Bel, Book, and Scandal Read online

  He gazed at a spot in the distance, a place over my head and out the window but, if I was reading him correctly, gazing at a point in time that was long gone. “You always had such a blind devotion, Bel. You always thought she was much, much better than she really was.” He stayed where he was for a few more seconds before returning his attention to me, to the present. “She betrayed you. You forget that.”

  “No,” I said. “I’ll never forget that. But we were young, and anyway, if you recall, so did you. Betray me, that is.”

  He regrouped, changed his tune. “It was just a kiss,” he said, but right there on his face was the fact that it wasn’t just a kiss; it had been much more.

  It didn’t matter what had happened, but it did matter how he had felt at the time. So that close bond that I thought we had, that I had almost given up my true self for, had been all in my mind. As with Brendan Joyce, it had never been about me; it had always been about her.

  He pulled out his notebook, casually writing down a few notes. “What did you say those names were? The people up at the Hudson Courier? In Wooded Lake?”

  “I didn’t,” I said, digging into my purse and throwing a twenty on the table. I slid out of the seat, my mind going in a million different directions but landing on one thought, a memory that I had suppressed for the last couple of months, not wanting to believe he had been standing in the middle of the Foster’s Landing River, the water gone and the earth below cracked and barren, looking out toward the spot where we had found Amy’s car.

  But he had. He had been standing there a long time, and while I wondered then why he would, I was starting to think I now knew.

  CHAPTER Thirty-four

  When I got home, I put together a list of things I knew and things I didn’t know. Feeney was still asleep on the couch, now seemingly a permanent fixture in my home.

  I knew that Archie Peterson was in Wooded Lake and that Tweed had lied to me about that. Estranged, my ass.

  I knew that Amy had married two men in the span of fifteen years—Tweed first and then Dave Southerland—and again, Tweed had lied to me about that.

  I knew that Kevin loved Mary Ann D’Amato but at one time had loved Amy, too, just like Brendan had and Cargan as well, even though he would never reveal anything of the sort to me. There was no talk of love in the McGrath family; you just had to assume it was there.

  I knew I could only trust a few people, and they were a disparate, ragtag group that consisted of the guy on my couch (who now owed me big-time), Cargan, and Alison Bergeron. I couldn’t think of anyone else with whom I could trust the information that either I had been given or I had learned over the last several days. There was a lot outside of my control, but there was maybe one thing I could control, could change for the better, and Feeney’s loud snoring reminded me what that might be.

  I texted Brendan Joyce and asked if he was available for lunch, saying that I had something to talk to him about.

  His response was immediate and positive, suggesting a quick sandwich at a local place that would ensure he could get back to school for his afternoon classes. I guess he was naïve enough to think that this was a step in the right direction for our relationship, and I felt a pang of guilt that my intentions weren’t pure. This was about Feeney. Not us.

  There was no “us” anymore and he was going to have to get used to that.

  I went over to the Manor, where I found Mom and Dad huddled together in the office, Mom in a formfitting one-piece catsuit that a woman half her age would have trouble pulling off, but when you’re a Pilates-practicing denizen of a small Hudson-river town, I guess you can wear anything you like. That woman had muscles on top of muscles. As I often did when she was decked out in a skintight getup, I sucked in my stomach, even though my flesh was hidden beneath a long turtleneck sweater with a leather bomber jacket on top of it.

  Dad jumped up when I arrived. “Belfast, how’s the head?” he said, pointing at his own as if I had forgotten just where my own head was.

  “It’s okay, Dad. Thanks for asking,” I said.

  “And how are you?” he asked, giving me the once-over.

  I mumbled something noncommittal. He was going to get more out of me; it was just a matter of when and how. He had his ways.

  “Out for breakfast?” Mom asked, ignoring the fact that there was lot unsaid in this conversation.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I wanted to touch base with Kevin about the party.”

  “Any new developments?” Dad asked. “I’ve told Lieutenant D’Amato no fewer than eighty-five times that we’ll be finished decorating by the time the party rolls around.”

