Don't Go Home (5 page)

Annie pulled her cell from her pocket. Marian was in her Favorites list. She swiped the name and listened as the phone rang and rang. When voice mail came on, she hesitated, then said uncertainly, “Marian, you know if I can help, I will.”

She put the cell back in her pocket. Had Marian seen caller ID and chosen not to answer? Was Marian on her way to the Seaside Inn?

Annie looked out at the thickening shadows. Was there anything she could do? Would it help or hurt if she asked Alex for the sake of decency to leave people in peace? Annie jumped to her feet. She couldn't sit here, listening to the cicadas and the frogs, and do nothing to help Marian. At least, whatever happened, Annie could be there for
Marian.

T
he parking lot on the west side of the inn was almost full. Annie found an empty space at the end of the third row. She could easily have walked over to the inn. Their house was only a half mile distant on a path that wound through a thick forest of live oaks, slash pine, bayberry, ferns, and saw palmettos. The night forest was cheerful, crickets and cicadas serenading, greenery rustling in a slight breeze, birds chattering in the treetops, but the night also hosted foxes, raccoons, cotton rats, possibly even a wild boar. Most fearsome to Annie was the possibility of stumbling over an alligator. A lagoon, home to several of the huge creatures, lay midway between their house and the inn. Alligators might look like logs with legs but they could outrun humans, and mama alligators didn't take kindly to any perceived threat to their babies.

Annie crossed the parking lot in deepening shadows as the sun continued to slip behind majestic pines. At the back of the inn, she made a slow circuit of the terrace, looking for Marian. She spotted
her in the shadows of the gazebo. Even dimly seen, the stiffness of her posture was evident; it said,
Don't come near, leave me alone.

A great majority of seats were taken but people still streamed toward the rows of white folding chairs. There was a festive air. Free entertainment was always a hit. That afternoon's
Gazette
had carried a half-page ad apparently placed by Rae. Either it had been too late for Rae to cancel the ad or she didn't mind leaving Death on Demand on the hook as a sponsor. There was nothing Annie could do about that.

DEATH ON DEMAND
Presents

ALEX GRIFFITH

Famous Southern Author

GRIFFITH'S Promise:
You Won't Be Bored

True Facts Behind Double-Dealing,
Freewheeling, Scandalous Lives
8
P.M.
Wednesday, Free Admission,
Seaside Inn Gazebo

Annie stopped and scanned the crowd. She knew many of those attending. She watched as guests found seats, turned to talk to friends. Convivial groups clustered near two cash bars. Laughter rose on the night air amid the light high sound of women talking and the deeper rumble of men's voices.

She looked for particular faces, found them. Her careful rereading of
Don't Go Home
, now that she knew Alex's connection to Joan Turner, opened doors these islanders had surely thought closed to the world at
large. Those in the family and connected to Alex were well aware what a careful reading revealed. They dared not stay away. What if Alex told everyone? That possibility brought them. They knew at terrible personal cost the truth behind Alex Griffith's characters. She saw that knowledge as she studied them, one by one. Each made an effort to appear as usual, but perhaps no one can face disgrace, embarrassment, perhaps criminal accusations, and maintain a bright and comfortable facade. Deep inside she felt a sickening realization that they would also associate this night with her and Death on Demand. Tomorrow she'd put an ad in the
Gazette
, disclaim all responsibility.

Annie felt enormous sympathy as well as a disturbing frisson of threat and darkness as she looked from face to face.

The provocative sentences in Ginger Harris's lead floated in her mind.

Has Martin felt remorse?

A fatal car wreck in the novel, not a sailing accident, a woman who died, not a man. In the book, Martin ran through the money that his wife, Regina, inherited, then pressured her until she took out an insurance policy. Her death was accidental but perhaps there was a sense that Regina welcomed death, that she drove fast and recklessly, angry with her husband. The kernel of the story was true here, an accidental death and the payoff of a huge insurance policy, a spouse saved from financial ruin, a speculator saved from disgrace. Martin and Regina in the novel represented Lynn Griffith and her late husband, Heyward. Lynn was Heyward's well-heeled widow after his sailboat was found drifting. Heyward's body floated to shore three days later.

Tonight Lynn was a vision of elegance in a pale green silk jacket with oversized shimmering abalone-shell buttons. Lynn stared at the empty gazebo. There was no social smile this evening.

Will Buck keep Louanne's secret?

