“That makes sense.”
“The night there was an intruder at her farm. It was Armitage.” I think about that a moment, feeling foolish and inept. “He couldn’t stay away from her. He didn’t know I was watching the place. It was Mattie who broke the glass. To cover for him. I was too blind to see any of it.” I look up from the tabletop and meet his gaze. “He killed Paul and the children so he could have her for himself.” I take a drink of the beer, but I don’t taste it. “I think she knew. About all of it.”
“The truth will come out.”
“Tomasetti, I knew her. Inside and out. Her thoughts. Her dreams. Her heart. I can’t believe I didn’t see something. I should have—”
“Some people lie to their last breath.”
“She was my best friend.”
“I’m your best friend.”
The words, the kindness, and the truth behind them triggers something inside me, like the shattering of glass. Setting down the beer, I lower my face into my hands and begin to cry.
*
It took me two days to catch the cat. It’s not that he doesn’t like me. He does. But he’s feral. Like me, he’s been kicked around a little and sometimes it shows, usually to his own detriment. He doesn’t easily trust. Sometimes he scratches the people who care for him most. I finally nab him using his favorite food. He’s not a happy camper when I put him in the carrier.
“It’s for your own good,” I tell him as I lug the carrier to my rental car and place it on the passenger seat.
He responds by hissing at me.
Ten minutes later, I take the Toyota Corolla down the lane of Mattie’s parents’ farm. I pass by an old barn with a fresh coat of white paint, and then the lane curls right, taking me toward the house.
It’s been seventeen years since I’ve been here, but so little has changed I feel as if I’m fifteen years old again as the house looms into view. The kitchen window where Mattie and I used to wash dishes while we whispered about boys still looks out over a cornfield that never seems to produce enough corn. The big maple tree still stands sentinel outside the window that had once been Mattie’s bedroom. The same tree she climbed down the night we went to see the midnight screening of Basic Instinct. Even the clothesline post still leans slightly toward the barn. I wonder how a place can remain the same for so many years when the rest of the world barrels on with such astounding speed.
It’s been two days since my ordeal at the clinic with Mattie and Michael Armitage. I’ve been put on administrative leave, though I’ve been told I’ll be back on the job by tomorrow afternoon. I haven’t slept since that night. Strangely, I’m not tired. I haven’t been able to eat, but I’m not hungry. I’m hurting, but it’s a silent pain because, after that first morning with Tomasetti, I haven’t been able to cry.
Being here today is one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done in my life. Tomasetti tried to talk me out of it. It’s not the first time I didn’t heed his good advice. Avoiding Mattie’s parents made me feel like a coward. I’m a lot of things—and not all of those things are good. But I’m not a coward.
Ten yards away, the door to the milk barn stands open, so I pick up the cat carrier and the brown paper bag that contains his kibble and head that way. I hear the generator that powers the milk machine rumbling from inside the small building next to the barn. I find Andy Erb in the aisle, sanitizing the udders of the cows he’s just brought in from the field. The rest of the cattle are in stanchions and David is pouring feed into the long feeder.
Man and boy look up from their work when I approach. “Guder mariya,” I say.
Andy Erb stiffens. His expression doesn’t change as he straightens and looks at me. He reaches for his grandson, but young David is already running toward me, grinning. “We’re getting ready to milk the cows. Do you wanna watch? I know how to do it.”
I muss his hair, amazed at how resilient he is. That life goes on for him, even without his mother, father, and siblings. “It looks like fun, sweetheart, but I can’t stay.”
He’s already eyeing the pet carrier. “What’s inside the little box?” he asks.
Andy approaches us, sets his hand on the boy’s shoulder, and eases him away from me. When the Amish man’s eyes meet mine, I feel an instant of guilt. I spent half of my life wondering if he’d abused his daughter, never doubting Mattie’s insinuation that he had. I’d hated him; I’d hated his wife for looking the other way. If Mattie had asked for my help, I would have done anything to protect her from them. Now, as an adult—and a police officer—I’m relieved she hadn’t, because we would have destroyed this man’s life and torn his family apart in the process.