  I had convinced his daughter of the same thing not an hour before. It hadn’t occurred to me to ask Kevin about Mary Ann’s sudden appearance, if she knew we were together and decided to drop by or if her showing up was as big a surprise to him as it was to me.

  “I’m going to work in the kitchen and then I’ll be out running errands,” I said. “Talk to you later.”

  As I turned to leave, I saw Mom grab a hunk of Dad’s muffin top and squeeze it; that was a bad sign. Old guy would be on one of those Pilates contraptions faster than he could say “plank.”

  In the kitchen, I took off my jacket and threw on a clean apron, wondering just what I would do with the intervening hours until I had to meet Brendan. Craft Feeney’s apology, one that he would never give? Beg for his forgiveness of my brother’s rashness? Or hit it straight: Feeney’s crazy and so are the rest of them. Take some pity on me, please.

  You owe me: You’re the one who broke my heart and not the other way around.

  In the end, as I walked into the sandwich shop where we agreed to meet, I decided to play it straight. I asked him outright, the look on his face showing that this was not what he was expecting.

  Before I had arrived, I had stopped at the bank and taken out a thousand dollars, more than enough, I was sure, to cover the damage. I pushed an envelope across the table like we were engaged in illicit activity, resting my hand on top of it.

  “Are you trying to bribe me, Bel?” he asked, aghast.

  “Bribe you?”

  “Yes. Bribe me. With money.”

  “Well, I sure ain’t bribing you with sex,” I said, not getting the uproarious response that I was expecting; his face remained a mixture of confusion and hurt. “It’s not a bribe. It’s the money to cover the damage.”

  “I had to have my windshield replaced,” he said.

  “Which is free if you have insurance.” I had seen the commercials; no one paid for a new windshield these days.

  “And the rest of the car detailed because some of that … stuff…”

  “It’s called schmaltz,” I said. “Well, technically schmaltz is chicken fat and this was duck fat so it’s not really schmaltz.…”

  He held up a hand. “Bel. Stop.” He pushed the remains of his sandwich, one bite taken, into its wrapping and crushed it, his appetite gone. “I used to find you hilarious. The funniest girl I had ever met. But now, you’re just insulting me.” He couldn’t look at me. “So, just stop.”

  I closed my mouth, my lips tight together.

  “I will drop the charges against Feeney,” he said. “Deep in my heart, there is a place where I find what he did admirable, protecting his baby sister against a horrible guy like me.”

  “You’re not horrible, Brendan,” I said.

  “I know I’m not,” he said. “But that’s what Feeney thinks. That’s what they all think.” He looked at me, forlorn. “I would appreciate it if you could disabuse your clan of my wrongdoing, even if you don’t believe what I told you. I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again: That photo was never mine and I never put it there.”

  I had heard this story before and I had been too hurt to believe it. Something about his look and demeanor today, though, was swaying me a bit, and while it might have been the familiar smell of his body wash—Jungle Prince, a scent made for middle schoolers that he just couldn’t get enough of—or
the way his tie was just slightly askew, as if he still couldn’t figure out how to tie it himself, or his acknowledgment that my brother’s heart was in the right place, I started to thaw just a little bit inside.

  And he could see it.

  “Yes, I’ll drop the charges, Bel. Just tell them the truth. Tell them that I haven’t given Amy another thought since that day she disappeared, that I would never betray you in that way.” He shook his head. “I would never be with you if I loved her. Even after all these years.” He turned his head to the side, unable to look at me. “Never.”

  “Hey, Mr. Joyce!” some kids called as they grabbed their sandwiches and exited the sandwich shop.

  “Hi, Brody. Carl,” he said. “See you in a few minutes.”

  “That your girlfriend, Mr. Joyce?” another kid asked, a cheeky girl in a “Nasty Woman” sweatshirt. It was the onset of winter and yet not one of the little ragamuffins wore a coat. I remembered those days.