Alex Griffith wasn't onstage yet. Would he appear in a white planter's suit, shades of Tom Wolfe? Had Rae arranged for a spot to illuminate him? A TV camera crew moved a little restively near one side of the gazebo. The comely reporter, swirling black hair, smoothly made-up face, checked her watch, tapped an impatient foot.

When Alex appeared, he would be handsome, virile, exuding charm just as the rumpled ad exec Buck did in Alex's book. Alex's self-portrait was admiring. Buck was the eye through which everyone in the novel was viewed, including Louanne, who was unhappily married to a feckless alcoholic. An impetuous affair. An unexpected pregnancy. A cuckolded husband who never knew. Annie thought about Marian's freckle-faced son, not dark like Marian and her ex-husband, but fair like Alex Griffith, a sunny kid with golden brown hair.

Marian still lurked in the shadows on the far side of the gazebo, close to a path that led to the rooms in the east wing. She would see Alex as soon as he reached the terrace.

Will Mary Alice ever tell Charles the truth?

Joan Turner, Alex's sister, rested a sharply pointed chin on the back of a fist. She was undoubtedly attractive, the pale blue linen dress perfect for her coal black hair, but her rigid posture betrayed her. She sat stiff and still, her thin face expressionless in the fading light. The passage in the novel detailing a sister's affair had been explicit. Now Joan's husband, Leland, looked toward the gazebo, but he radiated awareness of his wife beside him. Abruptly, Joan came to her feet. She bent, murmured something, then moved out into the aisle. She walked swiftly toward the back of the inn. Leland Turner twisted in his seat and watched as she disappeared inside the inn.

As he swings a golf club, enjoying power and pleasure, does Kenny think of a wasted form lying on a bed?

Annie recalled the narrative and the evocation of a powerful alpha
male. The fact that Eddie Olson was here revealed him as Kenny in the book. This gathering wasn't loud, brash Eddie Olson's milieu. In her occasional chats with him at parties or charity golf tournaments, he never mentioned books or reading, which usually came up since she was a bookseller. He never evinced any interest in Death on Demand. He could describe play by play the Citadel football games for the last twenty years. He talked about football, his latest golf score, football, the odds on the Kentucky Derby, football . . . He stood near a cash bar, gripping a drink. His heavy face was impassive. Burly and muscular, he stood with his feet apart, like a boxer balancing. Abruptly, he lifted the glass, drank the contents down, turned back toward the bar.

Does Frances remember choking in the water . . .

Another gender change, but Frances in the book was clearly a feminized George Griffith, fairly unkempt dark hair in loose curls, a little too much lipstick. George's shaggy hair was dark and curly. He might have been a handsome teenager, but too many drinks over too many years had coarsened his features. Oddly he didn't hold a glass in his hand tonight. Annie thought it might be the first time in a social situation with alcohol available that she had not seen a glass in his plump hand. He stood to one side of the path, his expression brooding. In the book Frances had been the lushly beautiful teenage girl, drunk, unsteady, clothes sopping, crying, “It wasn't my fault. The mist. The bicycle came out of nowhere . . .”

All of them were here to find out what Alex Griffith was going to say in his well-modulated, expressive voice. Would he read passages from the book, toy with those who were afraid, or did he intend to talk about himself? Annie suspected that in Alex's world it was always all about him: how he saw everything, how nothing escaped him, how delicately and perfectly he could wring laughter or tears.

A smug voice at her shoulder oozed pleasure. “I always wished
I'd lived in first-century Rome. What could be more thrilling than watching lions devour those tiresome Christians? This is the next-best thing. Love Lynn's face. Pure Ibsen. Not quite as supercilious as she was at the last Friends meeting.” Two little sniffs followed. The sniffs were habitual, an annoying accompaniment that always concluded breathy observations.

Annie didn't turn to look. She knew the voice and the sniffs. “Hello, Warren.” Warren Foster was the kind of person who couldn't be avoided in a small town. In his early thirties, though his fussy manner made him seem older, he lived on inherited money. He was ubiquitous on boards, at charity events, never missed a meeting of Friends of the Library. He knew everyone and absorbed gossip, innuendo, and outright slander with the delight of a connoisseur. His pale green eyes roved every gathering as he looked for hints of discord, acrimony, lust, or fear.

“Now, now, Annie, don't pretend you don't know what I mean. This may be the most exciting evening our little island has enjoyed in a long time. You may have missed the best part of the show, a delicious riff on foreplay. I've been watching them come and go for quite a while. Nervous as cats on a hot sidewalk.” Sniff sniff.

