Chapter 13 #2
When the plane touched down at T.F. Green Airport just after seven, Brian was back on Rhode Island soil for the first time in almost exactly fifteen years.
He turned on his cell the moment the plane landed.
A message from his mother told him his father was in stable condition and had been admitted to Rhode Island Hospital for tests. He immediately called her back.
“He’s in room seven twenty-two,” she said, sounding weepy. “He’ll be so glad to see you. Thanks for coming, Bri. I know how difficult it is for you to come home. I’ll see you soon.”
Brian realized coming home wasn’t difficult at all under these circumstances. He jogged through an airport that was much bigger than he remembered and emerged into the humid evening to find a cab.
“Rhode Island Hospital,” he told the driver. “And hurry. Please.”
The drive from Warwick to Providence along Interstate 95 was surreal in that nothing had changed.
The Thurbers Avenue curves were as treacherous as Brian remembered, and the big blue termite, known locally as Nibbles Woodaway, still sat atop the New England Pest Control building.
With the State House dome looming in the distance, the cabbie took the hospital exit.
Brian tossed two twenties to the driver and bolted from the car. On the seventh floor, he asked for his father at the nurse’s station and was directed to a room at the end of a long corridor. After taking a moment to prepare himself for whatever he might find inside, Brian pushed the door open.
Mary Ann turned and let out a happy yelp as she launched herself into her son’s arms.
“Tell me you did not call the boy home over this,” Michael groaned to his wife.
Overwhelmed by the sound of his father talking—and bitching—Brian released his mother and bent to kiss his father’s forehead.
“Shut up, Dad.” Michael was pale and his hair had gone completely gray in the few months since Brian had last seen him, but otherwise he looked fine.
Brian could have collapsed himself from the sheer relief.
“You shouldn’t have come,” Michael grumbled even as he reached for his son’s hand. “It’s nothing. Just a bad case of heartburn.”
Brian turned to his mother. “What’s the real story?”
“Thankfully, it wasn’t a heart attack,” she said. “They want to rule out any arterial blockages, so he’s having some tests tomorrow. They think it could’ve been an acute anxiety attack.”
“Stupid waste of time. I need to get back to work.” Michael pushed himself up, chafing against the monitors attached to his chest.
“You’re not going anywhere, Dad. Not now, anyway.”
“They found her,” Michael said with a grim set to his face. “They found Alicia Perry, and no one will tell me anything other than that. I’m the freaking chief of police! This is my case! I need to know what’s going on!”
Mary Ann went around to the other side of the bed and eased her husband back down to the pile of pillows. “You need to relax, Michael. All that stress is what landed you here in the first place.”
“If you expect me to relax, you have to find out, please, if they located Carly and if everything’s all right with her.”
“Carly?” Brian said. “What does she have to do with it?”
“I got a text message from her, right before this happened,” Michael said with a gesture to the monitors. “That she was waiting for me at the lake. I never asked her to meet me there, so I need to know they’ve got her and she’s safe.”
“Mom?” Brian asked, his own chest tightening with tension. “Do you know if she’s okay?”
Mary Ann appeared to be weighing whether she should tell them what she knew. She rested a hand on Michael’s shoulder as she said, “Honey, Alicia’s dead.”
“No, no, no.”
“Dad, take it easy.”
Mary Ann took a deep shuddering breath. “Carly found her under the willow at the lake.”
“Under the willow?” Brian gasped. “Are you sure that’s where she was?”
Mary Ann nodded. “Dave DeSilva picked me up at home and drove me here to meet Dad,” she said, referring to a Granville patrolman. “He filled me in on what was happening. Carly’s safe. There were people on the beach who heard her screaming and went to help her. One of them called the police.”
“She screamed?” Michael asked, incredulous.
Mary Ann nodded. “That’s what Dave said.”
“Why would he put Alicia there, of all places?” Michael wondered.
“I might know why.” Brian swallowed hard as the implications swirled through his mind.
His parents looked at him with interest.
“That’s where Carly and I used to go when we, um, wanted to be alone.” Brian couldn’t believe how embarrassed he was, even at thirty-three, to be confessing such a thing to his parents. “That’s where we were the night of the accident.”
Michael ruminated over that information for a moment and then glanced at his son. “Did anyone else know that was your spot?”
“I never told anyone, and I doubt she did, either.”
“Then whoever this guy is, he somehow knew about it, and that’s why he sent Carly there to find Alicia’s body.
” Michael was all but bursting to get out of that bed.
“Any doubt I had that this is somehow connected to Carly and the accident just disappeared. Call the station,” he directed Mary Ann.
“Tell Nathan Barclay I need to see him. Tonight.”
“Michael, surely it can wait until tomorrow—”
“Tonight, Mary Ann,” he said in a tone that left no room for argument.
Agent Barclay drove Brian and his mother home to Granville close to midnight.
Slumped against the back seat, Brian was drained and mortified after the grilling he’d withstood about how often he and Carly had gone to the willow, exactly what they’d done there, and whether he was sure no one else knew about it.
They were the secrets of his youth, secrets he’d never expected to share with his parents, of all people, and secrets he’d never imagined would factor into a murder investigation.
“You’re sure Carly is safe?” he asked Barclay. He’d learned earlier that she was spending the night with her parents.
“We have people keeping an eye on the house. Don’t worry.”
Right, don’t worry. “She really screamed when she found the body?”
“That’s right. Apparently, she was also able to tell the people who came to her rescue that there was a body under the tree.”
“Amazing,” Brian said. “Those are the first words she’s spoken in more than fifteen years.”
“So I’m told,” Barclay said.
“Does this mean she can talk again?” Mary Ann asked.
“We don’t know yet if it was temporary or not,” Barclay said. “She was a mess, so we decided not to push her for a statement tonight.”
“Poor Carly,” Brian said. “Like she hasn’t already been through enough.”
Mary Ann turned around in the front seat and reached for Brian’s hand. “I’m sorry, honey. This is not quite the homecoming I’d imagined for you.”
Brian shrugged and worked up a wry grin for her. “I left in the midst of high drama, so why not come home to it, too?”
They crossed the town line into Granville, and Brian was grateful that from this direction they wouldn’t have to take Tucker Road.
This day had been enough of a bitch without having to face that, too.
In the dark, he couldn’t see much of anything, which was fine.
There’d be time enough for that tomorrow.
A few minutes later, Barclay pulled into the driveway at the house, which had been painted white in his absence. He helped his mother from the car and thanked Barclay for the ride.
“Let me know how your dad makes out,” Barclay said.
“I will.”
He drove off, and Brian stood in the driveway with his mother, remembering the night he’d waited there with Officer Beckett to tell his parents that Sam had been killed in the accident.
The memory sent a shudder rippling through him.
“I like the white,” he said, forcing himself to say something as they climbed the front stairs.
“I do, too. We did it about four years ago, I guess. The brown was so depressing. I was sick of it.”
Walking into that house was like taking a step back in time. The furniture was new but arranged the way he remembered it. The smell was the same—a spicy mix of potpourri and candles—and the old school pictures of him and Sam still hung on the wall.
“I’m sorry I didn’t have time to clean out your room or get anything ready for you,” Mary Ann said. Her shoulders stooped with exhaustion as she led Brian past the closed door to Sam’s room.
Resting his hands on her shoulders, he turned her to face him and pulled her tight against him as she finally broke down.
“I’m sorry,” she said between sobs. “I was just so scared earlier when they said Dad had collapsed, and it’s so good to have you here, even though I know it’s hard for you.”
“Shh. Don’t be sorry. For anything. I’m right where I need to be tonight.”
Brian Westbury had finally come home.