“I’ve been awake. I haven’t slept.”
Paul turned up the music—an Alanis Morissette album (“just while we’re in Canada”)—and told Harry that he’d be able to drive the rest of the way.
They reached the outskirts of Ann Arbor by midmorning, the sky a deep metallic blue, and picked the first motel that didn’t look like it was owned by Norman Bates. They each stood by the car for a few moments after getting out, Paul doing jumping jacks while Harry stretched out his legs. The air was cool and smelled of nothing.
They rented a room with two double beds. The woman at the front desk, her sparse white hair combed over a bald pate, suggested they go to the Nichols Arboretum if they wanted a nice activity for later in the day. Paul told her they were attending a funeral Mass, and Harry watched as her eyes flicked from Paul’s face to his, then quickly back down to the computer. The murders in Kennewick, Maine, were national news, and Harry was sure that they were much bigger news in Ann Arbor, where Grace McGowan’s memorial was being held at three that afternoon.
They each ate an enormous breakfast at a Shoney’s, then went back to the motel room to sleep.
Paul crawled under his covers fully dressed, and said, “I don’t have to go to the service, if you don’t want me there. I’ll be happy to tour Ann Arbor’s bar scene instead.”
“Oh no, you’re coming,” Harry said.
Paul didn’t answer. He was asleep already.
Harry tried to sleep, but found himself alternately staring at the ceiling and then his phone, hoping to get a text from Caitlin, who knew he was arriving that morning. He hadn’t planned on texting her himself—it was the day of her sister’s funeral, after all—but he was secretly hoping she might reach out to him, just to acknowledge his arrival, to tell him it was okay he was there, although she’d already given him that blessing.
It was five days since he’d opened the trunk of Jake Richter’s car and thought he was looking at her dead body. The returning policeman had helped Harry lift her from the trunk as an ambulance arrived. She’d started to shiver once his arms touched her, and called his name, her voice barely audible. When she was on the gurney and about to be rolled into the ambulance, she lifted her hand and beckoned to Harry. He came close to her, placing his ear down by her mouth.
“It was John Richards,” she whispered.
“I know,” Harry said. “He’s dead now.”
Caitlin was initially brought to Kennewick Hospital, but was moved that evening to Portland and kept under observation for two days. Detective Dixon told Harry that her physical issues were comparatively mild—a broken nose, a contused neck—but that she was now under psychiatric care. Harry didn’t get a chance to see her before she returned to Michigan; he’d asked, several times, if he could see her, but was always told that she wasn’t seeing any visitors.
And then he was informed she was back in Michigan with her family.
During those bizarre days after Jake Richter’s death, Alice, hounded by the throng of journalists that had arrived in Kennewick Village, had moved into a spare bedroom at her friend Chrissie Herrick’s house. Paul Roman had immediately arrived in Kennewick, found an Airbnb near the harbor, and Harry had moved in with him, bringing Lew the cat from the store. He got far more information from Chrissie than he did from Alice, who’d barely spoken since being attacked by Jake in his condominium. Harry tried to elicit more information from Detective Dixon, but he was tight-lipped because of the ongoing investigation. Harry also wondered if Dixon was somehow ashamed at not having arrested Jake earlier. According to the articles that Harry read online, Jake had been a person of interest in the investigation into the murders of Bill Ackerson and Grace McGowan, but the police were convinced that the perpetrators were Lou and Annie Callahan, neither of whom had solid alibis for either murder.
Since the events that led to his death, more had come out about Jake Richter’s past, including from a schoolteacher from Albany named Joan Johnson who claimed that Jake Richter, back when he’d been a coworker of her mother’s, had seduced her when she was just a teenager. It also turned out that Jake Richter had lived for a number of years in the Fort Lauderdale area in Florida, where he’d been fired from a job at a beach resort because of “inappropriate behavior.” A picture emerged of a lifelong sexual predator.
There was much speculation that when he’d been married to Alice Moss’s mother, he’d been sexually assaulting Alice, and that he’d most likely killed Bill Ackerson out of some form of jealousy. Alice hadn’t spoken publicly yet to dismiss any of these rumors, but Vivienne Bergeron, a longtime resident of Kennewick, sold a story to one of the tabloids in which she said she knew for a fact that Jake and Alice had been lovers. But she also said that Alice had murdered her daughter, an erroneous claim she had apparently been making for years.
Harry had seen Alice just once since they’d been together in Jake’s condo. Chrissie had texted him to ask if he could get some more clothes from Grey Lady, plus Alice’s straightening iron, and deliver them to her (a ginormous favor, I know), and Harry had done it, going late at night back to the house to avoid news reporters, although one enterprising journalist had raced from his car when Paul and he emerged from the house with two suitcases filled with Alice’s things. They’d refused to answer the reporter’s shouted questions, and the next morning Harry went to the Herricks’ house. Alice had given him a short hug after he’d brought the suitcases into her bedroom. “I’ll leave you two alone for a while,” Chrissie said and disappeared.
“How are you holding up?” Harry asked. Alice still held on to one of his hands, then let go and sat on the edge of the bed. Harry sat on a wicker chair that had been painted white.
“I’m in shock, Harry. I’d known Jake my whole life.”
“Why was he calling himself John Richards?”
“I asked him, once, and he said he just wanted a fresh start. But now I think he was trying to escape something from his past, maybe something he did in Florida.”
“And you’re sure that my father knew he was your stepfather?” Harry asked.
“Oh, I’m sure he did,” Alice said quickly. “Still, it wasn’t a big thing. He and my mother were married barely any time at all. I just can’t believe . . . I had no idea he was capable . . .”
“You must have thought it strange that he changed his name?”
“It should have concerned me more, I know, but—”
“I just wondered,” Harry said. It was bothering him, not so much that Jake was calling himself by a different name, but that Alice had gone along with it. He wondered if his father really knew who his employee was, but there was no way to find that out now.
They spoke for just a little bit longer, Harry trying to read Alice’s emotions, her thoughts, but it was something he’d never been able to do. And he still couldn’t.
“I should go,” he said.
“Where are you going next?” Alice asked.
“Paul rented a place near here, and I’m staying with him.”
“No, I mean, after this is all over. Will you stay here in Maine?”
“I don’t think so, Alice.”
“No, I know. I understand.”
“How about you?”
“I’ll stay here. I don’t know where else I’d go.”
They hugged good-bye, and Alice held on to Harry a little too long, her face buried in his neck, as though she was smelling him.
“Jake probably killed my mother,” she said, as soon as they’d broken the embrace.
“What do you mean?” Harry asked.
“He probably killed my mother. She died of an overdose when I was in high school.”
“Did you tell the police?”
“I told them everything, but there’s nothing they can do about it now.”
He walked back to his car, feeling as though he might never see her again.