I’m frozen to the spot and can’t tear my eyes away from his face. His skin is pale, his mouth an angry red slash. His lips move rapidly but I have no idea what he’s saying. Out of the corner of my eye I see that Stitch, sensing my distress, has started pawing at the window.
I reach behind me searching for the door handle. He continues his approach and without laying a hand on me forces me against the cold metal of the Jeep. My fingers find the handle and I lift it. I’m able to pull the door open a few inches and Stitch is over the seat in an instant trying to nose his way through the small opening. Peter moves quickly forward and shoves the door shut nearly catching Stitch’s snout. He’s so close that I can smell the stale stench of coffee on his breath. I search wildly for any sign of help but the parking lot is empty of people.
Peter’s mouth continues to twist in anger and he’s speaking so fast that I’m only able to untangle a few random words. Garage, trespass, police. With an open hand he strikes the Jeep just behind my left ear. Was this what happened to Gwen? Did Peter become so angry, so incensed that he lost control and killed her?
If I can just squeeze past him, I think I’ll be able to outrun him and make it back to the speech therapy clinic. But what if the office is locked up tight for the night? What will I do then?
“Stop!” I shout. “Get back.” I press the palms of my hands to his chest and shove. He stumbles a few steps backward and for a moment I think he’s going to fall but he catches himself and staggers upright. “What do you want?” I ask.
Just as quickly as Peter’s assault has started it’s over. I don’t know if he sees the terror in my eyes or if he’s afraid that Stitch’s barking will alert someone from inside one of the nearby businesses, but he holds his hands out as if placating me.
“What do I want?” he asks, his eyes widen in disbelief. “What do I want?” he repeats. “You need to leave me alone. Stay away from me. Stay away from my home.”
“Why were you at the river?” I ask, knowing that I should just get into my car and get the hell out of there. “Why did you run from the church when you saw me?”
“Why were you at the river?” He shoots right back at me. “How do you know Gwen?”
I’m taken off guard by his questions. This isn’t how I would think a man guilty of murder would behave. “I found her,” I find myself explaining. “We were friends once.”
“You’re the one who called 9-1-1?” He regards me suspiciously and then glances at Stitch who is still going crazy in the Jeep.
“Yes,” I say. Slowly, I step backward knowing it’s now time to take my leave. McNaughton might be calm for the moment but that can all change in a second.
“You think I hurt her, don’t you? That’s why you came to my house. It wasn’t me. We’ve been friends for years.” All the fight has gone out of him and I have no doubt that one solid punch to his stomach would send him to his knees. “I would never hurt Gwen,” he says.
Suddenly, I feel sorry for him. There’s nothing frightening or menacing about him and for some reason I believe what he is saying.
“Then who?” I ask. “Who would do this to her?”
“Go ask your husband,” he says just as Corrine and another speech therapist are coming through the lot toward their cars. “And be careful,” he adds before he turns and leaves. It takes a moment for his words to register with me. They make no sense. I must have gotten it wrong. I get it wrong a lot. Especially if I don’t know the person who’s speaking well.
Go ask your husband.
Can that be right? Peter’s crazy. He has to be.
I open the driver’s-side door, climb inside and lock the door. With shaking hands I fumble for my keys and manage to start the car. Stitch is in the passenger seat next to me, still barking. “Utisit, utisit,” I say over and over until Stitch has calmed. Hush, hush. It really isn’t Peter whom I’m afraid of. It’s what he said. Go ask your husband. Be careful.
I don’t know what to do or where to go. So I just drive, turning down random streets, winding my way through parts of Mathias that I haven’t been to in years. My vision blurs and I realize that I’m crying. Why would Peter tell me to ask David about how Gwen was hurt? As far as I know, David barely even knew Gwen. It’s true we were friends, but we almost never spent time together with our husbands, and while Gwen was a nurse at the same hospital where David worked, she shifted around departments and floors. Besides, how did Peter know whom I was married to anyway? I wipe away my tears with my forearm and glance in the rearview mirror almost expecting to find Peter following close behind. No one is there.
