If She Should Die (6 page)

“Because he’s the police?”

“Because we don’t know him,” Christine ended lamely. Of course because he was the police. Three years ago, Sheriff Buck Teague had been convinced Jeremy had done something to Dara. He was probably still convinced. God only knew what Deputy Winter thought. She could tell he was sharper than Teague. And he’d been a detective in Los Angeles before he came to Winston.
Why
he had come to Winston was a mystery. So was he. A mystery that could pose a threat to Jeremy if the body turned out to be Dara’s and Winter held the same opinion of the mentally challenged as Sheriff Teague.

“You look worried,” Jeremy said as they stepped out the back door onto the small parking lot. “Are you worried about my dreams?”

Christine raised her umbrella, then locked the back door of the store. “It’s been a bad day. The rain, the flooding, the body. I’m just a little depressed.”

“I don’t feel too happy, either.” They hurried to her small car in the rear parking lot. Jeremy tucked his rangy body into the bucket seat. She opened her side, shut the umbrella, tossed it onto the backseat, then climbed in to meet Jeremy’s look of childish appeal. “I really wish you’d get a car like Reynaldo’s.”

“That’s a vintage 1957 Thunderbird he spent about three years restoring. I’m not up to the job. It’s also
expensive, and I just bought us a fairly big house.”

“And wouldn’t that T-Bird look cool sitting in the driveway?” Jeremy persisted winningly. “It’s even red, my favorite color.”

“I agree that it’s a great car,” Christine said, thinking of how much Dara had loved riding around in it when she’d dated Reynaldo. “Unfortunately, my
uncool
little blue car will have to do for now.”

“Well, maybe someday we can have one like Rey’s,” Jeremy said wistfully. “Christy, I feel real bad for thinking about food when Dara might be dead, but I can’t help it. I’m really hungry and nobody’s home.”

“Nobody? How do you know Patricia isn’t home?”

“This morning when she brought me to work she told me to fix a sandwich for dinner. She said she had to go out.”

“Out where? To dinner?”

Jeremy shrugged. “I don’t know. She doesn’t tell me things and I haven’t heard Ames asking her about being gone so much.”

“She’s gone a lot?”

“Yeah. Lately lots more than usual. Anyway, I’m
starving
.”

“Me, too,” Christine lied. She certainly didn’t want to drop Jeremy off at the empty Prince home to scrounge dinner for himself and think about Dara. “How about going to Gus’s Grill?”

“Good. I’ll have a cheeseburger and a banana split.”

Half an hour later they sat in a dark green booth in the intimate Gus’s Grill, whose decoration scheme could only be described as eclectic, a mixture of the Mexican, Chinese, and French restaurants it had been in past lives over the last fifteen years. Christine was particularly fond
of the renovated mural along one wall showing a woman in a kimono serving spaghetti and meatballs. They ordered loudly above the theme song from
Exodus
Gus had blaring over the speakers.

“I’ll tell him to turn the music down,” the waitress said to Christine after she’d repeated her drink order for the third time.

“Don’t hurt his feelings,” Christine said. “I know it’s his favorite song.”

The waitress rolled her eyes. “Gus’s feelings are made of steel. Couldn’t hurt ’em if you tried. And if
I
have to listen to that song one more time today, I’m going to hit him on the head with a frying pan.”

Jeremy laughed uproariously and the waitress smiled at Christine. She always tried to get a laugh out of Jeremy when they ate at Gus’s.

A few minutes later, when the waitress delivered their drinks and the music had been lowered a fraction, Christine asked Jeremy where he thought Patricia went so much of the time.

“Don’t know.” Jeremy noisily sucked Cherry Coke through a straw. “Nobody tells me anything. I get pretty bored and lonely at home, Christy. I only stay because Ames likes me around. Well, sometimes. Other times he acts like I’m invisible.”

Which wasn’t good for Jeremy, Christine thought. She knew her brother needed constant stimulation and a sense of purpose. She particularly disliked his being lonely. Ever since she’d bought a house late last summer, she’d planned to have him permanently move in with her. The basement was large and with an abundance of windows, giving it an unusual amount of daylight for a basement, and offered both inside and outside entrances. She’d decorated the whole area to look like a big loft apartment to give Jeremy a feeling of maturity and privacy while still living with her.

