Dearly Beloved (26 page)

Pat lives in a small, weathered cape on the north coast of the island, not far from the old Gilbrooke place. Sherm decides that he probably headed home for a while to change out of his wet clothes or grab something to eat.

After pulling on his thick, insulated gloves, Sherm starts to gather the hammer and other supplies he’d gotten ready earlier, then pauses.

Something’s making him uneasy, and it isn’t just the fury of the storm, or the run-in with Cavelli.

After a moment, he goes back to his desk and takes off his right glove. He checks the number in his Rolodex, then punches out the buttons on the phone and waits for Pat to pick up.

After four rings, the answering machine clicks on.

“Hey, you’ve reached Pat Gerkin. You know what to do. Later.”

At the tone, Sherm says, “Pat, this is Sherm. . . . I waited for you at the station, but it’s almost midnight and I’m heading out now. I’ll be home if you need me, and I’ll call you if we have to start evacuating. If not, have a good night, and thanks for helping out.”

He hangs up the phone, frowning.

If Pat isn’t home, where is he?

Don’t drive yourself crazy. . . . The kid has a lot of friends on the island. Probably stopped off for a beer or a hand of cards somewhere,
Sherm tells himself, and pulls his glove on again.

But as he heads out into the roaring wind to board up the station windows, he can’t shake the feeling that something isn’t quite right on the island tonight.

And after so many years of police work, Sherm’s instincts are usually on target.

D
anny Cavelli paces the bedroom, as he’s been doing ever since he hung up with the Tide Island police station over an hour ago.

“If she would just call again,” he tells Cheryl, glancing at the silent phone on the nightstand. “I mean, I just want to know that she’s okay.”

“I know you do. I still think you should call the local police. And your parents.”

“Oh, jeez Cheryl, we’ve been through this. What are the Greenbury cops gonna do if the Tide Island police don’t even give a shit about Sandy and she disappeared out there? And I’m not dragging my parents into this unless I have to. Maybe nothing’s wrong . . .”

“Maybe not.”

Danny stops pacing and looks at his wife. “No. No, she’s in trouble. I know she’s in trouble. The way she sounded . . . she would never play a joke like that on me.”

“I know.”

“Some guy was doing something to her, dammit!”

“Even if he were, Danny . . .” Cheryl gets off the bed and walks over to where he’s standing by the dresser. She puts a hand on his wrist. “Even if some guy
date-raped
her . . .”

He winces at the words.

“. . .
if
that’s what was going on—she’s going to be okay, Danny,” Cheryl finishes. “She’ll have a hard time getting over it, but she’ll be okay.”

“And if that’s what happened, I’m going to kill the son of a bitch with my bare hands,” Danny says, shaking his head and narrowing his eyes. “I swear to God, Cheryl. I’ll find him and kill him.”

“Okay, Danny, calm down. It’s not helping Sandy if you get carried away . . .”

“And it’s not helping Sandy if I just hang around here waiting for something to happen, either,” Danny announces suddenly, slapping his palm on the dresser-top so hard that the framed wedding photograph of him and Cheryl topples onto the floor.

“What are you going to do?” she asks, bending to retrieve it.

“Go out to Tide Island.”

“Danny, don’t be—”

“Cheryl, I can’t just sit here. I’ve got to find my sister; and if the cops don’t want to help, that’s fine. I’ll do it on my own.”

“No, you won’t,” she says quietly, and he spins angrily to face her. But as he opens his mouth to lash out, Cheryl adds, “You won’t do it on your own, because we’ll do it together.”

His jaw closes; and wordlessly, he gathers her into his arms and gives her a grateful squeeze.

I
n the attic of the Bramble Rose, Stephen carefully removes his blood-soaked tuxedo from the plastic bag he used to transport it back from the house by the water. He had so wanted to wear the same suit again for Liza, and for Laura, but he had forgotten about the blood.

It splattered him from head to toe as he stabbed Sandy, something he hadn’t taken into consideration earlier.

And that bothers him. He’d trusted himself to think of everything—how could he have overlooked such an important detail?

It’s not a good sign.

That—coupled with Jasper’s phone call about Sandy Cavelli’s brother, not to mention the unexpected visit from that redheaded kid—is making him nervous.

