Isabella Moon (25 page)

“You’re asking if my boy was on drugs,” he said.

“Yes, sir,” Bill said. “That’s what I’m asking.”

His response seemed to take the air out of the man and he backed away.

“Teenage bullshit,” Joe Catlett said. “I thought Doreen and I would be the ones not to make it through.”

“I won’t have cursing in this house,” his wife said. “Not over our boy, Joe.” She looked directly at Bill for the first time since he’d come into the house. “I thought it was a problem with his girlfriend, Heather. She hadn’t been coming out here and she hadn’t been calling him as often. But I won’t believe he was doing drugs. He knew better than that.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Bill said. He hadn’t expected more from either of them. Parents never did want to hear it, and he didn’t blame them. In their place—well, he would never be in their place. He had never wanted to be at the mercy of someone utterly dependent on him, but he could imagine how they felt.

Later, after they’d moved on to the sad details of obtaining the body, Bill was about to take his leave when Doreen Catlett suddenly spoke out, interrupting her husband.

“There was a name I heard a couple of times when Brad was on the phone. I don’t think he knew I heard him,” she said. “It was somebody named Delmar. I’d never heard of anyone by that name. He wasn’t from school, I don’t think.”

Bill made a note to ask Frank if the name had come up in interviews with any of the other high school kids.

“I just want us to be able to bury our boy in peace,” Joe Catlett said.

“I hope you can,” Bill said, thinking,
I just don’t want us to have to bury any more.

Margaret had supper ready when he walked in, and Bill, feeling more grateful than he could say, hugged her wordlessly there in the kitchen. They’d planned to go out, but she’d somehow intuited that after the long night they’d had and the press conference, he wouldn’t feel like sitting in a restaurant. It was one of the things he didn’t like about being the sheriff in such a small town: even people who didn’t know him very well considered it their personal privilege to interrupt his meal whenever they cared to for whatever stupid reason. It gave him a good picture of how important some people considered themselves to be.

“It’s only pork chops,” Margaret said, putting the plate down in front of him. “Baked, not fried. Sorry. We could use a little comfort food, I know. But I mashed some potatoes.”

“You’re a miracle,” he said.

“I got a nap today,” she said. “But I had to unplug the phone. Seems like everybody in town heard what you had me out doing at all hours.” She shook her head. “I still can’t get the image of that little girl out of my head, Bill. Those bones sticking out of her coat. Lying there like she was somebody’s Halloween joke.”

“I never should’ve taken you out there,” he said. “I should’ve asked Mitch or Frank. Daphne could’ve stood it.”

“It was my idea, remember?”

“How the hell did I know she’d be there?” Bill said.

Margaret leaned forward, her chin resting on the heel of her hand.

“Yes,” she said. “How
did
you know? You’re going to have to answer that question. Folks are already asking.”

“Just say someone stepped forward with the information,” he said. “It won’t get to be an issue until we get the evidence together. Charge somebody.”

“Then what?”

“Hey, did you make any gravy for these?” he said, digging into the potatoes. “These are great, but they need gravy.”

“You think someone’s just going to come forward voluntarily?”

“I don’t know. Salt and pepper? Butter?”

Margaret sighed. “I don’t know why you’re protecting that woman,” she said.

“Who?” Bill said. Of course he knew damned good and well who she meant.

“Maybe she
is
connected to the girl’s murder. Maybe it was her guilty conscience that made her tell you where to find the body. She just couldn’t stand it anymore.”

“I don’t think so,” Bill said.

“You trust her?” Margaret said.

“I never said that I trusted her,” he said, cutting into a chop as he spoke. “I get enough crap about this out there. I don’t need it at home.”

“Since when don’t we talk about a case like this?” Margaret said. “Why is it so different this time?”

Bill pushed his plate away hard enough that it knocked over his water glass.

“Give it a rest, Margaret,” he said. He left the kitchen, his heart beating hard in his chest. He heard her chair scrape back on the floor, but she didn’t follow him.

On the porch, he stood looking out on their quiet street. He hated that things were so screwed up. He hated that he could speak so harshly to Margaret. He hated it when things weren’t crystal clear, when he didn’t know what was going on in his own head.

Later, as he sat alone in his den watching the DVD of an old Charles Bronson film she’d gotten him for Christmas, the phone rang. He ignored it, letting Margaret pick it up in the kitchen. After a minute she brought the handset to him and left the room without saying a word. It looked like their fight wasn’t going to be over anytime soon.

“Delaney,” he said.

“I just got a call at home from the Catlett boy’s girlfriend,” Frank said. “She sounded a little drunk, but she was crying and I couldn’t really tell what-all she was saying. Then her grandmother grabbed the phone and said the girl wants to come in to talk to us. She said they didn’t want to wait until tomorrow.”

“I’m on my way,” Bill said.

“You stay home,” Frank said. “You’ve had a hell of a day. I can handle it.”

“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” Bill said. He hung up the phone and shut down the DVD.

25

Mary-Katie unwrapped the stiff foil package of the second pregnancy test with trembling hands. The first lay on the bathroom vanity, its vivid pink line stark in contrast to the white, urine-soaked pad behind it. She’d drunk three large cups of water in the past twenty minutes so she could do the second test right away, and her stomach felt full and achy. Worse, though, was the painful tenderness of her breasts, which she’d at first attributed to the onset of her period. But when it didn’t come, then was two, three days late, she’d made a special trip to the drugstore, tossing random items—a box of tissues, paper plates, rug cleaner, a bag of cherry sour balls—into her basket because the pregnancy test had looked so strange and significant alone there. Now, all those things lay in a pile on the kitchen counter, forgotten.

The several mirrors in the bathroom reflected a limitless number of Mary-Katies back to her. She was embarrassed to see her own involuntary smile, the naked emotion that seemed to have transformed her from a calm, sensible twenty-nine-year-old into a sheepishly grinning fool.

