In the Waning Light (24 page)

I don’t believe it. I don’t fucking believe this. All this time, all these years, and I’ve never shed a tear. It’s like I’m cracked open, and can’t control anything anymore . . .

S’okay, Meggie-Peg. Mom always said it was healthy to have a good, solid cry. Salt water, she always said. Tears, sea, sweat. It fixes everything . . .

Meg tensed at the sound of Sherry’s voice. It was in her head, had to be in her head. She didn’t dare open her eyes and look over to the passenger seat, where she could
feel
Sherry’s sudden presence. The air stirred and Meg caught a faint whiff of the perfume Sherry had loved in her final year. Happiness, it was called. And it smelled like sunshine and flowers, and summer. Slowly, Meg cracked an eye open. The seat of course was empty.

She snorted, and put her truck into gear.

I’ll take you seriously, Sherry, when you tell me what happened that day . . . Let’s go visit Emma then, shall we . . .

She pulled into the road, and glanced at the clock on the dash. She was going to be late for her appointment with Emma. She’d told Blake she wanted to do this one alone. She believed she’d get more out of Sherry’s best friend just woman to woman.

Careful who you trust, Meggie. None of us were what we seemed back then . . . Everyone has secrets, even secrets from themselves. It’s a marvel we can trust anyone at all . . .

CHAPTER 18

“Tell me to stop anytime you feel uncomfortable,” Meg said as she pressed the on button of her digital recorder. It was positioned on Emma’s round dining table. Meg had her notebook with questions in front of her.

Emma nodded. Dark-haired and pale complexioned, her beauty had worn around the edges. Life and time had not been so kind to Emma Williams Kessinger as it had been to others. Her home looked affluent, though. She lived in it with her daughter, who spent weekends with Tommy. Questions swirled in Meg’s mind.

“You were Sherry’s best friend,” Meg said for the tape.

“We were tight. Very. It was terrible what happened, how it tore us all apart.”

“You ended up marrying Tommy, my sister’s boyfriend.”

“The tragedy brought us close. Grief can do that. You share a bond through the person you both miss. In trying to work through it all, you take solace in each other. It was our way of healing, I guess.”

“The fall after the murder you and Tommy parted ways for a while. You went to pursue pharmacology studies in Portland and Tommy went to Ohio State?”

“We both came home for Christmas, when our relationship developed further,” she said. “And more so during spring break the following year. Tommy injured his knee just before that first spring break, and there were worries he’d never play football at the same level again. He was starting to second-guess his career options, studies, that kind of thing. And his dad was talking about grooming him to eventually take over Kessinger Construction.”

“My father was in prison on remand during that period, awaiting trial,” Meg said. “You visited my mom, I remember.”

“Tommy and I both did.”

Meg smiled ruefully. “I’m afraid I must have been an obstreperous kid at the time. I recall locking myself in my room when you guys came over, and turning music up loud in my headphones. Didn’t want to hear about Sherry or the murder.”

Emma cleared her throat. “It was a rough time.”

Meg paused. “Did my mother ever express any doubt to you guys about Ty’s guilt at that time?”

Emma made a moue, then shook her head. “No. I don’t think so. I don’t really recall.”

Meg studied her for a moment, trying to get a read on the woman. “When did Tommy move back to Shelter Bay full time?”

“When he injured his knee again, and he learned the long-term prognosis was not good. That’s when he quit school to work with his dad. I went back for another year, returning for vacations and every long weekend I could. We married the following December. Next thing we knew Brooklyn was on the way.”

“Which is when you quit school and got a job at your mother’s drugstore.”

“As a clerk. Yeah. Could have been a pharmacist if I’d stayed at school . . .” Her voice faded. Something shuttered behind her eyes. “Look, it was never easy. Tommy loved Sherry passionately. His whole teenage life had been defined by his relationship with Sherry.
He
was defined by Sherry. They were the ‘it’ couple who everyone wanted to be, or be a part of. He continued to idolize her, and Sherry became a saint in death that I could never be in life. If she and Tommy had broken up through an argument, or even if they’d stayed together, over time he’d have come to see the warts and all. It became a trigger point. Things degenerated gradually. He’d stay out nights. Silly arguments.” She paused. Her eyes seemed to go distant.

“What was the last straw with the marriage, Emma?”

