step forward, stopped, and looked at his wife with anguish. She shook her head and he leaned over, whispering something, and the sound system was sensitive enough to pick up her cracked voice saying, “No . . . no . . . I can’t.”
He touched his wife on the cheek and ambled forward, then stood there, looking at the microphone as if it were some magical instrument from the future dropped in front of him and he couldn’t puzzle out its workings. Bruce was about the same age as Ted, with a closely trimmed black beard, an open and smiling face, and he worked at a medical device company somewhere in Littleton, making a ton of money. Donna didn’t have to work and let everyone in the PTA know how pleased she was with her lot in life.
Jessica had a savage punch of a nasty thought traveling through her, that German phrase about reveling in the misfortune of others, and she wondered how pleased Donna would be at the next PTA meeting. She was horrified at the thought and hoped the detective standing next to her couldn’t sense her feeling.
Bruce finally got to the microphone. “Ah . . . thank you, thank you all. Aah, at some point Donna and I, we plan to set up a scholarship in the memory of our Sam . . .”
He stopped. Looked down. A long weeping whimper escaped as he clasped the microphone stand with both hands. Bruce took one hand off the stand, wiped his face and eyes, and stared out at the silent crowd. “Please . . . anybody here, if you know anything, please talk to the police. I . . . please find out who did this to our boy.”
He started sobbing, and Principal Glynn fumbled and switched off the sound system, and the Reverend Wessex went over and embraced both parents. Jessica couldn’t look anymore. Detective Rafferty was still there.
“You see what my job is now, don’t you, Mrs. Thornton?” he said. “Tomorrow at noon. My office.”
Rafferty started to move away in the crowd, and she said, “Detective?”
He said, “Yes, Mrs. Thornton?”
“Can you tell me what this is about?” Then she corrected herself, “I mean, as part of the investigation into Sam’s murder, can you tell me more?”
The detective gave her a sweet and understanding smile. “No,” he said, and then he moved among the other mourners and was gone.
Jessica didn’t want to go back to Rhonda and explain what had just happened. Her candle had flickered out, but she didn’t care. Then she spotted Ted talking to someone familiar, and she saw it was Paula Fawkes, the office manager at Warner Realty. Paula was short and on the curvy side—as Rhonda had once said, after Paula had made a deposit at the bank, “She’s about fifteen pounds overweight, but it looks good on her”—and her blond mane was always elaborately styled and coiffed. Jessica had never really warmed up to Paula, and the feeling was mutual, and—
Paula laughed, and Ted laughed, and then she touched Ted’s shoulder. Ted walked away and came over to Jessica.
“Hey, sorry I’m late,” he said. “Had to catch up with some things at the office.”
“That’s okay,” Jessica said quietly. “I understand.” I always understand, she thought.
He gave her a clumsy hug, and as the wind shifted, a scent came to her.
“What a terrible, terrible night,” Ted said.
The scent tickled her memory.
“I can’t believe how strong Bruce and Donna are,” he said.
Now the memory came to her.
“Can you believe being here after knowing your son was murdered the other night?”
The scent. The same scent Ted had on him the night he came home late, the same night the kids went missing.
The scent from Paula Fawkes.
And, like her job at the bank, where the numbers never, ever lied, Jessica knew.
She knew.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Ted Donovan stepped out of the shower, dried himself off with a thick light-green towel, and then looked at himself in the mirror, pinching the thick rolls along each hip. Damn. He would have to start paying attention to these lumps of fat if Paula Fawkes were going to continue seeing him.
He tossed the towel to the floor, picked up his robe. Okay, “seeing him.” That was a weaselly way of saying having an affair. Though, truth be told, it wasn’t much of an affair, not that he was complaining. It had started two months ago, when they were both working late and she was wearing this too-tight white blouse. She had come over to his desk with a new real estate listing, and as she leaned over the desk, one of the buttons had popped loose, revealing a fine lacy bra and gorgeous fleshy cleavage. He had stared at those delicious curves for about two seconds too long before Paula had said, “You like what you see?”
“A lot,” he had replied.
With a teasing voice she had said, “Then do something about it.”
And he had d
one so, right then and there, on his desk, with the tiny sane part of his mind screaming at him, You fool, you’re married and so is she, and her husband is in Afghanistan in the army. But once he got his hands on those curves . . . Forget it.
After a few minutes of recovery—unheard of at his age until then—he had sat down on his office chair and she had straddled him and they had gone at it again.
He pulled the robe tight, amused and slightly embarrassed that the memory of that and of what had happened earlier tonight, making him late for that sobfest on the town common—when Paula had grabbed him by the necktie, dragged him into the small break room at the rear of the office, and got down on her knees—was stirring him again.
He ran a comb through his hair, not bothering to worry about where this was going, only knowing that the guilt about cheating on Jessica was overwhelmed by the hot sex he was getting from Paula. His wife was sexy in her own way, but to be brutally frank, she had let herself go over the past several months. Not in terms of gaining weight or not bothering with hairstyle or makeup, but just in her general appearance. She wore the same black slacks to work every day, with a number of blouses that she rotated depending on the day or the season, and on weekends or days off she liked to lounge around in sweats or old T-shirts. Okay, that wouldn’t be a problem, and he hated to admit this like a horny teenage boy, but since they had gotten married, the lingerie, the lacy bras and panties, had been either tossed in the back of her bureau drawers or thrown away.
But Paula . . . Sure, she was a bit heavy, much heavier than Jessica, but she carried the weight well, and God, what she loved to wear underneath her office clothes—lots of lacy stuff, tight panties, thongs—it drove him crazy, and now he couldn’t quite believe he had her for his own.
Okay, he thought, heading out of the steamy bathroom, he was sharing her with Captain Antonio Fawkes, but Antonio was in Kabul and she was here, and he was gone for another eight months, and Ted wasn’t going to worry about that right now. That problem would be dealt with once the time came.
Ted got out of the bathroom, saw that the door to Emma’s room was closed but the door to Craig’s was open.
You Will Never Know Page 9