The Bone House (11 page)

    'Troy
told you, didn't he? That stupid jerk.'

    'I
know Mark Bradley and his wife were here at the hotel this week. I know you and
he have some history together.'

    Tresa
pushed her chair back, physically adding distance between them. 'That was all a
misunderstanding.'

    'He
was a teacher accused of having an affair with a seventeen- year-old student.'

    'It
didn't happen like that!' Tresa retorted. 'God, all of you are so stupid. No
one listened to me. No one believed me.'

    'He
lost his job.'

    'Yes,
and it was my fault!'

    'Are
you in love with him?'

    Tresa's
face flushed. She tugged at her dirty red hair. 'That's none of your business.'

    'Mark
Bradley was at your performance on Friday night, wasn't he? Is that why you
didn't do well? Did it make you nervous having him there?'

    'I
choked. The pressure got to me. That's all.'

    'What
was Mr Bradley's relationship with Glory?' Cab asked.

    'None.
There was no relationship.'

    'Did
Glory believe that you and Mark Bradley were having an affair?'

    'No!
That was my mother. That was all her stupid idea.'

    'Did
you or Glory have any contact with Bradley this week? Or with his wife?'

    Tresa
shook her head fiercely. 'No. I didn't even know he was there until I saw him
on Friday. We didn't talk to each other.'

    'Are
you protecting him?' Cab asked.

    'From
what? He didn't do anything.' She hooded her eyes and stared at her lap. 'Are
we done? I need to find my mom.'

    'Sure.
I understand. You can go.'

    Cab
watched her as she gathered up used tissues from the table in her fist and left
the room. Her face was a pouty mask. He realized that he'd reached a roadblock
with Tresa anyway. The girl was shutting him out. What frustrated him was that
he still didn't know a thing about Mark Bradley, and he didn't have any
evidence about the man, only rumors.

    He
was an enigma. Was he an angry predator with a predilection for teenage girls
or an innocent victim?

    Maybe
Glory Fischer, drunk, sexually promiscuous, had met Mark Bradley on the beach
on Saturday night. Maybe it was an accident or a deliberate rendezvous.

    Maybe.

    If
Glory did meet him, what happened next?

    'It
was him,' Troy Geier insisted, bolting out of his chair. 'Bradley. He did it. I
know it was him. That son of a bitch.'

    Cab
held up his hands. 'Sit down, Troy. OK? Take it easy.'

    The
burly sixteen year old paced back and forth between the walls of the interview
room and then slumped heavily into the chair again. 'Sorry.'

    'You
did the right thing by telling us about Mark Bradley. I appreciate it. Right
now, though, I want to talk about Glory.'

    Troy's
big head bobbed. 'Sure. OK.'

    Cab
sucked out more of his iced latte, which had melted and was mostly warm. He
gave Troy a minute to calm down. The teenager was a beefy kid with a broad face
dotted by pimples. He had wavy brown hair covered by a baseball cap, which he
wore backwards. His flabby chest and huge forearms stretched out the green
fabric on his Packers T-shirt. As Cab watched, Troy stuck an index finger
between his teeth and chewed on the nail.

    'This
is my fault,' Troy murmured, his mouth full.

    'Why
do you say that?'

    'I
never should have left her alone.'

    'You're
being pretty hard on yourself,' Cab told him.

    'Yeah,
but we argued, and it was stupid. She wanted to stay and swim, and I really
wanted to see this Will Ferrell movie on TV. I told her to come with me, but
she wouldn't, so I just left. Then the movie sucked, and I fell asleep anyway.'

    'You
never realized Glory hadn't come back?'

    'I
was out like a light. The bartender snuck me a couple beers for a few bucks. I
crashed.'

    The
bartender. Ronnie Trask obviously had a thriving business funneling alcohol to
minors. It was a spring break tradition in Florida.

    'Tell
me a little more about Glory, OK?' Cab went on. 'How long have you known her?'

    Troy
shrugged. 'Pretty much all our lives. We go to school together. Both of our
families have been in Door County forever. We're natives, but now it's all rich
fibs moving in, buying up the land.'

    'Fibs?'
Cab asked.

    'Fucking
Illinois Bastards.'

    Cab
smothered a smile. 'When did the two of you start dating?'

    'Last
year. She had a bad summer break-up. She was dating an older kid who was
staying on the peninsula for the summer. A tourist. She figured he loved her,
but he was just in it for the sex. After he dumped her, I think she decided she
wanted someone who really wanted her. That's me.'

    'What
was Glory like?' Cab asked.

    'She
was super cute. Really outgoing, doing things a mile a minute. Me, I'm pretty
shy, and I always felt like I was running to keep up with her.'

    'Was it
exclusive between the two of you?'

    'Oh,
yeah. Definitely.'

    Cab
was dubious. 'Are you sure it was exclusive for her?'

    'Absolutely.
After school, we were going to get married.'

    'Was
that your plan or hers?'

    'Mine,
but Glory wanted it too.'

    'Most
girls aren't looking for a serious relationship at sixteen,' Cab told him.

