Was it possible that in a dim corner of Annette’s expansive yard, my friends and I could air our fears and lessen their power? As I approached her house—blazing with light, fabulous music spilling from her backyard into the street already—I nursed a tender shoot of hope.
But not for long.
-6-
Salvatore
SALVATORE PARKED HIS CAR at 1009 Slaughter Lane. It was 5:00 p.m. on the dot and he was absolutely bone-tired, done. He didn’t want to get out of his car. His children, his loud, energetic, beautiful children, and the knowledge that one of the summer lifeguards could be a rapist and murderer…it all felt overwhelming. Was this depression? Could a pill fix him, make him want to stay in his life?
Salvatore’s team had combed the neighborhood surrounding the greenbelt, interviewed Lucy Masterson’s neighbors, co-workers, family, friends. They had not uncovered any other possible suspects.
One neighbor had seen “a teenage boy” entering Lucy’s condo the week before but had seen him only from the back and didn’t remember any identifying details other than that he was tall. Lucy’s professors at Austin Community College either couldn’t place her or had nothing to add. Her hometown doctor had stopped refilling an OxyContin prescription he’d written two years before for a rotator cuff tear. （Dr. Garcia talked to Tina for close to an hour about the painkiller problem in Sugar Land.）
Lucy Masterson had had sex the night she died, and the lab had promised to “ultra-rush” the process of analyzing the teenage suspects’ DNA to see if it matched the semen found inside the victim. （Salvatore had called the lab himself, and assumed Paul Jackson had been joking when he said, “Oh, we’re not just rushing, Detective. We are ultra-rushing.” Salvatore could never tell when Paul was being sarcastic or earnest or what; Paul was a weird guy.）
They hadn’t yet received a DNA sample from Charlie Bailey. After dinner, Salvatore was going to have to follow up again with the kid’s lawyer, the fearsome Hilary Bensen. She’d kept some gruesome criminals out of jail. The fact that she was representing Charlie Bailey looked very bad for the kid—everyone knew you didn’t pay for Hilary unless you were scared. Salvatore wasn’t sure what the DNA delay meant in terms of her strategy. She was smart as hell—he respected her legal acumen, if not her ethics.
Salvatore plodded up his walkway. （Someone needed to replant the window boxes and that someone was going to have to be him.） He made small talk with Mae Mae and bade her good night, assembled something like dinner. He felt half-asleep as his kids chattered and ate the meal, the very sad meal—deli meat, a stack of bread, sliced cheese, a jar of mayo on the table with a knife stuck in it.
Salvatore tried not to think of Jacquie, up in Heaven, wearing her favorite shortie pajamas with a matching silky robe, saying, “Sal, honey! The mayo jar on the table?”
He had to do better.
Allie was talking—maybe to herself?—something about lima beans, and Joe was dancing in his seat. As soon as they’d wolfed down the “dinner,” Joe cried, “Time for football!”
Football meant that Salvatore was supposed to change into his running shorts （still on his bedroom floor, filthy） and sneakers and teach his son about the game. Throw the ball. Listen intently. Somehow also entertain Allie, responding in a somewhat human way to her entreaties, and meanwhile, dessert would appear after football. There would be homemade cherry pie…or maybe pumpkin? Yeah, pumpkin, with freshly whipped cream.
“Dad!” said Joe. “Come on, Dad!”
He couldn’t do it. He. Could. Not.
“And then there are pinto beans,” said Allie. “And black beans, and the round ones that aren’t really beans. What are they, Daddy?”
“Come on, Dad!” said Joe.
“Daddy? The round ones? They taste like lima but they are not lima beans. Daddy?”
Salvatore’s head hurt so much. This must be depression, he thought. He wasn’t just tired, though he’d never been so tired. There was simply no joy. Even looking at his precious children, all he felt was an almost unbearable, yawning sadness. A dull pain that seemed endless and insurmountable.
His phone rang, and he answered.
“Sal?” It was Tina Silver, who had kept on working when Salvatore headed home. He felt a flicker of…not happiness, no…but distraction from misery.
“Tina, what’s up?”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Joe slink toward his iPad. Joe was old enough to know when he’d been rejected, and Salvatore was lanced with shame. Allie, still at the table, cast her eyes down at her crossed hands, waiting for him to be finished so they could further discuss beans.
“Robert Fontenot,” said Tina.
“Yes?”
“He’s a match,” said Tina.
“Oh,” said Salvatore. In the basketball team photo he’d found of the kid they called Bobcat, the boy was tall and gangly. He’d looked very young in the photo, but had apparently had intercourse with Lucy Masterson.
“Xavier Brownson is not a match. Still no DNA from Hilary Bensen’s boy, Charlie Bailey.”
Allie began waving to her father, making a motion to hang up the phone.
Salvatore turned away from his daughter, holding a finger over the ear not pressed to his phone. “OK, Tina. I’ll call you from the car.”
“Da-ddy,” sang Allie.
“Sorry, honey,” said Salvatore. “I’m going to have to go back in to work.”
“No,” said Allie, bursting into tears. “No, you don’t!”
“You’re an asshole,” said Joe.
Both grandmothers had offered to take the kids for the summer. Salvatore had thought staying together was best, but now he felt he may have been wrong. Something was the matter with him: he was not worthy of his kids’ love. The realization made him feel even worse.
“Joe…” said Salvatore. His son looked up, wanting a reprimand, wanting any attention.
“Don’t call me an asshole,” he said.
“Don’t go, Dad,” said Joe quietly. “Please.”
“This is my job. You know that,” said Salvatore without conviction. He sounded like a robot in his own ears. “I’m sorry,” he said. He was—he was so sorry.
Salvatore texted Peach, not meeting his children’s eyes. Joe stood, threw his iPad onto the floor, and ran outside. Allie was sobbing theatrically. Peach arrived within minutes.
“I really appreciate this,” said Salvatore. “Joe’s in the side yard, I think.”
“Oh, Sal,” said Peach. “I’m glad to help. I know you’re having a hard time.”
Salvatore wanted to disagree, but Peach was right. He was having a hard time.
As he put the car in gear to drive away, Salvatore looked out the window and saw his son, holding a football, watching him leave. He remembered a gang member tell him once, “Fear turns to rage in the end, man. It always does.”
He raised his arm to wave at Joe, but Joe turned away.
* * *
—
THE FONTENOT HOME, DEFYING the neighborhood trend toward modern, was what Jacquie had called “an architectural sampler”： it seemed there had once been a reasonable, traditional home, but the Fontenots had added Roman columns flanking a front door that looked to be larger than a normal front door, wings on either side of the house that each boasted giant dormers with strange balconies to nowhere and even a turret on top with—Salvatore squinted—yes, it was a widow’s walk, which overlooked not ocean but an expanse of paved driveway. The McMansion even held a four-bay garage. Salvatore could only imagine what the backyard looked like （he guessed a tiki bar and pool with naked cherubs “peeing” into the water）。 For once, he was not jealous of a Barton Hills home.