Dearly Beloved (36 page)

Oh, well.

Stephen opens the car door and steps out into the storm, hurrying across the frozen drive to the back door of the inn.

He’s no sooner closed it behind him and shaken the snow out of his hair than Jasper is standing in front of him, looking agitated.

“I’ve been waiting for you, Stephen . . .”

Irritated, he rolls his eyes. “Why?”

“I . . . here, come in and I’ll show you.”

Stephen steps into the kitchen, then follows Jasper through the dining room and into the parlor, saying, “I hope this doesn’t take long. I have to change out of this tuxedo. It’s covered with—”

He stops short when he sees her.

Laura Towne.

She’s lying flat on her back on the old rose-colored sofa beneath the window, her hands folded over her stomach. She appears to be sleeping peacefully.

Stephen looks at Jasper, who blurts, “I had to do it, Stephen! She tried to get away.”

“What the hell did you do?” he asks hoarsely. “You didn’t—”

“No, I only knocked her out with chloroform. She’ll come to in a little while,” Jasper says nervously. “And that’s not the only thing . . .”

Stephen scowls, bracing himself.

“An Officer Crandall came here, wanting to know about the inn, asking all kinds of questions . . .”

That nosy cop I met on the road. I should have guessed.

“You didn’t tell him anything, did you?” Stephen asks Jasper. “You didn’t—”

“Of course not. But you’d be proud of me, Stephen. I knocked him out with that vase from the desk, and then I locked him into the storage room off the kitchen. And his car is parked out back, near the dunes. I left the keys in it so that—”

“I want you to finish him off,” Stephen interrupts tersely, jabbing a finger at Jasper, “and then I want you to meet me out at the summer house.”

The little twerp gulps visibly. “But how will I get there?”

“Take my car,” Stephen says, tossing him the keys to the sedan.

Jasper misses, of course, and they go clattering onto the carpet.

“But then how will you get—”

“I’ll take the cop car, you idiot,” Stephen bites out in disgust. “What else can I do? Who knows how long it’ll be before someone else comes snooping around here?”

“But I took care of the cop, and—”

“And now he’s missing, too. Who knows how many people he told about Sandy Cavelli? He was looking for her. I bumped into him on the road earlier. He seemed suspicious. But never mind, it doesn’t matter now. Just take care of him. Can I trust you to do it, or are you going to screw up on this, too?”

“I’ll do it,” Jasper says firmly, raising his chin. “You know I’d do anything for you, Stephen.”

He lays a tentative hand on Stephen’s arm, and he fights the urge to recoil. He can’t risk putting Hammel off now. He still needs him.

He forces himself to soften his gaze as he looks at Jasper, to say soothingly, “I know you’ll do anything for me. And I appreciate it.”

“You do?”

“Of course l do.”

Jasper smiles happily. “Thank God. I was a little worried that you might not want me to come with you, the way you promised. I thought maybe you’d change your mind . . .”

“Why would I do that?”

Jasper hesitates, then says, “You wouldn’t. I know you wouldn’t. You promised. It’s going to be you and me forever, just like you said.”

Though his words are decisive, there’s a note of uncertainty in his voice, and Stephen wonders if little old Arnie is more perceptive than he gives him credit for being.

“Sure. You and me forever, Arnie,” he says to reassure him.

The man’s mouth quivers beneath his mustache. “You haven’t called me that in years.”

“And I didn’t mean to now. It was a slip of the tongue. You’re Jasper. . . . Don’t forget that.”

“I won’t.”

“Good.”

“I love you, Stephen.”

“I love you, too.”

Stephen sighs inwardly. There are times when he thinks he’s lucky to have this eager-to-please flunky on his side. But other times, he worries that he’s making a big mistake trusting someone who’s one sandwich short of a picnic.

Still, it won’t matter after a few more hours, he reminds himself.

Like Laura Towne, Jasper Hammel—a.k.a. Arnold Wentworth—will be history.

K
eegan looks back over his shoulder at the boat that bobs furiously in the water where he docked it.

“You think it’s going to hold?” Danny asks him.

“I don’t know. The rope’s pretty strong, but with this storm . . .” Keegan trails off and shakes his head.

“Should we go back and see if we can make it sturdier?” Cheryl asks, clinging to her husband’s arm and ducking her head against the driving wind and snow.