Somehow, his careful plan suddenly seems in danger of derailing.

No, it won’t,
he tells himself as he feels along the sloping wall for the familiar loose board.
Everything is fine. There’s no problem, not really. Just a few complications.

He finds the loose board, pulls it away from the wall, and shoves the tux into the space behind it. He’ll deal with it later. Then he removes the wedding album he’d stashed there and replaces the board.

Sitting in his rocker with the album on his lap, he closes his eyes momentarily and takes a deep, cleansing breath, then exhales.

Better . . . much better.

He begins to rock, gently so as not to creak the floorboards and wake anyone below . . . not that Liza and Laura are likely to stir, considering the strong doses of Seconal Jasper was supposed to give them in their dessert.

Flipping the album open to Sandy’s page, he replaces the old name card with the new one . . . the one written in her blood. Squatting beside her body in the drawing room, he’d taken the time to painstakingly letter her name in calligraphy, dipping an old-fashioned pen again and again into the pool of red on the floor as he worked.

Now he holds the wedding album away from his face a bit to admire his handiwork, then glances over at the camera he put on the table by the door. Such a pity he can’t go ahead and develop the photographs he’d taken of her as she lay dying at his feet.

Now, thanks to an unexpected interruption, he might as well wait for the others. He’ll do them all at once, in the makeshift darkroom back at the waterfront house.

Again, he thinks of how messy things got.

Why did that damn kid have to come along and ruin everything?

He hadn’t opened the door, not even when the kid rang the bell persistently and kept calling, “Anybody home?”

Then, just when he’d thought the intruder had left, two things had happened simultaneously.

He’d remembered that he’d left the car parked in front of the door and the porch light on so that Sandy wouldn’t get suspicious when he’d brought her here earlier. . . .

And he’d glanced up to see the kid’s face pressed against the window of the drawing room as he stood on the porch, peering in.

The horror in those eyes as they took in Stephen and the bloodied body of Sandy Cavelli was clear even through the rain-spattered glass.

He’d leapt into action, dashing for the door and collaring the kid as he tried to get away. If the intruder hadn’t been so shaken by what he’d just seen, Stephen had no doubt that he would have escaped. After all, he had an athletic build and he was strong. But as it was, his shock and fear had undoubtedly slowed him down and it took little effort for Stephen to restrain him long enough to pull out the knife he’d used to kill Sandy.

As soon as the kid saw the blade, he’d started begging for his life.

Stephen had only debated for a brief moment before realizing what he had to do. The kid had seen too much. There was no way he was going to let him go now.

So he’d done it swiftly and effortlessly, slashing the jugular in the kid’s strong young neck and feeling warm, sticky blood gush over his just-washed hands.

He’d wondered, as he dragged the kid’s body into the first-floor closet under the stairs, who he was and why he was here. Not that it mattered, really.

He’d gone back to the drawing room for Sandy, hurriedly dragging her, too, into the closet, dumping her heavy body on top of the other one. He had a lot of cleaning up to do after that, and it had taken him well over an hour to wash the blood carefully away from the front porch and hardwood foyer and drawing room floors. He’d congratulated himself for not getting any blood on the white satin runner, at least. That, he would need again . . . for Liza, and then for Laura.

With a contented sigh, he closes the wedding album and stands. The night isn’t getting any younger, and he’s been looking forward to paying Liza a visit.

Stealthily, he moves across the attic floor to the steps. Then, pocketing the ring containing the special keys to the doors of the guest rooms, he slips down the stairs.

J
ennie is running through the deserted shopping mall again, desperately trying to get away, when all of a sudden a freight train slams into the side of the building.

She cries out as everything shudders around her, flinching and waiting for the inevitable. . . .

Then, suddenly, she’s awake, staring into her pitch-black room at the Bramble Rose Inn.

It was just the same old nightmare,
she realizes, sitting up and turning on the light on the bedside table.

But the noise of the freight train was real—apparently caused by a sudden blast of wind off the ocean. It continues to batter the old house now, rattling the windows and howling like a mournful ghost.

Still trembling and breathless from her dream, Jennie swings her feet over the edge of the bed and gets up to go to the bathroom for a drink of water. After pulling on her robe, she pads across the chilly floor in her bare feet and reaches for the doorknob.

