The River Is Dark

by Joe Hart

  “Kind of.”

  “Me too. Interesting town, though. I heard there was a double murder here last night. Did you hear anything about that?” Liam tried to hide any reaction, and shook his head before downing half his beer. “I mean, how horrible. It sounds like it was pretty brutal. A doctor and his wife, if I’m not mistaken.”

  Liam turned his head just enough to look at the woman and saw that she was staring at him intently, the look of a child waiting for a firework to go off.

  Liam tipped his head back to study the low ceiling. “What station you from?”

  “What?”

  “I said, what fucking news station are you from?” He focused his gaze on her and felt a spark of satisfaction at the surprise on her features. She opened her mouth once for rebuttal, then closed it before deflating a few inches in her seat.

  “KQSL Channel 9, out of Saint Paul. I’m Shirley Strafford,” she said, holding out a manicured hand.

  Liam tipped the rest of his beer back and stood in one motion. “Thanks for the drink,” he said as he walked toward the outline of the entryway.

  “Mr. Dempsey, if I could just have a minute.”

  Liam heard the bartender grumble something and Shirley’s reply—“I can talk to anyone I want, thanks”—before he walked out the front door of the hotel and toward his waiting truck.

  Liam spent the next two hours driving around the small town, getting his bearings as he paused at each intersecting street. He coasted past businesses, homes, several two-story apartment buildings, and a park set on the banks of the river. He stopped at the park and took in the large menagerie of playground equipment, the swaying swings, and the creeping merry-go-round turning clockwise with the breeze. It was eerie to see a place made for laughter and people so empty. He knew why there was no one here; if he had children, he wouldn’t let them play alone in this town either.

  Liam got out of his truck and walked across the well-trimmed lawn and the sand of the playground, onto a wide wooden boardwalk that ran parallel with the park. The boardwalk threaded through a dense copse of hardwoods and then emptied out to a panoramic view of the river. Jagged chunks of rock stretched away from the boardwalk until the ground dropped into the swift water beyond. Across the river, Liam spotted the corner of a building, its general outline barely visible behind the thick growth of trees and brush that encumbered the opposite shore. The structure looked to be at least two stories high, and the last vestiges of a pier poked above the water like an ancient sea creature waiting for a meal. A sign with the same message as the one on the way into town from Colton Inc. grew out of the long grass next to the sunken pier.

  Liam stood there for a long time, watching the sun gather on the brown water and turn it into a reflection of the reddening sky so that it looked like a flowage of blood. His hand stole to the pocket of his jeans, and he traced the edges of the straight razor that lay against his thigh. It was a custom blade made by a friend of his father, for the barber. Instead of the customary pinion mounting that most razors had within the handle, his father’s locked when opened, and the handle was flat black, the once-polished ebony stone scuffed and abraded by years and years of use. Liam remembered when he asked his father why he always used the same razor day in and day out. The older man had merely smiled, the cigarette tilting up in the corner of his mouth, and said if a man does something well, his tools should be precious to him. The blade had shaved more faces than Liam could count and was still sharp enough to split hairs. He’d taken to carrying it wherever he went after his father passed away, the feeling of it in his pocket never failing to help calm him.

  His phone vibrated in his other pocket, letting out a chime that startled him from his reverie. When he looked at the glass display, the number calling only said Blocked.

  “Hello?”

  “Is this Mr. Dempsey?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is Sheriff Barnes. Would you still like to stop by for a bit?”

  Liam turned from the river and began walking toward his pickup. “Yes. Are you at your office?”

  “Yep, you can park around back of the building. I’ll let you in the door on the east side.”

  “Sounds good, thank you.”

  There was a pause, and then a grunt from the other end of the phone. “I’ll see you in a few.”

  The connection broke, and Liam stared at the blank screen for a moment before hurrying to his truck.

