Chapter 28
My hand flies to my mouth, and I press it hard against my lips. There’s a whooshing sensation in my head, like I’ve bent down to the ground and come up way too fast.
“Your daughter wasn’t gay, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Alison says. “She was just, uh, curious, I think . . . experimenting. We’d felt a strong connection at the end of her sophomore year, and as soon as she got back to campus, it turned into something physical.”
I step backward toward the center of the room, grappling with the revelation. I might as well be in one of the paintings here, this moment as surreal as a tiny horse being served for dinner or flames shooting from a baby doll’s head.
“Actually, that’s not what I’m thinking,” I say, feeling my anger spike. “Mel was her own person, and I don’t care whether she was gay or bisexual or whatever. What I am thinking is why in God’s name didn’t you come forward when she was murdered.”
“For obvious reasons,” she says and quickly tucks a tendril of hair behind her ear. “What good would it have done anyway?”
“What good? You might have been able to help the police.”
“That’s highly unlikely,” she insists. “Your daughter was a very special person, but what we had was simply a two-month fling, which I was about to end anyway.”
I shake my head again, bewildered. My thoughts are spinning so fast I can barely see them, but one finally takes shape.
“Did your husband find out about you and Mel?” I demand.
She looks off, silent for several beats. I watch her chest rise as she takes a breath.
“Yes,” she says finally.
That explains Handler’s awkwardness toward me, as well as his failure to divulge where Mel’s writing was stored. He might have feared something in Mel’s work would unveil the affair.
“Let me guess,” I say, not caring how snide my tone is. “He wasn’t happy with the news.”
She doesn’t bother arguing my point.
And surely Handler wasn’t merely unhappy. He must have been livid. Not only had his wife cheated on him, probably a no-no in his book despite his own infidelities, but she’d also made it a million times worse by choosing a Carter College student.
“Did it not occur to you that your own husband might have killed Melanie?” I ask. “In a jealous rage?”
“What?” she exclaims, her face now pinched in distress. “Of course not. Jeffrey wasn’t jealous about the relationship.”
“Oh please, how could he not have been?”
She looks off briefly again.
“Because we have an open marriage,” she says. “It’s been that way from nearly the beginning.”
I part my lips in surprise, totally taken aback. So, she’s not the cuckolded, possibly wounded spouse I imagined her to be.
“And he didn’t mind that you chose one of his students for a fling?”
She hesitates for a second, and I sense her picking her words.
“That was clearly a mistake on my part, and it’s why I’d decided to call it off,” she says, crossing her arms over her chest. “An open marriage needs rules and boundaries, and for us that’s always meant only one outside person at a time, and no students or anyone else close to home.
I came clean with Jeffrey, promised to end the relationship, and he forgave me. ”
“Just like that?” I say. It’s hard to believe he’d be so sanguine.
“Yes. I’d been having a really difficult time with my work the previous months, and it caused me to get sloppy with the rules more than once, about seeing only one person at a time and who was off-limits.
When I confessed everything to Jeffrey, he understood that it was about me losing my way for a while, not about him. I’ve never broken the rules again.”
I won’t judge her about her marriage, that’s her business, but I can’t stand how self-absorbed she sounds, talking about her sloppy phase as if she’d gotten tipsy at a couple of dinner parties.
She seems oblivious to the fact that there could have been serious repercussions besides those impacting her and her husband.
“You implied you had nothing of value to tell the police, but initially they were looking at people in Mel’s orbit, and as far as you knew, you had information that could be important to them.”
“That’s not true. Mel and I talked about art and poetry, about the books we were reading, and not a word about our personal lives. There was nothing for me to contribute.”
She bites her lip again, the mistress of the forest now suddenly ruffled, as if she’s sensed there’s danger in the dark between the trees. The most staggering part: she’s incapable of seeing her failure to act as wrong.
I shake my head, disgusted, and hitch up the strap of my shoulder bag, more than ready to get out of here.
“Why in the world did you encourage me to come today?” I say.