“We can’t worry about it now,” Keegan replies, looking toward the cluster of weathered buildings near the boardwalk straight ahead. “We’ve got to find out about your sister, and my—and Jennie.”

Walking as swiftly as they can despite the powerful wind and icy pavement, they make their way toward the nearest building.

“It’s the police station!” Danny calls as they draw closer to it, pointing to a sign above the door.

“Yeah, but it looks deserted,” Keegan points out, shaking his head.

“The windows are probably just boarded up because of the storm,” Danny argues.

“Probably, but it doesn’t look like anyone’s there,” Keegan tells him.

They approach it anyway and find the door locked.

The three of them huddle in the doorway beneath the shingled overhang that barely offers protection from the nasty weather.

“Now what?” Cheryl asks, shivering and stamping her feet on the concrete step, a note of despair in her voice.

“We go to the Bramble Rose Inn,” Danny says decisively, turning to Keegan. “Right?”

“Right. First we have to find someone who knows where it is, though.” Keegan looks around and spots a big white house with a widow’s walk at the top right on the water near the boardwalk.

“There’s a light on in the window of that old house,” he tells the Cavellis, pointing. “Let’s go see if someone there can help.”

The three of them set out again, and it feels like hours before they finally reach the house, though it’s probably only a matter of minutes. Keegan can no longer feel his feet, and his face is so stiff from the cold that it feels as though it’s going to crack open every time he speaks.

Please let someone answer the door,
he begs silently as he, Danny, and Cheryl stomp up onto the porch of the old house.
If I don’t get out of the wind and cold for a few minutes, I’m going to collapse.

He glances at Cheryl and instantly feels ashamed of himself. If he’s overcome, she must be barely hanging on. Her face looks wan and she seems weak and shaky, as if she’d wilt and drop to the ground if she weren’t hanging onto Danny for dear life.

Keegan reaches out and, with numb fingers, pushes the old-fashioned buzzer beside the door.

Moments later, it’s thrown open and a ruddy-faced man is there wearing a welcoming smile.

“Oh,” he says, and the pure-white brows that match his hair furrow at the sight of three bedraggled strangers standing on his porch. “Thought you were going to be Sherm Crandall.”

“Crandall? The police chief?” Danny asks.

“That’s right. You know him?”

“I talked to him last night, about my sister. She’s missing.”

The man looks taken aback. “Did you say your sister is missing?”

“Yeah, why? You know something about it?”

“Sherm mentioned something about it—a girl from Connecticut, right?”

“Right. You don’t know if he found her, do you?” Danny asks excitedly.

“He hadn’t—least not when I saw him around lunchtime. He was on his way over to the inn where she was staying—wanted to have a look-see, I suppose.”

“Ned?” calls a female voice from the back of the house. “What are you doing with that door open? You’re letting all the heat out!”

“That’s the missus—Shirley. And I’m Ned Hartigan,” he explains, and steps back, gesturing for the three of them to step inside.

They do, and Keegan gratefully unzips the top of his jacket, lifting his chin away from the soaked fabric at last. The house is like an oven, and a savory aroma fills the warm air. The white walls of the hall they’re standing in are covered in wood-framed photographs, and two bright rag rugs are scattered on the honey-colored plank floor.

Ned closes the door firmly behind them just as a lanky gray-haired woman comes into the hall, wiping her hands on a dish towel. Her thin eyebrows shoot up at the sight of three strangers dripping on the doormat.

“Thought Sherm might be here for dinner,” is all she says, glancing at her husband and then back at the visitors.

“So did I, but this is the fella whose sister is missing from the inn—remember I told you what Sherm—Say,” he interrupts himself, “how did you folks get here, anyway? There’s no ferry service today.”

“We borrowed a boat,” Keegan says simply.

“Pretty brave of you to come across the water in this storm, I’d say.”

“Would you like some hot coffee?” Shirley asks, looking with concern at Cheryl, who’s still trembling from head to toe.

“My Shirley brews the best coffee on the island. Ask anyone, and they’ll tell you,” Ned says proudly.

Danny and Keegan exchange a glance. “We really don’t have time,” Keegan says reluctantly, thinking about how heavenly it would be to stay in the warm house and sip something hot.

But there’s no time to waste.

Not when Jennie might be in trouble.

“But if you wouldn’t mind, why don’t you let my wife stay here for a little while and warm up,” Danny puts in.