  Liam was about to knock on the rear door of the law-enforcement building when it cracked open, with the sheriff’s round face, slightly redder than it had been at his brother’s house, visible in the gap. Barnes motioned him inside and led him down a corridor with several doors mounted in the left wall and three vacant cells on the right, their doors open as if each expected to be filled quite soon. The sheriff’s office was a small room at the front of the hall, the space within occupied mostly by an elephantine desk piled a few inches thick with papers and manila folders. A framed picture of Barnes knee-deep in a clear stream hung on the wall; his eyes were alight with happiness and his arms held a massive king salmon.

  “Have a seat, Liam—may I call you Liam?” Barnes said, motioning to a cushioned chair several years past comfortable use.

  “Sure,” Liam said, sitting.

  Barnes slumped into his own chair, which deflated a few inches beneath his bulk. He rubbed his eyes and then stroked the white hair on his upper lip before glancing at Liam. “I’m sorry about your brother and his wife.”

  Liam swallowed and stared at a spot over the sheriff’s left shoulder. “Sir, no offense, but I’ve been told how sorry everyone is from the moment I got here and no one’s answered any of my questions.” When he looked again at Barnes, the older man’s eyes were focused on the piles of paperwork covering his desk.

  “You’re justified in being angry. All I’m saying is, Allen was my doctor—he was most everyone’s around here unless they wanted to drive over to Fairview Hospital in Dayton. Suzie was a good woman, helped organize a lot of the community functions. They’ll be missed.”

  “Suzie was wonderful.”

  “Didn’t get along with your brother?”

  “Did he ever mention me?” Barnes didn’t say anything, only nodded. “Let’s just say we weren’t on speaking terms. I hadn’t seen him since my father died two years ago, and the time before that was five years earlier.”

  “You two have a row about something?”

  Liam settled back in the chair and fixed Barnes coldly, unblinking. “Sheriff, I don’t have the time or patience for your insinuations. I came down here to take care of my brother and sister-in-law’s affairs, and maybe glean some insight as to why they were killed. What I find is a community with two double homicides in less than a week and belligerent law enforcement that’s set on keeping me in the dark. Transparency breeds trust, so if you think I had something to do with my brother’s murder, say it now so I know where you stand.”

  To Barnes’s credit, the man didn’t move a muscle. After a beat, he pursed his lips, making his mustache rise in a wave, before exhaling. “I don’t think you’re involved. It’s just been a hell of a week and I’m in no mood to have someone else walk on my toes. They’re sore as hell already.”

  “I just want to know what you can tell me, not anything that might jeopardize the case,” Liam said.

  Barnes sighed again. “It started last Tuesday night. Jerry and Karen Shevlin were the first victims. Someone broke into their home in the evening, sometime around nine. Killed them, along with their dog. Their son, Eric, locked himself in their bedroom and called 911. Officers got there shortly after he hung up, found him on his parents’ floor bleeding profusely. It was pure luck there was a unit less than a mile away when the call came in, otherwise things might’ve been different. He was rushed to your brother’s practice, and Allen got the bleeding stopped before the boy was airlifted to Fairview.
He’s in a coma, hasn’t woken or said a word.”

  Liam absorbed the information, calculations overriding emotions, the feeling like slipping into a comfortable pair of shoes. “And my brother’s house? Same forced entry?”

  “I can’t say.”

  “Did Allen and Suzie know the Shevlins?”

  Barnes licked his lips, considering. “Yes, Allen and Jerry were best friends.”

  “How were they killed?”

  “I can’t say.”

  “Doesn’t look like you have any suspects in custody,” Liam said, motioning to the hallway and empty cells.

  “No, not yet. My deputies and I are support now for the BCA and their forensic team. This is way over our heads. I hesitated for only a heartbeat last week when I saw the Shevlins’ place before calling BCA for help.”

  Liam nodded. He’d worked extensively with several BCA agents during his career, and all had been excellent, trustworthy, and competent. Phelps exuded none of their traits. “How were Allen and Suzie discovered?”

  “They took the local paper. The delivery boy stopped by for payment early this morning and saw them through the front window.”