It’s stuck again, she realizes as she tugs on it.

She remembers what Jasper said about the old wood swelling in damp weather and pulls more forcefully. It refuses to budge.

Then, feeling an edge of panic rising within her, Jennie puts both hands on the knob and tries, with all her might, to open the door.

It’s not stuck,
she realizes with a stab of fear.
It’s locked . . . from the other side!

“Help!” she screams spontaneously, hoping to wake Liza, whose room is just down the hall. She bangs on the door. “Help! Someone get me out of here!”

Then she realizes that whoever locked the door is possibly nearby and the last thing she should be doing is attracting attention.

She clamps her mouth shut and backs away from the door, her heart pounding furiously as she hears footsteps pounding up the stairs and down the hall toward her room.

There’s a long pause, and then Jasper Hammel’s voice reaches her ears above the incessant sound of the wind. “Laura . . . Miss Towne, it’s me. Are you all right?”

“I’m locked in,” she says in a small voice, shrinking into the shadows at the far end of the room and staring at the door.

“I know, I’m sorry, I . . .” There’s a jangling noise, and then the sound of the locks clicking. The door swings open, and Jasper is standing there, wearing a pair of striped blue-cotton pajamas.

“I must have locked it by accident,” he says, stepping into Jennie’s room, wearing an apologetic expression. In his hand is an oversized key ring. “I was, uh, cleaning in the empty guest rooms earlier, and I somehow must have locked yours instead of one of those.”

Jennie only stares uneasily at him for a moment, then nods. “Don’t worry about it. It’s all right.”

“I’m so sorry,” Jasper says again, sliding the ring over his wrist and rubbing his hands nervously. “You must have been so startled . . .”

“It’s all right,” she says again. “Really.”

With a final apology, he steps back out into the hall and shuts the door behind him.

Jennie waits until she’s heard his footsteps retreat back down the stairs to the first floor. Then she goes over and locks the inside bolt again . . . unsettled by the thought that it doesn’t matter—not really.

Jasper, of course, can unlock it any time he feels like it. He just did.

And as for what he said about mistaking her room for one of the empty guest rooms . . .

She’s well aware that the doors to the empty rooms are kept open and unlocked. Isn’t that what Liza told her earlier?

Liza.

Strange that she didn’t hear Jennie screaming.

Biting her lip, Jennie unlocks her door again and slips quietly out into the dark hallway. It’s deserted, and she knows Jasper is back downstairs because she heard him go, but she still can’t get past the strange but distinct feeling that someone is lurking nearby.

Don’t be paranoid,
she commands herself.
Who on earth would be doing a thing like that? And why?

But as much as she knows it doesn’t make sense, she can’t seem to shake her anxiety.

Wrapping her robe more tightly around herself, she hurries to Liza’s door and knocks quietly. When there’s no response, she knocks again, calling, “Liza?” in a hushed voice.

No reply.

She hesitates there, considering knocking or speaking more loudly. But that might bring Jasper Hammel up the stairs again.

Shaking her head she tells herself that Liza is probably just a deep sleeper, like Laura. Her twin sleeps through blasting alarm clocks, ringing telephones and doorbells, everything.

And anyway, there’s the noise of the storm, Jennie remembers, as she becomes aware, once again, of the pounding rain and ceaseless wind howling outside the old inn. It probably drowned out the sound of her screams earlier, and the knocking now.

Slowly, Jennie retreats down the hall to her room and locks her door again. Then, feeling slightly ridiculous, she quietly pulls a straight-backed chair from the desk across the floor and wedges it under the doorknob.

Trembling, Jennie stares at it for a moment, wondering what she’s trying to protect herself from. The only person who might ever want to hurt her is dead.

But you’re not supposed to be Jennie right now. . . . You’re supposed to be Laura.

And who knows how many enemies flighty, irresponsible Laura has made?

Trying not to think about the most obvious one—her sister’s ex-husband, Brian—Jennie goes back over to the bed. She slips beneath the blankets again, leaning her back against the headboard. Bringing her knees up to her chest, she wraps her arms tightly around them and stares at the lilac-patterned wallpaper, vowing not to let herself fall asleep again tonight.