took for me to give in to his kiss, deep and warm and relaxing. I felt the buzz of the champagne and wrapped my hands around his neck. He pulled me hard against him.
“Baby,” he growled. “What you do to me . . .”
“Oh, Jack . . .”
“Listen . . .” He smiled. “This joint looks classy enough. Let me get us a room . . .”
“I can’t, Jack . . . I have a son . . . and I think . . . I think I’m still married—”
Jack’s kiss stopped my words. Then my alarm clock stopped Jack’s kiss. With its penetrating warmth still lingering, I opened my eyes to find the morning sun blasting through my open window and Jack’s tempting offer faded with the stars.
CHAPTER 22
My head was still booming away and I tried to fix it up with a hot shower. That helped, but a mess of bacon and eggs helped even more.
I SAT BLEARY-EYED in church that morning—so tired I hardly noticed my son’s impatient restlessness, so tired my aunt had to poke me now and again to keep me awake during the pastor’s seemingly interminable sermon.
The nightmare discovery in the woods, followed by a night of Jack’s dreams, had me crawling out of bed that morning with a feeling of impending doom. After the service I said good-bye to Sadie, reminding her to pass Johnny’s letter to Mina when the girl arrived for work.
Stuffed with hot homemade doughnuts and strong coffee—and milk for Spencer—we left Cooper’s Bakery and climbed into our mud-spattered, weed-encrusted blue Saturn for the trip to Newport. The food helped immensely, and I felt the fortifying sugar rush as I got behind the wheel.
It was a radiant morning, a cloudless azure sky, fresh cool breezes off the ocean, sunlight gold and dazzling. I snatched my seldom-worn sunglasses from the underside of the driver’s-side visor to shield my bloodshot eyes from the glare.
“You wore those last year, too,” my son remarked, tapping the dash in time to one of those boy band groups on Radio Disney.
“Wore what?”
“Your Hollywood sunglasses.”
I smiled. “Maybe I was wearing my contact lenses last year, too.”
“Maybe you just want to look like all the other mommies there. They all act like movie stars.”
Out of the mouths of babes. “Maybe that, too.”
Besides the shades, I was also wearing new clothes specifically purchased for this annual event—white capri pants, a pastel sweater set, and Italian sandals with a matching bag. All were expensive designer quality, which would help me blend into the McClure ranks, but bought at outlet prices, which is all I could now afford. And, frankly, I was grateful to have the long sleeves of the summer-weight sweater. It was warm, but I had some pretty nasty scratches on my arms from running topless through the woods.
Traffic was light and we were making good time as we neared the ramp to the highway. But as we came around a bend, Spencer cried out. “Look, Mom! Cops. Lots of them.”
I braked, rolling up behind several other vehicles. Squad cars were parked along both shoulders of the road, bubble lights flashing. Several belonged to the Quindicott police force but the majority were sleek silver Ford Crown Victorias with Rhode Island State Police markings.
For a moment, traffic remained at a dead stop. Several drivers were rubbernecking at the state police in their gray uniforms and “Smoky the Bear” hats swarming through the wooded area behind the Comfy-Time Motel.
“Move along, move along,” called Officer Franzetti as he waved his arms at the traffic jam. The gawkers stepped on the gas and sped away. With no cars behind my own, I stopped next to Eddie and rolled down the window. I tried to offer the handsome police officer my most clueless smile. “What’s up, Eddie?”
He motioned my car to an empty spot along the shoulder of the road.
“What’s wrong, Mom?” asked Spencer beside me.
“I just want to ask Eddie for some directions, that’s all,” I lied. From my son’s expression, I could tell even he didn’t buy that, but I told him I’d be right back. Then I climbed out of the car and approached Eddie.
“What’s happened?” I asked.
“The State Police got an anonymous tip last night. A woman caller, alerting them to the fact that a corpse was in the woods behind the Comfy-Time Motel.”
Eddie watched my reaction closely. I automatically grasped the buffalo nickel in my pocket for reassurance— the coin that apparently allowed me to bring part of Jack with me beyond the store.
“Who?”
I blinked at Eddie in mock surprise, cocked my head. “Really? Was it that girl you told me about yesterday?”
Eddie nodded. “Victoria Banks, age nineteen. She’s dead—probably murdered right after she disappeared.”
“Murdered?”
“Strangled. And beaten, too. Maybe pistol-whipped.”
I shuddered, recalling the horrific wounds I had seen the night before.
“Probably she was killed within an hour of leaving her motel room, but . . .” Eddie’s voice faltered. A shadow crossed his handsome face as he stared at the woods. “I was the one Chief Ciders sent up here to talk to her friends. I told the Chief I thought something bad had happened to the girl, but the Chief . . . well, he couldn’t issue an Amber Alert because the girl was over eighteen. And he insisted on waiting twenty-four hours before forwarding a missing persons report to the state police. We couldn’t even find her parents. The Newport and Manhattan addresses just had answering machines saying they were touring Europe for the summer.”
“Sure did,” I told him. “Hal lied.”
“Hal McConnell has something to hide.”
I could see the torment on Eddie’s face. He was blaming himself. I reached out, put my hand on his shoulder. “Look, Eddie. You said yourself that she was probably dead before her friends even reported her missing. You did what you could.”
“Yeah,” he said softly. “But if I’d gone into the woods for a look-see, she might not have been lying there all night.”
I closed my eyes a moment. I felt bad about it, too. “Oh, Jack,” I silently whispered. “I wish I could tell him about snagging Vicky’s cell phone, just to ease his mind.”
Just then, a Quindicott Volunteer Fire Department ambulance emerged from the edge of the woods. The red vehicle bumped along the service road at a funereal pace, swaying in the deep wheel ruts I’d followed less than ten hours before. I could tell by the expressions on the State Troopers’ faces that the vehicle bore the corpse of Victoria Banks, heiress, and now officially murder victim. Eddie Franzetti went pale as a—well, a ghost.
My heart went out to him.
Jack’s didn’t.
