“I’ve just started to collect information,” Des replied, although she did know this much: Four Chimneys was several miles from town. And the private drive down to Route 156 added at least another halfmile. No one would have walked that distance in the dark. Whoever had taken the Gullwing must have been dropped off here-which made it a twoman job.
“Collect all you want, Trooper,” Claudia sniffed. “We all know the Kershaw brothers did it.”
“Might be payback,” acknowledged Bement. He lit a Lucky and leaned against his truck, smoking it. “I did chump Donnie last night at Justine’s.”
“Exactly what did happen?” Claudia demanded.
“I punched him in the nose,” Bement told her, fingering his tender eye. “He hit me back. Des didn’t charge us or anything.”
“You knew?” she said to Des accusingly. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It’s not my business to do that, Mrs. Widdifield.”
Claudia heaved her chest, one foot taptaptapping on the gravel. “Bement, I really wish you’d stop seeing that girl.”
“Justine, Mom,” he said testily. “Her name is Justine.”
“No good will come from you mixing with her crowd.”
“Is that right? Tell me, what’s so damned special about my crowd? Are you and Dad all happy together in my crowd? Have you two got life all figured out? No, hunh? So let me live my own damned life, will you?”
Claudia’s lower lip quivered, but she didn’t cry. Wouldn’t cry. Instead, she stormed off toward her cottage, slamming the garden gate shut behind her.
Bement cursed under his breath. “Sorry, she just gets to me sometimes.”
“Not a problem. I come from a family, too.”
“This is why my dad left. Because she just won’t leave you the hell alone.” He flicked his cigarette butt off into the damp gravel, watching it smolder and sizzle. “They’ll trash Nana’s car, if I know them.”
“It’s worth way more if it’s in one piece.”
“Do you honestly think they’re smart enough to know that?”
“You stayed over with Justine last night?”
“Yeah. We stayed in, watched some old Eddie Murphy movie on TV.”
“Were you awake when Stevie and Donnie brought Allison home?”
“She didn’t stagger in until this morning.”
“She partied all night with them?”
“I guess. We didn’t talk. She just went straight to her room and crashed.”
“What time was this?”
“Right around six o’clock. I could hear their van idling outside.”
The kitchen door opened and closed and Danielle came tromping across the gravel toward them in her rubber boots. “Morning, Bement,” she said, smiling at him faintly.
“Hey, Danno. Listen, Des, I have to hit the shower and get to work.” He headed inside, his stride lithe and athletic.
“I should be off, too.” Danielle made no move to leave. “My chores await me.”
“So do you bring Poochie eggs every morning?” asked Des, anxious to keep her talking. The woman had something for her, she sensed.
“And bread when I have time to bake. She seems to appreciate it.” Danielle hesitated, clearing her throat. “Des, Mark Widdifield is in a very dark place right now. He’s lost the clients he had and isn’t trying to find new ones. He doesn’t even seem interested. The man’s in terrible pain. So frightened. He needs Claudia’s support, but she only sees his failure.”
Des nodded her head, patiently waiting Danielle out.
“H-He said something to me yesterday,” she continued haltingly. “He’d been drinking. And sobbing his heart out about how Claudia doesn’t care about people, only things. I don’t know if he really meant this or not…”
“Exactly what did Mark say to you, Danielle?”
“He said he’d do just about anything to make Claudia understand how desperate he is.”
Stevie and Donnie’s van was parked outside of Milo’s log cabin in the woods when Des got there. Honestly, it wouldn’t have shocked her to find Poochie’s Gullwing parked there, too. But she didn’t. There was no sign of Milo’s pickup. Nor, happily, his Doberman. Wood smoke rose from the stovepipe in the cabin’s roof. And she could hear the deep, steady thathump… thathump of heavy metal music coming from inside. Otherwise, it was quiet. An unsettling kind of quiet. As she stood there looking at the cabin, Des shuddered involuntarily.
She laid a hand against the van’s front grill. A bit warm, but not a lot warm. The van hadn’t been driven in the past couple of hours. She peeked through the driver’s window and saw fast food wrappers, rumpled drop cloths. Nothing more.
She started toward the cabin. It was nearly ninethirty now. On her way over here she’d checked all of Dorset’s beach and state forest parking lots for the Gullwing. No sign of it, but they’d have been fools if they didn’t look. There was always a chance Poochie was right-that some kids really had taken it for a joyride and then ditched it. On this point she and Luke Olman, the investigating detective from Troop F barracks, had been in total agreement. It was Luke’s case now. She was assisting with the interviews while he canvassed the neighbors and school bus drivers, and logged some computer time back at the barracks.
She knocked. No one answered. The door was unlocked. She called out “Hello?…” Heard no response. Only the music, which was “Whole Lotta Love,” a Led Zeppelin paleometal favorite. She went inside.
They were passed out in the living room-Stevie sprawled out on the sofa with his mouth open, Donnie face down on the floor beside the coffee table. Donnie’s legs twitched busily in his sleep.
Des thought she detected a whiff of marijuana smoke in the air, but she didn’t see any joints lying around. Besides, the house smelled so foul it was hard to be sure. The kitchen sink was heaped full of dirty dishes and several inches of dark, oily water. There were more dirty dishes on the table, greasy pans on the stove. Something was moving around in one of the pans. It was a mouse, she realized.
The stereo was over next to the big screen TV. She flicked off the music, knelt next to Donnie and rapped him sharply on the side of the head with her knuckles. “Knockknock!” she shouted into his ear. “Anybody home?”
Little Donnie rolled over onto his back, groaning, his eyes bloodshot, his nose looking fat and tender from his bout with ement. He smelled strongly of alcohol and sweat. “Wha’ the? Breath wasn’t real fresh either.
Over on the sofa, Stevie began to stir, blinking up at her, his pallor vaguely greenish, mullet damp and stringy. Actually, the two of them looked as if they needed to be hosed off and deloused.
“Morning, guys!” she exclaimed brightly. “Had yourselves a real welcome home celebration, didn’t you?”
Stevie staggered over to the kitchen sink and stuck his head under the cold water tap, somehow managing to overlook the dirty dishes and disgusting water. He wiped his face with the sleeve of his flannel shirt, took two cans of Miller out of the refrigerator and came back and flopped back down on the sofa, handing one to Donnie before he popped open his own and drank deeply from it. He belched hugely, then lit a cigarette, holding the cold can against his forehead.
Donnie popped open his beer and drank deeply from it. And belched. And lit a cigarette. And held the cold can against his forehead.
“What did we do now?” Stevie finally asked her, his voice raspy.
“You tell me,” Des replied, standing there with her arms crossed.
“Is the old man still here?” Donnie wondered, peering around nervously.
“I didn’t see him, or his truck.”
“Oh, yeah, he split,” Donnie recalled, scratching at his reddish beard.
“When was that?”
“Right after we got home,” Stevie replied, squinting at her.
“And when was that?”
“Lady, I ain’t no clock.”
“You got to help us out here,” Donnie said, gulping his beer. “Because we got zero idea what you’re stepping on our nuts about.”
“You didn’t show up for work this morning.”
“So we’re a little late,” Stevie said. “We’ll get there.”