  “Shouldn’t you be working on your self-portrait, Celine, instead of questioning me about my personal life?” Brendan asked, a big smile on his face. When the kids were gone, he answered her question, looking at me with those blue eyes that I used to love looking back at. “She used to be. My girl, that is.”

  He stood up, pushing the remains of his sandwich into the garbage bin by the door. We walked out to the sidewalk, teeming with students going to and from their lunch destinations and back to the high school again, a loud, boisterous throng jockeying back and forth, bumping into one another and us, the smell of pizza and Chinese food and deli meats wafting through the air. One of Brendan’s colleagues passed by, Mr. Malloy, the guy who coached swim team when I was in high school.

  “Hey, Belfast,” Mr. Malloy said. “Hey, Brendan.”

  “Dan,” Brendan said. He looked at me. “Coach here says that we have a potential record breaker in the one-hundred-meter fly.”

  “Impressive,” I said. “I was a freestyle girl myself. A little backstroke. Never could get the rhythm of the fly.”

  “And we tried, right, Bel?” the coach said. “It’s a tough stroke.”

  “The toughest,” I said.

  “So what brings you two here? Into the middle of the lunchtime fray?” he asked.

  Brendan pointed at the sandwich shop. “Sandwiches,” he said, as if it were obvious.

  “Right! Sandwiches,” he said.

  When it was clear there was nothing else to say, that he had interrupted a tense encounter, the coach waved as he walked off. “Gotta go. See you at school, Brendan.”

  “Poor guy,” I said. “Doesn’t know what he walked into.”

  “He’s a nice guy,” Brendan said. “Bit of a ball buster these days. Not as cool as he used to be. Swim team is doing well, though.”

  “I had him for PE,” I said. “Nearly failed me because I forgot my sneakers.”

  “For one day?” Brendan asked, incredulous.

  “Well, it was actually two months.” My mother had threatened to tie my shoes around my neck after getting my progress report that semester.

  Brendan repeated his promise. “I will drop the charges, Bel,” he said. “But there’s one thing?”

  I wasn’t sure I would like what I would be agreeing to, but familial loyalty always won out, to the detriment of my own personal emotional health. It was the way of the McGraths.

  “Sure. What is it?” I asked.

  “You have to believe me.”

  CHAPTER Thirty-five

  I waited for the official word from Kevin, who must have had a bit of an idea that I was involved in Brendan’s decision, on the dropped charges before I sent Feeney on his way. The money that I gave Brendan couldn’t have covered all the damage, but the next morning when I went down the stairs behind my apartment to the parking pad below, the envelope was tucked under the windshield wiper, all of the bills still intact, a note from Brendan asking if we could try “this” one more time, “this,” I imagined, being our relationship, the whole falling-in-love-all-over again thing. I was nothing if not stubborn; the blood of a thousand intractable Celts ran through my veins and it was a hard habit to break, being the one who held fast and stern in the face of the obvious.

  In this case, it was that the guy loved me and hadn’t lied. But that raised a larger question: Who put that photo in his wallet? It wasn’t something even one of my squirrelly brothers would do as a joke; they weren’t that cruel. So who was? Who was cruel enough to make it seem like he had carried a torch for my best friend all of these years, just to break us up? I didn’t think it was the French teacher at the high school, but who knew? Maybe she had a vindictive streak. Eligible bachelors weren’t a dime a dozen in this town; rather, they were like unicorns: rarely seen and maybe nonexistent. He was back on the market now at least, but it seemed his mind was elsewhere, still on someone else.

  Me.

  Feeney’s belongings were everywhere in my apartment: a comb that went straight into the garbage can and a toothbrush that looked as if it were suitable for cleaning grout and nothing else. I was bagging up the trash at the end of the day when my cell phone rang; it was Alison Bergeron.

  “How are we feeling today?” she asked. “Oh, and you’d be proud of me! I’m making chicken soup.”

  “Good for you!” I said.

  “But it’s got a ton of fat on the top. What do I do with that?” she asked.

  You don’t use it to vandalize your sister’s ex-boyfriend’s car, I thought, but I went with the straight answer. “Cool the soup down, put it in the fridge, and then skim the fat off the top.”

