The Secret Hour (19 page)

 
It had been a beautiful summer night, a full moon rising over Silver Bay. The women had worn sleeveless dresses, the men had worn blue blazers. Theresa had made the canapes; Sally had brought a casserole. After so many proms and dances and bonfires together over the years, this was their first gathering as adults.

 
The Judge had hired a band, and people were dancing. John had looked around: The party was for him, and he loved everyone there. He was a lawyer now, or would be as soon as he passed the bar exam in July. Real life was about to begin. He felt Billy grab his arm, and he pulled Theresa.

 
The inner core—Billy, Barkley, John, and Theresa—slipped away, behind the privet hedge alongside the garage.

 
“We should get Jen and Felicity,” Theresa said. “The other wives…”

 
“In a minute,” Billy said, producing a bottle of champagne. “This is just for us—the four musketeers.”

 
“Three,” Theresa said, smiling, trying to back away. “I don’t belong.”

 
“Always did and always will,” Billy said. “Johnny made sure of that.”

 
“You’re the fourth musketeer, Theresa,” Barkley said. “Even Jen and Felicity know that.”

 
“I’m honored,” Theresa said, smiling. John had felt so proud to be married to her. She looked radiant in her summer dress, tan and slim. Her eyes were glowing, as if she knew the secret of life, that it was a wild adventure, that she knew that these were her companions for the ride.

 
“This is it,” Billy said, preparing to pop the cork. “Here’s to John O’Rourke, Silver Bay’s latest lawyer.”

 
“And Billy Manning,” John said. “Silver Bay’s latest cop.”

 
“I’ve been on the force three years now.” Billy laughed. “Got a head start on you—I bust them and you’ll try to get them off.”

 
“I’ll represent them,” John said.

 
“Call it whatever you want, Johnny,” Billy said, holding the bottle. “For the first time in our lives, we’re about to be on opposite sides. I’ll kick your ass, too—don’t think I won’t.”

 
“I’ll kick yours back, Officer Manning,” John joked.

 
“Just read everyone their rights, Billy,” Barkley said, “so John can’t get them off on technicalities.”

 
“I don’t care what happens as long as we stay friends through it all. Here’s to that, okay? This toast is to you—”

 
“And you.” John nodded.

 
“Don’t leave out Barkley Jenkins, keeper of the light,” Theresa said with a laugh.

 
“And Theresa O’Rourke,” John said, holding her close. “Love of my life.”

 
“Cheers,” Billy said, the cork shooting into the side of the garage, the impact sounding like a pistol shot. The four of them laughed, passing the bottle of Mumms Cordon Rouge around. John’s and Billy’s eyes met, silently acknowledging this crossroads in their friendship.

 
John had kissed champagne from Theresa’s lips; he could almost taste it still. He and his friend Billy had survived life’s changes; he and his wife had not…

 
Now, standing in the Witch’s Brew parking lot, the music was still audible through the bar’s thick walls. John’s ears rang, and his clothes smelled like smoke.

 
“Spill it, O’Rourke,” Billy said now, staring at him.

 
“It’s not that simple.”

 
“Nothing ever is. You think you’ll get disbarred for talking to me? Well, fuck it. We both know that’s not gonna happen.” Billy laughed, reminding John that they were friends first, cop and lawyer second. He was tall and dark, his face rough and angular, his nose still crooked from when he’d gotten hit with a beer bottle in eleventh grade; when he’d decided to join the state police, all their friends had teased him that he looked more like the bad guy than a cop.

 
“Off the record…” John said.

 
“What do you mean?”

 
“I mean, what I’m about to ask you is delicate.”

 
“Delicate for who?”

 
“Me. My client.”

 
“Ah.” Billy smiled. “Greg Merrill raises his ugly head.”

 
“I didn’t say that.”

 
“You don’t have to. You’re running yourself so ragged working on his case, you got no room on your calendar for any other scumbag. What’s his problem?”

 
John hesitated. More cars drove into the parking lot. Although the two men were standing in back, far from the bright lights, John had the fleeting thought that a reporter could make plenty of a back-alley conversation between Merrill’s lawyer and his arresting officer.

 
“Don’t worry, John. Ask me. It won’t come back to bite you in the ass.”

 
“I don’t want to give anything up…”

 
“Hey, I’m half in the bag. I probably won’t even remember this conversation tomorrow. I’m an excellent forgetter of conversations, and you know it. Shoot.”

 
“Willa Harris,” John said, ignoring the dig. His heart beating in his throat, he watched Billy’s eyes. They didn’t react, didn’t even blink.

 
“What’s a Willa Harris? That a boy or a girl?”

 
“Girl. Missing person.”

 
“Huh. Doesn’t ring a bell,” Billy said, frowning. “Round when?”

 
“She went missing six months ago.”

 
“Right at the peak of Greggie’s run. Where’d you hear about her?”

 
“From Kate Harris, her older sister. She came to see me a few days ago.”

 
“Willa’s still missing?”

 
“Yes.”

 
“How’d her big sister trace her here?”

 
“A postcard of the East Wind,” John said. “Mailed from Silver Bay last April, but not received until recently. The sister’s divorced; apparently Willa and Kate’s husband had a thing going, and Willa needed to get away to think about it.”

 
“Maybe Kate got jealous and—”

 
“Doesn’t strike me that way,” John said quickly.

 
“Maybe the husband got worried. Willa threatened to tell, Kate was breathing down his neck.” Billy exhaled, shaking his head. “Wouldn’t want to be there myself—the ham in a sister sandwich. Sounds dangerous.”