I notice that her pale cheeks are now slightly flushed.
“I wanted to show some kindness—because I can tell how difficult it is for you to be back in the area. And because of Melanie. I cared about her, and to be honest, her death was quite shattering for me.”
Not so shattering that she wanted to help the police find the murderer. Right now, I can’t stand the sight of Alison Handler.
“I see I’ve upset you,” she adds. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll get over it.”
I start for the door, leaving her behind me, and then spin back around just as I’m about to reach for the handle.
“Does the name Riley Reynolds mean anything to you?” I ask.
Alison gazes back at me with a baffled expression.
“Reynolds?” she says and shakes her head. “I don’t know anyone by that name.”
I have no idea whether she’s being truthful or not. I tug the door open and slam it hard behind me.
I end up at the little diner I’ve stopped at before, having come on foot from the studio. I need to call Logan and loop him into every crazy thing I’ve learned this morning, but first I have to think through Alison’s revelation and decide what it might mean.
She said Handler wasn’t jealous, but there were other things at stake for him.
If the college found out that his wife had taken one of his students as her lover, it would have been a real embarrassment for him.
I doubt either Alison’s fling or the couple’s open marriage would have violated the moral turpitude clause of Handler’s tenure contract, but the indiscretion might have impacted him in other, smaller ways that added up over time.
According to Alison, she assured her husband she was going to break things off with Melanie, but he had no guarantee she’d keep her word—or that Mel would stay quiet.
And there’s something else, something that’s making my pulse race: If the other person Riley told about her experience was Handler, he might have known all the details—the blow to the head, the dog leash, everything.
Wait, is this really where I’m going? Seriously wondering now whether Handler killed Mel? It seems like a stretch to think he did it to derail gossip about his wife and a student—unless there’s part of the story I’m missing.
I take a sip of the iced tea I’ve ordered along with a plate of chicken salad and try not to get ahead of myself. Surely I’ll know more once I’ve spoken to Riley, so it’s pointless to speculate until I get there.
I wish I could call Bas right now and talk this through with him. But I’d feel like a fraud—which will be the case until I figure out what I’m going to do about my infidelity.
I force myself to finish my food, not wanting to skip another meal.
The revelation from Alison has added to how crumpled I feel.
I meant what I said to Alison about Mel being her own person and me not caring if she was gay or bi or simply experimenting.
But it’s shown once again how in the dark I was about my daughter.
The list of things I never knew refuses to stop growing, even this many years after her death.
Plus—as if I needed to add to my angst—I pretty much have proof now that Mel’s haiku about birches, the sliver of joy I held on to for so long, was not about the two of us. There was never a longing on her part to reconnect with me.
I need to pay the bill and get moving. As my eyes search the room for the waiter, they’re snagged by a familiar face.
Jack. He’s standing at the front counter, accepting food in a white plastic bag.
So, he’s still in town. Though the smile he flashes at the cashier is perfectly charming, it sends a shiver through me.
As I watch him leave and vanish down the street, I catch sight of Craig’s white cab idling on the curb outside. I’d called him on my hurried walk from the studio, switching my pickup address to the diner. It’s finally time to meet with Riley.
“So, you’re takin’ quite the tour of the area,” Craig says as soon as I slide into the car.
“Yeah, sort of,” I say. I’m tempted to add “a tour of the underworld” but instead sink back into the seat. The ride, I’ve determined, will take about forty minutes.
As soon as we depart, I see I’ve missed two texts from Logan wondering what’s going on, so I type out a reply.
Can’t speak right now—in a taxi. But I’ve pretty much confirmed Riley was not attacked the night she said she was. Will know more soon. Please stand by and don’t say anything to Halligan yet.
It’s only seconds before I hear back from him.
What? You cant call me? I need to know what’s happening
There’s no way I can discuss any of this in front of Craig.
I promise to call as soon as I can.
Right on schedule, we pull into the tiny town of Edgerton and soon after turn onto Bonner, a fairly rural road.
