Wall-To-Wall Dead (14 page)

But it wasn’t. The small hybrid was still there, like a smear of white in the gathering dark, parked in front of the building. I hurried over to the Beetle, three spaces down, unlocked the door and slid behind the wheel, and snapped off the overhead light just a second before the front door opened again, and Candy came through.

She was dressed in her usual tight jeans and a Barnham College hooded sweatshirt, with the ubiquitous ponytail and pink bubble gum. I could see her jaw moving from where I was.

She stopped for a second just outside the door and looked around, as if she thought she might have heard
something. I slid down in my seat until I could just barely see her above the dashboard, hoping that if I could hardly see her, maybe she wouldn’t notice me.

After a moment she took a left and headed for her car. I watched her go past the Beetle without a sideways glance, and heard the sound as she beeped off the hybrid’s car alarm. She slid behind the wheel and closed the door gently, and after a moment, the engine purred to life.

I expected her to turn on the headlights, but she must have forgotten about that little detail, because she just reversed out of the parking space and rolled slowly across the lot over to the road. There was no traffic to speak of this time of night, and a second later, she was on her way down the Augusta Road in the direction of town and Barnham College.

I left my own lights off as I followed, just in case she happened to look in the rearview mirror. When I got out onto the road itself, though, I thought I’d better adhere to the law, so I flipped them on. Candy had done the same; I could see her taillights a hundred yards or two up ahead.

With her lights on, she was fairly easy to follow in the dusk, and there wasn’t enough traffic on the road to cause a distraction. And as it turned out, she didn’t go far. Once we hit the Portland Highway and took a right—away from downtown Waterfield, toward Barnham College—only a minute or two passed before she signaled a right turn. I slowed down and followed. Right into the parking lot of Guido’s Pizzeria.

Well, that was a disappointment. She must have been talking to a friend on the phone, someone who knew what had happened in Candy’s building and who wanted to hear about the meeting with Wayne. There wasn’t anything sinister about it at all, no matter how adamant she had sounded on the phone.

Nonetheless, I slotted the Beetle into a parking spot and turned off the lights.

There was no sign of the hybrid, so after a brief battle with myself, I exited the car.

Guido’s is a low one-story cinder-block building that looks exactly like what it is: a roadside tavern. There are no windows save the one in the door, and no landscaping or other attempt to prettify the place. What you see is what you get: a squat, square building surrounded by parking spaces, and a neon sign flashing HOT-HOT-HOT, like a strip club.

That made me think of Derek, who was in Portland by now, probably into his third or fourth beer—or other alcoholic beverage—and who, for all I knew, was at a real strip club, toasting Ryan’s impending nuptials, with big-bosomed women strutting their stuff in front of him.

Not that I was worried. Derek isn’t the cheating type, and if he were, it wouldn’t be with someone whose bra size is bigger than her IQ. No offense.

And besides, I had more immediate matters to occupy me than the possibility that Ryan was corrupting my fiancé with women, wine, and song. Peering around the corner of the building, I saw a ghostly shape in the dark corner of the parking lot, under an overhanging tree: Candy’s hybrid.

The rest of the parking lot looked deserted, and she was parked nose forward into the corner. I knew she was meeting someone, so she’d probably be watching the lot in the rearview mirror. If I tried to move closer, she might see me, especially as I was wearing a pale yellow shirt, almost as bright as the neon sign on the roof. If I’d known I’d need to sneak through the dark spying on someone, I’d have chosen something black or navy blue, the better to blend into the shadows, but hindsight’s 20/20 and all that. It was what it was.

So I stayed close to the building, hiding between the cars and getting as close as I could to Candy without crossing the open expanse between the parking spaces around the restaurant itself and the parking spaces around the edges of the lot. I couldn’t get very close, but I comforted myself with the knowledge that I wouldn’t have been able to see anything even if I did. The corner under the tree was dark, and the interior light in the car was off. I couldn’t see Candy at all, not even as a dark outline.

Out on the road a car slowed down to pull into the parking lot. For a moment, the headlights illuminated the narrow space between the two cars, and I threw myself on the ground, heart pounding. If Candy had looked out at that moment, she would probably have seen my head lit up like a halo.

I thought this might have been whoever she was waiting for, but the car parked in a space near the front, and two people got out. A young couple, laughing and holding hands as they walked toward the entrance to the restaurant. I went back to watching and waiting.

There were sounds off to the left, around the back of the building, and for a second or two, the ground lit up. A shadow appeared, the elongated outline of a man, then the whole thing disappeared again, and I heard footsteps—hard soles slapping against the blacktop of the parking lot. Someone had opened the back door to the restaurant and had stepped through before closing the door again. A moment later, I could see the outline of a man walking briskly across the lot toward the hybrid in the corner.

By now it had gotten too dark to recognize anyone. It was a man, and his hair looked dark, but that was all I was able to see. I had no idea who he was, whether he was young or old, employee, patron, or what. He was just a shadow moving through the night. Until he reached Candy’s car and opened the passenger side door. Then the interior light came on for a moment. I saw the top of Candy’s head move as she turned to him, and saw him slide in next to her. The light went off again as soon as he closed the door behind him, but I’d seen enough to recognize him. It was the same man Candy had spoken to last time Derek and I had been inside Guido’s.

They spent five minutes together, nothing more, while I crouched between cars, eyes peeled to see what I could. It wasn’t much. As soon as the light went out, the interior of the car was plunged into stygian blackness again, under the tree. I couldn’t even see movement. Basically, they could have been doing anything at all in there. Although the car
didn’t move, so whatever they did involved minimal activity. Chances were they just sat there and talked.

