You Deserve to Know

Chapter 41

41

NOW

Gwen puts Anton’s journal in her bag and goes outside. She’s halfway up Aimee’s walkway when the door opens.

“Hey,” Gwen says. “I was just coming to see you.”

“Now’s not a good time.”

“Where you heading?”

“Frederick. It’s a long story, but I hope I can find out something about Cathy.”

“I’ll come with you. Keep you company.”

Aimee hesitates. “I don’t know.”

“That’s what you said yesterday when you went to Cathy’s house, and it was because of me—well, because of Sababa, actually—that we found Scott’s car.”

Aimee pauses and Gwen takes the opportunity to open the passenger door of her truck. “Anyway, there’s something you’re going to want to hear. I think I figured out what Anton was blackmailing Scott about.”

“Fine.” Aimee climbs in.

Aimee pulls the truck out of the driveway.

“Thank you for being there yesterday,” Aimee says in a somewhat begrudging tone. “You were helpful.”

“Of course. I want to help, Aimee. I want you to know that I will never forgive myself for not coming to you as soon as Anton said something to me. And I will do everything I can to make that up to you.” Gwen adds, “Besides, I need to get out of my house. I’m slowly going insane in there. Can you tell me where we are going?”

“I found this.” Aimee pulls something out of her jacket and puts it on the console between them.

Gwen picks it up. “A loyalty card?”

“Noa had it. Apparently, she’s got quite the sticky fingers.” Aimee lets out a short laugh, but it sounds fake. “I found her box of goodies the other day. She said it was all taken from Cathy’s house. But then this morning she told me there was one thing not from the house, but from Cathy’s car.”

“This card.”

“Yup.”

“So you think where Cathy really lives must be close to where this coffee shop is?”

“That’s the idea.” She glances over at Gwen. “Too far-fetched?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Sounds reasonable to me,” Gwen says. “What are you planning to do if you do get an address? Barge in with your hedge clippers and demand answers?”

This gets a faint smile from Aimee. “I hadn’t thought that far ahead.”

“What about calling that detective? Detective Salazar.”

Aimee scowls. “And say what?”

“Say exactly what you told me.”

“I’d sound crazy.”

“You don’t sound crazy. And I’m not sure it’s a good idea to go chasing after this woman. She could be dangerous.” Gwen retrieves the notebook from her bag. “If I’m right, then I think I know who she is.”

Aimee shoots her a sidelong glance. “What is that?”

Gwen turns over the black notebook in her lap. “It’s Anton’s. It looks like he was doing research for his next novel. The thing you should know about Anton, he likes to base his fiction on real people and real feelings.”

“Go on.”

“His first book, The Last Cyclamen , the one about the young French-Lebanese woman who had a fling with an older man in Beirut before the war?”

Aimee shrugs. “I never actually read it.”

Gwen laughs. “That’s okay. Turns out no one in my family did, either. The heart of the story was this girl’s coming of age back when Beirut was called the Paris of the Middle East. How one summer, an older wealthy man seduced her and she shed her sheltered religious upbringing under his guidance. And the guilt she felt in betraying her family’s values, but how she was so enthralled by the glamour of this new world he was introducing her to. Only, all the best parts, the ones that showcased Anton’s understanding of the human heart, the lyrical interior monologues that led one reviewer to say she couldn’t believe how thoroughly Anton Khoury understood the female psyche—he didn’t write them.”

“Who did?”

“His mother. In her beautiful script in her journal. After she died, Anton didn’t just mine it for inspiration, he copied her entries word-for-word.”

“That’s insane. How did you find out?” she asks as they pull onto the Beltway.

“I found the journal recently. He kept it all these years. Which is crazy. You’d think he’d burn it or something.”

“So you never knew.”

“No. Not until just now, after he died.” Gwen takes a deep breath. “It must have haunted him, that he didn’t actually write The Last Cyclamen . His entire identity was wrapped up in being a writer. Not just a writer, but a literary figure. But I still can’t believe he didn’t even tell me.”

“He was probably embarrassed. Maybe he was worried you’d think less of him.”

Gwen leans back and watches a semi whiz past them. If that was the case, he couldn’t have played it any worse. There was a chance, however slim, that telling her the truth years ago would have brought them closer. But Anton couldn’t even be honest with himself, much less her. “I guess both of our husbands were hiding who they really were.”