Stitch is finally calm but I have no doubt that he would have ripped Peter’s throat out in order to protect me.
I don’t want to go home. I’m not thinking straight. Is Peter dangerous or just crazy? Maybe he’s both. He does seem to have a strange obsession with Gwen. The news articles, the hidden scrapbook. And what about David? I’m still sure he was the one who left the glass of wine on my kitchen counter. Could he really have been involved with Gwen? Involved in her death? The very idea is ridiculous. Isn’t it? David delivers babies and takes care of Nora. He doesn’t kill people. The thoughts are ricocheting around my skull so furiously that I itch for a drink. Something to calm my nerves, something to quiet the storm in my head.
Before I even realize it, I find myself back on familiar roads. In the end, this isn’t about me at all. It’s about Gwen. It’s about her daughter. It’s about making sure that a very bad person can’t hurt anyone else. I have to go to the police department and tell Jake everything. He’ll know what to do.
15
I wait for Jake in one of the hard plastic chairs in the waiting area. When he finally appears, he signals me to follow him into his office. I do and when he shuts the door behind us I’m positive he’s going to give me hell for trying to insert myself into the investigation.
I take a seat and Stitch sits at my feet, watchful, as if expecting McNaughton to come through the door at any second. I wait for the ass-chewing to begin. Instead, Jake signs, “Now tell me exactly what happened.”
I take him step-by-step through each of my encounters with Peter but conveniently leave out how I ended up in his garage going through his things. I also leave out the part of the story when Peter says, “Go ask your husband.” Why, I’m not sure. I guess despite our past and our differences, I don’t want to accuse David of murder without one shred of evidence.
“So,” Jake signs, “you just happened to be walking Stitch down the exact street where McNaughton lives?” Jake doesn’t give me a chance to respond. “This is the same guy who you saw leaving flowers at the river and this is the same guy who took off from Gwen’s funeral when he saw you?”
I nod.
“And while you’re walking Stitch on the same street where Peter McNaughton lives, Stitch just so happens to escape from his leash and runs onto his property? And then today, out of nowhere, Peter McNaughton follows you to speech therapy, corners you and starts yelling and then apologizing and crying?”
I nod again.
“And that’s the entire story? When we bring McNaughton in to talk to him, he’s not going to have a different story?”
“You’re going to arrest him?” I ask. “I don’t know if you should do that.”
“Well, let me tell you a few things about Peter McNaughton. We have a file on him about this thick.” Jake holds his thumb and forefinger about five inches apart. When he sees the alarm on my face he adds, “No, it’s not what you think. Peter calls us about once a week complaining about something or reporting some sort of crime. A neighbor making too much noise, someone loitering around his bookstore, kids knocking on his front door and running away, a lady on his property with a dog running around without a leash.” He slides his eyes toward Stitch and I feel my face grow hot. “Peter is a one-man Neighborhood Watch. He real
ly is harmless.”
This matches what Marty told me, as well. “He has a bookstore?” I ask. “Which one?”
“A used bookstore over on Depot Street. I think it’s called The Book Broker.”
I’ve heard of it, driven past it a million times but have never been inside and had no idea that it was owned by Peter McNaughton.
“If it will make you feel better, we can talk to him. Remind him it’s not a good idea to corner women in parking lots and start yelling at them. Besides, we can tell him that you’re harmless too.” I give him a sour smile.
“I should get home,” I say. “The weather is supposed to get pretty bad.”
“It already is. There’s an ice storm advisory. Why don’t you crash at my place tonight?” Jake signs.
“I don’t know...” I begin, but the offer is tempting. The roads out to my place can be pretty treacherous and I’m still a little freaked out about the whole wine bottle fiasco. I haven’t told Jake about it. I’m afraid he’ll start putting me into the same category as Peter.
