You Will Know Me(29)

There was nodding, and Jim returned to the smeary chicken leg on his plate.

“Is he coming later?” Gwen asked. “Has he heard anything about the investigation?”

“I’m going to pay my respects to Teddy,” Katie said, turning. The investigation.

The front door swung open, the sunlight tearing their eyes.

“Have you seen Teddy’s new deck?” Gwen said, sunglasses dangling from her hand. “I mean, have you seen it?”



Following the sound of Teddy’s voice, Katie made her way to the back of the house.

That Foghorn Leghorn voice, lungs filling, each word a hard push from an organ bellows.

But whenever he yelled at the girls (Stick it, lick it, no weak stuff!), which was a lot, though never at Devon, not in years, you always felt it came from love. He reminded Katie of the uncle on that TV show her mother always adored, the bachelor uncle saddled with three kids, always rubbing his face like a weary, loving giant.

She found him in the den, in front of the gold-veined mirror tiles flanking the fireplace, his shoulders sunk, face wrung like a graying dish towel behind the perennial tan.

He was looking out the picture window, talking into his phone, his jaw clenched.

“Well, you upset her …I’m telling you, we’ll get her there. But we’ve just had the goddamned funeral.”

Discreetly, she moved away, nearly stumbling over Tina Belfour, paper towels in hand, scooping Jell-O salad off the lemon-colored rug.

“I’m sorry, Mama T.,” heron-necked gymnast Shailee Robins said, shaking her head. “Everything’s terrible now, forever.”



“Hey,” Eric said, his voice tinny on her phone, “should I still try to come?”

“No.” Sliding open the glass door, Katie stepped onto the old back porch, empty and forlorn now. “I don’t want to wait. I knew you wouldn’t come.”

“What? Katie, I promise I didn’t know it would take so long.”

“Forget it. It’s just…sad here. And strange,” she said. “I’m leaving soon. The Hargroves are driving Devon from practice. I’ll see you at home.”

After she hung up, she stood for a moment, the babble and hum of the reception muffled behind the patio doors, looking out onto the swimming pool, its magnificent opal surface. No one knew how Teddy could afford such an opulent addition to his already opulent home. It was probably a tax write-off for BelStars. He’d always understood the importance of show. Smile, smile, smile at those judges. Devon, you do know how to smile, don’t you?

Besides, the pool was how Hailey had met Ryan. He’d been working for Deep End Pool Service, the prelude to digging the BelStars pit and, finally, the job with Gwen.

Diving to the bottom, he’d rescued Hailey’s infinity-knot necklace from the drain.

Thinking of the gesture reminded her again of that time Ryan reached up from the depths of the foam pit and handed Devon her lost retainer. How shy Devon had been, her legs shaking.

Just then, it began. Katie felt it under her feet first, the redwood planks of the porch.

The low rumble came from inside the house.

Turning, she caught a glare off the sliding glass door.

On the other side stood Hailey, her arms tugging at the handle, the door shaking.

Mouth open wide as a trumpet bell, lips moving, she seemed to be trying to get her attention, frantically.

Katie reached for the door handle, struggled to drag the door, stuck on its track, open.

“Mrs. Knox,” Hailey said, voice smothered by the glass, both of them yanking now, on opposite sides, “I thought you were my friend. Are you my friend?”

At that moment, Teddy appeared behind Hailey.

“Mrs. Knox!” she was shouting, her arms bulging as she pulled on the door, her face gray behind the tinted glass. “Mrs. Knox, I know what’s happening—”

“What?” Katie shouted, wrenching the handle.

Behind the glass, Teddy took Hailey by the shoulders, flipping her around the way he had dozens of crying gymnasts, their bodies wilting toward him, his thick, strong Coach T. arms.

Katie watched as he buried her against his chest, her face seeming almost to slip away into the dark of his blazer. Her arms pinned to her sides, her body started shaking wildly.

“Hailey,” Katie said, the door finally popping open, a surge of warm, cloying air, “what is it?”

But Hailey didn’t hear and Teddy didn’t seem to see, instead spiriting his niece away as a squall of guests entered the kitchen, the kitchen swelling with mourners ready for cake.



“She got hysterical when the detective called,” Teddy explained, standing with Katie in the kitchen, his hand on his meaty brow. “She just lost it.”

“Detective?” Katie asked. “Do they have some kind of lead?”

She couldn’t guess why they kept needing to talk to Hailey.

“They just want to ask more questions. Routine, I guess. I don’t know.” He turned before she could meet his eyes.

Upstairs, they could hear Hailey, a sob throbbing through the floor for a few moments, then ceasing, replaced by Tina’s calming voice.

“I should go up and see her,” Katie said. “She wanted to talk to me.”

“About what?” Teddy’s tufted brows lifted.