  “That makes sense,” she said. “How’s the head?”

  With all that had gone on for the last twenty-four hours, I hadn’t even thought of my head. I touched the lump at the back of my neck; yep, still there. “Head’s okay. Heart, not so much.”

  “Uh-oh.”

  I told her the whole story about Brendan. When I was done, she started talking immediately. “Went through something similar with Crawford. I was stupid. Don’t be so stubborn that you can’t let this go, Bel. The guy sounds like a complete doll and why would he lie about this? He wants you back.”

  “Sure seems that way.”

  “Think about that.”

  I did. She was right.

  “Did you tell him about Amy?” she asked.

  “I didn’t.”

  “You going to?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said. “If this does come together again, I may. But I’m going to take it slow.” I put her on speaker while I tied up the garbage. “You’ve been there since the beginning. You just didn’t know it. That night at The Monkey’s Paw. That was the night my engagement ended and a part of my life as well.”

  “Hey, if anyone knows heartache, it’s me,” she said. “But I’m here to tell you that there are good ones out there and they should be found. And once they’re found, they will never leave you.” She laughed. “Heck, next thing you know you’ll be at birthday parties at trampoline parks with little ones.”

  “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” I said.

  “Why do you think I’m making this soup?” she asked. “I’m also going to try to bake bread. Make it up to the poor guy.” She let out a long sigh. “What in the hell is happening to me? I used to have a refrigerator that held a jar of olives and a bottle of vodka.”

  “Times change,” I said. “We change.”

  “Wow. Far out, sister. Don’t get all existential on me now.”

  “I won’t,” I said, picking up the garbage and lugging it to the back door. “Talk to you soon.”

  I opened the back door and was surprised to see Larry Bernard from Wooded Lake standing there, the sight of him making me gasp.

  “Most women just say ‘ugh’ when they see me,” he said. “Gasping out loud? Now that’s a new one.”

  I opened the screen door and let him in. “Do I need my lawyer?” I asked.

  “You do not,” he said. “This is a friendly chat.”

&nbs
p; How could that be when I was the witness to an attempted murder—or the aftermath of one—and he was a cop? His Jewish-mensch-Columbo thing may have been an act and may have been designed to put me off my game, but he didn’t seem like he had an agenda beyond figuring out what happened to Tweed and why.

  “I was going to call you,” I said, that thought floating into my mind as I had struggled to consciousness that morning. “I wanted to find out how Tweed was.” I had hesitated making contact with anyone associated with what had happened; it all fell into an area in which I had never traveled, violence and harm the signposts I could see and wanted to avoid.

  “Poor guy,” he said. “He had surgery to repair a punctured lung and hasn’t been conscious since.”

  “Is he going to make it?” I asked, the same question from the other night.

  “My brother Saul is the doctor. I’m just the cop,” he said. He smiled. “I couldn’t tell you, Ms. McGrath. It’s hard to know.”

  “Would you like a cup of tea?” I asked. Tea in an Irish family is the go-to refreshment. Before five o’clock anyway. Despite the hour, it didn’t feel appropriate to offer him a drink, and my alcohol stash was depleted after Feeney’s stay. I didn’t wait for his answer, putting the kettle on and taking two mugs down from the cabinet next to the stove.

  “More of a coffee guy myself,” he said. “But I’ll try this tea you seem to have an affinity for.”

  “It’s the Irish in me, Detective. We love our tea.”

  “The Jews, we’re not about the tea,” he said. “But when in Rome…”

  He went to the front window of my apartment and pushed the curtains to the side. “This is quite a place you have here, this Shamrock Manor. Sounds hokey, but it’s much more beautiful than the name would suggest.”

  “Yes, my father picked the name. Thought it sounded like a piece of the old country. I’m with you: I think it sounds hokey.”

  “But everyone knows it by that name now, so too late to change it.”

  “Yes,” I said, dropping a tea bag into each mug. “Sugar?”

  He shook his head.