Heat Wave (4 page)

“Yes. But bare breasts on the town
beach?”

“It was a mishap. It was all over in less
than ten seconds. A police officer was there. I wish dumping ice on
someone’s back was a crime, but it wasn’t. If it was, you’d be
lecturing that obnoxious boy instead of me right now.”

Stuart seemed to shrink. “I’m not lecturing
you, Meredith,” he said, sounding far more apologetic than the
occasion called for. “I’m just saying, let’s not let this happen
again.”

Of course. As if Meredith would ever, in her
entire life, unfasten the top of her swimsuit again. Even in the
privacy of her own home—she’d figure out a way to remove her
swimsuit bra without opening it. Some Peeping Tom might be lurking
in the bushes outside her window with a periscope and an ice
bucket. You just never knew.

“It will not happen again,”
she said, no longer exerting herself to smile. For the first time
since the policeman on the beach had thrown a towel over her, she
felt dirty. Foul. Stuart’s lecture—and it
was
a lecture, regardless of what he
claimed—made her feel cheap and tawdry.

She couldn’t tell him that, though. She had
to remain pleasant and polite, so he wouldn’t veto the tenure
recommendation the English department might make on her behalf.

“If that’s all…?” She rose to her feet.

Stuart stood, too. “That’s all,” he said.
“I’m sorry this happened.”

“Believe me, so am I.” She nodded, pivoted,
and marched out of his office.

She felt herself deflate as soon as she
reached her car in the faculty lot behind the school building. She
unlocked it and slumped onto the seat. Having baked in the summer
sun for the past seven hours, the Prius’s interior was hotter than
a blast furnace. She turned on the engine, cranked up the air
conditioning, and tried to think.

What if Mr. Solomon’s
cryptic text meant something other than that her case was done?
What if it meant he’d done his best, but her fate remained in the
hands of the police department? What if it meant he’d given it a
shot and now was done with her? What if it meant
she
was done?

If her car didn’t cool down soon, she’d be
well-done. She studied her hands, half-expecting to see her fingers
crisping up like strips of bacon in the scorching heat. Closing her
eyes, she tried to conjure a vision of this parking lot last
February, when the plows had left four-foot-tall heaps of snow
around the lot’s perimeter. The image failed to cool her down,
however. As soon as she visualized the snow, she visualized herself
wrapped in layers—turtleneck, cardigan, wool slacks, fleece-lined
boots, a down jacket, a knitted scarf, insulated gloves. She
quickly opened her eyes.

Done
. What if it didn’t mean what she’d thought?

She pulled out her phone, reread the
attorney’s message, and then pressed the icon next to the phone
number from which he’d sent the text. His phone rang four times,
and then his voice broke in: “Caleb Solomon here. I can’t take your
call right now. Leave a message.”

She bit back a curse, then scrolled through
the phone’s contact list until she found the number for his office.
He must have sent the text from his personal cell phone. Surely his
receptionist would answer the office phone.

She did. “Chase, Mullen and Solomon,
Attorneys-at-Law,” she sing-songed. “May I help you?”

“I need to speak to Caleb Solomon,” Meredith
said.

“He’s with a client right now,” the
receptionist told her.

Meredith almost retorted that she was a
client, too. But for one thing, she figured she couldn’t possibly
rank high among his clients. For another, she was a well-bred
southern woman. Even under threat of death, she’d be hard-pressed
to make rude demands. It just wasn’t in her.

“Would it be possible to
talk to him when he’s finished with his client?” she asked. “Can I
call him back, or have him call me? It’s important.” She stumbled a
bit on that last word. It was important to
her
, certainly, concerning not just
her tenure but also her status with Stuart Kezerian, who seemed to
think she was the star of some students’ X-rated fantasies.
“Perhaps I could stop by his office—”

“He’s not in his office right now,” the
receptionist said. “He’s…well, I guess they’re still setting up.
He’s holding a press conference on the steps of Town Hall. But I
don’t think he’ll want to be disturbed. I can have him call you
tomorrow, Ms…?”