  “Was my brother questioned after the Shevlin murders?”

  “Yes, but he and Suzie were in shock. They didn’t know a thing.”

  Liam chewed the inside of his cheek. This wasn’t going anywhere, and he deduced from Barnes’s reactions and answers that there wasn’t a whole lot more than what he was telling him. They were almost as much in the dark as he was.

  “You’re quite a bit younger than Allen,” Barnes said, appraising Liam again.

  “Sixteen years. I was a planned oops, my dad used to say.”

  Barnes chuckled. “You’re young for a detective too.”

  Liam felt the familiar tightening in his chest and swallowed. “Yeah, guess I was too dumb to be on the beat.”

  Barnes smiled, and it looked like a lot of effort. “Is there a reason—”

  Liam stood and reached across the desk to shake the sheriff’s hand. The older man stopped speaking and returned the gesture. “I appreciate all your help, Sheriff. Do you know when the bodies will be released for burial?”

  Barnes blinked and nodded. “Tomorrow, I believe. Agent Phelps wanted the autopsy results as soon as possible.”

  “Could you notify me when they release them? I want to get back home as soon as I can wrap everything up here.”

  “Sure.”

  “Thank you,” Liam said as he exited the office. His footsteps clicked and echoed back to him from the far walls of the cells, and the crushing feeling in his chest accelerated him out of the door and into the evening air.

  CHAPTER 3

  He found a pub on a side street that looked like it served food.

  The inside was larger and cleaner than he expected, and when he sat at a table in the back of the room, it was only a few seconds before the locals returned to their drinks. The menu was featureless, and his appetite hadn’t returned. He ordered a cheeseburger basket, and nursed a Guinness until it arrived. He was about to make an attempt at actually eating when the door to the bar opened and a woman walked in.

  She was tall, maybe five feet nine, and wore a knee-length skirt. Her dark-brown hair was swept away from her brow by a black headband and hung almost to her shoulders. She clutched a purse close to her side, and as her eyes passed over him without lingering, he remembered the dances they’d shared, the feeling of her slender back beneath his hand, how her lips felt against his, even the way her skin smelled.

  Liam set his burger in the basket and stood. The woman turned away from him and tried to lean on a barstool as she waited for the bartender to finish with another patron. Liam threaded his way between a row of tables and put a hand on the bar a couple feet from where she stood. He watched her eyes glance at him, traveling up his forearm to his face before sliding away, and then coming back. She pivoted, her mouth open, the beginning of a question on her tongue.

  “Hi, Dani,” Liam said.

  She tried to say something—he could see a word forming in her mouth—but then she simply stepped around the barstool that separated them and hugged him, tears already spilling from her eyes.

  He led her back to his table after she put in an order for a vodka tonic. After the waitress dropped off the drink, she sipped it and stared at him over the rim of the glass. He crossed his legs and sat back in his chair, looking at the spots where her tears dried in ghostly, crooked lines on her cheeks.

  “I can’t believe you recognized me,” she said after a few minutes of them trading gazes.

  “Ditto,” he said, cradling his beer in one hand. “But in all fairness, you haven’t changed that much.”

  Dani huffed laughter as she wiped again at the trails of tears. “In ten years? Yeah, right.”

  “No, really,” Liam said. “I knew it was you right away.”

  She brushed her cheek one more time and then looked at him, her green eyes unwavering in the low light of the bar. “You look different.”

  He tried to smile, but it crumpled and refused to take hold. “It’s been a long time.”

  “Yes, it has.”

  Liam searched her face and found himself studying the angles of her nose, the sharp lines of her eyebrows, the red of her lips, just as he had when they’d danced so many years before. He took a long drink of his beer, then set it down on the table.

  “It’s horrible,” she said after a moment. “I can’t even bring myself to accept it yet.”

  “I know what you mean. It’s a shock.”

  “I just can’t—” Dani’s eyes filled with tears again, and she shook her head. “Sorry. I’m still trying to wrap my mind around it. Suzie and I were pretty close, even for cousins.”

