Kitabı oku: «A Beautiful Corpse», sayfa 2

Her eyes welling, Bonnie shook her head, mutely.

‘No idea,’ Harper said.

‘Meeting the boyfriend?’ Daltrey suggested.

‘Her boyfriend lives in Garden City.’ Bonnie wiped a tear away with the side of her hand. ‘Naomi lives on 32nd Street. Those are both miles from downtown.’

Daltrey’s phone buzzed. She picked it up to look at the screen.

‘All right. That’s it for now, ladies.’ Pushing back her chair, she stood abruptly. ‘Leave your numbers with Dwayne, he’ll give you mine. Let me know if you think of anything you haven’t mentioned tonight. I’ll be in touch if I have more questions.’

She directed them toward the lobby. Dazed, Bonnie headed down the hall, but Harper hung back with Daltrey, who was turning out the lights in the interview room.

‘Was Naomi robbed? If she wasn’t, what happened to her phone? We know she had it before she left the bar.’

Daltrey fixed her with a cool look. ‘I don’t know why you’re still talking, McClain. I don’t give tips to turncoats.’

Harper flinched.

No matter how many times it happened, she never got used to it. The detectives who’d invited her to their parties, drunk beer with her, showed her pictures of their kids, now treated her like a criminal.

‘I’m only trying to help,’ she said, stiffly, and left the room.

She didn’t wait to hear Daltrey’s response. It was always the same with all of them these days.

Traitor.

Chapter Three

Five hours later, Harper walked into the newspaper’s offices, clutching a large black coffee and blinking in the sunlight flooding through the tall windows.

After leaving the police station, she’d grabbed a few hours’ rest in Bonnie’s insanely pink spare room. She’d crept out early to go home for a shower and change of clothes before heading to work, and she felt like she hadn’t slept at all.

The newsroom was busy and loud, with twelve writers and editors all typing and talking at once.

With its rabbit warren of corridors and narrow staircases, the sprawling, century-old building was designed to be a boarding house rather than a newspaper but, despite its worn edges, there was something undeniably grand about the place. This was most true of the newsroom, with its sturdy white columns and tall windows overlooking the river.

The reporters’ desks were set in rows, overlooked by three editors’ desks at the far end of the room and, beyond them, the glassed-in office of the paper’s managing editor, Paul Dells.

Harper’s desk was midway down the row closest to the windows. She’d had this prime position since the last round of layoffs removed many of the paper’s senior writers two years ago, and left the newsroom half empty.

As soon as she set her coffee down, DJ Gonzales spun his chair around to face her. His wavy dark hair was even more unruly than usual.

‘What are you doing here this early?’ he asked accusingly. ‘I thought you burned in daylight.’

‘I’m not a vampire, DJ,’ she told him, dropping into her seat. ‘I work nights. We’ve had this conversation.’

She switched on her computer with a move so automatic she couldn’t remember doing it two seconds later and took a sip of coffee.

‘Christ, I’m tired,’ she said, rubbing her eyes.

DJ rolled closer. ‘Were you up all night on this murder everyone’s talking about?’

Harper waved her coffee in affirmation.

He didn’t try to disguise his envy. DJ worked the education beat. He found Harper’s work endlessly glamorous.

‘Sounds like a juicy one. It was all over the TV this morning. You’re going to own tomorrow’s front page.’ His tone was wistful. ‘I can’t believe some chick got capped right in the middle of River Street.’

‘I can’t believe people still say “capped”,’ she replied.

‘Is it out of fashion?’ DJ sounded surprised. ‘I thought it was cutting edge.’

‘Harper.’

At the sound of Emma Baxter’s sharp bark from the front of the room, DJ spun his chair back toward his desk with pinpoint precision, and ducked behind his computer screen as if it were a shield.

The city editor strode across the room, her blunt-cut dark hair swinging against the shoulders of her navy blazer. Dells was right behind her.

‘Crap,’ Harper whispered.

The managing editor usually didn’t get involved in the crime beat. But this one must be big enough to attract his attention.

‘What’ve you got on River Street?’ Baxter asked as she neared Harper’s desk. ‘Why does Miles say you know the victim?’

Out of the corner of her eye, Harper saw DJ’s head bob up.

‘I don’t really know her. I just happened to be in the bar where she works last night,’ Harper explained, glancing at Dells.

‘Perfect,’ Baxter snapped. ‘Do me a first-person, emotional account – “A Brush With Death”. It can run alongside your main piece on the shooting.’