“Is that what’s in the notebook? Something about Scott?”

Gwen knows that if she answers this question, she will risk her friendship with Aimee. Their bond is already on life support, and what she’s about to tell her might be the fatal blow. In the best outcome, Aimee will view Gwen telling her what she found as a show of solidarity. As confirmation that they are in this together, no matter how bad it gets. More likely, however, Aimee will be so upset by what she hears, so horrified by what Gwen has to say about Scott, not to mention what Anton was doing, that she will take her anger out on Gwen.

After all, a few hours ago, as Gwen pored over these interviews that Anton conducted, and then read Anton’s fictionalized version of these events, she wanted to throw up. Her husband was mining a woman’s grief, opening her wounds, and stirring up the ugliest feelings inside of her in the name of his art.

“Where should I begin? Basically, twenty-eight years ago, two guys in the fall of their senior year of high school went on a backpacking trip into the mountains of California. Neither ever returned. One of them was named Dexter Kohl, and the other Michael Finch. Anton somehow tracked down Dexter’s mother and interviewed her. She is convinced that Michael killed her son on that trip and disposed of the body. She thinks that he fled the state and started over by changing his name. And she thinks the person he became is Scott Crowder.”

Aimee pulls over and slams on the brakes. “What are you talking about? Scott’s never been to California. He didn’t live there.”

“There’s more. The mother’s name is Cathy Stocker.”

Aimee lets out a guttural scream. She slams the steering wheel twice with her palm. “Shit! Shit!”

Gwen sits very still, unsure of what to do. She’s had her own earth-shattering revelations recently and knows there is really nothing that can be done. All she can do is stay and witness it, and help Aimee process it when she is ready.

“I am such a goddamn idiot.” Aimee leans her head against the steering wheel.

“You’re not an idiot. How could you have known? She had everyone fooled.”

Aimee picks her head up. “To think Noa was there.” She shudders. “What does she want from us?”

“Here, let me read you some of this.” Gwen opens the book. “I have to warn you it’s kind of choppy, because Anton is obviously jotting down notes as he is talking to her, but here goes. Michael and Dex friends at the beginning of tenth grade when Michael and his mom move from New Mexico… inseparable from the beginning… both played on the baseball team .” Gwen looks up at Aimee, who is staring straight ahead, her hands gripping the wheel tightly.

“Okay, so what?” She sounds defensive, and Gwen doesn’t blame her. She’s always put Scott on a pedestal, and now she’s learning he’s not as perfect as she thought.

Gwen continues reading from the journal, “ Police never found their bodies… witness heard gunshots on the mountain that day… witness left town, too… couldn’t be tracked down… saw Michael on the mountain months later… sure of it… went to police… Ray McCready’s guys harassing me. ”

“This is insanity! You want me to believe that Scott is a fugitive who killed someone and then changed his name? This woman is nuts. Where’s her proof?”

Gwen looks up. “From what I can make of his notes, Dexter’s mother claims she saw Michael on the mountain months after their disappearance, but when she called his name, he fled. When she tried to kickstart the investigation, she says this Ray McCready sent some guys to scare her. Apparently, McCready ran a big growing operation up there in the nineties. She dropped it because she was afraid for her life, she says. But then Anton stirred things up, calling and saying he thought that Michael Finch became Scott and started a new life in Bethesda.”

“And how did Anton learn about all this?”

“I don’t know.” Gwen stares out at the mountains in the distance. “Maybe he learned something and went digging? He didn’t mention anything about it in his notes.”

“No, this can’t be right. This is crazy.” Aimee shakes her head wildly as if she can physically banish the thought. “I don’t believe it. Scott is not capable of murdering someone.”

“It doesn’t really matter whether you believe it, if Cathy Stocker does.”

“There’s more to this story, there has to be. She’s confused. She has the wrong person.” Gwen puts the truck in drive and eases back onto the road. “It can’t be Scott. She’s mixed up.”

“It might explain a few things, though,” Gwen says. “Like what Anton was blackmailing Scott about, and why Cathy moved here and hired you. Look at the dates—Anton interviews Cathy several times in August. And then she moves here in September and hires you.”

Aimee shakes her head in defiance. “She has the wrong person. I’m telling you. Although…”

“Although what?”

“She did tell me that she had a son. She said she lost him when he was young.”

“She told you that?”

