Trust (14 page)

"First of all, Lauren is not a suspect and never has been. Second of all, there is no history of murder. Lauren and two others, me included I might add, were coerced into giving false confessions to a murder over twenty years ago. Those confessions were garbage and were rightly tossed out. This information is meaningless. There's no story here." He looked furious and Lauren loved him for it. Jack was a great friend.

"Okay, well thank you for that. Live from Waverly, Mass., this is Barbie Montgomery. We're going back to Bill in the studio now. Bill, what do you think of this?"

The camera flashed to anchorman, Bill Pendleton, and his sidekick, Jenna Carlson. Bill was in his mid-fifties, a seasoned pro who had been with the station for over twenty years. Jenna, on the other hand, was in her late twenties and preppy-pretty, with long shiny blonde hair, parted neatly in the middle and falling just past her shoulders. She wore fashionable black glasses that were supposed to make her look smarter, but as soon as she opened her mouth and spoke in that high, breathy, little-girl voice, the illusion was immediately shattered.

"It certainly makes you wonder," he said slowly, and then Jenna piped in, "Where there's smoke there's fire, right?"

"Speaking of fire," Bill began, "we're going live to Jose in Mattapan where a three alarm fire is raging."

David clicked off the TV and turned to Lauren, "Jack was good, and credible. Hopefully, people won't put much stock in this latest 'revelation.'"

Chapter Twenty-Eight

A
my picked Lauren up the next morning and when they pulled into the school parking lot, Lauren braced herself for an onslaught of hungry media. But, much to her surprise and relief, there wasn't a single van waiting.

"Maybe they got all they needed on this, or realized that Jack was right and there's no story here," Amy said.

"Thank god," Lauren said as she got out of the car and grabbed her tote bag and coffee. Maybe Jack and David were right and people were smart enough to realize this really was a non-issue.

After school, Amy and Lauren went over to Nellie's to pick up their dresses. Lauren was in a fabulous mood. It seemed like the media insanity might be over and now she could concentrate on the wedding, which was a week and a half away.

Plus, it was snowing again, big fat flakes slowly floating down. The snow had started a few hours ago and was expected to keep on through the night. It didn't look like much of a storm now, but the winds and intensity were supposed to pick up overnight. The kids in her last period class were all excited, and wishing verbally for a snow day tomorrow. Lauren had to admit the idea appealed to her as well. She wouldn't mind a day off to curl up and watch old movies while the snow swirled outside.

When they arrived at Nellie's place, Lauren saw that she had the house decorated for Christmas. Delicate strings of white lights blinked merrily along the many well-groomed hedges, all along the Gingerbread trimming, and around the railing of the farmer's porch. The front door held a shiny silver wreath of jingle bells tied with a shimmery purple ribbon. Lauren recognized the wreath came from the Pottery Barn and she had the same one at home.

The door opened before they had a chance to knock. Nellie had been keeping an eye out for them.

"Come in, come in. This weather is terrible!"

They entered the front hall foyer and per Nellie's instructions took off their shoes and then followed her down the hall to the sewing room.

"Now try these on again real quick. Make sure they both fit the way you like. Lauren, you first." She carefully handed Lauren the wedding dress and held the curtain of the dressing room back so she could enter.  Lauren held her breath as she slipped on the dress, hoping that it wouldn't be too tight since that would be hard to fix with so little time before the wedding. But she relaxed as she saw the dress fit perfectly with no tight spots anywhere. She stepped out of the dressing room for Amy and Nellie to see. Nellie took a step back and peered intensely at the dress from every angle, asking Lauren to do a slow turnaround.

"You look beautiful!" Amy said.

"The fit is good," Nellie said and seemed satisfied with her work.

"It's absolutely perfect! Thank you so much." Amy was next and her dress was also a success. When they were both in their regular clothes again, Nellie zipped each dress into a tight, protective cover and then insisted that they both join her for a hot chocolate in the study.

"You don't have to ask me twice," Lauren said. "Amy, what about you?"

"Of course." Nellie led them into her small study, which was at the front corner of the house overlooking the Farmer's porch and Main St.

"Thanks," Lauren said when Nellie returned a moment later with two steaming mugs of hot chocolate with mini-marshmallows bobbing on top. "You have a great view here."

"This is my favorite room," Nellie said proudly as she settled into a padded rocker that faced the window. "I sit here most afternoons with my knitting. I play a little jazz or big band music and watch all the activity out front, the kids coming home from school, trolley's going by, and people out walking their dogs."

"That sounds relaxing," Amy said before taking a tentative sip of the very hot chocolate.

"I don't miss much," Nellie added. "If something happens in this neighborhood, I know about it. Just before you got here for example, I saw at least a half- dozen of those media vans come bombing down the road. Going way too fast if you ask me. Don't know where they were going, but they were in a real hurry to get there."

Lauren and Amy exchanged glances. "We should probably get going," Amy said.

"Wait a minute. Let me turn on the police scanner, see what's going on. It might be a bad accident or something. You don't want to get stuck in traffic." Nellie switched on the ancient police scanner that sat on a little side table, in easy reach of her rocking chair. No wonder she didn't miss much. The radio crackled, then the static eased out, and a moment later, they could hear voices talking.

"The old Graybar building finally went. Fell right off the cliff and into the ocean. On my way now."

"Well, isn't that something." Nellie said. "That old building has been teetering for years. It was the only one left." Erosion was a big problem in some parts of Waverly. The Graybar building was once a stately home and turned into a bed and breakfast years ago, but for the past ten years had sat empty and waiting for a storm strong enough to shake it loose.