Dells stepped forward. As always, he was impeccably dressed, in a dark-blue suit with a crisp white shirt that looked like it cost more than her car, and a pale blue silk tie. His dark hair was neatly styled.

‘What do we know so far?’ he asked. ‘The TV stations haven’t got much.’

‘The dead woman is Naomi Scott – a second-year law student.’ Harper flipped open her notebook. ‘Seemed to be your basic all-American girl. Left work at one thirty, died of two gunshot wounds. Found with her purse but not her phone. Cops aren’t saying if it was robbery. Nobody knows what the hell she was doing down by the river.’

‘Do we know who her family is?’ Dells asked. ‘Are they locals?’

‘I think so,’ Harper said. ‘Her father’s Jerrod Scott, I’m trying to track him down now.’

Baxter peered at the half-empty notebook. ‘Is that all you’ve got?’

‘Come on.’ A defensive note entered Harper’s voice: ‘I was in the police station half the night.’

‘We’re holding most of the front page for this,’ Dells told her. ‘The TV stations are going to be all over it.’

‘I’ll start making calls,’ Harper said.

‘Good.’ Baxter’s tone was brisk. ‘I want to know who this girl was. If she was so perfect, how’d she end up dead in the street at two in the morning? Call the mayor’s office. Ask her what she’s going to do about people getting shot in the middle of the damned tourist district.’

Dells headed back to his office. Baxter followed, turning so fast her jacket flew off one bony shoulder.

Her last words floated behind her like a cluster bomb: ‘Do it fast. We need something for the website, now.’

When they were gone, DJ swung around to look at Harper, brown eyes wide behind smudged, wire-framed glasses.

‘Dude. You drank in her bar and then she died?’

Harper nodded.

He looked impressed. ‘Tell me something – do you ever think you might be cursed?’

Shooting him a withering glance, Harper logged in to her computer.

‘I’m busy, DJ.’

‘I’m only saying it’s worth a thought,’ he said, spinning back toward his own desk.

It was a bad joke but, as Harper hurriedly checked out the stories about the shooting on the local TV station websites, she found herself thinking about it, nonetheless. After all, Naomi wasn’t the first murder victim in her life.

The first murder victim had been her mother.

Harper had discovered her body on the kitchen floor when she was twelve years old. That still unsolved homicide set off a chain of events that led to her close relationship with the police.

It had also led to everything that happened last year, when Lieutenant Smith was convicted of a murder that had mirrored her mother’s killing in every way.

Breaking that story – and becoming part of it when she was shot by Smith – had raised Harper’s profile; ensuring her position at the newspaper, even in these shaky financial times.

Still, Baxter wasn’t one to stand on history. She needed a steady stream of juicy crime stories to anchor the front page. Even without police cooperation, Harper could provide that. She had her ways. She knew the system better than anyone.

As long as she could keep the headlines coming, her job was safe. She hoped.

Picking up the phone, Harper dialed the mayor’s office number. It rang five times before an assistant answered.

‘Thank you for calling Mayor Cantrelle’s office, how can I help you?’

‘This is Harper McClain at the Daily News. I’d like to ask the mayor some questions about the shooting on River Street last night.’

‘She’s in a meeting.’ The assistant’s tone indicated she wasn’t the first to call. ‘I’ll ask her to get back to you.’

‘Make it quick, would you? We’re in a rush.’

‘As I said,’ the assistant sounded unmoved, ‘she’s in a meeting.’

While she waited for the mayor to call her back, Harper opened an internet search engine and typed: ‘Naomi Scott’.

A flood of false returns filled her screen. A blogger with 40,000 Twitter followers dominated, along with a Chicago attorney.

When she added ‘Savannah’ to the search, though, she found what she was looking for.

It was a social networking site for students at the Savannah State College. The picture on Naomi’s page was arresting. Her shoulder-length black hair hung loose in waves. Her unblemished skin, high cheekbones and huge, cinnamon eyes gave her an ethereal beauty.

Harper stared at the familiar face for a moment.

‘What did you get yourself into?’ she murmured.

The short bio beneath the image said: ‘Young, free, and ambitious. Ready to change the world.’

It listed her area of study as criminal law. The only other information was a phone number and a student email address.

Leaving the landline open for the mayor’s call, Harper picked up her cell and dialed Naomi’s number.

It went straight to voicemail.

‘Hi. This is Naomi. Leave a message.’

Hearing the dead woman’s familiar voice was chilling.

