“Home.”
“I’ll keep an eye on her,” Aden promised.
Out of the crowd of concerned townspeople, a sea of tan materialized. Payton blinked the color into focus. A pair of stocky but very long legs. There was a tiny spot of something brown on the left thigh. A little higher, a shiny belt buckle with the initial E. Higher up Payton’s sight was obscured by a paunch above the belt. The legs moved, folded, and brought the torso into her line of vision. A round, fatherly face peered down, smooth cocoa colored skin, maybe South American descent, dark solemn eyes and a neatly trimmed beard. A shiny silver nametag proclaimed him to be Sergeant Espinoza of the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department.
“I’ll be working this case. Do you feel up to talking?”
Case? What case?
Because of his name Payton expected him to have an accent, and he did, straight out of the Bronx. She didn’t—couldn’t—smile even though this struck her as humorous.
“Officer,” Aden said. “Can’t it wait? She’s not in any shape for this.”
Sergeant Espinoza nodded and stood erect. “I’ll come see her later this evening.” He slipped a sheet of paper from his notebook and handed it to Aden. “Would you have her make out a statement?”
Helen took the cup. Aden and Edward gripped her upper arms and helped her up. When Payton’s feet touched pavement, her knees buckled, but the hands held her upright.
“I really think the hospital should check her out,” Edward said.
“She doesn’t want to go. I’ll stay with her,” Aden said.
MaryAnn sprinted toward Payton. Her face was flushed and she was out of breath. “Golly, are you all right? When you fell in the water—I’m sorry for suggesting—Oh, God, I could’ve been responsible…”
Payton nodded, a little bobbing dog in a car window.
“The boat’s battened down. Seymour helped.”
She nodded again.
“She’s full of lake water.” Aden chuckled. “I’m going to take her home and pump her out.”
“I’ll watch the store. Take care. I’ll talk to you later.” MaryAnn gave Payton a hug.
****
Payton lay against a mountain of pillows, a steaming cup of tea in one hand, Aden gripping her other. Outside the window, it was dark. Normally she’d have shut the shades by now. “I can’t believe they’re dead,” she said, for the tenth time.
“We didn’t know what was happening until the race was over. We thought it was strange no one cheered for us as we crossed the finish line.” Aden gave a little laugh. “I didn’t think people felt
that
angry about us winning so often.” He took the cup and set it on the nightstand. “I can’t tell you how I felt hearing you’d almost drowned while I was having fun.”
“Does anyone know what happened?”
“Vaughn said it looked like a freak wave knocked them overboard and they drowned.”
She closed her eyes. A mental tidal wave hit, cloaking her in its embrace. Her eyes flew open.
“You all right?”
“Yes.”
“I have some phone calls to make,” Aden said. “Will you be all right for about an hour?”
“Of course. I’m not a child.”
He bent and kissed her cheek. “I know.” His lips moved across her face, to her lips. The kiss was short but let her know he definitely didn’t think of her as a child.
She was so tired. She closed her eyes.
Sean’s face exploded out of the water, eyes bulging, mouth open in a silent scream that prickled the hair on her arms. Payton flung off the bedclothes and sat up. Pain rocketed from every corner of her being. She closed her eyes and the aches melded into a single entity.
After a moment, the clouds parted and she stood. She went to the sliders and stepped outside. In the distance, the harbor looked calm. Suddenly, the waves swelled. She ran back indoors.
Payton sat on the edge of the bed and waited for the dizziness to abate. She gave a longing look at the pillows and a wistful one at the deck, then got up and tiptoed downstairs. Payton dropped onto the loveseat in her sitting room. It was dark now. She could make out objects, but not details, outdoors. It wasn’t too dark, though, to see a State Police cruiser in Aden’s driveway and a light in his living room. Something tickled the back of her brain. They wanted to talk to her. About what? She hadn’t seen the accident. She and MaryAnn had been busy keeping their boat on course. MaryAnn was the one who spotted her namesake veering off course. And Payton had swallowed every ounce of common sense and half the lake attempting to save Sean and Frank.
