“Well, Kit,” he says, “I sure am surprised to see you.”
I yank the hem of my uniform, trying to tug it an inch or so closer to my knees. I’m cold, thanks to a chill that’s clung to me since the moment I realized I was looking at Mary Milton’s corpse. It’s shock, I know, exacerbated by the fact that I’m talking to the man who wanted to throw me in jail.
“Surprised I’m at Hope’s End?” I say. “Or surprised I’m still allowed to work after you accused me of murder?”
The detective sighs. “This doesn’t need to be contentious, Kit. I’m just trying to figure out what happened.”
“You didn’t seem too interested in that the last time we talked.”
“I’ll let that slide,” Detective Vick says. “You’re understandably distressed.”
I am. I’m afraid to even blink out of fear the image of Mary’s corpse poking from the sand will be projected onto the backs of my eyelids. Making it worse is the realization that I spotted her body last night, after I almost tumbled over the terrace railing.
I looked down and saw dark objects in the sand that I thought were rocks but now know was Mary. And I can’t stop thinking about how long she’d been there—and how, had I understood what I was looking at, I could have at least spared her a few more hours of indignity. Knowing that I didn’t leaves me so sad and guilty I can barely catch my breath.
But I refuse to let Detective Vick see any of that. I’ll sprint from this room and never come back before that happens.
“Just ask me your questions,” I say.
“What’s your job here at Hope’s End?”
Even though my uniform and history should give it away, I provide an answer. “I’m a caregiver.”
“And who is it you care for?”
I hesitate, not wanting to tell him because I know the kind of reaction it’ll bring. An ironic smirk, probably. Detective Vick might even make a crack about the appropriateness of a killer caring for a killer.
“Lenora Hope,” I finally say.
To the detective’s credit, there’s no smirk. But I do notice the slight lift of his brows, indicating surprise.
“How long have you been caring for her?”
“This is my third day.”
The detective’s brows rise again, higher this time, as he says, “Quite an eventful first week on the job.”
The understatement of the year, considering everything else I’ve experienced since arriving at Hope’s End.
“You’re the one who first saw the body, correct?”
I give a quick nod, again trying not to picture Mary mostly covered by sand that had been packed over her for more than a week. She might have been completely buried in a few more days. Maybe less. I know it’s a good thing she was found before it was too late, even though I deeply wish it wasn’t me who did it.
“Walk me through it,” Detective Vick says.
I do, quickly recounting being on the terrace, noticing the seagulls, looking over the edge of the cliff, and seeing Mary.
“Why were you out there in the first place?”
It feels like a trick question, even though I know it’s not. But to answer it honestly would mean talking about strange noises and shadows moving around Lenora’s room. There’s no way I’m going to go there. Instead, I give a not entirely dishonest reply.
“Just getting some fresh air.”
I look out the row of windows that face the ocean. Outside, a pair of cops mill about the terrace. One of them paces back and forth, eyes aimed at the ground. The other keeps peering over the railing at the water below, even though Mary’s corpse was recovered more than two hours ago. Because of the steepness of the cliff, the police needed a boat to reach it. A small army of officers then stormed the narrow beach and dug Mary out before the tide rolled in again.
“What are they looking for?”
“Anything that might give us an idea of what happened,” Detective Vick says.
“But Mary fell, right?”
I continue to eye the terrace railing, thinking about how I almost tumbled over it last night. The raw panic of that moment remains fresh in my memory. First surprise, then fumbling, then pure fear. I imagine the same thing happening to Mary. A trip. A slip. A long, terrifying fall. It makes me wince. That poor, poor girl.
“It’s one of several possibilities,” Detective Vick says in a noncommittal way that makes it sound like he’s considered only one possibility.
I study his face, so expressionless it could be a mask. I’ve seen that look from him before. I know it means he’s already made up his mind.
“You think she jumped,” I say.
It makes more sense than falling, despite my recent near miss. The terrace, with its low railing and cliff’s edge access, seems tailor-made for suicide. It would be so easy for someone to climb over the railing and make that final leap.
Under normal circumstances, I’d spare another thought for poor Mary Milton, feeling sad and sorry for a woman whose personal demons drove her to take her own life. But right now I can only focus on my mother, another woman driven to suicide, and how Detective Vick refused to believe she acted alone.
“I don’t want to make any assumptions at this time,” he replies in that same maddening tone.
“Yet you were fine making them about me.”
Those assumptions eventually found their way into the local newspaper, caused me to be suspended for six months, and almost landed me in jail. They made my few friends vanish and my own father suspect the worst about me. Anger rises inside me, so fast and volcanic I think it’s about to propel me off the love seat and across the room to attack Detective Vick. Only sheer force of will keeps me in place. I sit with my arms tightly crossed, unable to make eye contact. I fear just looking at him will set me off again—and that I’ll no longer be able to control it.
Sensing my anger, Detective Vick tries to calm me by saying, “This is more than just an assumption, okay? A note was found in a pocket of Miss Milton’s uniform, indicating that she intended to kill herself.”
I don’t ask what it says. One, it’s none of my business and, two, I’m too busy wondering how different my life would be right now if my mother had left behind a suicide note. I suspect it would be very different, seeing how a note seems to be all Detective Vick needs.
“Are you aware of any reason why Mary Milton would want to take her own life?” he says.
“I don’t know. I never met her. She was gone before I got here.”
I cringe as I say it. Gone has multiple meanings. Dead is one. Missing is another. So, too, is left, although it turns out Mary never did. She was here the whole time.
Detective Vick tries a different tactic. “Do you think she liked working at Hope’s End?”
“From what others have told me, I guess she did,” I say.
“Do you like working here?”
Caught off guard by the question, I shift on the love seat. “I just got here.”
“That doesn’t answer the question. Which is a simple one. You either like it here or you don’t.”
“I like it here,” I say, flashing a tight smile so it doesn’t seem like the lie it is. Completely unnecessary, it turns out.
“That’s not what you told your employer,” Detective Vick says.
“When did you talk to Mr. Gurlain?”
“About fifteen minutes ago. Before you and I talked, I wanted to confirm you were indeed the same Kit McDeere I thought you were. When I spoke to Mr. Gurlain, he told me that you also called him not long ago.”
My anger returns. Before he even set foot in this room, Detective Vick knew I worked at Hope’s End, how long I’ve been here, and what my job entails. He also knows I asked Mr. Gurlain for a new assignment mere minutes before finding the body of Mary Milton. This whole interrogation feels like a trap to prove I’m untrustworthy. One I walked right into.
I’d walk right out of it, too, if I could. But there’s Mary to consider. While I didn’t know her, everyone else at Hope’s End seemed to like her. That alone is enough to make me continue to face Detective Vick. Then there’s the fact that Mary was a fellow caregiver. She cared. I owe it to her to try to help make sense of her untimely end. Yet none of that means I need to go easy on Detective Vick.
“Are you going to ask me something you don’t already know?” I say.
“I don’t know why you just lied to me about liking it here.”
“Because I want to keep my job.”
“Even though, according to Mr. Gurlain, you asked for a new one?”
“I need to keep my job,” I say through teeth gritted so hard it makes my jaw ache. “Thanks to you, this is my only option.”
Detective Vick’s mouth drops open, as if he wants to say something but feels he can’t. In that absence of words, I can only wonder what it is. An apology seems unlikely.
“You told Mr. Gurlain you weren’t comfortable here,” he eventually says. “Why is that?”
“Three people were murdered in this house, Detective. Are you comfortable being here?”
“Yes. Then again, I’m used to crime scenes. Do you think Mary was uncomfortable here?”
“I honestly don’t know.”