“Come on,” he says, “I can take off now.” Jake stands and grabs his coat from a hook on the back of the door. “We’ll go to my house.”
I look at the clock on the wall. It’s almost seven thirty.
“Seriously,” he says, seeing the doubt on my face. “It’s okay. We’ll grab some food and watch the Hawkeye game.”
I won’t say it out loud, but I’m relieved. “It’s probably safer,” I concede.
“Then it’s settled. Let’s go,” Jake says.
Stitch and I follow Jake out of the station and to my car. Night has fully fallen and the streetlights have come on. The snowplows have made their rounds, turning the newly fallen snow grimy along the fringes. The temperature is at that level just above freezing when the skies don’t know if they are supposed to rain or snow. Sleet falls in icy sheets and I hold on to Jake’s arm until we reach my Jeep. I carefully follow Jake’s SUV to a sub shop where we pick up dinner and then to his house, the one he shared with Sadie.
It’s a two-bedroom craftsman in a quiet, tree-lined neighborhood just a few blocks from where we both grew up. If Jake and Sadie had children they would have gone to the same elementary school that we did. I park behind him in his driveway and together we walk up the slick steps to the front door.
Inside, not much has changed since Sadie died. He still has the same sofa and love seat, the same pictures on the walls, the same books on the bookshelves. I don’t know how he stays in this house. How does he walk across the same floors that Sadie once walked? How does he sit in the same furniture, sleep in the same bed without feeling her presence? Maybe he does feel her there. Maybe that’s the entire point.
Despite its unaltered appearance, despite all the cozy furniture, the house has a neglected air about it. Maybe that’s because I knew Sadie. Knew that her very presence filled a room. Sadie was sweet, beautiful, kind, and she and Jake were inseparable. In crowds she was always searching for him. My Jake she called him. Even when all the eyes in the room were on her, Sadie was always looking for her husband.
What did she see in the murky waters of Five Mines that compelled her to leap from the train bridge? I don’t know how she could leave a world that held someone whom she so clearly loved and who so clearly loved her.
I kick off my shoes and take off my coat. Jake takes it from my hands and opens the closet door. As he reaches for an empty hanger I see Sadie’s red, ankle-length, woolen coat. Four winters have passed since Sadie killed herself. I wonder if Jake presses his nose into the scratchy fabric in search of some lingering essence of her. It makes me sad thinking of Jake this way, held captive by a ghost. A small voice in my head scolds—who’s the one holding on to the past? I’m the one still clutching on to the eroded edges of my marriage.
Jake presses a button on a remote and the TV comes to life. He tells me to take a seat and tosses me a throw blanket and the remote. “Rookie,” he signs and moves to somewhere in the back of the house. I take this to mean that he’s going to let Rookie out of his kennel.
I switch on a light and settle onto Jake’s couch and arrange the blanket around my legs. I know that Jake doesn’t let Rookie on the furniture, so I don’t invite Stitch to join me. Instead, he spends a few minutes sniffing each corner, each chair leg and a discarded pizza box left on the coffee table.
Jake and Rookie come into the room setting Stitch on edge. With his broad chest and regal stature, Rookie is definitely the alpha male. Stitch waits rigidly while Rookie sniffs at him and assesses Stitch with his sharp eyes. When Rookie is satisfied that Stitch is no threat to him, he looks at Jake, who orders him to go lie down. I notice that Rookie complies with each of Jake’s commands immediately and without complaint. I look down at Stitch. “Lehni,” I say. Down. He ignores me and begins to snuffle the pizza box again.
I catch Jake laughing as he comes over to the couch, take-out bag in hand, and I stretch out my legs so he can’t sit down next to me. He does anyway, and I scramble to move my feet before he sits on them.
When Jake finally stops chuckling I can see just how exhausted he is. He’s been working 24/7 on Gwen’s murder and it doesn’t look like he’s much closer to finding the killer than he was on that first day.
