The Ghost and the Dead Deb

Anyway, that means there’s even more evidence to show Victoria Banks had an intent to harm Angel Stark—which would have given Angel a motive to go after Victoria. Seems to me, Angel was worried how far Victoria would go with her threats . . . and that night, when the girl actually threatened her in public, Angel decided to rid herself of the little Banks pest before she got around to getting rid of Angel.

“So what about the gun then?”

We know from Kiki’s claim that Hal was here late last night looking for Angel— and he lied about it to you, so he’s trying to cover up his tracks. If he killed Angel, like you and I both think he did, he might have taken that gun from her. And he could be packing right now.

“Gee-zus, Jack, what a time to share this with me!”

I quickly used Vicky’s cell to call Eddie Franzetti. He was the only person on the Quindicott Police force whom I trusted with this information. He’d been through this with me before, when he helped me capture Timothy Brennan’s killer.

“Sorry, Mrs. McClure,” said the desk sergeant. “Eddie went up to Providence with Johnny and Bud Napp. Tomorrow Johnny’s going to be arraigned for murder, and the Staties wanted him close for a perp walk in the morning. I guess Bud wanted to go along to support his nephew.”

“Dammit!” (I couldn’t help myself.)

“Is anything wrong? Is there anything I can help you with?”

“No thanks, Sergeant.”

Call it off, doll, Jack said when I hung up. If he’s armed, you may be setting up another crime scene here.

A stone rattled on the path. I turned at the sound. Hal McConnell was approaching me, a frown creasing his handsome features.

“Sorry, Jack,” I silently told the ghost. “It’s too late. We’ll just have to make do with the resources at hand.”

I surveyed the suspect. He wore khaki pants that flapped in the summer wind. A yellow polo shirt, buttoned to the top, peeked out of his buttoned blue blazer. Once again, he wore an outfit too heavy for the warm, sticky weather. Hal stopped a few yards away, eyes level with mine. The warm breeze blew his forward-swept hair back, and for the first time I saw the angry bruise, confirming what I’d suspected. He’d suddenly changed his hairstyle for one reason—to cover a defensive wound.

“Well?” Hal asked, sliding his hands into his pants pockets.

“I spoke to Kiki Langdon earlier today,” I began. “She told me she saw you the night Angel was killed, in front of this inn.”

Hal’s half-smile turned sour. “I see now that Newport’s code of silence is selectively applied . . .”

I shook my head. “Hal, listen to me. The security camera above the Inn’s front door would have photographed your whole encounter with Kiki. The State Police have that evidence now—and they’ll care about it once I tell them what to look for and why.”

Hal swallowed. His hands came out of his pockets. He rubbed the back of his neck, like he was thinking fast.

Good, honey. You surprised him with the camera. He didn’t know about it.

“So I talked to Kiki that night? So what?” he finally replied. “It’s not illegal to stop by an inn . . . I’ll just deny having anything to do with Angel’s murder.”

“There are things the police don’t know yet, Hal. Like the fact that Angel was the one who murdered Bethany, and Bethany’s little sister, Victoria, discovered that fact.”

Hal blinked. I’d caught him off guard again.

Keep going, baby.

“Yes,” he slowly admitted. “It’s true. Vicky knew. Donald told her . . .”

“Easterbrook?”

Hal nodded, sighed, folded his arms tightly across his chest. “It wasn’t enough to have Bethany. He started on Victoria, too . . . Before Bethany’s body was even in the ground.” A bitter expression crossed his features. “Donald has a hobby, Mrs. McClure, getting girls into bed . . . not that it’s a crime. With him it’s more of a compulsion . . . maybe it’s in his blood, part of that Brazilian meal-ticket his father married, or maybe he’s just phenomenally more successful at it than the rest of us so it comes off as out of control, but . . . there it is.”

“You must be furious with Donald then. He slept with both of the women you loved.”

Hal laughed at that, a broken, brittle sound. “You think I loved Bethany? Once maybe. But by the time she was murdered I hated her so much I probably could have killed her myself.”

“But not Victoria.”

“No. Not her. But then there was always more to her than Bethany. She quickly regretted getting involved with Donald. She . . . she was starting to love me, I think.”

Okay, baby, you got him where you want him. Spring your theory. Only make it sound like you already know for sure, like he’s not telling you anything you don’t know. Lie, baby. Lie good.

I swallowed my nerves. “And then, of course, Angel killed Victoria. I know that, too, Hal. I found the evidence.”

His expression darkened. “I heard the whole thing over the cell phone. We were talking, Vicky and I. Suddenly Vicky said something like ‘what are you doing here,’ and then I heard another voice. Angel’s. She said something like ‘you want to threaten me now?’ That’s when the connection broke.”

“You were in Newport when this happened?”

Hal shook his head. “I was already in my car, on my way to that fleabag motel on the highway. After the connection broke, I floored it. When I pulled into the parking lot, I saw Angel getting into a parked car. I thought Vicky might have been in that car, too, and I followed it.”

“So you came here to confront Angel.”

“I got here right as she pulled up. Of course, Vicky wasn’t in the car. Not in the backseat, not on the floor, not in the trunk. By that time, Vicky was already dead in the woods. But I didn’t know it at the time. I demanded Angel tell me where Vicky was, what had happened.”

“And did she?”

“Angel was high, I think. She laughed and ran down this path. She thought it was a big game. She had some yellow rope draped around her neck, told me how she’d grabbed a few pieces of it off the back of that kid Johnny’s pickup, just so she could frame him a second time.”

I closed my eyes a moment. “Jack, did you hear that?”

Yeah, baby. Remember the kid’s testimony in the bookstore —he’d said he’d been so upset trying to get away from Angel he’d flooded the engine in the parking lot. It wouldn’t start for a few minutes.

I could hardly believe it was that simple. “That must have been the moment Angel grabbed the lengths of rope,” I silently agreed. “But Johnny had been so focused on the truck’s stalling, he never saw her do it.”

“Angel’s hands were still bloody when I confronted her,” Hal continued. “She was still holding the gun she’d used to beat Vicky unconscious. She pretended to tighten the piece of rope around her neck so she could show me exactly how she’d killed Vicky. It was a big game, a big taunt to torture me. That was Angel’s kick, you know? Making people squirm. She’d gone to the motel, called Vicky from one of the motel’s pay phones to lure her outside, then forced her at gunpoint into the woods. There were no bullets in her gun, she told me she’d thrown them in Johnny Napp’s face when he’d refused to help her. So she beat Vicky unconscious with the butt and strangled the life out of her with one of the pieces of rope she’d taken.”

His gaze, which had gone far away as he recounted that night, suddenly focused on me. “Angel was a monster and had to be stopped. And I was going to stop her. That’s all I could think. I just snapped . . . slapped her and cursed her. She fought me, but I took the ends of the rope she’d draped around her neck to taunt me and I started to choke her. Angel fought hard. I know what she wrote about me in that book—she called me childish, sentimental, weak, had no respect for me. She never thought I had it in me . . . but I wouldn’t stop . . .”

My throat suddenly felt like it had been stuffed with cotton balls. I tried to clear it.

Steady, kid. Hang in there.

“So that’s why you were wearing the jacket and tie when I met you at the bookstore?” I asked. “And why you