“No, that’s fine,” Meredith said, then
disconnected the call. He was holding a press conference on the
steps of Town Hall? Well, that sure put her in her place. The
client he was with right now was apparently worthy of a press
conference. Her trivial citation most definitely was not. Top
lawyers like Caleb Solomon had bigger fish to fry—and they weren’t
crawfish.

Still, her tenure was
important to her, if not to anyone else. If by
done
, Mr. Solomon had meant he was
done with her, she needed to find someone else to help her get her
public indecency charge dismissed.

Her car had cooled down enough for her to
drive. She ought to go straight home, take an icy shower, wrap
herself in a robe, and fill a glass with something simple and
potent. Chilled white wine would do.

But her hands on the steering wheel and her
foot on the gas pedal ignored ought-to’s, and she found herself
driving east, toward the heart of Brogan’s Point, to the grassy
square bordered by the Catholic church, the Unitarian church, the
Methodist church, the town library, the charming old brownstone
that housed the Historical Society and the Brogan’s Point Seafaring
Museum, and, on the northwest corner, Town Hall.

Brogan’s Point’s Town Hall building was a
classic New England structure: red brick, tall windows flanked by
black shutters, a portico adorned with classic white columns, and
broad steps leading from its double doors down to the sidewalk. The
driveway cutting around the building to a parking lot at the rear
was currently clogged with vans bearing the logos of several news
stations out of Boston, and a crowd had gathered on the sidewalk at
the base of the stairs. Meredith eased her car past the vans to the
parking lot, turned off the engine, and stepped out into the muggy
late-afternoon heat.

Joining the throng on the sidewalk, she
noticed a podium positioned about halfway up the stairs, with a
microphone clamped to it. A few TV reporters stood on the grass,
speaking into wireless microphones while camera operators filmed
them, using the bucolic town green as a backdrop. Meredith
recognized two of the reporters from local news broadcasts.

So Mr. Solomon truly was
going to hold a press conference. Meredith felt absurdly
insignificant. When it came to her minor transgression, of course
he was
done
.

I can’t keep from
crying,
she thought, then snorted. She was
tough. If Mr. Solomon dropped her case, she’d hire someone else. Or
fight the citation herself. If worse came to worst and she was
denied tenure—or fired—she’d find another teaching job. And dress
in a burka, so her students wouldn’t get crushes on her.

She realized she wasn’t even close to tears.
The words had come to her in a driving rhythm, lyrics from the song
she’d heard at the Faulk Street Tavern yesterday.

“Heat Wave”
was an appropriate song, given the sultry weather.
But something told her the weather had nothing to do with that
song’s having become stuck inside her head. It was because she was
about to see Mr. Solomon. Because they’d shared that song in some
way.

The front doors of the Town Hall swung open,
and Mr. Solomon emerged, along with a slightly paunchy, balding
older man. The reporters raced to the sidewalk at the foot of the
steps. A camera operator on Meredith’s left jostled her and she
moved a step back, out of his way. She didn’t want to stand too
close to the front of the crowd. If Mr. Solomon spotted her, he
might think she was a pest, bothering him about her silly
misdemeanor when he was busy with a case meriting a press
conference.

Despite the heat, he was dressed formally,
in a pale gray suit and a dark gray tie, the knot tight against the
collar of his tailored shirt. His hair was not quite as
conservative as his apparel; parted on one side, it flopped onto
his brow, and he jerked his head to toss it off his face. The man
with him was dressed marginally more casually, in khaki trousers, a
polo shirt and a navy blue blazer. He looked like someone on his
way to the country club for a round of golf. Meredith thought she
might have seen him somewhere before, but she couldn’t recall
where. She’d probably seen dozens of men like him at her parents’
club; maybe that was why he looked familiar.

Mr. Solomon nudged the man toward the
podium. The man shot him a quick look, then pulled a folded sheet
of paper from an inner pocket of his blazer and leaned toward the
microphone. “I have a brief statement,” he said, then read from the
paper. “This morning, the district attorney of Essex County
produced an indictment against me, charging me with having
embezzled $864,225.00 from the Brogan’s Point employees’ pension
fund. This indictment is based solely on the allegations of Sheila
Valenti, our former town treasurer, who, I believe, is responsible
for the missing money and who is trying to divert suspicion from
herself onto me. I categorically deny these charges.” He folded the
paper and stuffed it back into his pocket.