Harper hung up and then immediately dialed another number. This one she knew by heart. As it rang, she stared at the picture of the vibrant young woman with her challenging eyes.

The ringing stopped abruptly. ‘Savannah Police Public Information.’

The voice was male and breathless – as if he’d snatched up the phone while running in search of a fire extinguisher. She could hear other voices in the background and people typing – the sounds of a busy office.

‘This is Harper McClain,’ she said. ‘I’m looking for whatever you’ve got on the Naomi Scott murder from last night.’

‘You and everybody else,’ he said. ‘What do you want to know?’

‘The basics. Got any suspects?’

‘Nothing I can tell you on that.’

‘You looking for the boyfriend?’ she tried, already knowing the answer but also suspecting he wouldn’t verify it on the record.

He snorted a laugh. ‘Is this some sort of hoax? Or do you have any real questions?’

Harper tried a new angle. ‘Could you verify that her wallet was found in her bag?’

She heard him typing something.

‘That’s affirmative,’ he said.

‘Money in the wallet?’ she asked, propping the phone under her chin as she made notes.

‘Affirmative.’

In that case, it definitely wasn’t a robbery. Miles’s source had been right.

‘But her phone was MIA?’ she pushed it.

‘That is what it says on my screen,’ he said, adding, ‘Right now we don’t know if she lost it, left it at home, or got shot for it.’

Harper knew she hadn’t left it at home. Bonnie had seen Naomi take a call less than an hour before she left work.

‘Any witnesses?’

There was a pause, and she heard him clicking keys on his computer.

‘Negative,’ he said, after a second. ‘No witnesses have come forward. The body was found by two members of the public, walking home from a party at the Hyatt hotel.’

‘Can you give me their names?’ she asked.

‘Oh sure,’ his tone was sarcastic. ‘And would you like perfume on your birthday, or do you prefer flowers?’

‘Please?’ Harper begged. ‘Just one name?’

He made an exasperated sound. ‘You know I can’t tell you that, McClain.’

Through the line, she could hear another phone ringing.

‘Is that everything?’ His voice was impatient. ‘I’m a popular man today.’

‘I guess that’s it –’

Before she’d even finished the sentence, the phone went dead in her hand.

Well, at least, thanks to Bonnie, she had the father’s name. And the internet had given her his phone number.

She dialed the number and waited as it rang and rang. After eight rings, she hung up.

If she couldn’t reach family, she’d need to find someone else. But she had enough for the website now.

Turning to her computer, she quickly wrote up a short, sparse news story about the shooting.

Murder on River Street

By Harper McClain

The city was shaken in the early hours of this morning by news of a murder at the very heart of the city’s tourism district.

The victim was Naomi Scott, 24, a law student who also worked as a bartender at the Library Bar on College Row. Police say she was shot twice, at around two o’clock Wednesday morning.

No motive has been determined at this time, although robbery is unlikely.

As this story was being written, detectives were still looking into the details of the crime.

The body was discovered minutes after the murder by two members of the public. Police say no witnesses to the crime have come forward.

Calls for comment to Mayor Melinda Cantrelle’s office were not immediately returned.

She’d just sent the story across to Baxter when her phone rang.

‘McClain,’ she said, throwing her empty coffee cup in the bin.

‘Now look, Harper, my office will be issuing a statement at ten thirty. Don’t you dare write that I’m not replying, or that I’m trying to dodge this murder case.’

Mayor Melinda Cantrelle had a distinctive voice – rich and resonant, made for television. In fact, twenty years ago, she’d started her career anchoring the morning news on a local station. That experience gave her an air of cultivated calm most of the time, and she had a made-for-TV smile. But today she was talking fast, her words short and clipped.

Harper fired a quick message to Baxter: ‘Hold the story. Mayor on phone.’ And then leaned back in her chair, propping a notebook on her knee.

‘Of course not, Mayor Cantrelle,’ she said sweetly. ‘But the first story will go up on the website any minute now and I can’t have our readers think I didn’t try to reach you.’

‘Oh come on, Harper …’ The mayor did not sound happy.

‘Can’t you give me something small?’ Harper cajoled. ‘What does this murder mean for tourism? And will you be sending more police downtown? Anything like that would be enough to get that “no comment” out of my story.’

There was a long pause, during which Harper suspected the mayor was fighting to control her temper. She’d taken over the city leadership a year earlier, and Harper almost liked her – she had a blunt approach that, if nothing else, gave the appearance of honesty. At forty-five, she was younger than the gray-haired men who normally served as mayor, and she was still new enough at her job to pick up the phone at times like these.

