A Stranger on the Beach(95)

“Around town, do people know you were arrested for killing your best friend in a love triangle when you were younger?”

“Yes. Everybody knows.”

“And how are you thought of? Violent? Unstable?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. People are shitty. They don’t give me the benefit of the doubt.”

“So, if Caroline noticed you watching her house, and decided to ask around about you, she’d hear that you were an unstable young man, with a history of violence, with this, this situation in your past?”

Aidan sighed. “Yes. It’s the first thing people mention if you ask about me.”

“If you want my honest reaction, I think your friend Brittany is right. I think Caroline was playing a very long game.”

“How so?”

“She knew who you were. She knew enough about you to think you’d make a good patsy. She asked Brittany to hire you to work her party in order to meet you. She wanted to meet you, so she could seduce you, kill her husband, and frame you for his murder. Do you see it now?”

No. Never.

Believing Lisa’s theory would mean accepting that his love affair with Caroline had been a fraud from start to finish. A setup. And he knew that wasn’t true. He’d lived it. He’d loved her. It was real.

“That’s not possible,” he said.

“You need to stop being so na?ve, Aidan. People are liars. Caroline is a liar. You have to accept that.”

“I thought this was the good news,” Aidan said.

“Huh?”

“When you came in, you said you had some good news and some bad news. I asked for the good news first.”

“This is good news. Not good. It’s great. We have the Ambien in your blood. Caroline’s prints on the murder weapon. And now your friend Brittany to explain how Caroline set you up. You’re innocent, Aidan, and the prosecution is going to see that. I bet they dismiss the charges.”

“Okay, what’s the bad news then?”

“Nothing. Forget about that. Your only concern should be putting Caroline Stark behind bars where she belongs. That woman is evil.”





56


The good news felt terrible. And the bad news was about to come bubbling to the surface like noxious gas rising from the bottom of a murky lake.

Aidan had been lying on his bunk, staring at the ceiling, reviewing in his head every moment he’d spent with Caroline. He was looking for treachery—and finding all too much of it. He’d assumed that he was the one who’d pursued her. He had it in his mind that she was above him, that he’d struggled to win her attention, that his charms had prevailed against all odds, that she gave in to her feelings for the guy from the wrong side of the tracks because she couldn’t help herself.

He saw now that the truth was the opposite. From the first moment they met on the beach, it was Caroline who pursued him. She arranged for them to meet at her party. She came into the Red Anchor—twice—looking for him. She must’ve played drunk—had she drunk all the vodka tonics he poured for her?—in order to get him to drive her home. Once she had him in her house, she used a “tour” as a pretext to get him to her bedroom. To her bed. After that, he was lost. He would have agreed to anything she asked, no matter how extreme. Although he didn’t, thank God. He had some moral boundaries. Almost immediately, Caroline—what was that legal word Lisa had used?—solicited him to kill her husband. And Aidan said no. So she was forced to kill Jason herself, but she made sure to set him up to take the fall. She acted afraid, so he promised to protect her. He followed Stark around. He put himself out there for anyone to see. Then she invited him to her home on the night of the murder, drugged him, shot her husband, and planted evidence of the crime in Aidan’s truck. Aidan had delivered himself up like a sheep to slaughter. He was that gullible.

Now Aidan lay on his bunk, listening to his cellmate grunt as he did push-ups, trying to make sense of the disaster that was his life. He’d walked into a trap, and the door had swung shut behind him with a resounding clank. The cell smelled of sweat and urine from the toilet in the corner. The cellmate didn’t speak to him and was in for armed robbery. Aidan didn’t share Lisa Walters’s optimism that the prosecution would agree to his innocence. He’d rot here forever, worrying that his cellmate would strangle him in his sleep. Wishing for that, even, to be put out of his misery. Things had never gone his way. Why would they start now?

The guard came up to the cell door and unlocked it, which could only mean one thing. It was visiting hours.

“Callahan. Visitor,” the guard said.

“I saw my lawyer already.”

“It’s not your lawyer. It’s a family member. Let’s go.”

Family. Tommy? Aidan scrambled down from the top bunk and presented his hands for the manacles. In light of everything that he’d learned this morning, he saw yet again how stupid he’d been to reject his brother’s advice. The only person in his life who’d ever really looked out for him was Tommy. He walked down the long echoing corridor, his chains clanking, ready to throw himself on his brother’s mercy. Ready to fight for his own future, if only for Tommy’s sake.

But it was Kelly.

He sat down across from her. She took his hands. They both had tears in their eyes. Kelly, from seeing him in his prison blues, his eyes hollow and haunted. Aidan, from seeing how her familiar, pretty face had aged in the space of a single week. He could only imagine what Tommy looked like, and he couldn’t stand it.