Andrea was pretty sure she loved the place.
She looked for the wine glasses but quickly gave up. She hadn’t managed to unpack anything before her parents came to help, mostly because she knew that her parents were going to help. She found two water glasses, a jelly jar and a coffee mug in a box marked stuff.
Andrea turned on the kitchen faucet, squirted dishwashing liquid, grabbed the sponge. The dinner plates from last night were caked in sauce. Unbidden, her mind flashed up Nardo Fontaine taking his hand away from his neck. The blood had splattered all over Star. The woman hadn’t screamed. She hadn’t even wiped the blood from her face. She had sat down at the stool, clasped her hands on the counter, and stared ahead at the white tile wall as she waited for someone to tell her what to do.
Andrea closed her eyes. She took a deep breath.
This was how it happened sometimes. The trauma came back. Flashes of violence, flashes of pain. Instead of fighting it, instead of trying to change her whole life into something different because of it, Andrea had learned to accept it. The memories were part of who she was now, just like the memory of the triumph she’d felt when she’d taken Ricky Fontaine’s full confession.
Andrea listened to the sounds in the other room. Her absence had brought down the temperature. She could hear Laura lecturing Mike, Gordon laughing at them both. She slipped her iPhone out of her back pocket. Andrea’s iCloud account had backed up the photos she had surreptitiously captured of teenage Judith’s collage. The original piece had been destroyed in the fire. Andrea had the only proof that it ever existed.
She scrolled past the liner notes from Melody Brickel’s mixtape. The affirmations from what she’d later found out were from one of Melody’s letters. The ultrasounds of infant Judith that fanned out from the center of the piece. The photos of Emily laughing and playing and doing everything but dying.
Andrea had been so desperate to persuade herself that Judith looked like Clay, but the fact was, she looked very much like her mother. Emily’s light blue eyes were nothing like Clay’s icy blue. As for Judith’s sharp cheekbones and slight cleft to her chin, they could have come from some distant Vaughn or Fontaine the same way Andrea had drawn her own Piglet nose from her family’s gene pool.
She swiped the screen, stopping at the group photo Judith had placed among the other candids in her collage. It was the same photo that Ricky had given a place of honor for forty years.
The clique.
Emily and Ricky were dressed alike, their liquid eyeliner and spiral perms placing them squarely in the eighties. The boys all had shaggy hair and wore their Members Only jackets with the sleeves pushed up. Ricky resembled Nardo more than her fraternal twin. Blake and Clay could be brothers. Together, the group looked like they were posing for a prequel to The Breakfast Club, though there wasn’t a jock or a princess. Andrea only saw the nerd, the basket case, and of course all but one was an admitted criminal.
Gordon’s loud laughter broke the spell. Andrea heard a teasing in Laura’s voice when she responded. For once, Mike apparently had nothing to offer.
Andrea slid the phone back into her pocket. She stuck her hands into the sudsy water and started to wash the dishes. Her fingers curved along the smooth edge of a plate. Again, her mind started to wander back to the diner.
An investigation by the Delaware State Police had ruled that Jack Stilton’s shooting of Bernard Fontaine was justifiable. Andrea couldn’t disagree with the finding, though she wondered if Stilton would’ve found a way to kill Nardo anyway. He had been ready to take that second shot. The only thing that had stopped him was Andrea. She understood his hatred of Nardo. Stilton had been bullied by the asshole for years—including back in the late nineties when, according to Stilton, Nardo had threatened to out him as gay unless he made a DUI charge disappear. She couldn’t imagine how difficult his life had been. Tormented by the murder of his high school best friend. Distraught over his lack of power to bring her killer to justice. Knowing Nardo was the key to solving the crime but too terrified to confront him. Andrea knew that Stilton was an alcoholic and a misogynist, but he had also been Emily Vaughn’s only true friend.
“Hey.” Mike’s arms wrapped around her waist. He pressed his lips to the back of her neck. “You all right?”
“Yeah.” The lump in her throat reminded her not to lie to him. “I keep thinking about Star.”
Mike pressed his lips to her neck again. His three bossy sisters had taught him that not every problem had a solution. He simply said, “I’m sorry.”
Laura cleared her throat. She held up three wine glasses. “I found these in the box labeled bathroom.”
Andrea shrugged. “Why take a bath if you’re not going to drink?”
Laura frowned when Mike took the glasses. “I read that judge’s obituary in the Times. No surprise that Reagan appointed her. What a fucking hypocrite.”
Mike said, “Criminals who live in glass houses …”
“Completely different,” Laura scoffed. “You don’t claw your way up to those levels of power without corrupting your soul. Look at my disgusting brother.”
Andrea was enormously grateful when her phone started to ring. The caller ID read BIBLE, LEONARD, which was strange, because it usually came up as USMS BIBLE.
She told Mike and Laura, “I know you two can’t play nice, but play fair.”
Andrea slipped out the door before her mother could argue. She walked toward the stairs as she answered the phone. “Are you calling me back about your chirpies?”
There was a long pause. She heard the rumble of shouts and profanities that served as the distinctive background chatter of a federal penitentiary.
Clayton Morrow said, “Hello, Andrea.”
Andrea felt her hand go to her mouth.
He said, “I heard you visited the old hometown.”
Andrea dropped away her hand. Her lips parted as she took in a deep breath. She did not cry out. She did not panic. She told herself the facts. Her father was in prison. Contraband cell phones were easy to obtain. Clay had spoofed Bible’s number so that she would answer.
He wanted something.
“Andy?” Clay said. “I heard the news about Ricky and Nardo. Such a toxic relationship. They always did deserve each other.”
Andrea took another deep breath. Dean Wexler might be a poor copy of Clay Morrow, but Clay’s cruel tone reminded her of Bernard Fontaine.
“Did you find what you were looking for?”
Andrea stood up. She couldn’t risk her mother coming into the hall. She climbed the steep stairs. She pushed open the door to the street. Traffic whizzed by. Horns blared. Pedestrians filled the sidewalk. Andrea leaned her back against the building. If Mike was still at the sink, he would be able to see her feet through the narrow window.
She asked Clay, “What do you want?”
“Ah, there’s that beautiful voice,” he said. “I’d like for you to come visit me, daughter. I’ve put you on my approved list.”
She felt her head shaking. She would never visit him.
“Your uncle Jasper,” he said. “I know you’ve been working with him.”
“I wasn’t working with Jasper,” she told him. “I was trying to make sure you never get out of prison.”