Confession

  This is the way to die, I thought: You get on the back of a bike behind somebody else, a good driver, and you lean trustingly in to him and you close your eyes and give yourself blissfully up to the crash.

  “Your father had it all wrong,” I said quietly into his back, into the wind that carried my words tactfully away from the ears of the boy. You don’t kill yourself and somebody you love with a gun in a stifling, unhappy house, you get on the bike, and you ask her if she wants to go with you and if she says yes, you give her a hand up onto the bike with you and you both ride hellbent for leather into a perfect night when there’s a fiery moon overhead and a billion burning stars and the weather is a silky stream of warm air and cool that wraps around your shoulders like a satin shawl, and you don’t wear many clothes or maybe any at all, and you run your bike up to a speed where everything is pure sensation and right at the height of it, right when you feel as if you can’t absorb any more sensation through your skin or your eyes or your nose or your mouth, that’s when you do it, that’s when you aim for the light pole, the bridge abutment, the side of the barn. And you pass straight over from bliss to ecstasy, from heaven to heaven, and you never even remember the despair that drove you to it, and you don’t miss earth for a minute.

  “That’s how to do it,” I whispered, and the words flew back at me.

  “You’re crazy,” I told myself next, and I laughed on the back of the bike. Who cared? Who could possibly care where we were going, for what reason, or even if there were a reason? I didn’t. I just wanted to ride on the back of that bike forever. I didn’t want to drive it, I never wanted to drive it, I just wanted to ride and ride.

  It felt absurdly like tragedy when he began to slow down.

  He pulled onto a bumpy side road, more like a dirt path gouged out of the grass by car and truck tires and bordered by tall pine trees that cast it into midday darkness. I didn’t have time to start getting nervous again, because the ride lingered in my blood like a drug and because he abruptly pulled up to a barbed wire fence and stopped, allowing the bike to idle while he held it up with one of his feet on the ground.

  “I spent a lot of time out here when I was a kid,” he said.

  Over his shoulder, I saw a bucolic scene: a two-story red wood barn, a one-story ranch house, outbuildings, a couple of calves in a pen, a few horses nibbling grass.

  “Who does it belong to?” I asked him.

  He didn’t answer me and he didn’t give me any longer to look at the view. Instead, he backed the bike back onto the road, turned it in a short radius, and took off back the way we had come to the highway. I didn’t care, I wanted only to get back to that high-speed road again, and if we never made it back into town, that was all right with me.

  Halfway there, he turned his head and raised his voice. “You like this?”

  “Yes!” I shouted, forgetting that I didn’t have to yell.

  He turned his face forward again, and the road and the wind and the sun and the sound of the engine took over the universe, and soon, too soon, we had to slow down at the outskirts of Port Frederick.

  David dropped me back at my car at the McDonald’s restaurant.

  When I tried to thank him, he shrugged and frowned and backed away from me, then hurried back in to his job. I wondered if it was still waiting for him. Once he was inside, and I felt confident that he wasn’t coming out again, I sidled back up to his motorcycle. I slid my hands along the handlebars, I warmed my palms on the seat, I slipped open the backpack and reached my right hand inside and felt three books, a notebook, pencils, pens, and a plastic box, which I pulled partway out. It was a videotape, and its label said “Mom.”

  He was luring us, Geof had guessed.

  Leading us on, manipulating us, pointing us to where he wanted us to go, seducing us …

  I took the tape.

  When I slid back behind the wheel of my beloved Miata, I felt like a changed woman. Even in the convertible, as I drove away, I felt confined, I missed the feel of the rushing air on my bare toes and the vibration of an engine on my thighs. I wanted to go faster than the law allowed in the city, and I wanted to tell Geof that if he wished to purchase a motorcycle for his fortieth birthday, it was okay with me, so long as he bought a second helmet for his passenger.

  I found out that evening that while my husband was quite interested in the chance encounter that Sabrina and I had that day with Dennis Clemmons, he wasn’t thrilled with my newfound enthusiasm for motorcycles.

  “You went for a ride with him, Jenny?”

  “When will you get the results of your blood test? And what do you mean their house felt familiar, Geof? Like déjà vu, you mean?”

  “What if he’s the one who’s been leaving the dead animals around here, Jenny? Did you think about that before you just rode off with him?”

  “You’ve probably driven by it a thousand times, that’s all.”

  “You didn’t even know if he was a safe driver, did you?”

  I put my fork down and stared at him across our dinner table. “I thought that since he was a teenage boy, I could probably take it for granted that he was not a safe driver.”

  “And you went anyway?”

  “I was wrong. He’s a great driver. Smart and safe.”

  He didn’t have a retort to that, so he ate a bite of rice and swallowed. “I haven’t driven by that house a thousand times; it’s on a cul-de-sac, hidden by a lot of tall trees; I wouldn’t drive in there unless I had a reason. Maybe we’ll go over to Ron and Judy’s house tonight. You want to go?”

  “Oh, heck,” I said.

  He stared at me.

  I made a disappointed face. “I was hoping we could go shopping for motorcycles.”