Vaughn suggested a strange tidal surge knocked both men off the boat. They’d been the closest boat to
MaryAnn
if there’d been such a wave, wouldn’t she and MaryAnn have felt it?
The police were coming. She should be dressed. Aden had helped her change into her worn but comfortable sweats when they returned from the lake. She didn’t want anyone to see her in these old things. A tiny laugh squeezed from her throat. She hadn’t wanted Aden to see her in them either. She hurried upstairs as fast as her aching body allowed.
Twenty minutes later, Payton sat on a stool in her kitchen in jeans and a pale blue Vikings sweatshirt. Sergeant Espinoza stood across the counter with his notebook open before him. She noted a thin silver band embedded in the flesh of his left hand. An enormous high school ring weighed down his right. He turned to a blank page and wrote. She looked up from the statement she filled out.
“Tell me what happened.” His voice sounded like a father asking his daughter what had gone on in school that day.
“Isn’t that what I wrote here?”
“Humor me. Where did your boat start in relation to
MaryAnn
?”
“It was our first time on
Zephyr
and we got a slow start. Most of the yachts were out ahead of us.” Payton stopped talking and tried to arrange the placement of the boats in her mind. “I don’t remember seeing Sean and Frank till we rounded the first pin. Something about their conversation made me think they were arguing.”
Sergeant Espinoza glanced up from his page. “You heard them yelling?”
“We all yell. It’s the only way to communicate over the sound of the water and the air pushing out of the sails.” Payton ran a hand through her hair. “I couldn’t hear
what
they were saying. I was busy, but something about the
way
they were yelling struck me.”
“You mean their body language?”
“Yes, I guess that’s right. Sean was standing kind of stiff, and Frank was a little bent over like he was carrying something. He staggered toward Sean.”
“Staggered?”
“Again, it’s the only way to walk on deck.” Payton thought, then said, “All I saw was him taking one or two steps, sort of bent over. I got busy maneuvering the boat around the pin.”
“Were Mr. Simpson’s steps angry? Or just regular?”
“I think…he was walking fast but not stalking. Yeah, I’d say he was just in a hurry.”
“When did you see the men again?”
“On the home stretch. I wondered why the crowd wasn’t cheering. There were so many spectators. But they were looking behind us. I looked but didn’t see anything unusual.
MaryAnn’s
sails were loose, that’s about all.”
“Are loose sails normal?”
“If the wind changes suddenly.”
“Where were the other boats at that time?”
“Helen and Carter were just in front of us. Or maybe it was Sylvie. I’m not sure.”
The sergeant made a note.
“That’s when MaryAnn spotted Sean’s boat going out of control. The sails were really flapping and the boat had veered off course. MaryAnn yelled that she’d get
Zephyr
alongside if I wanted to try and leap across to—”
“Where were Mr. Adams and Mr. Simpson at that time?”
“I don’t know.”
“You couldn’t see them?”
“No. I—”
“If you couldn’t see anyone, then why were you going to jump across?”
Payton’s brow wrinkled as she concentrated. She put her head in her hands. It couldn’t hurt to let the afternoon’s horror replay for just a moment, could it?
She let the waves break, heard the crowd’s screams, felt the wind in her face. She felt dizzy when she looked up. “They were lying on the deck. I remember thinking Sean must have been hit by the boom, but then I saw Frank lying near the helm. The boom couldn’t have hit both of them. Not that distance apart.”
“They were both lying down? Not stooping or bending?” The sergeant flipped to a new page.
“Sean was on his stomach, Frank on his back. Wait.” Payton felt herself frowning. At first she didn’t know why. Something was off kilter. She put her face in her hands to block out the policeman. Finally the image cleared and she looked up. “Sean and Frank were on the deck. Lying down.”