She moistened her lips, as if casting her mind back, or perhaps deciding how honest to be. Then her gaze met Meg’s cold and square. “I thought this interview was about Sherry,” she said coolly. “Not me and Tommy. Our relationship.”

Meg nodded. “It is about Sherry. I was trying to get a sense of my sister at the time. For example, if she was going out with Tommy, if they were this perfect ‘it’ couple, why was she two-timing him?”

“You mean, why did she go with Ty to the spit?”

“Yes.”

“I . . . I don’t know.”

“She didn’t say?”

“Other than telling me they were going to be intimate, no. Maybe she just wanted a last, crazy fling before heading off to Stanford.”

“Was she seeing anyone else, apart from Ty?”

“What? No.”

Meg hesitated. “Did you know Sherry was pregnant when she died?”

Emma’s face paled.
“Pregnant?”

“It was in the autopsy results.”

Her mouth opened. Then closed. “Whose baby?
Tommy’s?
”

“No. His DNA was not a match. And neither was Tyson Mack’s. The paternity is unknown at this point. I was hoping you’d have a clue who the father might be.”

“No. I . . . I had no idea.” She got up, paced. Meg watched, thinking her sister would be this age. What might it be like to have Sherry around now?

“There was this guy one night at a beach party early in the summer,” she said. “Tommy was away that weekend. Sherry got really drunk, and she was kissing this guy. She
might
have had sex with him that night. And if she did, there’s a chance she wouldn’t have even remembered it. She was completely out of it.”

Meg’s pulse quickened. “Who was he?”

“He was from Eugene, I think. On holiday with a bunch of guys. A postgrad thing. I don’t know what his name was.”

“So, you’re saying that Sherry might not have known she was pregnant, if this man was the father?”

“If she did, she wouldn’t have wanted to keep it, that’s for sure. My guess is that if she did know, she’d have waited until she got down to California, and have gotten rid of it quietly over there. It was almost time for her to leave.”

“You don’t think, if she knew, that she’d have told the father?”

Emma stared out the window. “No.”

Meg was besieged with the distinct impression Emma was hiding something. She’d interviewed so many people through the course of her work—criminals, murderers, victims, lawyers—she’d developed a gut detection for deception that was usually pretty spot-on.

“I thought Sherry and I shared everything,” Emma said quietly, looking out into the gray, rain-soaked garden. “Guess not.” She turned, reached for her box of cigarettes, tapped one out, lit it, then, as an afterthought, said, “Do you mind?”

“Your house.”

She opened the window a crack, stood by it, an arm across her stomach, cigarette in her other hand hovering near her face.

“Why do you think Tommy kept my sister on a pedestal all those years, if he’d learned after her murder that she willingly went with Ty Mack to the spit?”

She took a deep drag on her cigarette, blew smoke slowly out the window. Trees swooned in a building wind.

“Tommy refused to see it like that. A lot of others did, too. His take on the whole thing was, yeah, so Sherry went to the spit. She was being flirtatious, but she didn’t want to have sex. Ty must have pressed her. She said no, and he forced it, brutally assaulting her to teach her a lesson for being a cock tease. Tommy blames Mack, not Sherry. She was always sorta flirtatious, but Tom believed it was in a completely innocent way. He liked that his girlfriend attracted the attention of other guys. Made him feel powerful. The alpha.”

“How do
you
figure it played out?”

“Ty was a badass. Just look at the old pictures of him. He cultivated that image. He came from a shitty background, and I feel sorry for kids who grow up in homes like that, but not all those kids become killers and rapists like him. I don’t know what pushed him over the edge that day. But I do know Sherry called to say she was going to do ‘it’ with him. Maybe she changed her mind.” Another drag. “Did you know that Ty’s father did time for attempted rape, when he was in his twenties? Apple never falls far from the tree.” She exhaled smoke slowly.

Meg held Emma’s eyes, an anger building low in her belly. This was the prejudice that Lee Albies had been talking about. This was the stereotyping and scapegoating she’d volunteered to fight against.

“Why?” Emma said suddenly. “You think he
didn’t
do it?”

“There appears to be ground for reasonable doubt. I think if Ty Mack
had
been charged, and if the case
had
gone to trial, he would have been easily acquitted by a jury. He would have walked a free man.”

She stared. “Because of the pregnancy?”

“In part. Plus other DNA on the scene. Witnesses.”

“What witnesses?”