  Geof shook his head in wonderment. “I can’t believe this. If you knew how long I’ve been putting off telling you that I’d like to get one, you’d laugh.”

  I laughed and said, “Surprise.”

  My laughter sounded nervous, and no wonder: I was feeling queasy with anxiety. My God, I’d stolen something out of the boy’s backpack. Why had that wild ride tempted me into theft? The fact that I intended to return the videotape did not redeem the act. Nor did I really accept my own excuse that if the kid wouldn’t openly talk to us, we had to sneak the facts out of him. And my original feeling—that he had left it out there practically begging me to take it—seemed like a sick fantasy to me now. No, there was only one fact: I had stolen a videotape from David Mayer. No, there were actually two facts, and the second one was that I hadn’t told my police lieutenant husband about the first fact yet.

  “So what’s your due date?” I asked him.

  “My what?”

  “When will you know the results of the blood test?”

  “Soon, tomorrow.” He looked amused. “My due date?”

  “Well, don’t you feel a Little like an expectant father?”

  “Now that you mention it, I guess I do.”

  I grinned at him, feigning good sportsmanship. “We could throw a baby shower for you.”

  As I hoped he would, he laughed at that. “Great.”

  Yeah. Great.

  “Speaking of fathers,” I said as we were clearing the dishes. “What’d you find out today about David’s stepfather?”

  “Funny thing.” Geof swabbed the stovetop with a wet dishrag. “Dennis Clemmons did serve time for burglarizing a house, just as Lee told us. It wasn’t his first arrest on that charge, but it was his first conviction.” He laughed as he flipped food crumbs into the sink. “The arresting officers actually caught him in the house, Jenny, stuffing silverware into a laundry bag.”

  “So thoughtful of crooks to get caught in the act.”

  “Isn’t it? He has a long jacket on other charges, though, petty theft, shoplifting, it goes way back. His juvenile record’s been expunged, but I talked to an old-timer who remembers a kid named Dennis Clemmons getting in trouble for everything from numbers running to delivering porno for the local slime.”

  I
put the salt and pepper away. “He sounds charming.”

  “Yeah. I find myself less flattered that Judy was ever attracted to me.”

  I smiled to myself. “I’ll bet.”

  Geof draped the rag over the faucet. “There’s no record of the beating he gave Judy, and there’s nothing in the files to tell us how he got hurt himself.”

  “That doesn’t surprise us, does it?” I asked him. “That there’s no record of what he did to her? According to her doctor, she didn’t want anybody to know.”

  To which my husband observed, “There seem to have been a lot of things that Judy Baker didn’t want anybody to know. I think maybe I’d like to talk to Annabelle Baker.”

  “Who?”

  “Judy’s mother.”

  “What for?”

  He looked surprised. “Well, maybe she can clear up some of these questions.”

  “Are you kidding?” I shook my head at his naivete. “Haven’t you heard that mothers are the last to know? It’s true! Parents don’t have a clue what their children are really like, and kids don’t understand their parents either.”

  “We’re a little cynical tonight, aren’t we?”

  I pointed a clean fork at him. “I’m just telling you.”

  He flipped off the kitchen lights and said, “Yes, ma’am,” as he pushed me out of the room ahead of him. “Then why don’t you talk to her for me? That way I won’t take her word for anything, since she doesn’t know anything about her own daughter.”

  I elbowed him in his stomach. Then I decided to call his bluff.

  “All right,” I said, suddenly turning on him in the dining room. “I’ll do it. What’s her number?”

  He grinned. “I suppose it’s in Lee’s files or the phone book. You’re going to call her right now?”

  “Why not?” I feigned a certain insouciance, which dropped away from me the instant I actually did connect with the number in the phone book and did actually hear the voice of Judy Baker’s mom on our telephone. Instantly, I thought, What have I done? This is the mother of a woman who was murdered, I can’t just barge into her life like … “Uh, Mrs. Baker?”

  “Yes?” It sounded chirpy, brittle, like a woman who was trying very, very hard to be cheerful for anyone who called.

  “Mrs. Baker, my name’s Jenny Cain, I’m so sorry to disturb you—”

  “No bother, honey!” She gave a fake little laugh that twisted my heart. “Is this business or—”

  “No, I … well, I went to school with Judy, Mrs. Baker … and I was just wondering if I could come over and talk to you about her … just kind of reminisce …” Invisibly to her, I shuddered at my own prevarication.

  “About my Judy?” she said, sounding as if I’d taken her by surprise, and then she said kind of breathlessly, “Well, aren’t you sweet?”

  No! I thought with utter guilt. I’m not!

  “That would be lovely to meet a friend of Judy’s,” she continued in that awful, bright, false cheerfulness. “But maybe not right now, I’m a little busy right now …”

  “Oh, I didn’t mean right this very—”

  “Maybe some other time, maybe in a week or two—”

  “Oh, yes, fine, thank you—”

  “Call me again, honey … and come by and see me, that would be just awfully nice, but maybe not right now, maybe …”

  “Later,” I agreed.