Before the holidays she’d told Ames she wanted Jeremy to move in, but Ames had begged her to let Jeremy stay until after Easter. “I’d miss him too much on long, dark winter evenings,” Ames had said. But today had changed a lot of things. Even if this body did not turn out to be Dara’s, the fear that it had been was likely to throw Ames into a depression Jeremy didn’t need to be around. And it sounded as if Patricia wasn’t home much, although she rarely went out of her way to entertain Jeremy. While Christine forced down half a cheeseburger she didn’t want, she decided the time had come for Jeremy to move in with her.

“You’re hardly eating,” Jeremy commented. “You usually eat as much as me, maybe more.”

“That is not true!” Christine retorted heatedly, then noticed Jeremy’s twitching lips. He was trying to get her to smile. She obliged. “I happen to be watching my weight, smarty. I haven’t been going to the gym as much as I need to.”

“But you’re not fat. Just tall.”

At five feet, ten inches, Christine had always felt like an Amazon beside petite Dara, in spite of her vigilant maintenance of her weight. Danny Torrance, the gym manager, told her she was perfectly proportioned although she needed to be more diligent about her workouts to build strength. But then, Danny had been a family friend for years and could be counted on for a compliment.

As soon as he’d finished the very last drop of his ice cream, noisily scraping the sides of his glass dish, Jeremy looked at her and frowned. “I don’t really want to sleep at Ames’s house tonight. I’d rather come to your house. Is that okay?”

“Sure,” Christine said promptly. “And it’s
our
house.” Jeremy beamed. “I’d be glad for the company, and I know Rhiannon will be happy to see you.”

Months after Dara had disappeared, when Christine graduated from college and moved out of the house, she had taken Dara’s black cat, Rhiannon, because Patricia detested her. So did Patricia’s obnoxious little dog, Pom-Pom, who never gave Rhiannon a moment’s peace.

“I can’t wait to see Rhiannon,” Jeremy said enthusiastically. “And can I watch
Buffy the Vampire Slayer
?”

“Certainly. I like it, too. But you have to call home first to let them know you’re with me. If no one is there—”

“I know. Leave a message on the machine.” Jeremy sounded like a beleaguered teenager. “I don’t have to be told stuff a million times, Christy.”

“Sorry. I didn’t know you were so sensitive.”

“It just wears me out when you say things over and over.” Jeremy sounded slightly cranky, something Christine didn’t want to deal with tonight.

“I won’t keep repeating myself. I promise.”

“Good.” Jeremy wiped his mouth and scooted out of the booth. “Now I’ll make my call.”

“Where are you going?”

“To the pay phone.”

“Where’s your cell phone?”

Jeremy’s face reddened. “I left it at the store.”

“Jeremy, it’s very important for you to keep the cell phone with you.” She stopped. She was about to deliver a lecture he’d heard a hundred times. “Sometimes I forget mine, too. Do you have—”

“Money for the pay phone? Yeah,” Jeremy said over his shoulder as he headed toward the front of the restaurant and the pay telephone. “For Pete’s sake, Christy!”

Christine smiled to herself. When others treated Jeremy like a child, she got annoyed, but she did it herself. Constantly. It irritated him with good reason. He was twenty now. It was time for her to stop hovering over him.

“It looks like this is the place to be tonight.”

Christine looked up to see Sloane Caldwell standing beside her booth. Sloane was an associate in Ames’s law firm, and a few years ago they’d been engaged. She’d broken off the engagement only weeks before the wedding, but they’d remained friendly, if not close. “The place does seem to be doing a booming business tonight,” she said. “I think it’s so gloomy, people hate to go home. Have a seat. Jeremy’s gone to use the phone.”

“Forgot his cell phone again?”

“Yes,” Christine said without defensiveness. Sloane had always been kind to Jeremy, and during their engagement he’d seemed happy at the prospect of having Jeremy live with him and Christine. Not many men would have been so accepting of a woman’s mentally challenged younger brother. “He’s decided to spend the night at my house and wants to let Ames know.”

Sloane sat down. He was a big, rugged-looking man with broad shoulders and a deep, booming voice that served him well in court. He had thick, curly brick-colored hair, an open smile, and a dozen lines shooting from the corners of his dark hazel eyes as if he’d been looking into the sun too long. His nose bore a bump from a long-ago break and a thin scar traversed his chin, both imperfections the result of his playing high school football. In spite of the designer suits he favored and his flawless manners, Christine had always thought Sloane looked like he should be spending his days hunting in the mountains instead of sitting behind a desk in a law office. He’d never married after their broken engagement.