Warren Foster moved nearer, leaned to murmur in her ear.

Annie's nose wrinkled at the heavy scent of peppermint.

“Joan's hopped up and down a half dozen times. Leland sits there and looks after her and I'll bet a penny to a farthing—”

Weedy Warren Foster was tall and a little stooped. Ever since a summer at Oxford, he'd affected day cravats (even Warren wouldn't dare an ascot with a tweed jacket) and sprinkled Britishisms with abandon:
mum
for mother,
biscuit
for cookie,
bonnet
for hood. From the corner of her eye, she noted the day cravat was a deep purple, his shirt gray, and thought longingly how nice the cravat would look
stuffed between his thin lips or tied around his long, thin nose, possibly muting those inevitable sniffs.

“—he knows all about her fling. Husbands can sense these things. At least that's what I've been told. As for Eddie Olson”—a slight shudder—“he's as appalling now as he was in high school. I avoided meeting him in a hallway. What a brute. Looked at me like I was a palmetto bug. But I didn't know until I read the book that he was the one who hurt Michael Smith. I knew he was sullen that Michael beat him in tennis. Never a good idea to beat someone like Eddie. Of course, he relished football. Physical, you know. Star turns for bullies. I didn't go to football games, my dear. Savagery, that's what football is. Everyone said, ‘Oh well, too bad, these things happen.' Eddie still has that tough-guy glare but he's restless tonight, too. He can't stand still for long. First he's here, then there.” Sniff sniff. “Then there's poor George Griffith.” The light high malicious voice was regretful. “He used to be much better looking, but he's let himself go. A definite potbelly. Cute on pigs and babies. Someone should tell—”

“Oh golly, Warren, I see a customer I need to say hello to. Excuse me. Good to see you.” She didn't want to spend another instant listening to that soft trickle of venom, but Warren's patter was a harsh reminder that she wasn't alone in connecting islanders to Alex's book. At least Warren hadn't mentioned Marian.

She strode firmly away, skirting those who had yet to take seats, until she reached a favorite customer, SueLee Douglas. “Margaret Maron's new book will arrive next week. Do you want me to hold a copy?”

They chatted for a moment, then Annie edged nearer the gazebo, though she made no effort to make eye contact with Marian, whose thin face was turned toward the steps.

Near the steps, the TV reporter shrugged her shoulders impatiently.
Her photogenic face was abruptly not quite so lovely, perfect brows drawn in a frown, lips pressed together. She glanced at her watch. Likely the crew intended to film a portion of Alex Griffith's talk, then leave to catch the nine o'clock ferry back to the mainland.

Annie looked at her watch. Five minutes after eight. Abruptly she made up her mind. Maybe it wouldn't matter but she was going to find Alex Griffith, try to stop him. She knew she had to move fast. Maybe Alex was waiting for the lights to dim, intending a dramatic entrance up the center aisle.

Annie was painfully aware of Marian's hunched figure a few feet away. Annie knew that she was helpless to prevent misery for Marian. Nothing stopped an avalanche. But she could try. She started toward the far side of the terrace.

The TV reporter, who had forgotten to smile, huffed, moved with a grim face, dark hair swinging. In two long-legged strides, she reached Rae Griffith. The reporter's gestures were clear. One bright nail tapped the wrist with a watch, a slender hand swept toward the gazebo.

Annie had no difficulty imagining the cool, modulated tone as the reporter pointed out they had a ferry to catch, and where was the speaker?

Rae brushed back a strand of silky black hair, her expression ingratiating. She said something, then quickly ducked around the reporter and walked fast toward the inn. She passed within a few feet of Marian.

Marian's face . . .

Annie hurried after Rae.

Rae was at the corner of the inn.

“Rae,” Annie called out, starting to run, her steps loud on the terrace. Maybe Rae would help.

Rae Griffith half turned, frowned, looked both impatient and irritated. “A little late, aren't you? Did you change your mind?”

Annie skidded to a stop. “I'm not here about books. I wouldn't bring books for him ever. I'm here about people. Can't you stop him?”

Rae's irritated look slid away, replaced by a mixture of regret and uneasiness. Her expressive face was suddenly forlorn, weary. “I've tried.” She pressed her lips together for an instant, then blurted out, “Everything's a mess. Look, I don't have time to talk now, the TV crew's about to leave. I have to get him.”