  Humbly, I said good night to her and hung up. Even more humbly, I turned to my husband, who had been standing by, listening, watching me. “I’m not tough enough to do what you do,” I told him quite seriously. “I could never be a cop or even a reporter.”

  “Why? What’d she say?”

  “It’s too soon, Geof.” I thought of her heartbreaking effort to be sweet to me. “I don’t think she wants to talk about it yet.” I gave him—or myself?—an encouraging smile. “But she said maybe in a week or two I could call her again.”

  He shrugged. “That’s fine, Jenny.”

  “It is?”

  “Sure. I might have pressed harder, but maybe I wouldn’t have. It’s not an active case, after all, and I might have felt just as sorry for her as you do.”

  I stepped into his embrace and murmured, “Good for you.”

  13

  BEFORE WE LEFT FOR TOWN TO TAKE A LOOK at Ron and Judy Mayer’s house—and because I was feeling guilty and paranoid—I slipped David’s videotape into my purse. The only one it fit into was a huge black leather affair that looked a little odd with my shorts and T-shirt and red vinyl sandals. But I didn’t want to leave the tape unprotected in the house. And I thought that if I worked up the nerve to confess to my crime, I’d better have the evidence with me. Of course, Geof immediately noticed when we got into his Jeep and I placed the ugly old thing in my lap.

  “Why are you bringing that along, Jenny?”

  “My purse? You never know, we might want to stop and get an ice cream cone on the way back.”

  “You could carry your life savings in that. I have money with me.”

  “I just feel like taking it, Geof, all right?”

  “Okay!” He laughed a little at my testiness. “Take the whole house if you want to.”

  “Thank you. But this will do.”

  He looked at me as if he thought I was crazy, then started the engine for our quiet, hot ride into town. It was going on eight o’clock by the time we arrived at the Mayers’ house in Royal Acres. The sun was setting on the steamy day, but it was like a hot iron coming down on a wet shirt; the world was only getting darker, not cooler. As I climbed out of the Jeep to meet Geof on the sidewalk, I felt like surrendering, like giving up and melting into everything.

  “I apologize,” I said. For my earlier testiness, I meant.

  “It’s hot, we’re all cranky.”

  “Nice of you to say so.”

  It must have been the heat, but at that moment I looked up at his face, so hard at the jaw line, so evaluative, so gauging around the eyes, and I wondered what it was about a person’s psyche that would make her marry a cop. My own father couldn’t have been less coplike. If Geof was “fuzz,” then my dad was fuzzy, so maybe that was the reason, one of the reasons.

  “What?” he asked intuitively.

  I hedged. “I always think a house where a murder has taken place is going to look different somehow.” I knew I was babbling, as guilty people are inclined to do. “I don’t suppose you think so. I know it’s silly, but when we drove up here, I half expected to see the crime scene ribbons still in place after all this time.”

  “No, I know what you mean.”

  “You do? An old cop like you?”

  “Don’t say old.” His grin appeared briefly, and my guilty heart warmed to him. “Not to a man who’s turning forty.” He grasped my left elbow and steered me forward. “Come on. No more stalling. Let’s see if there is, in fact, anything different about this house.”

  From the outside, it looked like all the others on the block: safe, secure, conventional, where nobody would ever raise her voice except to call the children in to dinner. I’d never have picked it as a location where a woman would die violently at the hands of a man who said he loved her.

  We’d been talking over the noise of a lawnmower in the next yard.

  The man who was mowing made his pivot to come back down his lawn, and when he did, he noticed us. He released the handle of the machine, which shut down the engine. A few yards behind him, a woman in orange Bermuda shorts was clipping hedges. She had her back to us, but when his mower stopped, she looked up, too. As Geof and I ascended the front steps to the Mayer house, the man in the next yard came walking toward us, smiling tentatively, looking curious and friendly like a dog coming to sniff us out.

  We stopped and waited for him to reach us. I resisted an impulse to put out the back of my hand for him to smell.

  Mentally, I put him in his forties and the woman in her late fifties or early sixties. She was tanned and pudgy, with a yellow tank top over the orange shorts
and gray-blond hair pulled messily up on top of her head. He was slimmer and darker and bare chested over black Bermuda shorts, with tennis shoes and white socks. He wiped the sweat off his forehead with the back of his right hand and called out before he reached us, “Hello! May I help you?”

  The woman lowered her shears to stare openly at us.

  In the quiet, which came as a relief, I heard a prattle of traffic on the road into town; from somewhere in the vicinity came the thump of a basketball repeatedly hitting a garage door and a woman’s voice was calling, “Here, Fanny, here kitty-kitty!” The smell of fresh-cut grass and a sniffle of dust filled my nose. We hadn’t had a good rain in a couple of weeks, typical for late August in Massachusetts.

  “Hello!” Geof was all smiles, reaching out his hand for the man to shake. “I’m Geof. This is my wife, Jenny.” Downright folksy, he was, as he dangled the Mayers’ house keys in the air between him and the neighbor to assert our bona fides. “David asked us to come take a look at the house.”

  “David did?” The man seemed extraordinarily happy to be shaking Geof’s hand and then mine; he looked unaccountably pleased to see us. “That’s great!”