The Watcher

by Jennifer Pashley

  “Not an option,” Hurt says.

  * * *

  Kateri starts in the back bedroom, the master. She takes both toothbrushes from the en suite bath and a razor she finds in the trash bin. She grabs a book from the nightstand that she suspects is Shannon’s. The Weekend. She remembers then the books in his bedroom at his own house, the book he has in his cell. This kid reads, she thinks. She can’t decide whether or not it’s unusual, given his circumstances. He didn’t finish high school. He was working as an unskilled laborer. But he’s smart. She doesn’t know what to expect anymore.

  Hurt stands looking out the back window while she bags things and labels them.

  “Jesus Christ,” he says, at the pool, the tennis courts.

  “Is this the only bedroom?” Kateri asks.

  “No, there are like seven bedrooms,” Hurt says.

  “I mean, the only furnished bedroom,” she says. “The only one being used.”

  He looks at her bags of toothbrushes, the book.

  “Shit,” he says. “That’s too weird.”

  “Why?” She leans into the white pillows on the bed and plucks one of Shannon’s shorter, blond hairs. She threads it into a smaller bag. Then she grabs a longer, golden-brown hair and bags that.

  Bear leans in the doorway behind her. “You could just ask me,” he says.

  “Ask you what?” Kateri says, without turning to face him.

  “If we’re sleeping together,” Bear says.

  She presses the seal on another bag and hands it to Hurt, who collects them all in a large container.

  “It’s pretty clear,” Kateri says.

  “Do you need physical evidence?” Bear pushes. “That I’ve been fucking him this whole time?”

  “Do you want to wait in the car?” Hurt asks Bear.

  “I’m not sure why it matters,” Bear says. “Except maybe personally,” he adds.

  “Don’t be an asshole,” Hurt says, and brushes past him into the hall. “It makes you a potential accessory, at the very least,” he says. “And a possible suspect.”

  The rooms upstairs are empty. Kateri moves from bedroom to bedroom, through the other en suite baths, checking empty closets, the laundry chute, the back playroom. For one second she imagines Birdie there, on the floor with dolls, this one room more vast than anything she’s ever seen in her five years.

  In the basement, she finds tools, items she is sure will show Shannon’s prints, and she bags them all out of protocol. A hammer, a screwdriver, a drill, paintbrushes. Nothing looks out of place, stained, or unusually clean either.

  “I should have brought a team,” Kateri tells Hurt in the basement. He peers into the back room, an unfinished workroom with a bench and fluorescent lighting. There are saws in there, both hand and power.

  “We should luminol that room,” Hurt says.

  “Do you think it’s here?” she says, heart hammering. “The real body?” she asks. Her eyes widen. “Hurt, who placed those bones?”

  “We’ve got more to investigate,” he says, “that’s for sure. Do you think …” He hesitates, and Kateri thinks he’s about to speculate on whether or not Bear Miller has killed more than one person. “Do you think they’re gay?” Hurt says.

  “Joel,” Kateri says. “We have unidentified bones,” she whispers. “And a missing girl.”

  But his face is perplexed. It’s a detail he can’t get past.

  She opens a utility closet in the workroom. “And a shotgun,” she says.

  * * *

  Bear is sitting on a stool at the kitchen island when they come up. Hurt carries a box of bagged evidence out to the squad car, and Kateri goes out the back door to do a preliminary search of the veranda, the storage boxes, the pool house, the work shed. She orders a team. And cadaver dogs.

  She stoops and takes a picture of a boot print in the shed. It’s unusual, and one she’s seen before, inside the Jenkins kitchen. It doesn’t have the normal zigzag or tire print of a work boot. It leaves a sort of fleur-de-lis in the dirt.

  Hurt is in the garage with Bear. He has gone through the cabinets and taken apart the Land Rover. There are cigarettes in the can at the back of the driveway, which Hurt has bagged, but Kateri already knows they match the ones she picked up in the park.

  “Any Luckys?” she asks Hurt.

  He looks in the bag. “No.”