“You okay?” I ask, taking in the dark smudges beneath his eyes and the deep grooves that seem to have suddenly appeared in his forehead.
“I’m fine.” He sets the sub-shop bag on the arm of the sofa and props his feet up on the coffee table. I’m well aware of how close we’re sitting to each other—only inches apart. “All part of the job.” He closes his eyes and folds his hands across his chest. I know this is true. Jake lives for his job. Since Sadie died it has become much more than a job really, more like a vocation.
“Now that you know Marty didn’t kill Gwen, what are you thinking?” I ask as I begin to feed Stitch one of the sub sandwiches we picked up.
Jake opens one eye. “I can tell you what I’m not thinking. I’m not thinking it’s Peter McNaughton. At least not yet.”
I nudge him with my shoulder. “Come on, you must have someone in mind.”
Jake sits up. “We’ve got nothing,” he signs. “The ME says there are no signs of a sexual assault so the theory that she was abducted and raped is out the window. From all that we can find, Gwen Locke was simply a wife and a mom who worked as a nurse and ended up strangled and dumped in Five Mines.” Jake looks defeated and this isn’t like him at all. Jake doesn’t give up.
“Hold on a sec,” he says and gets up. He disappears into another room and comes back a moment later carrying a manila folder. I almost groan. I’ve had my fill of manila file folders as of late. “You’re a nurse. Can you take a look at the ME’s report and tell me if anything at all looks out of the ordinary. I’ve gone through it a million times and from what I can see it doesn’t tell me a damn thing that will help me solve this case.”
“Sure,” I say, and he opens the file and pulls out a small sheaf of papers and hands it to me. Jake watches me as I read and he’s right. There is very little to learn from the autopsy, at least initially, besides the fact that Gwen was strangled. Listed is the obvious injury from the blow to her head and the ligature mark around her neck but beyond this there doesn’t appear to be much in terms of forensic evidence—no wounds on her hands to indicate that she fought back and no evidence that she was drugged. Plus the fact that Gwen’s body was deposited in Five Mines means there is a good chance that any evidence left behind by the killer was washed away and was compromised by the millions of microorganisms found in a river’s ecosystem.
I continue to read and my eyes stumble on a tiny notation that I almost miss. To me it’s the most tragic piece of information in the entire report. “She was pregnant,” I say, looking up at Jake.
“Yeah,” Jake says. “About three months along.”
“Did Marty know?” I ask. He didn’t mention anything when we met.
“He says he didn’t but he also said that they had been trying for a while and Gwen had a few miscarriages before then. Marty said that Gwen was probably going to wait until she was sure the baby was healthy before telling him.”
“So he’s sure the baby was his?” I ask.
“The lab is testing the fetus’s paternity but there’s absolutely no indication that Gwen was having an affair. She went to work, she came home. That’s it.”
But of course that wasn’t just it. Whoever killed Gwen targeted her for some reason: for the way she looked, for something she knew or something she saw. If we can figure out what it was, her murder would be solved. In frustration, Jake tosses the file folder on the coffee table and the corner of a photograph slides out. The autopsy photos.
I reach for them but Jake gathers them back up. “You don’t need to see those,” he says.
“I’m a nurse, I found her,” I say, gently tugging on the folder. Reluctantly, Jake lets go. The first series of photos are from the crime scene. Gwen floating in the water, hair tangled among the brambles, her skin starkly white among the fallen gemstone-colored leaves. The next set shows Gwen in the medical examiner’s office laid out on a metal table. These photos focus more on Gwen’s injuries: the three-inch gash on her skull, the broken blood vessels in her eyes, the bruised flesh around her neck. The marking is curious in its uniformity and the surprising lack of tissue damage. If the murderer used a wire garrote there would be deep narrow cuts in the flesh around her neck. If he used a belt or strap of some kind there would be unique, distinguishing marks or bits of fabric left behind. “Do you know what made these marks?” I ask.