“You look beautiful, as always, Chris, but I can tell when you’re troubled,” he said kindly. “Want to tell me what’s wrong?”

“You’ll hear soon enough, if you haven’t already. A body wrapped in plastic washed ashore today. They think it might be Dara.”

Sloane’s lips parted and he stared at her for a moment, his eyes seeming to go flat with shock. “Good God! One of the secretaries told me a deputy came to the office looking for Ames. I guess that’s what he wanted to tell him.”

Christine nodded. “He tracked Ames down at the store. Ames demanded to be told right in front of everyone, then he insisted the body couldn’t be Dara’s. He was badly shaken, though. I was glad Wilma Archer was there. She’s like a mother to him, you know.”

“Yes, she is,” Sloane said distractedly. “Did this deputy tell Ames the body was definitely Dara’s?”

“It was Michael Winter, that new guy from Los Angeles, and he didn’t say the body was Dara’s. He said it was the right height and had long black hair, but there was a lot of decomposition in spite of all the plastic wrapping. After all, if it
is
Dara, she would have been in the water three years.”

“If she was wrapped in plastic, she didn’t drown accidentally. She was murdered,” Sloane said. “But she could have been murdered later—weeks or months after she disappeared.”

“I hadn’t even thought of that possibility. If she did run away and came back a while later, though, no one saw her.”

“At least no one who came forward.”

“That’s true. You’re always so good at seeing all the angles.”

“It’s part of my job,” Sloane answered. “Sometimes it’s necessary in a client’s defense.”

“Yes, I guess it is.” Christine ran a hand over her forehead. “Anyway, the body was sent directly to the medical examiner’s in Charleston. Ames is there now to see if he can identify her. I think it’s cruel to make him look at the body if there’s been massive decomposition.”

“There’s no point in blaming the police, Chris. It’s procedure.”

“It may be procedure, but that doesn’t make it less awful,” Christine said dully, feeling like a cold wind was blowing over her.

Sloane shook his head. “Someone should have gone to Charleston with Ames.”

“Me. I should have gone. But there was Jeremy to deal with—”

“I didn’t mean you, Chris. I’m the one Ames should have called.”

Yes, Christine thought, Sloane was incredibly strong. It was so easy to lean on him. But leaning on Sloane became a double-edged sword. It made him think he was in charge of every situation, a trait Christine had learned she couldn’t live with and that was partially responsible for making her decide she couldn’t marry him three years ago.

“I’m sure he’ll be all right if there’s no way he can be sure the body is Dara’s,” Christine said with more hope than certainty. “And he won’t be alone when he comes home. He has Patricia.”

Sloane pulled a face. “Yes, the devoted and sensitive Patricia, who couldn’t stand Dara. She’d probably be a great comfort.”

“Jeremy says she’s gone all the time anymore.”

“Is she getting bored with the good life already?”

“Maybe. She’s a lot younger than Ames, and he hasn’t exactly been a barrel of laughs since Dara disappeared.”

“Chris, I doubt if Ames was ever a barrel of laughs.”

“No, that’s not his style. Still, he’s gone from serious to gloomy. God knows how he’ll be if this body turns out to be Dara’s.”

Jeremy appeared at the table. “Hi, Sloane.”

“Hi yourself. Haven’t seen you for a while.”

“I’m really busy at the store. You heard about my job, didn’t you? I’m not just a stock boy. I get to design jewelry.”

“Of course I heard about it. Ames is really proud of you.”

“Did Christy tell you about Dara?”

“She said a body was found, but no one’s sure it’s Dara. Don’t think the worst, Jeremy.” Sloane stood up quickly and Christine was glad he wasn’t going to linger on the subject. “I’ve got a ton of work to do tonight, so I’d better get going. It was good to see the two of you. Drive carefully tonight. Those roads are treacherous.”

“Christy drives
real
slow,” Jeremy complained. “It takes us forever to get anywhere.”

“Well, it’s better than going too fast, having a wreck, and not getting there at all. Good night, folks.”

Jeremy scooted into the booth after Sloane left. “Nobody was home, so I left my message.”

Christine knew Ames was in Charleston, but where was Patricia? She should have been with Ames, of course, to help him through this horrible experience. Instead, no one seemed to know where she was. She might not have even heard about the body.