carelessly giving probation to a felon without noticing that he was currently in violation of an earlier probation—a stone-cold killer who went out and carjacked, raped, and murdered a young college student.
“Annie was my cousin,” Mel Garrett said, fighting to hold back her tears. “She and Hank were supposed to get married last November. At Thanksgiving. I was going to be her maid of honor.”
At our committee meeting on Sunday, Roberta Ouellette had said, “She was on her way back to class after a fitting of her wedding gown when he grabbed her.”
Too bad none of us thought to ask the name of the groom-to-be.
“He told me that he and his girlfriend usually took summer jobs in the mountains,” said Edwards, “but that you convinced him the beach would be a good change. I thought you were the girlfriend he was referring to.”
Mel shook her head, her eyes as pink as the streaks in her jet-black hair. “Not me. Annie. She loved the mountains. After graduation, they were going to work at one of the inns till they could afford to buy an inn of their own. They had so many plans. When she got killed, Hank was so out of his mind with grief that we were all afraid that he might hurt himself. If he could have gotten his hands on the asshole that killed her, he would have ripped his bloody heart out.
“Then when the newspapers wrote about how he should have been behind bars and not out on the street, that the judge had screwed up, that really started to eat at Hank. I thought getting him to come here this summer instead of going to the mountains would help him, but it was like that appointment in Samarra, wasn’t it? He comes here to get over Annie’s death and the man who caused it turns up here, too.”
She pushed back the hair that had fallen over one eye and looked Edwards straight in the face. “Honest to God, I didn’t know that the judge was here that night. All we knew was his name, not what he looked like. That’s why I believed Hank when he swore he had nothing to do with the murder. I was afraid that if I told about Annie, you’d say he did it.”
I remembered looking across the crowded dining porch when Hank seated Allen and the children, how Pete Jeffreys had come up to the table and Hank had stood by patiently while Allen introduced the children to Judge Jeffreys. “I’ll bet that’s how he knew who Jeffreys was,” I said, and Edwards told me that Hank had confirmed it when he confessed.
The rest was as I’d conjectured. He had followed Jeffreys into the restroom and accused him of causing his fiancee’s death. When Jeffreys tossed him enough money to pay his bill and stormed out of the restaurant, Hank had followed.
“I wanted him dead,” Hank told them. “Dead like Annie. I was in such a rage that I just snatched up that strap and strangled him. At that point, I didn’t care if anyone saw me or not. But once I’d thrown him into the river and nobody had seen me, I thought I might get away with it. Then you and Judge Knott came back to the restaurant Sunday morning and she mentioned the judge who saw me follow Jeffreys into the restroom. I knew I had to get rid of him before he said anything about me.”
He had killed Kyle late Monday afternoon—a crushing blow on the head that he thought would not be noticed with all the other damages a car crash can inflict on a body, not realizing that blood doesn’t spurt once the heart stops beating. And he had been incredibly lucky that neither roommate had walked in while he was packing up the would-be actor’s things. After sending the car with Kyle’s body off that exit ramp late last night, he had pedaled Kyle’s bicycle back to Jonah’s in the rain with all the loose ends neatly tidied away.
“Except that Judge Knott kept picking at them, unraveling them,” Hank had said. “She was going to help Judge Fitzhume remember me and I couldn’t have that, could I?”
“He says he didn’t mean for it to go so far,” Edwards told me. “He says he didn’t want to hurt you and he really didn’t mean to kill Jeffreys, but the judge brushed him off like he was trash. As if the girl’s death meant nothing. He says that if the judge had just said he was sorry, admitted he’d screwed up, that would have been the end of it.
“But Jeffreys told him, ‘Shit happens, kid. Get over it.’ ” Edwards shook his head at the waste of it all. “He kept saying that this wasn’t how it was supposed to be, it wasn’t what he wanted.”
“No Innisfree for him,” I murmured.
“Huh?”
“Not important,” I told him.
It was almost midnight before I got back to the SandCastle. Edwards had offered to have someone drive me, but I swore I was okay. And I was, except for an incredibly sore shoulder. All I wanted was a long hot soaking bath and two more aspirin. I put my .38 and its holster back into the locked metal toolbox I keep stowed in my trunk and went up to my room with the candles I’d bought earlier.
When I unlocked the door, I was startled to see that the lights were on.
As was the television.
And a man was asleep on my bed with the remote control in his hand.
Dwight opened his eyes when I closed the door and set the candles on the ledge of the tub. He gave me a drowsy smile and looked over at the clock radio on the nightstand. “Midnight? I thought you were going to be in bed every night by nine o’clock.”
As I came closer, he registered my torn and dirty red halter top and saw the scrape on my shoulder and sat upright. His smile turned to concern and all sleepiness disappeared.
“Deb’rah? What the hell happened to you?”
I went straight into his arms for a long slow kiss that made me forget all about my sore shoulder and aching head.
At last we reluctantly drew apart and he said, “How did you get so banged up? What happened?”
“It’s a long story,” I said, as I slipped off my torn halter top and began to unbutton his shirt. “Let’s get in the Jacuzzi and I’ll tell you all about it.”
* See