After a few minutes, the passenger side door opened again, and the guy got out. He walked back across the parking lot to the restaurant, his movements quick and sort of angry. After he’d disappeared inside—the light and sound from the restaurant came back for a moment and then was cut off again when the back door closed—everything was still and quiet. Candy’s car didn’t move. The minutes ticked by, and I fidgeted.

Had something happened? Was she OK?

Had the guy killed her?

Should I go check?

I had just decided to stand up and make my way over there when the hybrid’s engine cranked over. I ducked down between the cars again, hurriedly, as the taillights came on and Candy backed out from under the tree. The tires squealed, and I wondered if she were angry, too. She drove as if she was.

She took a right on the road, heading back toward the Augusta Road and—I assumed—home. I thought about following her, but I was pretty sure I’d just be tailing her back to the condo.

Instead, I thought maybe I should follow the boyfriend.

If that’s what he was. He was much too old for her—late thirties, at a guess, while she was Brandon’s age—but there was definitely something going on between them. They were sneaking around, meeting in dark corners. From what I had been able to make out from hearing Candy’s side of their conversation, they’d been together last night, after the restaurant closed, and Candy had lied to Wayne about it. And besides, the fact that he was a man—good-looking, well-dressed, seemingly well-off—and she was a young, attractive blonde, made the assumption sort of automatic.

What was he doing here? He didn’t look like the type to frequent Guido’s. It caters to the college crowd, with student
waitresses, cheap beer, and pizzas. Barnham College was just a couple of miles down the road. A slick professional-looking guy in a designer suit didn’t fit the marketing demographic at all. He wasn’t a teacher, not unless he was brand-new this semester. I’d taught a couple classes at Barnham myself last spring, and I knew pretty much everyone on staff there.

Maybe he was the owner? Guido himself?

I had no idea who owned Guido’s Pizzeria. A lot of Italian places are family-run, with all the relatives pitching in. Stefano works the kitchen, Maria is the hostess, and Tony and Joey wait tables after school while Mamma Rosa folds napkins in a corner of the dining room. New York City’s Italian neighborhood, Little Italy, is full of restaurants like that.

This wasn’t one of them. The waitresses were all Barnham students, and so was the kitchen staff, at least from what I’d seen of it. But someone had to own Guido’s, whether his—or her—name was Guido or something else.

I made my way back to the Beetle and pulled out my phone.

It took a few rings, but finally Derek answered. “Yeah?” I could barely hear his voice over the din in the background. Loud music and what sounded like yelling.

“Where are you?” I asked.

“You checking up on me, Avery?” But his voice was amused, so I didn’t think he minded.

“I had a question.”

“Shoot.” It sounded like he took a drink of something while he waited.

“Where are you?”

“That’s the question?”

Not the one I’d called to ask, but now I wanted to know. “Strip club?”

“Something like that. Don’t worry, I’m just looking.”

“I’m not worried,” I said. “I’m sitting in the parking lot outside Guido’s.”

“Why? Afraid to go in?”

“Of course not. I just wanted to know if you knew who owns the place.”

“Guido’s?” He took another swig of whatever-it-was. “Why?”

“Just tell me if you do. It’s hard to hear with the music going on in the background. I want to get off the phone and let you get back to it.”

“I don’t know who owns it. Nobody local. Flatlanders, I think.”

“Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” Derek said.

“Are you having fun?”

He chuckled. “Oh, sure. A half dozen bachelors, a bunch of almost naked women, booze, and loud music. What’s not to enjoy?”

I laughed, too. “Stupid question, I guess.”

“Not really. I’d just as soon be home with you, with a pizza and a movie and Mischa trying to lie between us.”

“I miss you, too,” I said, touched. “But I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“You know where to go?”

“I’ll look up the directions on the Internet before I leave. I’ll see you around eleven.” The ceremony started at two, and it would take me a little time to get ready first.

“See you then,” Derek said, just as the music in the background changed to something that sounded suspiciously like the intro to “Pour Some Sugar on Me.” The yelling intensified. “What the…” Derek said, sounding suddenly very awake.

“What?”

“Nothing. Or nothing important. Just thought I saw someone I recognized.”

“Melissa?”

“Hardly,” Derek answered, but with a smile in his voice. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Avery.”

He hung up. I did the same, and leaned back in the seat, trying to get comfortable. It was just after nine thirty. I had
nowhere to be and no one to get home to. I could stay awhile.

I was still sitting there an hour later, but I was seriously contemplating leaving. College students and other young people of both sexes had come and gone, but there had been no sign of Candy’s boyfriend. And I had to pee. I suppose I could exit the car and use the bathroom in Guido’s—or alternatively, hide under the tree where Candy had parked her car earlier—but Guido’s restrooms are meant for patrons only, and although I doubted anyone would stop me if I pushed my way through the restaurant to use one, I didn’t want the boyfriend to see me. And the second option was just plain undignified. I was thirty-two—too old to squat behind a Dumpster.

And it was a good thing I didn’t, because just at the time I would have reached the bathroom at the back of the restaurant—or alternatively, just at the time I’d have been squatting, pants down to my ankles—the back door opened again, and Mr. Tall, Dark, and Handsome came out. If I’d been inside the restaurant, I’d have missed him. If I hadn’t…well, let’s just say that the idea of running through the parking lot zipping up my jeans so I could get to the Beetle and follow him before his car moved out of sight was just mortifying.

The car was a sleek BMW, late model. Convertible, although the top was up now in September. The color was difficult to ascertain in the dark, but it was either black or navy blue, possibly green. And when it left the parking lot, it took off in the same direction as Candy: toward Barnham College and the condo building. I waited a few seconds and fell in behind.