    'Well,
I loved her, and she loved me,' Troy insisted. 'We weren't thinking about
college. You go to college, and they ship your job over- seas these days. I
figured we'd both work at my dad's restaurant after we graduated. That's where
Glory's mom works. When my dad retires, I figure I'll take it over, although he
tells me I can't handle it.'

    'Why
does he say that?'

    Troy
frowned. 'Oh, he never thinks I can do anything right. He still thinks I'm a
dumb kid.'

    Cab
thought about what Tresa had said. Troy's father didn't treat him well, and
neither did Glory. Despite his size, Troy looked like the kind of boy who got
kicked in the head and came back on his knees for more punishment. At some
point, all the kicks probably felt like love.

    'I
heard that Glory was a wild child,' Cab told him. 'Sex, drugs, drinking. Is
that true?'

    'Sure,
Glory liked to do crazy stuff sometimes. Drugs once in a while, but nothing
heavy. She'd get me to sneak some wine from my dad's restaurant on the
weekends. So what?'

    'Sex?'

    'Yeah,
we had sex. Glory was cool about it.'

    'It
sounds like you two were pretty different, though.'

    'I
told you, I had to run to keep up with her, because she was always going two
hundred miles an hour. It was like I was along for the ride sometimes.'

    
Or
maybe you were just the designated driver
, Cab thought. He understood the
attraction for Troy, who had obviously worshipped Glory for most of his life.
It wasn't as clear to him what Glory saw in Troy. The teenager was plain, and
simple in a farm boy way, but he had the attraction of being utterly pliable.
Cab guessed that Troy's role in their relationship was to do whatever Glory
wanted him to do.

    'Whose
idea was it to go to Florida?' Cab asked.

    'Glory's,'
Troy said.

    'To
see Tresa dance?'

    Troy
shrugged. 'Yeah, that's what she told her mom so she'd say yes. Really, she
just wanted a vacation in Florida, you know? Swim and sun.'

    'How
was it for you two hanging out with Tresa? Big sister, little sister. Did that
slow you guys down?'

    'Tresa's
pretty low-key compared to Glory. Always with her nose in a book. We didn't
spend much time with her. She was practicing a lot for the dance thing anyway.'

    'Were
there any arguments?'

    'Between
Glory and Tresa? No.'

    'How
about between you and Glory?'

    Troy
flushed. 'Just on Saturday. Glory was really pissy with me. I don't know why.
That's one of the reasons I left her at the pool. She'd been giving me shit all
day over the stupidest things.'

    'Did
something happen?'

    'No,
that's the thing. We'd been having a great week.'

    'When
did it start?' Cab asked. 'I told you, it was Saturday.' 'Not Friday night?'

    Troy
stopped. He chewed his fingers again. 'Well, that night she went to see Tresa
dance, and I stayed back at the room watching basketball. Glory came back
around ten thirty.'

    'How
did she seem?'

    'She
was quiet,' Troy said.

    'Upset?
Angry?'

    'I'm
not really sure,' Troy admitted. 'I was watching the game. I know I should have
paid more attention, but I didn't. I found out the next morning that Tresa
hadn't done well in the dance competition, and I figured Glory was just
disappointed for her.'

    'What
did Glory do when she came back to the room?'

    'She
took a shower. I remember thinking she was in there a long time.'

    'Then
what?'

    'She
came out and sat down next to me. She had a towel on, and I thought maybe she
wanted to have sex, but when I tried to kiss her, she pushed me away. I asked
what was wrong.'

    'What
did she say?' Cab asked.

    'She
said it was nothing.'

    'That's
all?'

    'She
told me that she saw someone she knew.' Troy blinked nervously, as if he
realized he'd forgotten to share something important.

    'Someone
she knew?' Cab leaned forward.
'Who?'

    'She
didn't say.'

    'Did
you ask?'

    'Yeah,
but she didn't answer me. She didn't make it sound like it was a big deal. She
just said she was going to bed.'

    'Did
you ask her about it the next day?'

    'No,
she didn't say anything more about it.'

    Cab
laid this nugget of information down in his head and stared at it.
Someone
she knew?

    Not a
stranger. Someone who sent her running through the dark corridor of the hotel
in tears, nearly colliding with the hotel bartender, Ronnie Trask. And the next
night Glory wound up dead on the beach.

    It
still could have been a random assault. Boy meets girl, boy rapes girl, boy
kills girl. Sometimes it happened that way, but Cab was beginning to wonder if
Glory's death involved a more personal motive.

    'Did
you see anyone you knew during the week?' he asked. 'Anyone that Glory would
have known?'

    Troy
shook his head. 'Nobody,' he said. 'Nobody except Mark Bradley.'

    Cab
found a bag of organic plantain chips in the drawer of his desk. He ate them
one at a time as he reviewed the interview notes gathered by the police with guests
at the hotel throughout the day. He also reviewed the crime scene photos, and
as he studied the body and imagined how Glory Fischer had ended up in the surf,
topless, strangled, he found his memory going back to Vivian Frost.

    The
girl he'd asked to marry him. The girl who had said yes.