 
John nodded. “Kate says she reported her sister missing back then, that the word went out.”

 
“FBI?”

 
“No. No suspicion of kidnapping.”

 
“Huh. Well, you know how that works. I might have gotten notice, but if there wasn’t reason to think she’d been in our area, I’d have passed right over the sheet. Maybe it was a different East Wind…”

 
John shook his head. “Nope. I saw the card.”

 
“And the trail stopped here?” Billy asked, frowning.

 
“No—it went on to Fairhaven, Massachusetts, Newport, Providence…”

 
“There you go!” Billy said, shrugging. “Why’s the sister bothering you—as if I didn’t know?”

 
“Merrill.”

 
“Obviously. He’s the most famous serial killer in New England, the time frame works, why shouldn’t he have been the one? Did you tell her he’s but one of many such cuties plying their trade, that her sister’s probably—”

 
“No,” John said, for some reason cutting Billy off, not wanting to think of all the other predators out there, or of Kate’s sister’s fate.

 
“You know, if the general public knew what we know…Ever think of that, Johnny?”

 
“Not when I can help it.”

 
“It’s like that thing with sharks…You know from fishing, right?”

 
“Know what?”

 
“How people would be horrified to know what’s swimming around them every time they go in the water. There’s that old saw about most shark attacks occurring within ten feet of shore, in three feet of water…and everyone thinks that’s because it’s where all the swimmers swim.”

 
John was silent, watching the beam of Silver Bay Light cross the sky, reflecting off the low, black clouds. There wasn’t a star in the sky.

 
“When, in fact, it’s that sharks are
everywhere
,” Billy said.

 
“I know.”

 
“It’s the same with freaking killers. Everyone loves it when someone like Merrill gets caught. That gives them their explanation for all the free-floating evil in the world. You serve up the Breakwater Killer and everyone breathes a sigh of relief. They vote for the death penalty, and they think they’re safe from another monster.”

 
“Careful—your liberal colors are showing.”

 
 
“Bullshit. They can’t juice him fast enough to suit me. I’m just saying, he’s just another shark in the cove. Plenty more where he came from—they just haven’t been classified yet.”

 
“I know. So—nothing on Willa Harris?”

 
Billy shook his head. “No. Tell me, though—are you asking on Merrill’s account? Or the big sister’s?”

 
“I’m not sure,” John said honestly. He shook Billy’s hand, ignoring the concern in his friend’s eyes. The first freezing raindrops began to fall. They stung like ice, like tiny razors on the skin. He started toward his car, then half turned. “Ever been to Fairhaven?”

 
Billy nodded. “Mass? Sure. I’ve bought fishing gear there. A great little store just east of the boatyards. Why?”

 
“You know where the Texaco station is?” For some reason, asking the question made John’s heart speed up. He swallowed hard, past the ache in his throat. He hoped Billy wouldn’t say,
At a convenience store, in a strip mall with a Laundromat…

 
“I don’t know, man,” Billy said. “You’re on your own, there. You want me to call Fairhaven P.D.?”

 
“Nah,” John said. “I can always call Information.”

 
Billy waved, heading back into the Witch’s Brew. The door opened, letting out loud music and voices. John caught a glimpse of people, of all those women at the bar. He had a picture of people having fun, trying to make a connection. He thought of Sally, and then of Theresa. Their girls’-nights-out had occasionally included the Witch’s Brew on a Friday.

 
Then John thought of Kate Harris. He wondered what she was doing tonight. Was she, perhaps, inside right now?

 
Something made him think she wasn’t. He imagined the East Wind, perched on the high bluff overlooking the sea. It would be blustery out there with sleet driving in off the Atlantic, the lighthouse illuminating the low storm clouds and the building white waves. His fingers brushed her sister’s picture, still in his pocket.

 
His chest felt frozen. He thought of Kate Harris, a stranger who’d told him her story so easily—as if she’d needed someone to trust and talk to, as if John was that person—the second time they’d met. When Billy had gotten too close, trying to talk about what Theresa had done, John had pushed him away.

 
Maybe it was only possible to talk about it with someone who had gone through the same thing. It was a very intimate thing, adultery. Between the married couple, one of the most private things there was. Making love, planning a wedding, conceiving a child, cooking your first holiday meal, going to your first PTA meeting: all things that bound a couple closer and closer, events that only they could share and know, memories they would take to their graves.

 
Adultery could be part of that list. The shadow of all those shining times; the flip side of the bright coin of marriage. For infidelity to cut as sharply as Theresa’s, there had had to be so many things in place: trust, hope, longevity, family, and love. If those hadn’t been present, what difference would her cheating have made?

 
John had loved her so much. He remembered back to law school; they had lived in a big, old Victorian house on MacArthur Boulevard, and John had ridden his bike to classes at the law center on Capitol Hill. She would rub his shoulders while he studied, he would bring her breakfast in bed on weekends. They had been so inseparable that she’d sometimes come to class with him, listening to Irving Younger’s tapes on evidence, sitting through hours of contracts and torts.

 
John never would have believed they could grow apart. It had happened slowly, without his even noticing. Anniversaries and birthdays, if not actually missed, then neglected. He had taken her for granted. And it worked both ways—sometimes he had felt more like a wallet with legs than a man. She bought, he paid. She adored the kids and raised them well; she made it possible for him to work late, to attend conferences, to not be there as often as he wanted to.