  Bear rubs his eyes. “There are yellow American Spirits,” he says, exasperated. “And some cheap white Indian cigarettes. They’re mine and Shannon’s,” he says. “No one smokes Lucky Strikes.” He laughs at her.

  “Oh, someone does,” Kateri says. “They’re in the evidence bin.” She holds out the picture of the boot print. “Where are these boots?” she asks. She looks at the ones on his feet, but when he holds them up, the soles don’t match.

  “Those?” Bear says.

  “Yes, these,” Kateri says. She’s tired of his stalling, of everyone’s efforts to distract her, to lead her in a different direction, to confuse her with things that don’t matter, reluctance to just tell her the goddamn truth.

  “I left them,” he says.

  “Where?”

  “At my wife’s house,” he says. “In Vermont.” He waits a moment and then adds, “Surely you knew I had a wife.”

  “I did know,” Kateri says. “When’s the last time you were there?” she asks.

  “Last weekend,” Bear says.

  She nods to Hurt. She needs to get her hands on those boots, and whatever else might have evidence from the crime scene on it.

  Bear leans on the rail of the step that goes back into the kitchen. “You can’t put me on trial,” he says, “for having a consensual affair with a boy who’s of age.”

  Hurt tips his head and slips into the kitchen again for one last sweep.

  “It wouldn’t be for that,” Kateri says. “It would be for plotting to and/or helping him kill his mother. The affair is just icing,” she says.

  “Why on earth would I kill his mother?” Bear says.

  But she doesn’t get a chance to answer, because Hurt comes back into the garage and takes the evidence bags from Kateri, adding them to his growing collection kit.

  “Thanks for your cooperation, Mr. Miller,” Hurt says, curt. “A separate forensics team will be out this afternoon to conduct a more thorough search.”

  He walks briskly away from the garage and motions for Kateri to follow.

  “We’ll be in touch,” Hurt says over his shoulder.

  Kateri, follows, flummoxed, and gets into the driver’s seat.

  “I don’t care if you drive,” Hurt says, “but please stop for coffee.”

  She drives out of the new development, back into town, and gets two sugary, creamy coffees and a bag of doughnuts from a non-chain place in town, where the doughnuts are heavy grease balls covered in granular sugar and cinnamon. They sit in the parking lot before going back into the office. The sky is a blinding bright blue behind trees that are nearly bare.

  Hurt pulls an evidence bag from his jacket and waves it at Kateri.

  “What’s that?” She licks the sugar off her fingers.

  He has bagged a piece of mail. An envelope from Kerpak Industries to the auction house. It’s stamped, but it’s not canceled. Outgoing mail.

  Hurt waits while she registers the name, the context, and then puts it back in his pocket.

  “He wants the property,” Hurt says.

  “That’s it?” Kateri asks.

  “I don’t know if that’s it,” Hurt says. “There’s clearly some other shit going on. But that house is standing in the way of Bear Miller making a fuckton of money.”

  “On what?” Kateri asks. “The house is worthless.”

  “The land,” he says. “He wants to develop the land. The Jenkins own a big chunk of it,” he says. “I guarantee you when we open that, it’s a preempt. A hefty offer prior to auction.”

  Kateri leans back in the driver’s seat. “Who would go that far?” she asks. “To get pro
perty?”

  “It’s worth millions to him,” Hurt says. “And he’s a sadist. Any other businessman would just offer the kid money and buy him out. Not Miller,” he says.

  “That poor kid,” Kateri says.

  “Well,” Hurt says.

  “Miller is providing his lawyer,” she says.

  “Yeah,” Hurt says. “That kid’s fucked.”

  TWENTY-SEVEN: SHANNON

  THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 2

  Brewer slams around when he comes to visit. It’s like the chair isn’t enough to hold him. He’s not a big guy. Not much bigger than me, but he takes up a lot of space. He asks questions like an annoyed school psychologist, like some kind of shrink, hoping to blame it all on my mother.

  “What are you doing?” I ask him finally. I’m tired of wearing prison scrubs. My feet feel clammy inside the rubbery crocs they issued me to wear over these awful scratchy white socks. The seams of the scrub shirt rub under my arms and leave my skin red and raw.