There’s a mix of houses along it, some a bit ramshackle, and others newer and suburban in feel, but they’re all set fairly far apart, with plenty of trees growing between them.
So, this is what Hilary meant when she said she wanted to give country life a try.
Craig comes to a stop at number 4204. The house, up a slight incline, is an attractive, average-size grayish-beige ranch with a stone foundation and an attached garage. The front lawn is dotted with young trees, obviously planted after the excavation.
I reiterate to Craig that I’ll be finished in thirty minutes or less. I’m positive Riley will want to get this over quickly, and I’m not going to belabor things, though I hope I can talk her into calling Halligan while I’m here.
I reach the porch and press the doorbell, the kind with a camera lens just above it. From inside come two melodious dong sounds, almost like church bells. I inhale deeply, waiting for footsteps to follow. But they don’t come. I give it almost a minute before trying again. Nothing this time, either.
Has Riley gotten cold feet? No, that can’t be the case, it just can’t be. I felt her sense of urgency as we spoke on the phone.
I back off the porch and traipse through the flower bed until I’ve reached one of the front windows.
I peer inside. The curtains have been pulled closed, but there’s enough of a gap for me to see a small, sparsely furnished bedroom.
It looks like a guest room, possibly the one Riley is staying in, though she doesn’t seem to be in the room.
The curtains on the other window are too tightly closed to see inside.
She’s probably in the rear of the house, I decide, where the living area must be, and it’s possible she has earbuds in and didn’t hear the bell.
I scroll through today’s calls and tap her number.
For a second, I think I hear the faint sound of a ringtone, but it could be my imagination.
The call goes to voicemail, which makes me growl in frustration.
“Riley, hi, it’s Bree. I’m out front. I’m really looking forward to speaking with you.”
I return to the porch and try the doorbell again. Nothing. I jiggle the door handle. Locked.
Okay, so maybe she’s simply out for a walk, and then I instantly realize the absurdity of that thought. After being brutally raped in a park, Riley Reynolds has probably never ventured out by herself for a walk since then, let alone on a deserted road.
I decide my only option now is to call Hilary Brown, though if Riley hasn’t told her about the meeting, I’ll be tipping my hand, and she might try to nix the whole thing. This time Hilary picks up right away.
“Hilary, hi,” I say. “Did Riley tell you she’d invited me to your house to talk?”
I hear her sigh.
“Yes,” she says. “And, Bree, I must tell you that I advised her to cancel the invitation, at least for now. I know you’re looking for answers, but if Riley wants to discuss things with you, she’ll need to do it once I’m home and can be in the room with her.”
“She never canceled,” I explain. “I’m at your house now, but she’s not answering the door.”
Brown sighs again, a mix, it seems, of frustration and empathy. “I’m sorry you drove all the way out there. She might have felt skittish about calling you back to cancel, and now just isn’t responding.”
“I can understand your wish to be part of the conversation,” I say, “but . . . what if you call her and conference me in?” I’m grasping at straws, desperately hoping not to leave empty-handed. “I would let you take the lead, of course.”
The line goes quiet for a moment.
“Hilary, please,” I add, nearly begging now. “I don’t think Riley was completely honest with us, and we need the truth from her. Otherwise, we’ll never know what really happened to Mel.”
“All right,” she says. “Give me a minute to try her and I’ll ring you back.”
I lean against the wall of the recessed porch. It’s utterly quiet out here, not a car, bicyclist, or jogger on the road. The silence is suddenly broken by the faint ringtone of a phone, coming from deep within the house. I’m close enough now to really hear it.
The second ring cuts off midway through. I strain to pick up Riley’s hello, but nothing follows.
Seconds later Hilary phones back.
“She didn’t answer,” she says.
“I could hear it ringing in the house. Maybe she didn’t pick up because she’s seen me out front and knows you’re reaching out on my behalf.”
“No, that’s not like her,” she says bluntly. “Something’s wrong.”