Chapter Thirteen
Thirteen
I recoiled from his words, pushing myself as far back in my chair as I could. I knew it. I knew Deacon had been the most obvious suspect. No wonder Bob had been so distressed by Deacon’s appearance.
I was going to give my murderer-detecting cat a thousand treats when I got back inside.
“W-what do you mean?” Scanning the street, I tried to see if my food delivery was anywhere to be seen, but there wasn’t even anyone out walking their dog. I was all alone here, faced with the gravity of his confession.
Deacon brushed his dark-red hair back from his face, and I noticed then just how rough his appearance was. It looked like he hadn’t shaved at all today, russet stubble peppering his jaw, and there were deep-purple circles under his eyes. Was this grief or guilt, or some powerful combination of the two?
“I made a huge mistake.” He leaned back in his chair, staring out at the street like he was just talking to himself.
I darted a quick glance over to my phone, wondering if I could pick it up and send a 911 text to Detective Martin without Deacon noticing. But too late; his head swiveled, and suddenly his gray-green eyes were locked on mine. “Have you ever been in love, Phoebe?”
This was such an unexpected question given the current circumstances that I had to stop myself from letting out a nervous little laugh. “I have, yes.”
“And did you let that love slip away?”
I was starting to realize what he was talking about, and suddenly all those chummy university photos, the long-standing business relationship, everything I knew about Deacon and Sebastian up until this moment started to take on an entirely different shape.
“For me, it wasn’t that I let it slip away, it’s that it ran away all on its own.”
He nodded, back to his own contemplative world, looking more through me than at me. I couldn’t have been more confused if I tried. I had taken his words to mean that Sebastian’s death had literally been his fault because he’d killed him, but now I wasn’t sure anymore.
“Deacon, what do you mean Sebastian is dead because of you? Did . . . did you do something?”
If he registered the implication of my question, it didn’t show. He let out a long, quivering breath and waved his hand toward the view of town from my deck. It was a great view, considering Lane End House was perched at one of the highest vantage points in town.
“This is really nice. You must like living here.” He started to cry, so silently I didn’t realize it was happening until I saw the silvery droplets tracing down his cheeks and dripping from the bottom of his chin.
“Deacon?”
“I told him he could either have me in his life forever or have me in his life as his manager, but I couldn’t do both. He picked business. He picked business over everything we had, and he told me he loved me but he didn’t love me. After fifteen years. How . . . how does love just stop like that?”
My heart skipped a beat, and for a selfish moment I thought about myself, and my marriage, and I wanted to give this poor guy a hug, even if I still thought he might have killed someone.
“I don’t know what happens to love when it goes away, but sometimes it does, and we can’t hold on to love any more than we could hold on to a running stream, you know?”
Roughly he swiped away the tears on his cheeks. “I couldn’t stay. After he told me that I couldn’t keep being there with him every day, I just . . . I couldn’t breathe anymore. I thought it was going to be best for both of us, so I quit. And he replaced me just like that.” He snapped his fingers, and the sound of it was like a gunshot in the stillness between us. I jumped. “He threw everything away, and he gave it to her. And she doesn’t deserve it. She doesn’t care about him, just his money.”
I assumed he was talking about Melody. I wondered if he really meant everything , because I certainly had gotten more of an overprotective-mother-hen vibe from Melody, not a romantic attachment to Sebastian. She had been pretty torn up over his death from what I’d seen, though, so perhaps I had misread that dynamic as much as I had missed the clues about Deacon and Sebastian.
I also noticed that Deacon had said he’d quit, while Sebastian had said he’d been fired. It was an important distinction, to be sure.
“Deacon, did you go see Sebastian after you left the shop?”
“I just wanted to talk to him.”
“Did you?”
He balled his hand into a fist, hitting the arm of his chair with a hard thud. “He’s so stubborn . Why couldn’t he just listen? Why did he have to make it all so difficult? Maybe if he had just listened, he’d still be alive.”
A car door slammed, grabbing the attention of both of us. A teenage boy in a Metallica T-shirt came trotting up the front steps with a big paper bag bearing the logo To Thai For on the front.
I got up automatically, wondering if I shouldn’t tell the boy to wait with me a moment so someone would be here, but I wasn’t sure what good a skinny teen boy would be against a grown man. I thanked him, handing him an extra ten dollars for a tip, and stepped back onto the deck.
Deacon was gone.
*
Detective Martin arrived about ten minutes later. She looked ready for business in her tailored navy-blue pants and crisp white button-down, and with her mirrored aviators on she looked so cool I had no idea why they didn’t make a TV show about her.
She joined me on my deck, where I was tucking into my pad see ew as Bob lounged at my feet and kept a watchful eye out in case the interloper returned. Martin sat down next to me, and I nudged a box of spring rolls in her direction. I thought she might decline, but she took one out of the package and bit into it with a satisfying crunch.
“Thanks, I haven’t eaten all day.”
I had explained most of my story to her over the phone, but between bites, I walked through it one more time.
“Why do you think he came to see you?” she asked.
This question had been plaguing me since Deacon disappeared. It was so strange for him to have sought me out specifically, so much so that he’d go to a public store and get directions to my house.
“I wish I could tell you. We were friendly in emails, but we certainly weren’t friends . Still, he really doesn’t know anyone else here except for the people he used to work with. Maybe he thought I was the closest thing he had to a friend in town, because it didn’t seem like he trusted most of them anymore.” I shrugged. “Maybe he just wanted to talk to someone.”
“Did you get the sense from what he was saying that he might have been responsible for killing Sebastian?”
I set down my Styrofoam noodle container and leaned back in the chair, contemplating her question. “I feel like my answer to that changed with every other thing he said. He feels guilty about something, and a lot of what he was saying made me nervous, especially when he said he’d gone to talk to Sebastian last night. But he also just seemed so sad .”
“Well, if what you said about their past relationship is true, he certainly had plenty of motive. We see so many cases like this with a lover scorned, and especially if his job and relationship were both lost at the same time. That can push people to unexpected places. He might have snapped and just acted in a moment of passion. It happens more often than you would think.”
Bob jumped up on my lap and started to purr loudly while kneading biscuits into my thigh. When he thought I was distracted enough, he leaned over onto the table and took a big piece of chicken from the takeout container. Bold as he was, he didn’t run off with it. He just sat there, happily munching.
I thought about everything Deacon had said, and it made me start thinking about Honey and her runes and the possible implication that the wrong person had died.
Obviously, Honey hadn’t said that for sure, but the runes and her dream about the birds was something I couldn’t shake. If that was true—and I still wasn’t sure what to make of that entire rune-reading situation—then Deacon’s confession became more confusing, because the object of his love and frustration was Sebastian. So if the motive rang true, then the right person had died, no matter how tragic it was.
“I wish I’d asked him more questions, I’m sorry.”
Martin shook her head, taking one more spring roll for the road. “You did more than enough, Phoebe, believe me. This is honestly why I asked for your help, because it seems like no matter what you do, trouble has a way of finding you. Might as well harness that power for good.” She smiled at me, pushing her sunglasses up now that the sun was almost gone. “Just promise me if he comes back, you call me right away, okay? I’ll have someone drive by later tonight just to make sure everything is fine.”
“Thank you.” I didn’t think Deacon planned to hurt me, but it was nice to know someone was looking out.
“And Phoebe?” Martin said from halfway down the sidewalk.
“Yeah?”
“Just because trouble finds you, that’s not an invitation to go looking.”