  “She wouldn’t have had just anyone as her maid of honor, I’m sure.”

  Dani jerked her head, the tears she fought to hold back streaming down her face again. She rubbed a shaking hand across her forehead and took a long pull from the glass before her. “You never think you’ll have to deal with this sort of thing, you know? You do your regular routine every day, and it’s easy to forget this type of stuff happens all the time.” Liam didn’t move; instead, he fought the bindings of panic beginning to tighten in the center of his chest. “You just don’t think it will ever happen to you. It’s terrible of me, but I didn’t want to come. I wouldn’t have, but there’s no one else on Suzie’s side of the family besides my parents, and they’re on a cruise vacation.” Dani wiped her eyes again.

  Liam struggled for words of comfort. Words he’d spoken before to families he didn’t know, wives, husbands, children, mothers, fathers. But now, he found nothing in the reservoir deep within him. It was hollow and empty, a tomb of dried emotions that lay silent in a dark place he couldn’t reach anymore.

  “I’m sorry,” Dani said after a moment.

  “For what?” Liam asked, rising from the depths inside him.

  “Here I am sobbing and carrying on, and it was your brother. Suzie and I were close, but I’m sure not as much as you and Allen were.”

  Liam curled his mouth at one corner and reached for his mostly empty beer. “Allen and I weren’t on the best of terms as of late.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry.”

  Liam shrugged. “We . . .” He shifted in his seat. “We just didn’t keep in touch anymore. He had his life here, his practice, Suzie. I was always busy. It just wasn’t conducive for us.”

  Dani looked at her lap. “I hadn’t seen Suzie for quite a while either. I think the last time was at Christmas two years ago. My mom and dad and I all came here for a weekend. We stayed with Allen and Suzie. It was nice.” Dani’s face contorted with grief again, and Liam reached out to grasp one of her hands in his own. Her fingers wrapped around his, and she squeezed as a sob hitched through her chest. “I’m sorry, I just can’t be
lieve they’re gone,” she whispered.

  She took another drink of her vodka and glanced at him before staring at the table. Her hand remained in his, and neither made any move to release the hold. “Do they have any leads?” she finally asked.

  “Not that I can tell. They’re being pretty close-lipped about the whole thing. I met with the sheriff tonight. I got the feeling he doesn’t know much more than I do.”

  “It makes me so angry,” Dani said. “What did Allen and Suzie ever do to deserve this?”

  Liam said nothing. The door to the pub opened, and Liam watched the shaggy head of Nut appear and slouch to the bar, where he began to talk to the bartender.

  “Dani, I have to speak to someone,” Liam said, his eyes never leaving the vagrant’s back. “Can you give me your number so I can get ahold of you tomorrow? Maybe we can help each other make arrangements?”

  Dani glanced over her shoulder and then back at Liam. “Sure,” she said, and reached into her purse, pulled out a business card, and handed it to him.

  He saw the confused look on her face and squeezed her hand once more. “Are you going to be okay?”

  Dani finished her drink and made an effort to smile. “Yes, I’ll be fine.”

  “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  Liam stood and left his beer and food on the table. He moved in a straight line across the pub toward Nut, who had an overfull glass of beer clutched close to his chest. The older man spotted Liam when he was two steps away; his eyes widened and a bit of beer slopped from his glass onto the floor. Liam saw the indecision on the bum’s face and wondered if he would have to pursue him out of the pub.

  “I need to talk to you,” Liam said when he was within arm’s reach of the man.

  “Uh,” Nut said.

  Liam jerked his head toward a corner table in the back of the pub and saw the bum’s shoulders slump. Liam let him go first, and as they made their way to the back of the bar, he saw Dani rise from her seat and walk toward the door. He felt her eyes on the side of his head, but he locked his gaze on the back of Nut’s dirty coat. Nut set his beer on a wobbly table and sat in the chair closest to the wall, while Liam took a seat beside him, effectively blocking the vagrant’s only escape route.