The sergeant nodded. When he said, “The coroner said they were already dead,” he watched her very closely.
“They didn’t drown.”
“They were already dead. We don’t know how yet. Tell me what happened next? You saw them lying on the deck.”
“MaryAnn brought us alongside. I jumped. The next thing I remember with any clarity is someone sitting on my back, squeezing water out of me.”
The sergeant was busy writing. Payton thought of Aden. Where was he? Why wasn’t he here buffering the space between her and authority?
“Who pulled me out?”
“A man from Massachusetts. His name is—” He thumbed through the pages. “Dennis Rogers of Chatham.”
“Do you know how I can contact him? I’d like to thank him.”
“He’s gone home already, but I have his number.” He scribbled then tore out the page and passed it to her.
Chapter 19
Payton turned on the lights in the shop and puttered around, picking off dead leaves, dusting. She stood in the patio area for a long time absorbing the aromas and melding them with the sounds of the wakening town. Did it sound different without Sean Adams? Was there a palpable difference in the atmosphere?
When Cameron died she’d definitely thought so. But Cameron was well loved. His death impacted not only his immediate family, but members of the business world. Echoes of his murder reverberated as far as Europe. Payton didn’t think Sean’s death would be that far-reaching, yet the air did hold a similar aura. Death lent a massive weight to those left behind, her analyst had said. And she’d been right. Payton still carried the burden of her husband’s death, just as MaryAnn would. Neither divorce nor death could take away what a couple once had.
Payton twisted the knob to the outdoor sprinkler system and set the timer. It was just a little egg timer on the counter, but one time she’d forgotten to turn it off and customers had to slosh on wet ground all morning.
Payton returned inside intent on making coffee. MaryAnn appeared in the doorway. Her cheeks were hollow and she fidgeted her fingers around the strap of her shoulder bag.
“Good heavens, what are you doing here? I wanted to call to tell you to take the day off, but I didn’t know where you were staying. Here, sit down.” Payton settled her in the middle of the ugly-patterned sofa and sat in the facing chair. She wished there was some brandy in the place.
MaryAnn’s purse dropped off her shoulder as she fell back into the cushions. “I came to see how you were.”
“I ache all over and have a bugger of a sore throat, but otherwise I’m good. What about you?”
“I slept in Sean’s bed last night. I don’t know why.” Her face puckered. “Payton, shouldn’t I be sorry he’s dead? I’m not. I just feel dead myself.” She shook her head as if to dislodge hair from her face. “He really did love me, you know.”
“Of course. Did he have a will?”
The first giggle burst from MaryAnn’s throat like a rocket. She laughed, doubled over until Payton laid a hand on her thigh.
When she looked up, Payton asked, “What’s so funny?”
“Sean had the strongest will of anyone I ever met!” Then as if someone flipped a switch, she grew serious again. “A will. Yes, we did them when we first got married. Sean thought it was romantic. I thought it was morbid but went along with it. I went along with lots of things back then.”
Scuffing shoes in the doorway made them look up. Helen stood there, her eyes adjusting to the lighting. She held something in her left hand. “Oh, there you are.” She started across the room, but when she recognized Payton’s guest, she tossed the item on the counter and went to sit beside MaryAnn. “What on earth possessed you to open the shop this morning? Look at the two of you; you look like hell. When was the last time either of you had anything to eat?”
“Aden fed me soup last night.”
MaryAnn shrugged and leaned forward a little. She hadn’t bothered to cover up her black eye. “Will you help me with the funeral arrangements?”
“Of course.” It was the second time in two days Payton agreed to something without thinking. It was also the second time she regretted the words the instant they were out of her mouth. “We’ll get busy with it this afternoon, after you’ve eaten and rested.”
MaryAnn started to get up.
“Wait, dear,” Helen said. “Why don’t you just sit here a while. I’ll go find you something to eat.”
“I’m not hungry, really.”