Go home. We’ll be by to interview you shortly.
What had I done?
I kept moving once I got to Dad’s. My nerves wouldn’t let me sit down. I knew nothing.
I knew everything.
Rachel and the boys were dead. Killed by David because he found the note. No, no. Rachel would’ve destroyed it. But what if whoever wrote the notes had seen us talking the day before at the farmers market? They’d tipped David off, expecting righteous retribution. And they’d gotten worse than that. So much worse.
Dad watched out the window. I couldn’t look. He told me what was happening.
Two more cop cars were there, lights off, no siren.
Now an unmarked van. Men and women with paper gowns and booties carrying black cases.
Now the—
Now the what? I asked.
He looked at me gravely. Now the medical examiner was there.
An hour later a gurney was wheeled out, the flat black of the body bag darker than midnight even in the midmorning sun.
God. I’d done this.
We watched the officers canvass the neighborhood, the cop who’d stopped me earlier finally arriving at Dad’s door. He came in and stood by the kitchen counter and asked us questions. Did we know the Barrens? How well? When was the last time we’d spoken to them? Had we seen or heard anything in the middle of the night? Anything out of the ordinary?
Dad had a strange look on his face when he shook his head to the last question. I bookmarked it and told the officer, yes, I’d heard a bang and wasn’t sure if it had been part of a dream or not. He noted this and talked quietly into the radio on his shoulder. I asked him what had happened. He said someone would be by shortly to speak with us further. He thanked us and left.
We waited, the minutes elongating into hours. No more body bags were taken out of the house. Gradually the vehicles began leaving. The yellow crime scene tape stayed.
A knock on the door came later. Dad and I had just finished picking at our lunches, neither of us talking about the elephant up the street. In that time lapse after the officer left and before the knock at the door came, I so wanted to tell Dad everything. He would’ve understood. I could’ve let it all out just like I’d released the last of my book onto the page the day before. I felt sick, and telling him the truth would’ve been a relief.
But I didn’t.
When I opened the door, a squat, dark-haired man stood there. I noticed his eyebrows first. They were thorny brambles across the lower part of his forehead, something I recalled being transfixed by fifteen years ago.
“Officer Spanner,” I said, the name leaping from the nether of memory to my lips.
“Detective, actually,” he said. “How are you, Andy? It’s been a while.”
Yes. Yes, it had.
The last time I’d seen Vince Spanner had been at the local precinct the night after Emma’s death. I’d been drunk on a pint of cheap whiskey and wandered up to the church in the early-morning hours. Crying and shouting, I’d taken a stone the size of my fist and hurled it through the window of the sanctuary.
Officer Spanner had been first on the scene. He’d hauled me roughly off the curb where I’d been sitting and slammed me up against the side of his squad car so hard one of my ribs cracked. I couldn’t breathe deeply without pain for several weeks. He was an Irish cop who had watched too many Irish cop movies.
He was also a certified asshole.
I invited him in.
He sat at the kitchen table, not touching the cup of coffee Dad poured him, and looked everywhere around the room except at either of us.
“So when did you roll back into town?” he asked finally.
“About a year ago.”
“And your residence is across the street?”
“Yes.”
“What’s the address?” I gave it to him. “Phone number?” Rattled it off. “Place of employment?”
“Self-employed.”
“What do you do?”
“I’m an author.”
“Oh yeah? Have I read anything you’ve written?”
“How should I know?”
His expression hardened like curing cement. “In regards to the incident—”
“What happened?” I asked.
“I’d like to know what time you heard the sound you mentioned to Officer Reynolds.”
I watched him. “What happened?”
“I can’t divulge any details in an ongoing case.”
“We’ll be able to read it in tomorrow’s paper.”
“Then read it. I’m not here for scuttlebutt. I’m here to gather statements and evidence. Got me?”