“Where are they now?” Lindsey asked.
“They’re at university,” Carrie said. “Kyle is a senior at Dartmouth, and Kim is a sophomore at the Rhode Island School of Design.”
“It’s late,” Lindsey said with a glance at the clock on the mantel. “Do you think you should wait until morning?”
Carrie looked confused. “Maybe.”
“Is there anyone else we can call for you?”
“My sister is in Florida,” Carrie said. “But her husband is very sick. I don’t want to bother her.”
They heard Chief Daniels’s heavy tread on the stairs before he appeared. His face looked grim, and Lindsey had a feeling Carrie’s night was about to get worse, if that was even possible.
“Carrie, I’m going to need you to come down to the station,” he said. “I’ve got some questions for you.”
“All right.” She rose from her seat on the couch. She looked stoic with her blanket wrapped around her shoulders and her face pale but determined.
“This is in an official capacity,” the chief said. “Would you like to call your attorney?”
Lindsey didn’t think it was possible for Carrie to get any paler, but she did. Lindsey couldn’t stand it. The whole thing was preposterous.
“She was at the library all evening,” Lindsey protested. “She’s the president of the Friends, and there are plenty of witnesses that can place her there.”
Chief Daniels nodded, looking almost relieved to hear it. “Good. So, you were there from what time?”
“Seven,” Carrie said. “No, wait, I was running late. I didn’t get there until seven fifteen.”
An awkward silence filled the room and Carrie glanced around at each of them. “I was having car trouble.”
“That’s true,” Sully said. “I gave her a ride home because her starter is dead.”
The chief looked less happy as he glanced at his watch. “It’s nine thirty now. That only accounts for the past two hours. I don’t know enough about forensics to even hazard a guess at when this might have happened. For your own protection, Carrie, we need to do this by the book.”
Lindsey would have laughed at the pun if she wasn’t so freaked out that Carrie might find herself in jail for a crime she could not possibly have committed.
“Officer Plewicki is going to escort you to the station, Carrie. Sully, Ms. Norris, we’ll need statements about what occurred upon your arrival here. We can take them now or you can give them at the station, too.”
“The station,” Lindsey said. She turned to Sully. “Is that okay with you?”
“Just fine,” he said. He turned to Carrie. “We’ll follow you.”
She gave them a ghost of a smile. She pulled the afghan off her shoulders and carefully folded it, placing it on the back of the couch. She smoothed it with her hand, as if by tidying up one corner of her shattered life, she might extend order to the rest of it.
Emma appeared on the landing below, and they all trooped out the door with her. There was an awkward moment at the squad car when Emma opened the back door for Carrie. Carrie looked like she wanted to balk, but instead, she gave Emma a nod and climbed into the back.
The small cul-de-sac was filling up with cars. As Lindsey and Sully followed Emma’s squad car, they saw the state coroner’s van pulling in. She did not envy them their night’s work.
“Are you sure this is okay?” Carrie asked for the third time.
“More than okay,” Lindsey said. “I called Nancy and she said she made up the bed for you.”
Sully parked his truck in the short driveway in front of the house where Lindsey rented the third floor. When it had occurred to her that Carrie couldn’t go home, she had called Nancy from the police station and they agreed that while Charlie, Nancy’s nephew and tenant of the middle apartment, was gone on tour, Carrie could stay in his place.
Nancy had gone through it before they arrived to make sure it didn’t reek too much of twenty-something musician man-child. She deemed it okay, and Carrie had gratefully accepted their offer to stay there until she could return home.
After being questioned at the station, Carrie had been allowed to go home to pack some personal items, including a change of clothes and her toothbrush. Sully hauled her overnight bag and Lindsey’s bike out of the back of his truck while Lindsey led Carrie up the stairs of the old captain’s house.
Sully followed and handed off Carrie’s bag in the foyer. “Will you two be all right?”
They both nodded and he said, “Call me if you need anything, either of you.”
“Thanks, Sully, for everything,” Carrie said.
It was well past midnight now and she looked dead on her feet. Lindsey glanced over her head and she and Sully exchanged a concerned look. Their questioning at the station had been painless, but Carrie’s had taken hours and she was looking the worse for wear.
“Go rest,” Sully said. “I’ll check in on you tomorrow. I’ll take care of your car situation.”
“Thanks, Sully,” Lindsey said.
They watched as he disappeared back into the night.
“He’s a good man,” Carrie said.
Lindsey had to agree. Parked in the hard plastic chairs at the station for hours, Sully had never once complained or begged off. He had just watched and waited, his solid presence giving the surreal situation an overlying sense of calm. No, there weren’t many like Mike Sullivan.
“Hey, you two, get on up here,” Nancy Peyton called down as she leaned over the railing on the second-floor landing.
After the grisly discovery at Carrie’s house and the stress of the police station, Lindsey was grateful to hit the familiar stairs. Once she got Carrie settled for the night, she planned to toddle right up to her own place. At the moment, she couldn’t think of anything she wanted more than to cocoon herself in the softness of her flannel sheets and downy comforter.
She shouldered Carrie’s bag and led her up the stairs. Charlie’s doors were curtained French doors, probably the original from before the house had been reconfigured into a three-family residence.
Nancy was standing in the open doorway, holding a key. Lindsey could see several candles burning behind her. They were the big pillar kind in a dark burgundy that smelled of cranberries. Probably, Nancy was trying to burn out Charlie’s man stink.
“I pushed all of his music equipment to the side in the guest bedroom and made up the bed with my own fresh sheets,” Nancy said. “Oh, honey, you look done in.”
As soon as the words were out of her mouth, Nancy blanched.
“Oh, I didn’t…” she began, but if Carrie had noticed the bad word choice, she didn’t show it and instead she wrapped Nancy in a big hug.
“Thank you so much,” she said. She turned and included Lindsey in the hug. “Thank you both so…”
Her voice cracked and she began to sob. Lindsey and Nancy exchanged a look and then hustled her over to the cushy chair by the gas fireplace, which Nancy had already turned on.
While Carrie sobbed, Nancy slipped into the kitchen. Lindsey heard the rattle of glasses, and when she reappeared, Nancy had a tray with three mismatched shot glasses and a bottle of Jack Daniel’s.
“The boy is sadly lacking in his brandy supply,” Nancy said. “But this will do the trick.”
She set the tray down, and while Carrie blew her nose on a tissue and tried to pull herself together, Nancy splashed the whiskey into the glasses. Lindsey took hers up and noted it was filled almost to the rim. Nancy did believe in a generous pour.
“Here’s an old Irish blessing: To live in the hearts we leave behind is not to die,” Nancy said. “Godspeed, Markus Rushton.”
Lindsey took a healthy swallow. It burned on the way down, causing her to grimace, but it also warmed her from the inside out. Carrie took a delicate sip, but Nancy shook her head at her.
“Drink the whole thing,” she said. “It’s your medicine tonight, and believe me, you’re going to need it.”
