“What about Lizzie? You ever do her hair?”
“Once, actually. For her wedding.”
“I saw a photo. She looked very pretty.”
Jennifer chuckled. “Lizzie? Pretty? Must have been a good picture. The hair turned out nice, though. I was still in vo-tech then; I was just a kid. But yeah, it was just that one time. She doesn’t come here”—she paused, checking herself—“I mean, didn’t come here. Lizzie wasn’t much for haircuts. Or chitchat.”
“She didn’t confide in you, then,” Bird said.
“Not me. Not anyone, I don’t think. Dwayne, maybe.”
“Tell me about Dwayne.”
Jennifer shrugged. “I don’t know where he is, if that’s what you’re asking. I guess you think he did it, huh?”
Bird didn’t blink. “How about him and Lizzie? You knew them both, sounds like. How’d they end up together?”
She snorted. “They were eighteen, Officer. I bet you can guess.”
“So she was pregnant,” Bird said. He’d known this, of course. It was one of the first things he’d learned about Lizzie Ouellette once he started asking questions, the first thing that most people seemed to think he needed to know about her.
“She was,” Jennifer said. “She lost the baby, I guess. But she got the guy.”
“It sounds like you think she got away with something.”
Jennifer sighed. “Look, I was two years behind Lizzie and them in school. I didn’t run with those kids. But I don’t think I was more than four years old the first time someone told me the Ouellettes were trash and I should stay away. They said Lizzie had herpes and if you got too close, you’d catch it. We didn’t even know what herpes was, but you know how kids are.”
“Sounds like this was more than kids being kids,” Bird said.
“It definitely kicked up a notch around the wedding. People were angry about what she did to Dwayne.”
“What she . . . did?” Bird tried to keep his face neutral, but Jennifer caught his tone and smirked.
“Oh, you know. Ruined his life.” She rolled her eyes. “Like she got knocked up all by herself, right?”
“Is that how Dwayne felt?”
She shifted her weight, suddenly uncomfortable. “I don’t know. Everyone was surprised that they stayed together, after. He didn’t talk about it very much. I think he felt trapped once they were married, baby or no baby.”
“Were either of them ever involved with someone else? Affairs?”
“I wouldn’t know about that,” Jennifer said quickly. But her eyes slid to the side as she did.
Bird would come back to that, if he needed to. For now, he finished his questions and thanked Jennifer Wellstood for her time.
He was halfway turned around, shifting the cruiser into gear to pull out of the parking lot, when the door of the purple trailer banged open. He dropped the car into park, instead, then rolled down the passenger-side window as Jennifer approached. She had her arms crossed tightly beneath her breasts, hugging herself, and she looked back and forth, up and down the empty road, before bending at the waist to peer through the window.
“Miss Wellstood,” Bird said.
“Look,” she said. “I don’t want to cause trouble.”
“Trouble for who?” Bird said, and again, she looked chagrined. Good. Sometimes, people just needed a gentle nudge in the direction of decency—or at least, not being overly worried about damaging the reputation of the guy who’d dismantled his wife’s head with a shotgun.
Jennifer leaned in farther. “A while back, I went by Lizzie and Dwayne’s place to drop some stuff. It would’ve been right after the holidays, I had my husband’s whole family for Christmas and she let me borrow her big roaster pan. She answered the door with two black eyes.”
Bird raised his eyebrows and held her gaze, waiting, sure there was more. Jennifer bit her lip. “She was trying to keep me from getting a good look. And I didn’t ask. I didn’t want to ask.” Then she shifted her weight, and for the second time, her eyes slid sideways. Guilty. “I guess I should have asked.”
Bird leaned toward the window.
“You think Dwayne was hitting her?” he said, but Jennifer stiffened and stood, stepping back and looking out at the road. A car was approaching from the west. It slowed as it passed, the driver’s face a pale moon behind the glass. Watching. Jennifer waved. A hand flashed in return. When the car was out of sight, she stood back, recrossing her arms.