Well, at least one thing he’d said was
irrefutable: that was a brief statement.

The reporters broke into a jumbled chorus of
shouted questions. Mr. Solomon raised his hand to silence them and
stepped up to the microphone. “Mr. Felton will not be answering any
questions at this time,” he said.

“Who are you?” one of the Boston TV
journalists shouted.

A reporter near her murmured, “That’s Caleb
Solomon. Serious legal firepower.”

Mr. Solomon answered from the podium. “I’m
Caleb Solomon. I will be representing Mr. Felton in this matter.
“

“The missing money is from the pension
fund?” someone shouted. “Does this mean retired town employees
won’t be receiving their pensions?”

“Accommodations will be made so no retired
employee misses his or her monthly pension check,” Mr. Solomon
said. “Ever since discovering that the funds were missing, Mr.
Felton has been working with the state auditor, insurance
companies, and others to recover this loss. Obviously, we expect
that once the legal system has performed its duty, the perpetrator
of this crime will repay what was stolen.”

“Did the DA issue an indictment based on
just the allegations of this one person?” a reporter asked.

“That seems to be it,” Mr.
Solomon replied. “I’ve read the indictment, and as Gertrude Stein
would say, there isn’t much
there
there.”

Quoting Gertrude Stein? Meredith’s heart
melted a little, and not from the heat. How could she not look
kindly on someone—even if he was a lawyer—when he cited a famous
literary figure in the middle of a press conference?

“Are you taking a leave of absence until
your case gets settled?” someone shouted.

Mr. Solomon’s client leaned toward the
microphone to answer, but the lawyer blocked him. “Mr. Felton will
be taking a paid leave,” he answered. “His assistant, Regina
Stoller, will be handling the town manager’s responsibilities until
this matter is resolved.”

Town manager. That was why Mr. Felton looked
familiar. As a diligent citizen, Meredith had attended a few town
meetings since moving to Brogan’s Point. She had probably seen him
there, droning about some bond issue or property easement. The town
meetings addressed important subjects: affordable housing,
Community Center facilities, and—near and dear to her—the school
department’s budget. But to partake of those discussions, she had
to sit through long, arid stretches during which fifteen residents
felt obliged to offer their opinions on whether the bathrooms in
the main fire station should be renovated, or whether the town
should license a second Starbucks franchise. She never attended a
town meeting without a book or her e-reader tucked into her bag.
Without something to keep her occupied during the drearier
presentations, she might nod off.

But she’d definitely seen Mr. Solomon’s
client at those meetings, providing data and narrating power-point
presentations. Jerry Felton. The Brogan’s Point town manager.

Charged with stealing nearly a million
dollars from the town’s pension fund.

No wonder Caleb Solomon had sent her his
succinct message. He had his hands full with a brewing municipal
scandal. He had news media all the way from Boston hanging on his
every word. He had to defend a public servant against a major
embezzlement charge. He probably hadn’t had time to type more than
a four-letter word into his phone before he raced off to rescue
Jerry Felton. She would have to find herself a new lawyer.

I can’t keep from crying…

For heaven’s sake, she
wasn’t crying. If there was moisture gathering below her eyes, it
was perspiration. She was hot, she was worried, and she was
done.

Some things were easy to fix. Some things,
not so much.

A five-minute chat with one Officer
Sulkowski had gotten Meredith Benoit’s citation voided. Caleb
hadn’t resorted to intimidation, but the patrolman had seemed
intimidated, anyway. Caleb supposed that Brogan’s Point’s finest
weren’t used to having an attorney sweep into the police station
and argue a misdemeanor. Caleb hadn’t really even argued it. He’d
simply pointed out that Meredith had been the victim of a prank
which had bordered on assault. Who posed the greater threat to
peace? Caleb had asked. A woman trying to defend herself against an
attack, or the boy who had attacked her?