Nine Lives(10)

“Probably at Cooley’s. It’s a bar down the other end of the beach. He’ll be spending my money and badmouthing me all at the same time.”

Sam had gotten a pretty good description of Ben Gagnon, then gone down to Cooley’s and brought him back to the station for questioning, where the kid made a full and weepy confession. Frank hadn’t pressed charges, and Ben had returned the money. It had been Sam’s first case in Kennewick and that was probably the only reason he’d remembered it. But since then, Sam had regularly gone to the Windward for a scotch and soda on a Friday night. And occasionally, over the years, he went to Cooley’s for a beer, despite the fact, or maybe because of the fact, that it was the only place in his new town in which he’d experienced any kind of racism. A very drunk real estate developer from Wells, the next town over, had said to Sam, sometime during his first winter in Kennewick, “Anyone tell you you’re the wrong color for Maine?”

“What’s your name, son?” Sam had said, aware that he was letting a little of his Jamaican accent slip into the question.

“I don’t have to tell you that.”

“No, you don’t. I’ll remember your face. And one of these days I’ll arrest you, probably for drunk and disorderly, and when that happens, you’ll be glad to know that I forgot you ever said what you just said to me.”

The man had looked confused. He’d looked confused, too, when Sam had, in fact, arrested him about two years later after he’d gotten drunk, this time at the Kennewick Harbor Hotel, and reached across the teak bar top to grab the breast of the college girl who’d been working behind the bar. True to his word, Detective Sam Hamilton acted as though he’d never met the real estate agent named Harvey Beach before. It had been the only time anyone had said anything racist to him in the state of Maine. In fact, most people he’d met had been perfectly friendly, despite the reputation New England had for unfriendliness. And that had included Frank Hopkins, ever-present owner of the Windward, who’d been murdered on his morning walk.

Sam thought back and was pretty sure that Frank had been married when he’d first met him. A dark-haired woman who worked at the post office. He thought her name might have been Sheila. She’d left town to move to Florida and had not invited Frank to go with her. That was years ago, and Frank was now a confirmed bachelor and a man of strict habit—the walk on the beach each and every morning unless the wind was just too much, then most likely a half-day spent working on the daunting task of keeping the Windward Resort profitable and running, then a long evening spent in the Windward lounge, quietly nursing a succession of Bud Lights—and as far as Sam knew, there was no room in that schedule for love affairs. Not only that, but Frank did not make enemies. He was an easygoing boss, friendly to everyone. Which meant that what happened to Frank on the beach felt like something else altogether, something, for lack of a better word, wrong. If it hadn’t been for the letter, Sam would have thought that Frank had been killed by accident, a mugging gone wrong maybe, or, who knows, maybe someone who just wanted to experience how it felt to kill a man, press his face into the sand. But what about the letter? That list of names?

Sam did a search of the other names online, to see if any of them had come up in a murder investigation, but there was nothing. Still, he was just searching through Google. The state police would be looking at their own database. Something—some connection between the names on the list—would come up.





2





FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 12:30 P.M.


Jessica Winslow almost always went to Cece’s for lunch on Fridays, usually with Mary from the accounting department, but Mary was on vacation this week, and Jessica thought she’d try that new lunch place over on Congress Street, the one with the rotisserie chickens in the window.

All the tables were taken but there was a seat at the back counter. She ordered iced tea, a smoked chicken leg with rice and beans, and fried plantains on the side. The old Latino guy behind the counter scanned her face, then asked her one of her least favorite questions. “Where you from, chica?”

She hadn’t heard this particular question in a while, but she’d heard it enough in her life. That and “What are you?” or, the less rude but just as condescending “Aren’t you pretty?”

“Maryland,” she answered.

“No, I mean before that.”

“Maryland, far as I know.”

The old man raised one eyebrow, but gave up, and went down the counter to take another order. Jessica had been adopted, but all her parents knew for sure was that she’d come from Vietnam. There was definitely some Vietnamese in her, but there was also some African blood, and white blood as well. She wasn’t certain, but she assumed she was the product of a Vietnamese woman and an African-American soldier. And if that was the case, then it was possible that her mother had been a prostitute. Honestly, she didn’t care that much. She never thought about it till some stranger decided they’d love to know all about her ancestral history, as if it were any of their goddamn business. She felt the anger rising up and tamped it down. The old guy was probably harmless, just wanting to figure out if she spoke Spanish. Lots of people took one look at her and assumed she did.

The geezer brought her the chicken leg, and it was much better than she’d been told. Halfway through her lunch, her phone, turned upside down on the counter, buzzed twice, and Jessica ignored it, partly because her fingers were covered in chicken grease, but mostly because she just wanted to enjoy the remainder of her food. But the third time her phone buzzed, she put the chicken leg down, wiped her fingers on her napkin, and looked at the screen. Two of the calls were from Aaron, and one was from Stephanie, the receptionist. There was also a text from Aaron. Where are you?