He then turned to Phil and asked crisply, “What happened?”
“If my wife could unwrap herself from you, maybe we could have a serious discussion.”
“You’re the one having the fucking affair!” Bette hissed.
“What happened to our ‘open’ marriage? It was okay for you, but not for me?” Phil snapped back.
“Meghan Volker?” she practically screamed.
Cooper, who’d carefully extricated himself from Bette’s embrace, knew he was in over his head. River Glen was sometimes too small a town.
Phil lifted a hand and began ticking off each finger. “Tom Gideon, Lanny Dufernal, Ted Ryerson, Lawrence Stapleton—”
“I did not sleep with Lawrence Stapleton!” Bette shrieked.
“Only because he turned you down.”
“Wait,” Cooper held up a hand.
“You fucker! You absolute fucker! You . . . you slept with Meghan Volker. Her husband will kill you. He’ll kill both of us!”
“Ex-husband. And I’ve already talked to him about marrying Meghan Volker once this whole divorce thing is over.”
Bette screamed so loudly it made Cooper’s ears ring.
Phil stood up from his chair and advanced on her.
“Hold up.” Cooper put his body between the two of them, half-convinced he was going to be beaten up by one, the other, or both. Emotions were hot, spewing like lava. “Calm down, both of you, before something happens that’ll send you both to jail or worse.”
“I hate you. I hope you die!” Bette screamed.
“You first, bitch.”
“Sit back down.” Cooper pointed Phil to his chair. “You too.” He turned to Bette.
She looked wounded that he’d turned on her. “You would really send me to jail?” In a heartbeat, he thought, but what he said was, “You need to stop escalating this fight before somebody gets really hurt. I suggest one of you leave the house.”
The Kearnses stared at Cooper for a moment, then slowly looked at each other.
Phil made a sharp motion with his arm. “Fine. I’ll go. I don’t want to stay here anyway.”
Her lip quivered, and Cooper could practically see the air go out of her. “No, I’ll go. The kids like you better anyway,” she added, starting to sob.
Phil got up from the chair again. “I’ll pack a bag.” As he passed by Cooper, he asked in a lowered voice, as if he suddenly was worried what his daughter could overhear, “Did you sleep with her, too?”
“No.”
“Y’sure?” He lifted his brows.
“Shut up, you asshole,” Bette said, also in a quieter voice, but her eyes burned with fury.
Phil brushed past him and Bette, alone with Cooper, seemed to finally feel some embarrassment at her behavior. Her face flushed pink and she looked down at her toes. Cooper waited while Phil packed a bag, then after making sure he was on his way, he got ready to leave himself.
Bette jumped up and begged. “Please stay. Please!”
Very carefully, not wanting to send her into a screaming virago once again, he explained that he had work to do.
“Come back later,” she then invited.
Hell no.
Away from the scene, he’d gone back to the station and written up the report on the incident. He hoped that would be the last of it. After work he drove first to his place, calling Jamie on the way. He’d wanted to go over to her house. Had hoped she would invite him, even though he told her right from the get-go that he was working on a number of things, but it hadn’t happened. Instead, they ended up having a fairly meaty conversation about Emma’s attack and his efforts to basically reopen the cold case. He told her that he wanted to set up some interviews, both with his old classmates and with Ted and Serena’s parents. Also, he related the murder of Dr. Alain Metcalf, a crime she knew about from her mother who’d worked with the man. She, in turn, told him about Gwen Winkelman’s meeting with Emma and then Gwen’s warnings to be careful and stay safe and to tell Cooper the same.
“Always,” Cooper said, a stock answer.
“No, she was serious. Like she knew something, something dangerous, but she wouldn’t say what that was.”
Cooper considered. Gwen had really helped out the department, but she was a tad out there for him.
The department had let it be known through the press that they were still looking for Marissa’s attacker, thereby backhandedly clearing the senior boys, so Cooper had felt comfortable telling Jamie that they were searching for a different man entirely, no one from the school, at least none of the kids.
He almost asked her if she wanted to take a trip to Bend with him, to drop in on Dr. William Ryerson, but he held himself back.
This morning, Friday, he’d learned about a burglary that had apparently taken place about three blocks from the Ryersons’ on Saturday night. The couple hadn’t initially noticed items had been stolen when they got back from a night out at a party. It was over the course of the week that they’d recognized that money had been taken from the drawer in the kitchen, where they kept spare change, some relatively inexpensive jewelry couldn’t be found, and their newest television, in their living room, had been oddly askew. Originally, they’d each thought someone else in the household had moved it and put it back, but now, as more missing items came to light, they wondered if the thief had tried to take the TV and, upon realizing it might be too difficult to get away with, had had to abandon it. Cooper had directed fingerprints to be taken, and they’d found where the thief had gained egress; a pane of the window in the kitchen door was easily removed and put back, which was how the couple let themselves in when they were locked out.
Someone likely had that information, so maybe it was
