“You’re wrong. It is entirely true. I urged Ted to go on the boating trip, and I knew Brian was going to put the pressure on to sell. I hate this cabin. I wanted to sell. I begged Ted to listen to them. They were offering a good price.”
Luke was getting a different picture than he’d been told. “But Ted didn’t want to.”
“He suffered from nostalgia. His grandfather built the original cabin and, after a fire, his father rebuilt it into what it is today. Ted wouldn’t touch a nail to renovate, so here it remains. The place I’ll most likely die.”
Anger, he thought. Very likely forged from guilt. “Would it be possible to talk to you in person? I promise I’ll be as quick as I can.”
There was a long pause. He really thought she would refuse him. It hung in the air like a dark threat. “I saw you on the news,” she finally said. “When you were interviewed at your partner’s hearing.”
On the steps outside. He hadn’t been the warmest interview. “I was worried about Bolchoy’s chances.”
“I applauded you. Pauline Kirby is an overbearing bitch.”
“Ah . . .” He cleared his throat, fighting a smile. Maybe Bolchoy had been right. She’d seen him and taken his side against the shark reporter.
“I suppose you can come to the cabin,” she said doubtfully.
“If you would prefer to meet somewhere else . . . ?”
“No. I’m not going anywhere, so if you want to stop by today, just give me a time.”
He looked at the clock. Noon straight up. “Two o’clock?” he suggested.
“You know the address?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’ll see you at two, Mr. Denton. And it’s Peg,” she added.
“And I’m Luke,” he said.
“Luke,” she answered carefully, as if trying it out.
He clicked off, thought about it a second, then reached for the phone to put a call through to Andi. He hesitated with his thumb over her number on his favorites list. It would be better to wait until after his full interview with Peg. He was rushing. Eager to let her know he was making progress on his mission to bring the Carreras to justice. But was he? He had no idea really what Peg Bellows could offer him.
He warred with himself for a few minutes, then grabbed his jacket and headed out into a crisp October afternoon. He would get lunch and go over the case notes he’d written out for himself, part of which were the questions he wanted to ask Ted Bellows’s widow. Preparation. The type of writing he was best at.
She’d been broken after the fate that had befallen her and had retreated from the world. She was proud and alone and refused to be coddled, even when coddling would have fulfilled his own desire to play the hero. He wanted to protect her, wanted to be the one to make her safe, wanted to shine in her eyes....
“Total crap,” he said aloud as he climbed into his truck. Picking up his cell, he punched in his brother’s number. Dallas didn’t answer, so he left a voice message, “Just so we’re clear. I’m not writing any goddamn book.”
*
September walked out of the squad room and through the door to Laurelton PD’s reception area. She passed by Guy Urlacher, who slid her a look as she exited the front doors. Guy was a stickler for protocol and had intimidated September with his strict rules when she’d first been promoted to detective. He never intimidated Gretchen, however, who did as she pleased and told Guy he could do many colorful things to his body should he really demand she sign in and out every time she entered or left the building. Over the last year September had become inured to his stiff and small ways and had adopted some of Gretchen’s chutzpah. Now there was a silent, cold war brewing between them, but at least he’d stopped sliding the clipboard her way and demanding her signature.
She was alone and intent on interviewing Grace Myles, Tynan Myles’s mother, at Maple Grove Assisted Living. Weeks had passed since she’d planned to contact the elderly woman to see what, if anything, she could glean from her memory, weeks when she and Gretchen had been drawn into other cases, both of which were Wes and George’s, but for one reason or another on which they’d needed extra help. Gretchen had actually gotten a pot thrown at her by the infuriated husband whose wife and girlfriend had been cheating on him. She’d deflected the missile but not the hot soup it contained and she’d ended up with a scalded arm.