‘The police have informed me they are searching for a suspect,’ the mayor said smoothly. ‘We believe this to be a family incident. It would be inappropriate for me to comment further while the investigation is underway. But we intend to get to the bottom of this, I can promise you that. I consider it my number one job to keep visitors and residents here safe.’

Harper wrote as she talked, pen skidding across her notepad.

‘A family incident? Can you be more specific?’ she asked, not looking up from the page. ‘You’re not saying her father had something to do with it, are you?’

‘This is off the record.’ The mayor lowered her voice. ‘But I’m told the detectives are looking for her boyfriend. They think this was a personal thing.’

Someone spoke in the background, and the sound suddenly became muffled. When Cantrelle returned she sounded rushed.

‘Look, I’m afraid I have to go. We’ll be issuing a full statement in an hour. Cathy will email it over. Call her if you need anything else.’

When she’d hung up, Harper read over her notes.

As she’d suspected when Daltrey questioned them last night, they thought it was the boyfriend.

She flipped through her notepad until she found his name: Wilson Shepherd.

It wasn’t a surprise. The vast majority of murdered women are killed by someone close to them – husband, boyfriend, friend. No more than one in ten murdered women are killed by someone they don’t know.

Harper had long thought women were afraid of the wrong thing. Women are scared of the hooded teen at a gas station, or the unknown man walking down the dark street late at night.

They should be afraid of their husbands.

When you get right down to it, if you’re a woman, being killed by someone you love is the most ordinary murder of all.

This was bad news. The paper hardly covered domestic violence.

‘There’s nothing there,’ Baxter had said, more than once. ‘No one wants to read about that stuff.’

She wasn’t wrong.

A random murder is a threat to everyone. It’s lawlessness in the streets.

But if a woman’s ex-boyfriend shoots her? Well. She should have made better choices.

If Naomi Scott was killed by Wilson Shepherd it would move the story to page six within a couple of days.

Harper kept trying to remember if she’d met Naomi’s boyfriend. Her mind summoned an image of a serious, chubby-cheeked guy, neatly dressed, sitting quietly at one end of the bar.

Otherwise, she knew nothing about him.

Before she’d gone to sleep last night, she’d asked Bonnie what she knew about him. All she’d said was that they met at school. She’d been so worn out Harper hadn’t wanted to push it.

She’d still be asleep now. But later today, she could see if she remembered more.

For now, she searched his name in the newspaper database and came up empty.

Staring at the empty screen, she tapped her fingers against the desk. She’d done all she could in the office. It was time to go hunting.

After typing up a quick update with the mayor’s statement and sending it through to the editor, she grabbed her scanner and stood up.

DJ glanced at her enquiringly.

‘I’m heading out,’ she said, stuffing a fresh notebook in her pocket. ‘If Baxter comes looking for me, tell her I’m off to find a killer.’

Chapter Four

When she stepped out of the newspaper office, the sun was fierce. Humidity hung so thick it left a white haze in the air, giving the gold dome of the City Hall an oddly electric shimmer in the distance.

August was always brutal, but this year it seemed even worse than usual. It had been over a hundred degrees every day for two weeks. The heat was relentless.

Harper shoved her auburn hair back, twisting it into a knot at the base of her neck as she surveyed the traffic backed up on Bay Street. She’d planned to get in her car and drive straight to The Library to try to find out more about Naomi and Wilson Shepherd, but it would take half an hour to get anywhere right now.

Instead, she walked toward the scene of the crime.

Already sweating, she threaded her way through stalled traffic, breathing in the acrid scent of exhaust and hot pavement. Whatever the mayor’s worries, news of the murder clearly hadn’t reached the city’s visitors yet. Tourists circulated in brightly colored crowds of T-shirts, baggy shorts and baseball caps, guidebooks shoved under arms.

As she headed down an uneven cobblestone ramp towards River Street, Harper was struck by the audacity of the murderer. All around her were people. Walking, strolling, driving. A Savannah Police car was stuck in traffic twenty feet away.

Even at two in the morning, this area would not have been empty. The Hyatt hotel stood nearby, overlooking the river. Hotels, restaurants, and apartment buildings surrounded her on all sides.

People were close the whole time.

Most murders take place in the shadows. They’re shameful acts hidden from prying eyes.

This hadn’t been a normal murder. This location made it a kind of public execution.

