The Inn(33)

Dark thoughts swirled as I watched the trees roll by. Effie turned and looked at me, seemed to sense my trepidation, and hugged my head to her chest briefly. It was an unusual gesture for her, and I should have felt comforted. But I took it to mean she knew that I blamed myself for all this. As we pulled into the hospital, I worked my phone out of my pocket and texted Marni.

Call me immediately.

We waited in the emergency room for two hours, no one speaking, the television playing a documentary about sharks. I watched the big, beautiful animals gliding through the depthless blue and felt a hunger for Cline’s blood shimmering through me. By midnight I had resorted to reading pamphlets about Zika virus to distract myself from violent thoughts.

I turned when Sheriff Spears walked through the automatic doors. He was stunned by the sight of us all. I hardly noticed the gurney behind him, the bundle of white sheets that three paramedics took straight into the emergency room.

“Clay.” I went to him, Nick at my side. “You heard about the house? Did Doc Simeon call you?”

A strange stiffness had come into Clay’s face. It was an expression I had seen plenty of times in my career, emotion barely held in check, a jaw locked, trapping fury or sadness inside. He glanced at the others, then took my arm and led Nick and me outside into the freezing night.

We huddled under the blazing red emergency sign.

He didn’t beat around the bush. Cops never do.

“I’m sorry, Bill.” Clay eased the words out carefully. “Marni’s dead.”





CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX





I COULDN’T LOOK at Clay, at the truth of it burning in his eyes. I turned and put my hands on the wall, pressed my forehead against the cold bricks. Some deep, dark corner of my mind knew that this was exactly where I had been standing when they told me Siobhan hadn’t made it. I’d been drenched in sweat, having driven like a madman to the hospital after receiving the call. My legs were shaking now as I tried to focus on the mist of my breath in the light of the illuminated sign.

It was Nick who asked the questions I couldn’t bear to.

“Mitchell Cline had a big party at his place tonight,” Clay said quietly. “Hundreds of people there. Marni was last seen alive hanging around the pool area. The party spilled out into the street and the beach and the woods behind the house. They found Marni in the woods about a half an hour ago, unresponsive. The paramedics are calling it an overdose.”

“Where’s Cline? Have you arrested him?” Nick asked.

“We have no—”

“Tell me you’ve arrested him!” Nick barked.

“There’s no reason to.” Clay sighed. “We have no cause. There were hundreds of people at that party, and anyone could have given Marni whatever it is she took. It could have happened on or off Cline’s property, we can’t confirm anything at this stage. If we—”

Nick punched the neon sign beside my head, shattering the fiberglass and splintering the light inside, darkening the first E in Emergency. I didn’t intervene when he grabbed the steel casing of the letter and ripped it off the wall, taking the M with it, and smashed the letters into the pavement. I could barely breathe but I managed to get out some words as Nick stormed off toward the end of the lot, pushing over anything that wasn’t bolted down.

“Didn’t they try?” I asked.

“They tried,” Clay said. “But she was cold when the party-goers found her. Someone started CPR then and the medics carried it on.”

Clay put a hand on my shoulder. It was like he wasn’t touching me at all. The weight and warmth of it had no effect. I stood in the cold and tried not to scream.

“Bill,” Clay said. “We’re going to find out what happened. I’ll chase down everyone at that party and get all their photos. My team and I will talk to witnesses. I’m going to do everything I can do to make this right.”

“Yeah,” I said, frightened by the sudden evil intent in my own voice. “So am I.”





CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN





THE MIND SHUTS down in these situations and the body does what it can to maintain calm. I followed impulses that came from nowhere, getting a cab home from the hospital, walking into the house without talking to anyone, climbing the stairs to Marni’s room. The cluttered space smelled like her, the way everything seemed to smell of Siobhan after she’d been lost to me. I lay down on the floor on the fluffy pink rug and let the hateful thoughts rage.

I had done this.

The circle had closed. I had stood in the very same spot at the very same hospital where a man had told me that another woman in my care had died in the woods.

Between the internal blows I threw at myself, I had visions of Cline, his throat in my hands. I listened to the house fill with people, all talking and crying. The air was full of questions that had no answers. How had this happened? Why had she gone to the party when she’d said she’d be home? When had she been invited? Who invited her?

As the pale light of approaching morning lit the window above the bed, the house fell into sudden silence, everyone exhausted and numb with grief. I realized I was succumbing to sleep when the sound of a door opening nearby snapped me awake. As I sat up on the floor, the door to Marni’s room opened. A man I didn’t recognize stood there looking at me. Neddy Ives was as Siobhan had described him, tall and long-faced, a kind of grayness to his skin from his days inside that gave him the air of a figure in a faded photograph. He glanced down the hall as though to make sure we were alone and then took Marni’s violin from the stand and weighed it in his big hands.