She wasn’t supposed to be pregnant. She’d been religious about taking her birth control pills for years, never missing a single one by more than an hour or two. Miles was finally at least open to talking about having children, but they were supposed to come much later. He treasured her body the way it was now, lithe and fresh, almost boyish in its athleticism. He wouldn’t even allow her to sleep with pajamas on. Sometimes she would awaken, chilled, because he had pulled back the sheet to watch her body as she slept. Pregnancy would change all that. Certainly a child would.

The thought that Miles might react badly stole the smile from her face.

Finally, she couldn’t wait any longer and did the second test. When she finished, she nervously set it on a pile of toilet tissue. With her eyes on her watch, she washed her hands and tried to calm herself.

She was realistic about Miles’s selfishness. He would be unhappy—for a while—and that’s all. There were some facts of life that a person just had to deal with.

Mary-Katie checked the temperature of the pinot grigio she had set in the wine cooler beside the hot tub. She had brought two glasses from the kitchen, then realized she wouldn’t need one for herself. So many things were going to change. She poured herself an iced tea and sat, waiting, wearing only the gauzy silk robe that Miles had brought back for her on his last trip to Atlanta.

She rested her hands on her lower abdomen, imagining she could feel a slight rounding there. Looking in the mirror as she’d changed out of her clothes, she inspected her profile carefully, but her stomach was as taut and flat as ever. Her clothes hadn’t even gotten tighter. When her mind began to race ahead to where she might shop for maternity clothes, she stopped herself, laughing out loud. Soon she’d have the baby already born and on its way to college!

When she heard Miles calling her from inside the house, she went to him, loosening the belt of the robe so he could see that it was all she was wearing.

In the living room, she found him standing in the fading light, his briefcase still in hand, conversing with a man she’d never met before. It was like Miles not to warn her that he was bringing a client home with him.

The evening was not going to go the way she’d planned.

Once Mary-Katie had gotten dressed, she went to the freezer to take out another filet for Miles to put on the grill. He had poured a substantial amount of the pinot grigio she’d opened into a glass for the client.

The client, a Dutchman named Jules, looked at her with—what? Perhaps a shade of disappointment as she came into the room wearing a tissue-thin, black V-neck sweater and a pair of tan silk pants instead of the nearly transparent robe she’d been wearing when he arrived. At first she wanted to snap at him, telling him that the show was over. Instead, she found herself flattered by his attention. Something about having a secret made her feel more comfortable, less reluctant to talk with this man, this stranger.

“Here, baby,” Miles said, holding out a glass of wine to her.

She hesitated, but then took it, knowing that she didn’t have to actually drink it. No one would notice if she poured it, little by little, into the sink when she was alone in the kitchen.

Jules was a good six inches taller than Miles and better looking, with his ash-blond hair, broad forehead, and chiseled jaw. He’d taken off his sport coat, and Miles had encouraged him to relax and loosen his tie. Unlike Miles, he wore no jewelry. Mary-Katie found him refreshing.

When, at dinner, Miles guided her to the chair closest to Jules’s, she felt a flutter of panic, remembering Kyle Richardson and his soft, pleading eyes, his desperate need to please her, despite the fact that she’d been sold to him for the afternoon. But after a moment she was surprised to find that her panic had dissolved completely. No way would she let Miles use her that way again. She had a child to protect! The thought made her bold. She could act as she pleased!

“You should visit St. Maarten,” Jules told her. “We have fantastic beaches. Sand the color of snow on the right days.”

“You know, I don’t really like to fly over that much water,” she said. “It’s too far.”

“What?” Miles said. “You’ve never told me that before.”

“I thought Miles said you were from Holland,” she said, ignoring Miles.

“I have a villa in St. Maarten. I never do business when I’m there.”

“What about Hawaii?” Miles said. “We flew for six or seven hours over the water. We live by the beach, for Christ’s sake.”

“Maybe I’ve just decided,” she said, turning to Miles. “Can’t people change?” She felt a small thrill in defying him. Throughout the evening she took pleasure in addressing Jules directly, leaving Miles out of the conversation. She knew that she was playing with a kind of fire. But she wasn’t alone anymore. There was someone else to think of, another person who would make life with Miles—always unpredictable—slightly more bearable. She was hopeful, too, that the baby would soften him. She knew that he was capable of incredible gentleness. How could he be anything but gentle with his own child?

By the time Jules left with a chaste kiss on her cheek and promises to return to their house when he was again in the area, Miles was as sullen as Mary-Katie had ever seen him. As they carried the dishes into the kitchen from the patio, he was silent.

“What a nice guy,” Mary-Katie said. “Is he really from Holland?”

Miles noisily dropped a plate and a salad bowl into the sink, where she would have to retrieve them for the dishwasher.

“What the hell was that all about?” he said.

“I don’t know,” Mary-Katie said, deciding not to pretend ignorance. She laughed. “I was just feeling kind of loopy. Sometimes I get that way.”

“Bullshit,” Miles said. “You would’ve screwed him right there on the fucking table if you’d had five minutes alone with him.”

“That’s silly, Miles,” she said, shaking her head. “You know better than that.”

“Fuck me,” he said. “I bet you liked doing it with Kyle Richardson, too. Here I thought you were doing it for us. Because I needed you to.”

Mary-Katie started back to the patio, but Miles grabbed her arm.

“Tell me,” he said. “Tell me you liked it.”

“Don’t be stupid,” she said, pulling away. Until this evening, she’d finally been able to put Kyle Richardson and what she’d done out of her mind for hours at a time. Now, with the child inside her, what she’d done seemed even dirtier to her. She prayed that she hadn’t been pregnant at the time.