Down by the river, a breeze cooled her skin. The exhaust faded away, to be replaced by the smell of muddy water, and the cloying scent of burned sugar from the praline shops.

It was already busy. Kids ran through the riverfront plaza, oblivious to what had happened here a few hours ago. In the distance, a paddle-wheel riverboat, painted candy-cane red and white, sat waiting for passengers. A busker played the banjo, a battered top hat shading him from the sun as he jangled out a version of ‘Summertime’.

This was why the mayor was panicking. Why Harper and Baxter had both come to work seven hours early today.

The death of Naomi Scott threatened all of this.

Savannah lived or died by its tourist trade. A murder on this street put poison in the well.

Hurrying her pace, Harper walked down the narrow street, searching for the spot. It was hard to square the dark street from the night before with this bright, busy scene. It took a few minutes to find what she was searching for.

In the end, it was the ragged white remnants of crime tape that guided her, fluttering from the base of the lampposts.

From there, the crime scene was easy to find. Discarded latex gloves lay at the curb, along with other medical detritus, overlooked in the hasty clean-up in the dark.

The cobbles were damp – someone had hosed them down, trying to wash the evidence away. But blood stains everything it touches.

The darker stones showed clearly where the body had fallen.

She turned a full circle, oblivious to the tourists jostling her as they passed.

It didn’t make sense. Why had Naomi left The Library in the middle of the night and come here? Was she meeting her boyfriend, as the police suspected, only to be shot dead? And if so, why here of all places?

This was a crazy place for a murder.

Half an hour later, Harper parked the Camaro in a shady spot on a narrow lane on the other side of downtown.

Tucked away not far from the Savannah College of Art and Design, College Row was quiet and dingy during the day, littered with empty beer cans and cigarette butts. The short alley served no purpose except to hold two bars and a small clothes shop, known for its quirky T-shirts.

The lights were off in the Library Bar when she walked up. Its sign – an open book with a martini glass perched on it – was unlit.

When she tried the door, Harper found it locked.

‘Hello?’ she called, knocking on the door. ‘Is anyone in there?’

No response. She knocked again, raising her voice.

‘Hello?’

This time, something inside stirred. She heard footsteps shuffling across the room.

After a minute, the door opened a crack.

A rumpled, lived-in face peered out at her.

Harper barely recognized Jim ‘Fitz’ Fitzgerald, the bar’s jovial owner. Normally, he was a natty dresser, with a penchant for tweed jackets, turned-up cuffs and crisp, white shirts. Today, he wore a flannel shirt and wrinkled slacks, his thick, graying hair waved wildly.

‘We’re closed right now,’ he told her, and began to shut the door.

Harper moved quickly, angling her body so it would have been rude – if not impossible – to close the door on her.

‘Hi, Fitz,’ she said. ‘I don’t know if you’ll remember me, but I’m a friend of Bonnie’s. Harper McClain, from the newspaper?’

For a moment he didn’t react, but then recognition dawned.

‘You’re that police reporter,’ he said. ‘The one who got shot.’

Even from here, she could smell the medicinal tang of vodka on his breath.

‘That’s me,’ she said. ‘Look, I hate to bother you at a time like this, but I need to ask you a few questions about Naomi Scott.’

‘Oh, lord. I don’t know.’ He peered at her blearily. ‘Would you want to print this?’

‘I need someone who knows her to talk to me about the kind of person she was,’ she said, avoiding his question. ‘I only met her a few times, but I know she was a smart, kind person. I need someone to tell me who she was so people who never met her can understand.’

He studied her with red-rimmed eyes. ‘I don’t know if her family would want me to talk.’

‘You’d be doing them a favor,’ she told him. And this, at least, was the truth. ‘They know how wonderful their daughter was but talking to me will be hard for them right now.’

He hesitated, leaning hard against the door, one hand still poised to push it shut.

‘I’d really appreciate your help.’ Harper held his gaze steadily.

Finally, he took a step back.

‘I guess you better come in. We’re letting the air out.’

Harper followed, closing the door behind her.

Inside it was dim and cool. It smelled faintly of disinfectant and beer.

Fitz shuffled to the bar and climbed unsteadily onto a stool in front of a tall glass filled with ice and clear liquid.

Harper perched on the stool next to his.

‘I can’t understand it.’ He turned to her, his face haunted beneath that tangle of hair. ‘She was right here last night.’ He pointed across the bar to the empty space in front of the bottles. ‘She was fine. Now, they say she’s dead.’