  “What do you mean, what am I doing?” Brewer asks.

  He’s not attractive. I mean, I’m sure someone finds him attractive, like maybe a woman who wants to be told what to do without ever being looked in the eye. He’s too perfect. Not a hair is out of place. Bleached teeth. It’s repulsive. His eyes are bright but creepy. His shirt, underneath his suit jacket, is so starched it’s like heavy paper.

  I motion at the notes he’s always making. “With this,” I say. I just want to lie down, on a real bed. On the white bed, with Bear, and Buddy curled behind my knees. It’s been hard to sleep at all, and I’m always tired, frayed, fuzzy at the edges. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear it was a tactic.

  “I’m building a character study,” Brewer says.

  “On me?”

  “And your mother,” he says. He moves his feet noisily on the concrete floor, and it echoes in the room.

  “Is she on trial?” I ask. I want to goad him. I feel like a brat.

  “Kind of,” Brewer answers. “I have a better chance of proving you not guilty if I can paint an accurate picture of her.”

  “You can never paint an accurate picture of her,” I say. “She’s more complicated than one thing,” I say. “Was,” I add.

  “Not without your help, I can’t,” he says. He drums his fingers hard on the table. His hands are big, with squared-off fingers and short nails. “This is difficult,” he says to me, “and I apologize.”

  I shrug. I’m not even sure what Brewer might find difficult. Lifting, maybe. Having a pimple.

  “Were you sexually abused by your mother?” he asks.

  “No.”

  “Someone else?” he asks.

  “No,” I say.

  “How often did your mother abuse you?” he asks.

  “I just said she didn’t,” I say.

  “Physically,” he says. “Hitting, kicking, et cetera.” He waits.

  “I don’t know,” I say. I was hit a few times, in the midst of bad fights. It wasn’t what I would call abuse. It was fighting. Abuse is when you hit a kid who can’t hit back, when you beat someone with something. A bat.

  He writes on his pad without looking at me. “Did your mother try to strangle you?” he asks.

  “What?” I say. “No.”

  But Brewer points at my throat.

  “I know it’s hard to admit.” He tries to be soft. “It’s very important,” he says. “It’s recent. And it incited you to take action. In reality, you might not even remember it correctly,” he says, “like the crime itself.”

  My hand goes to my neck.

  “I do have photographs,” Brewer says, shuffling through a fat folder, “that show the bruise at its worst, which will help. Can you do your best to describe the scene to me?”

  “What scene?” I say. All I can do is whisper.

  Brewer puts his pen down. “When she tried to strangle you,” he says. His eyes are heavy, with thick, dark lashes.

  “She didn’t,” I say.

  “Shannon,” Brewer says, and he leans back in his chair, puts his foot up on the opposite knee. “This isn’t the time to defend your mother, okay? It’s time to defend yourself. It actually should be easier than this,” he says. “But you’re making it very difficult.”

  The scene, I think, and I remember the glint in Bear’s eyes, the feel of his hand around my windpipe, the flash of stars, of gasping for breath finally, with my whole body in a flush of euphoria.

  I trust you.

  “I need a minute,” I say, and swallow. I really, really want a cigarette.

  “Sure,” Brewer says, and stands up, the chair rattling backward. He stomps around in a circle. “I’ll step out,” he says. “I need to make a call.”

  “Can I speak with Detective Fisher?” I ask.

  “Without me?” Brewer shoots back.

  “Yeah.”

  “It’s not smart,” he says. He leans down on the table. The table is a metal mint green with crosshatched lines, like the teachers’ desks in elementary school. I remember standing at those desks, telling one teacher after another that my mother couldn’t make the conference. She’s working, I’d say. Everyone knew she didn’t work. I wouldn’t even tell my mother about the conferences. I didn’t want her to show up high.

  “I am your best defense,” Brewer says. “I want you to tell me everything you even think about saying so that I can say it for you, because everything you say will be used against you. Can you understand that?” he says. “You’re not in a position of power here. You’re very vulnerable.”

  “I can speak for myself,” I say.