“Someone who corroborated Ty’s claim that he dropped Sherry safely at that Forest End trail. Someone else who saw a vehicle parked on the spit that evening.”

She stared. “And this is why you’re doing this? Writing this book?”

“I started with the intention of just telling Sherry’s story as we’d all understood it. But now I’m not so certain whose story it is. Or what
The End
is.”

“Shit,” she said quietly. “But who else could have done it?”

“That’s what I’m trying to find out. If you think of anything, any ideas, will you call me?”

She nodded, but her eyes were unreadable.

Meg switched off her recorder. “Thanks, Emma. I really appreciate it.”

“No worries. Hope it helped.”

Meg packed her tote, checked her watch. Blake had suggested she bring Irene over to the marina for dinner. She had a few hours to spare before then. Perhaps she’d see if Tommy was available—she was burning to hear his side of the story now. Hooking her tote over her shoulder, she got to her feet, then stopped at a silver-framed photo on the dresser.

“This your daughter?”

“Brooklyn, yes.”

“She’s beautiful.” Meg glanced up, and felt a strange pang in her chest, thinking of Sherry, and a baby that died with her. “She looks like a mix of both you and Tommy.”

A wry smile twisted Emma’s mouth. “Best parts of both of us, thank God. Her seventeenth birthday is coming up.”

“I heard. Tommy invited me to the big bash. I’ll see you there?”

Sharp heat flashed through her eyes. “No. Maybe.”

Meg hesitated, uncomfortable. “It really did end badly?”

Emma snorted, stubbed out her cigarette in an ashtray on the table. “It’s being around that new wife of his that makes me sick. Exact replica of Sherry, except a little more white-blonde than gold. And taller. Norwegian with an accent to match, and all of twenty-five years old. Not much older than Brooklyn. Not much older than Sherry when she died, either.” She went to the front door, opened it.

Meg pulled on her boots and coat. “I heard about his second wife, Deliah,” she prompted, deeply curious now. “That must have been tragic.”

“Tragic,” she echoed, no emotion to the word. “He got her business, though. Deliah had inherited Sproatt Renovations and Design from her father shortly before the accident.”

The door closed behind Meg with a firm snick. She was grateful for the fresh air. As she walked back to her truck, she noticed Emma watching her from behind the drapes.

Sherry, Sherry . . . what were you doing that summer? Did any one of us really know you?

How does one know anyone, Meggie-Peg? By how they look? By what they do? Or say? Like I said, it’s a marvel we trust at all . . .

Leaves skittered across her path in a sharp gust of wind. A fine mist of rain started to fall. In her truck, she called Tommy’s assistant.

It was four in the afternoon when Lori-Beth Braden Thibodeau turned her SUV back into her driveway and maneuvered herself out of the driver’s seat into her wheelchair in the pouring rain. She’d received a call from the midwife just after the cops had taken Sally that morning—Holly had gone into labor. She’d raced down to Chillmook at once. Alone. She’d not wanted to call Henry. Her most fervent hope was that baby Joy would arrive, and become hers before doom hit. And she was certain doom was going to hit now. In what form she did not know yet. But Holly’s contractions had proved false. Braxton Hicks. Afterward, the midwife said it was a sign her body was getting ready. It should be soon now.

She wheeled into the kitchen to make a pot of coffee, wondering if she should take a hotel room in Chillmook so she could be close. Thinking about her baby, making plans—it kept her mind off the other things. It’s all she wanted—all she was living for right now. And she’d do anything—everything—to make it happen.

She was sitting in the kitchen sipping her drink and eating a slice of toast when Sally walked in.

Her heart stopped. Carefully she set her mug down. Her sister’s face was waxy and white, dark bags under her eyes.

“What happened?” Lori-Beth’s voice came out hoarse.

Sally took a seat at the kitchen table, and rubbed her mouth.

“Did they charge you?”

She inhaled deeply. “No. Not yet. I got a lawyer. She’s good.”

“Did you do it, Sally? Did you vandalize Meg’s house? Did you shoot out her windows?”

Sally’s eyes locked with her sister’s. And an indescribable kind of weight pressed down on Lori-Beth. This could not be happening. She was going to wake up. It would all be a dream.

“Why?”
she whispered.

“I’d do anything for you, LB. Anything.”

Lori-Beth stared, her brain folding in over itself. “What do you mean, ‘for me’? Why would you terrorize Meg Brogan
for me
?”