Ice rattled as he lifted the glass and took a long, shaky drink.

It was ten thirty in the morning. If he was already drunk, Harper couldn’t imagine what he’d be like a few hours later.

She needed him to talk quickly before he passed out.

‘What can you tell me about Naomi?’ she asked. ‘What was she really like?’

‘Oh, everyone who knew her will tell you she was a great kid.’ He stared into his glass. ‘And it’s true. Hard worker. Smart as hell. Always smiling. People came in here just to see her smile, I swear. And ambitious as hell. I thought she’d be president someday.’ He looked at her helplessly. ‘Who would do this to her? Can you tell me that much at least?’

He seemed genuinely grief-stricken.

To an extent, this fit with what Harper knew of him. She didn’t encounter Fitz often – he didn’t tend to hang around on the late shift, and she rarely arrived at the bar before one in the morning. But Bonnie always described him affectionately.

‘Fitz is everyone’s dad,’ she’d told Harper once. ‘He worries about me more than my own father does.’

Still, Naomi had only worked at the bar a few months. Harper was a little surprised at the intensity of his reaction.

‘Were you close to Naomi?’ she asked. ‘Did you know her family well?’

‘I met her dad a few times when he came to pick her up.’ He reached for his glass. ‘Can’t say I know him particularly well. But he’s a good man.’ He took a long drink, the ice rattling in his glass, before adding, morosely, ‘This’ll kill him.’

‘I know the police are on this,’ she told him. ‘They want to get this guy.’

‘They better get him.’

Reaching across the counter he swiped up a bottle from the other side and poured himself an unhealthy measure.

‘Can you tell me anything else about her?’ she asked.

He waved his glass.

‘Her mom passed a few years ago. Her dad’s a cab driver.’ He’d begun to slur his words. ‘She was an only child – she and her father were very close.’

He slapped his hand hard on the bar. ‘Dammit. This doesn’t make sense. I keep thinking someone will come in here and tell me it was a mistake. For a minute, that’s what I thought you were here for.’

‘What about her boyfriend?’ Harper asked. ‘Wilson Shepherd, isn’t that his name?’

‘Wilson?’ His gaze sharpened. ‘What about him?’

‘How long had they been together?’

‘A year maybe?’ He rubbed his face, his hand rasping across his unshaven jaw. ‘Poor old Wilson.’

‘The police think he did it,’ she told him, watching for his reaction.

‘What?’ His head jerked up, eyes wide in a drunken pantomime of shock. ‘You can’t be serious.’

‘They’re looking for him now.’

‘Then they’re nuts.’ He was angry. ‘No way. They were crazy in love. He wouldn’t hurt Naomi.’

But the first hint of uncertainty had entered his voice. They both knew crazy in love people hurt each other all the time.

‘Did they ever fight?’ Harper asked. ‘Fall out over anything?’

‘Hell, I don’t know.’ He held up his hands. ‘I’m not the one she’d talk to about that. But she seemed happy with him. Except –’

He paused, thinking.

‘Except what?’ Harper pressed him.

But he wouldn’t be hurried. He gripped the glass tight, and rattled it, lost in his thoughts.

‘It’s probably nothing, but I’ve been going over it all in my head – trying to think of anything – something I should have noticed,’ he said, peering at her. ‘Only thing I can think of was something that happened a couple weeks ago. Struck me as strange. Seemed like nothing at the time, but now …’

‘What happened?’ she asked.

‘It was a busy night. A Saturday. Naomi was helping Bonnie at the bar. Everything was fine, and then out of nowhere she came over to me and said she had to go right now. I wouldn’t have noticed, but she seemed real upset.’

Harper’s brow creased. ‘Did she tell you what happened?’

‘Sort of. We were packed. It was midnight. I mean, where could she have to go at midnight? I asked if she could at least stay half an hour. And she begged me – literally begged me. “Let me go, Fitz. I have to.” In the end, I gave in. Couldn’t stand to see her so upset. She was shaking. It was like she was scared or something. She ran out the door like the devil was on her tail. Didn’t even stop to take her apron off.’

‘Did you ever find out what she was scared of?’ she asked.

The lines in his craggy face deepened.

‘She was off the next three days. By the time she came back to work, I had other things on my mind.’ He looked at her. ‘You know how it is. You lose track.’

‘But after that she was fine?’

He made a vague gesture. ‘She seemed fine. Maybe a little more distracted than usual. But I figured it was school keeping her busy.’