“Yeah, she had this framed photo of her and a little baby in her kitchen. She must have carried that photo to Jean’s house with her every day and then taken it home every night.”

“I’m not surprised.”

“What do you mean?”

“From the interviews it’s clear she wanted to find out what happened to her son. She wanted to find Michael Finch. And I’m sure having a picture of her son with her motivated her. She was on a mission.”

“What was her mission?”

“Justice. To bring the people responsible for her son’s death to justice,” Gwen says. “In these interviews she said she had given up on ever finding out what actually happened to Dexter. She had given up hope that anyone would ever be held accountable for his murder. Until Anton contacted her.”

A few minutes later, Aimee noses the truck into the parking lot of a small strip mall. The Little Fox Coffee Shop is the last business, on the far end, just after the Knitter’s Corner yarn shop.

“Here we are.” Aimee cuts the engine.

Gwen gets out and takes a deep breath. The air is just a shade cooler up here than it is closer to D.C. In the distance, Gwen can make out the wavy line of the Blue Ridge Mountains. They are several miles from downtown Frederick, surrounded by farmland, and this little strip mall is the lone commercial post on the road as far as Gwen can see.

Aimee pauses outside the entrance to the coffee shop. “I don’t know what to say in there.”

“Why don’t you let me do the talking?” Gwen says. “Do you have a photo of Cathy on your phone?”

Aimee pulls up the photo of Cathy with the kitten that Jean texted her yesterday and sends the pic to Gwen. The Little Fox is small and cozy. Leaning against the counter is a large blackboard with colorful lettering spelling out the specials, apple caramel cappuccino and oat chai latte. Gwen recognizes an Indigo Girls song playing from the overhead speakers and gets in line. The clientele is a mix of the usual coffee house habitués—a scattering of folks at tables with laptops open in front of them, maybe writing the great American novel, working on spreadsheets, or more likely watching YouTube. The only person in front of her is a burly man with a baseball cap who looks like he spends his days atop a tractor. Gwen waits as he orders a smoky latte, whatever that is, from a slight girl with pale-pink bangs that almost cover her eyes.

Then it’s Gwen’s turn at the counter. When Nova—the girl’s name, according to the tag pinned to her blue apron—asks her what she wants, Gwen asks for a plain black coffee. After using her phone to pay, Gwen keeps the phone out and pulls up the picture of Cathy.

“I have a really weird question.” Gwen smiles at Nova, hoping to disarm her. “I’m looking for my friend—her name’s Cathy. She comes here a lot. Do you recognize her?”

Nova hunches her slender shoulders and leans toward the phone. “She looks vaguely familiar. Skim milk latte?”

“I don’t know her drink,” Gwen says. “Like I said, her name is Cathy. I’m worried about her. Did she come in today?”

A young man who has been cleaning the behemoth silver espresso machine steps to the counter. “Let me see.” He’s short, the same height as Nova, and has a tiny, pointed beard that reminds Gwen of the devil. “I know her! She comes in every morning. She was here, yeah.”

“Oh my gosh, thank God. I’m Gwen. Cathy sometimes sits for us, and she’s become like a part of our family, and well, she didn’t come yesterday, and she has not been answering her phone.”

“Oh.” He scrunches up his face.

“I know. Not good.” Gwen glances at his name tag. “And, Lance, is it? I know this might be an overreaction, but I just wanted to make sure she was all right. That she hadn’t, like, fallen or something. Her family is back in California. She really doesn’t know a lot of people here.”

“Right, that’s scary,” Lance says, nodding enthusiastically.

“I thought about calling the police, but I don’t want to embarrass her. Just, for myself, I need to know that she’s okay. And I know she lives up here. She’s mentioned this coffee shop, but I actually don’t have her address.”

“Hmm.” Lance turns his head toward the glass pastry display as if inspiration might be found among the croissants. “Actually, I’m pretty sure that she lives near the construction of the new high school on Autumn Lake Road, because she was complaining today that it was so loud. She said there was a cement truck in the road blocking her way to the coffee shop this morning.”

“Thank you, guys, so much.”

“I hope she’s okay.” Lance smiles. “Don’t forget your coffee.”

Once they are outside, Gwen hands Aimee back the phone.

“I never realized you were such a good liar,” Aimee says, raising an eyebrow.

“I prefer to consider it improvisation.” Gwen takes a sip of the steaming coffee. “So? Let’s go find the new high school on Autumn Lake Road.”