  “You can also go to prison,” Brewer says. “For murder. What do you have to tell Fisher that you can’t tell me?” he asks. “Kid, you’re not going to confess, are you?”

  “I didn’t do it,” I say. My insides hum, little fried nerve endings vibrating. I wonder if someone, a dog maybe, can hear that sound. The sound of my body singing at a high frequency. Buddy. I miss the feel of his lean.

  Brewer stretches his hands behind his head, his elbows out at angles, and he blows a long breath through his lips.

  “Okay,” he says. “I’m stepping out. I’ll give you a minute to think,” he says. “Think hard.”

  * * *

  I pace until Detective Fisher comes in. I ramp up faster than I realize, and when she comes in the door, there’s the vacuum rush of air and I spin around, panting.

  “Have you found my sister?” I ask.

  “There’s been a sighting,” Kateri says. “We’re getting closer.”

  “She’s with someone,” I say.

  Kateri says, “She was spotted in a car.”

  “What kind?” I ask.

  “A Buick,” she says. “Does that sound familiar?”

  “No,” I say. I can’t think of anyone who’s driven a Buick ever. “I can’t do this,” I tell her.

  “You can,” she says. I like the sound of her voice, even in that closed room. It’s soft, like it has round edges.

  “I’d rather just be dead,” I say. My head feels like a whirlpool.

  “Sit down.”

  “I’ve been sitting down,” I say. All I do is sit down. I’d do anything, I think, to get into the woods, to feel the wind on my face, hear the creak of the trees.

  “Do you want a Pepsi?” she asks me.

  “Yes.”

  She comes back in with a tall plastic cup filled with ice and a can of Pepsi. I crack it open and pour, watching the haze of effervescence. It fizzes at my nose when I drink it, and it smells like summer to me. “I need to talk to Bear,” I say.

  “I’ll see what I can do,” she says. “Is there anything I can help you with?”

  I look over my shoulder, even though there’s nothing behind me but a blank cinder-block wall.

  “I want a different lawyer,” I say. “How can I ask for that? I didn’t ask for this one. I can’t pay for anything,” I say. “I’m going to lose everything.”

  “The court will appoint you a l
awyer,” Kateri says. “That doesn’t mean that the court lawyer will be bad. Sometimes they’re great,” she says. “What don’t you like about Brewer?”

  “He’s like … making it up,” I say. “Because he says it’s what I need.”

  “Well,” Kateri says. “That’s the nuance of a defense. Sometimes you have to trust that he can tell the story in a way that’s favorable, in a way you maybe couldn’t yourself.”

  “No,” I say. The Pepsi seems loud between us. I wish again for a cigarette. “I don’t know what happened to my mother, okay? But I know what didn’t happen. I didn’t kill her because she tried to strangle me. I didn’t kill her at all.”

  Kateri puts her fingers to her lips, thinking, or avoiding.

  “Who did?” she asks.

  “I don’t know,” I say. “I swear to God, I don’t know who killed her.”

  “No,” Kateri says. “Who …” Her hands go to her own throat. “Who tried to choke you?”

  “It doesn’t have anything to do with this,” I say.

  “You don’t know that,” she says.

  “Yes, I do,” I say. “I did it. Myself.”

  “You did it to yourself,” she repeats.

  “I caused it to happen.”

  She shakes her head and sighs. “No, Shannon,” she says and stands up. “This is what I mean. You need a lawyer to hear this.”

  She turns toward the door, about to summon Brewer back in there, and he is the last person I want to say this to.

  “Bear did it,” I say.

  Kateri turns around with the door still shut. Her face is pale. “Did he attack you?”

  “No,” I say. “The opposite.”

  “The opposite?” she says.

  “You know.” I roll my eyes and flash back on the scene. The room, the bed. My skin blushes from my collarbone up to my eyes. “We were in bed,” I say.

  “Shannon,” Kateri says. She comes back and sits across from me, but I can’t look at her. The blush is so hard it almost hurts. My eyelid twitches. “Just because something happens during sex doesn’t mean it happens out of love,” she says.