Beach Wedding(49)

Viv sat on a towel as I took Angelina out past the waves with me into the “lotion” again. We did better this time, and I actually taught her how to do a little bodysurfing. After she tired of swimming, I just lay there in the swash with her as she played with her Barbies in the muddy sand.

It was that golden moment they talk about. The sky light and the water going from blue to black. In the twilight, the beach mansion over the grassy bluff looked like something out of a storybook.

I turned my gaze to Viv, who looked just as amazing, tan and beautiful and positively glowing. I couldn’t believe what a lucky man I was.

Then I thought about what Courtney had said in the barn about the empire starting to strike back, and I wondered if I was pushing it. I’d dived into the case with both feet and made some progress, but it was going to get harder, I knew. The higher up the food chain you went with an investigation, the heavier the pushback. The people I would be talking to now were closer to Hailey, and it would be more difficult to get anything from them.

Plus I’d been lying to people, misrepresenting myself. That could get me into trouble with the Philly PD brass, some of whom weren’t exactly my best buddies.

It had been a head rush finding out about Kelsey’s investigation and his files.

I looked over at my beautiful little daughter talking to herself as she played in the sand.

Maybe I needed to roll it back some, I thought. But I was getting so close to the truth.

We stayed out a little longer than we should have, so we had to hustle our butts back to the room for showers and sprucing up before we were ordered to head out to the front steps.

It was downright ridiculous, of course, for all of us to be standing there in sport coats and dresses in the front formal court while waiters served champagne like we were starring in a modern version of Downton Abbey.

However, as Tom explained, it wasn’t for us but for Emmaline’s very formal, well-to-do British aristocratic parents, whom Tom had never met. All the stops had to be pulled, Tom had said, as William Fullerton, Emmaline’s dad, was actually Sir William Fullerton.

Sir or no sir, I really thought they were going to be a couple of stiffs. Three bags full, sir. William especially.

And as he emerged from the limo, it looked like my prediction was true. He was decked out in three-piece Savile Row despite the heat, and Sir William’s nose was literally raised into the air like he was staring up at the sky as he came across the seashells. We all watched breathlessly as he halted at the bottom of the steps and sniffed up at the thirty-thousand-square-foot mansion behind us.

“This will do, I suppose,” he said in his clipped British accent. “And all of you are staying where now?”

Tom stood there wide-eyed with his mouth open, unable to speak. I’d never seen him so nervous. Or so stunned.

Then William finally broke character and gave Tom a wide grin as he seized his hand.

“Gotcha, son!” he cried as we all laughed with relief.



66

After a truly great dinner and a laughter-filled evening with the Fullertons, who were all as funny and sweet and charming as Emmaline, Sir William maybe even more so, I woke up at seven, just in time to see a message appear on my phone.

An hour later, I was in a conference room on the top floor of the new modern federal courthouse building in Central Islip.

On my left was Special Agent Courtney Frazier, and across from us was her boss, ASAC Walter Marino, along with Marvin Heller.

Funny and sweet and charming was yesterday, I thought as I looked at their grim cold faces.

“Ready?” Courtney said as she stood.

“Ready for what?” I said.

“You’ll see,” Marvin said as Courtney led us out of the room and into the hallway.

Ten feet from the end of it, Courtney opened a door, and we all entered a room the size of a walk-in closet with a mirror in it. The mirror was one-way and on the other side of it was a person I couldn’t help but immediately recognize.

It was Noah Sutton’s old chauffeur, Darren Ross.

He sat on the other side of a beat-up table, desperate-looking and sweating, a far cry from his demeanor during my interview with him at the bar. His hands were pulled inside his T-shirt and he needed a shave.

“What the...? What’s he doing here?” I said.

“He got busted on a drug deal three days ago up in Boston,” Marino said. “Mexican heroin. Pretty major weight.”

“You don’t say.”

“When we heard about it, we reached out,” Courtney said. “He wants to cut a deal, Terry. Turns out it’s just like you told us from the Kelsey file. Ross was there that night. Not only that. He saw something. Something you’re not going to believe.”

“You have to be kidding me. He knows what happened to Noah Sutton?” I said, wide-eyed.

“Yes, Terry,” Courtney said, nodding. “Not only did he see what happened that night, he’s willing to testify in exchange for leniency.”

“That’s amazing,” I said. “So, c’mon already. Tell me what happened. Was he involved or something?”

“I’ll let him tell you,” Courtney said as she left.

A moment later, Ross seemed to jump through the glass as the door behind him clacked open and Courtney entered the interview room and sat.

“Hey, Darren. I know we’ve been through this already, but just one more time. So, you were there that night in the house. How did it happen again?”