Cheryl starts to protest, but Shirley swoops right in like a mother bird and puts her arm around Cheryl’s shoulders. “Don’t you be silly,” she says. “You look like you’re about to faint. Now you come right back into the kitchen and sit by the fire and have some chowder.”

“Go ahead, babe,” Danny urges his wife, who looks at him questioningly.

“But what about Sandy?”

“We’ll go see what we can find out,” he assures her, and she nods.

“Can you tell us where the Bramble Rose Inn is?” Keegan asks, turning to Ned. “Is it within walking distance?”

“It would be if it weren’t snowing and blowing like the dickens. But come on. We’ll take my pickup . . . if it starts.”

It does . . . after several tries.

As Ned Hartigan pulls out onto the ice-covered road that leads back toward town, Keegan peels off his wet wool gloves and blows on his numb fingers.

“Frostbite?” Hartigan asks, glancing at him.

“Hope not.”

“My feet are starting to sting like crazy,” Danny says.

“That’s a good sign. Circulation’s coming back.”

Keegan tries not to think about his own feet. He can’t feel them at all.

“So did you see my sister at all this weekend?” Danny asks. “She’s a little chubby, but pretty, and the sweetest girl you’d ever want to meet.”

“Well, the gal I saw who was staying at the inn was anything but sweet,” Ned says with disdain as the truck creeps along the road. “Blond, and acted like she was the Queen of England.”

Definitely not Jennie, Keegan thinks. Glancing out the window at the slowly passing buildings along the boardwalk, he asks, “I don’t suppose you came across the woman I’m trying to find. She was staying at the inn, too.”

“From Boston?”

“Yeah!” Keegan turns excitedly to Ned. “Jennie Towne. You met her?”

“Does she have the prettiest light-purple eyes—like Liz Taylor’s?”

“That’s her! Where’d you see her?”

“Came into my store—that’s it over there, by the way,” Ned says, pointing to a building on the boardwalk that’s fronted by a painted Victorian-style sign that reads “Hartigan’s.” “Anyway, she came in yesterday and was nice as can be. Then she sat down and had coffee with the nasty blonde, which surprised me because I didn’t think the two of them could be friends. Although my wife, Shirley, is a good woman and she has some friends who are downright obnoxious, I’ll tell you. This one gal, Myra’s her name, Myra Tallman, well she—”

Keegan, sensing that Ned Hartigan is the kind of man who can easily lose track of a conversation, interrupts. “Excuse me, Mr. Hartigan, but how did the woman from Boston seem?”

“How did she
seem?
” he repeats, not missing a beat, which tells Keegan that he must be used to being interrupted. “What do you mean?”

“Was she . . . I don’t know. Nervous?”

“Not really. Just a little stand-offish, maybe. But real nice. You could tell. She was probably just shy. Didn’t want to open up much about herself, not like some of the tourists who stop by.”

That’s Jennie, all right,
Keegan thinks as Danny says, “My sister doesn’t have a shy bone in her body. You’d know if you met her. She’s a real chatterbox.”

“Wish I could say I’d seen her, son,” Ned replies.

They all fall silent as the pickup truck plods along the road that has started curving away from the boardwalk. Keegan stares vacantly out the window at the boarded-up shops and hotels, some bearing signs that read “See you in June!”

Dusk is falling rapidly and the snow is coming down harder than ever. The truck’s windshield wipers beat a bleak rhythm that seems to be echoing the refrain in Keegan’s head—
Find Jennie. Find Jennie. Find Jennie . . .

“There’s the inn, up ahead,” Ned Hartigan says suddenly, pointing. “On that little rise, to the right.”

Danny and Keegan lean forward, peering through the stormy twilight outside the truck.

Keegan’s shoulder and arm are against Danny’s, and he can feel the guy’s apprehension as Hartigan slows the truck even more and starts to pull off the road.

“Say,” Ned Hartigan leans forward over the wheel, “isn’t that . . .”

Keegan catches sight of what he’s looking at. A car is just pulling out onto the road from the other side of the inn, its headlights cutting an arc through the blustery shadows.

“Is it a cop car?” Danny asks just as Keegan catches a glimpse of the official insignia on the door and the round dome on the roof.

“Sure is . . . only one on the island. That’s Sherm Crandall,” Ned says. “Must be headed back to his house. Lives up toward the center of the island.”