That stretch of cliff had been hit especially hard over the years and one-by-one each home had toppled into the sea, with some of the worst Nor'easters taking more than one at a time. Graybar was the only one left and they were not allowed to build in that area.

"The waves out there must be ferocious," Lauren said. Whenever there was a particularly bad storm, the media tended to flock to Waverly for storm coverage of giant waves crashing over the rocks and onto the streets.

"The eleven o'clock news will be exciting tonight," Nellie said. "Still, it's a shame to see it happen."

Chapter Twenty-Nine

"I think we need to take a closer look at Randy," Jack said. The lights flickered for a moment in the office as the snowstorm raged outside. It was nearly five o'clock and the winds had really kicked in out there. Five officers were sitting in Jack's office reviewing their notes on the Eric Armstrong case. They were still waiting for the DNA results to come back from the lab in Boston.

"I don't like the guy much either," Scott said, "but he does have an alibi."

"Yeah, but it's his wife. I'm not sure how much stock I'd put in that," Chris the younger officer said.

"I'm inclined to agree with Chris," Jack said "And so far, he's the only one who has any kind of motive."

"I don't know if I'd agree with that," Scott said. "He has a temper and he was annoyed with the kid, but a reason to kill? Not so sure about that."

"He's a hot-head though," Chris said. "He could have just snapped."

"We still need to look more closely at Lauren. Jack I know you're friends with her, but it seems to me like she might have a pretty good motive here. If she was fooling around with the kid, maybe she tried to end it and he got all upset and threatened to go public. She stood to lose her job and her fiancé."

"That's nothing but speculation," Jack said dismissively. "There's no evidence that there was any kind of inappropriate relationship between the two of them. So, no relationship means no motive."

"There were people who thought something was going on. His friends wondered, said he was spending a lot of time outside of class with his hot English teacher. And there was his online journal talking about the 'mad crush' and hot 'older woman'."

"Lauren admitted to spending time after class with Eric, but she was counseling him, trying to help him do better. He may have had a crush on her. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me a bit. But it doesn't mean it was mutual."

"I wonder about his parents." Tim, another of the senior officers, spoke up. "The father was known to be a drinker and to have an ugly temper. In her statement, Lauren said Eric talked about trouble at home. Maybe he's the one that snapped."

"He has an alibi too." Jack said.

"Right, his wife. Did you notice how timid she becomes whenever he's around? I think she'd say whatever he told her to say."

Jack rubbed his temple, willing away the beginnings of a stress headache.

"All right, let's regroup tomorrow, dig deeper into all of this and see what emerges. Drive safely out there everyone, it's looking nasty."

––––––––

Chapter Thirty

L
auren slept in the next day and stretched lazily in her bed. It was still snowing heavily outside and she could see several sharp icicles hanging just outside the bedroom window. The call from school went out last night—there would be no classes today. Lauren suspected she was as excited by that news as her students were.

She flipped on the TV and landed on the local station where they were showing coverage of the Graybar house. The waves hitting the cliff were massive, reminding her of the giant surf you see in Hawaii and rarely saw in the northeast, except for particularly bad storms like this. The media got there too late to capture the house falling into the ocean, but a few teenagers were there and shot the footage on their own camcorders.

The video was obviously amateurish, wobbly and blurry in parts, but the overall image of the house tumbling into the sea was spellbinding and surreal. It looked more like a Hollywood special effect than a real event. The rest of the news was tame in comparison, and after a few minutes, Lauren switched off the TV and rolled out of bed.

She stayed in her pajamas most of the day, lounging on the sofa downstairs, wrapped in a soft fleece throw and watching old movies. Every now and then she got up to grab a snack or a bowl of soup. By mid-afternoon, she was movied-out, jumped in the shower and then got to work in the kitchen.

She was going to make braised short ribs and had taken the meat out of the freezer first thing in the morning to defrost. The snow was still coming down hard outside and she was glad that David's car had four-wheel drive and that he didn't have far to go. His office was just a few miles down the road. He'd called earlier to say they were going to wrap up around 4:00 so people could get home before dark and before the roads got too icy.

Lauren went to work chopping the vegetables to add to the braise. She liked to have all her ingredients ready and prepped in small bowls before she started cooking. Short ribs were one of her favorite things to make, and were the ideal comfort food in weather like this. The final dish would be similar to a rich stew, with a silky sauce of reduced wine, beef broth and aromatics over meat that was fall-off-the-bone tender from slow cooking for several hours.

Once the onions, carrots and celery were finely chopped and in their respective bowls, Lauren pulled out her giant sauté pan—the one that was wide and about five inches deep—and set it on her largest burner. Everything would happen in that pan. First, she added a little olive oil and heated it until it started to crackle, then she browned the short ribs in batches until they were all deep brown and caramelized on the outside. She then set the meat aside on a platter, dumped the vegetables into the pan and stirred them as they cooked to release the brown bits that were stuck on the bottom.

These would contribute great flavor to the sauce. Once the vegetables were soft and slightly brown, she added a full bottle of full-bodied red wine and let it reduce down to about a cup of liquid, which would intensify the flavor for the braising liquid. She added a cup and one-half of tawny port and the same amount of beef broth, then put the short ribs in, covered the pan and set it in the oven to simmer at 325° for three hours.

While the meat was simmering away in the oven, Lauren curled up on the sofa with the latest Jodi Picoult novel. By a quarter to five, when David came walking through the door, the house smelled amazing and her stomach rumbled a little in anticipation. David shook off the snow from his jacket, took it off and stepped out of his boots.