“Was Jeremiah frightened when you talked to him?”
“Of course he was. Scared to death.”
“Did he say why?”
“He’s a little boy. He felt guilty that I’d found him out.”
“Is that all?”
“Yes, that’s all.”
“When was this?”
“Last fall. November.”
“What date?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Mrs. Sloan?” I asked quietly. “Do you remember?”
I could tell that Ellen had already guessed the truth, because she put her hand over her lips with a kind of frozen horror. “My conference was the weekend of the fourteenth.” Then she went on, as if we could read each other’s minds. “Is that possible, Shelby? Do you really think—?”
“Yes, I do,” I replied. “It was November fourteenth. That was the night Colleen Whalen was shot and killed. I think Jeremiah was there. I think he saw it happen.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
I finally did what I should have done months ago.
I confessed.
We were all gathered in the dark, dank sheriff’s office. Me. Dad. Monica. Adam. Violet. Agent Reed. Before we could start talking about what to do next, I told them that I had something to say. And that was when I laid it all out. I told them exactly what had happened on Halloween night during Ursulina Days. How Keith and I went back to his place together. How we talked. How we drank. How we had sex in the old barn with his wife asleep in the main house a quarter-mile away.
The face I didn’t want to see as I confessed was my father’s, but I had to look at him anyway. He had this sad, sad expression that was like a knife in my heart. I knew he was disappointed in me for what I’d done. The affair with a married man. And worse, concealing it when I knew things that might have changed the direction of a murder investigation. Keith Whalen’s marriage hadn’t been fine, no matter what he’d told us back then. He’d cheated with me only two weeks before her death. If Colleen knew, if she’d found out, if he’d told her, then he had a motive to kill her.
The next step in the investigation was to question Keith. Not just about Colleen, but about Jeremiah, too. If I was right that Jeremiah had seen Colleen Whalen being killed — if that was what had terrified him the night of November 14 — then Jeremiah was a witness to murder, and witnesses were always at risk. The question was what the boy had actually seen. Anna didn’t know. Jeremiah hadn’t told her who the Ursulina was. But Keith was the obvious suspect.
I wasn’t going to play a role in the interrogation. I knew that. My father was the natural person to question Keith, but Violet suggested in her usual pointed way that Dad’s relationship with me had poisoned his involvement in the case. He didn’t argue with her. I assumed Agent Reed would take over, but Reed thought a local cop should take the lead.
So that meant Adam would question Keith.
Adam jumped at the chance. He was hungry for an opportunity to prove himself after his drunken voicemail the previous night. Strangely, when I looked at him, I realized that he didn’t look like a kid anymore. He wasn’t James Dean on his motorcycle. The last couple of days had sobered and matured him. I felt the same way about myself. Maybe that’s what happens when you have to confront your mistakes.
We drove to Keith’s land, which was located down a dead-end road from the main highway. As the crow flies, we weren’t even a mile from where the Sloans lived. It was an easy hike through the forest for a ten-year-old boy. Keith wasn’t in the main house, but his car was outside the garage, so I guessed where he was. I led the parade over a shallow hill to Keith’s renovated barn.
It was midafternoon under bright sun, a beautiful day and humid enough to make me sweat and make my uniform stick to my skin. I stayed outside alone and listened to the raucous blackbirds while Adam and Agent Reed went inside. I didn’t think they would be there long. Once Keith realized that he was a suspect, I assumed he would ask for a lawyer and shut up. That was the smart thing to do.
But Keith was impulsive and had other ideas. I had only been waiting there for a couple of minutes when Reed returned and waved me toward the barn.
“I thought we agreed I shouldn’t be part of this,” I said.
“We did, but Whalen doesn’t want a lawyer. He wants you. He says he’ll talk to us but only if you’re there.”
I didn’t want to do it, but I went inside.
The barn assaulted me with memories, mostly bad ones. I remembered the jazz music playing, although it was silent now and every footstep echoed from the wood floor to the high ceiling. I could hear my guitar and feel the strings under my fingertips as I sang the Ursulina song. I could smell the mustiness of the barn and the peat of the whiskey we drank. I remembered the crackle and ash of the roaring fireplace and the smoke that burned my eyes. There, in front of the fire, was the white sheepskin rug where I’d made my foolish mistake.
Keith sat in a leather recliner, watching me. His eyes said that he knew what I was remembering, and he was remembering the same things. The rest of us took up chairs around him, and Adam sat in the middle like judge and jury. Adam removed his deputy’s hat with both hands and carefully placed it next to his chair. He smoothed the sleeves of his uniform and kept his black boots flat on the floor.
“Okay, Shelby’s here. Are you willing to talk to us?”
“Why not?” Keith replied. “I don’t have anything to hide. I didn’t kill my wife. I didn’t have anything to do with Jeremiah’s disappearance. I’ll save you the trouble and repeat what I told you eight months ago. I was at the lake all day. I came home late. It was nearly midnight. I found Colleen dead outside our house. She’d been shot. I called the police. That’s all I know.”
“Except you told us back then that there were no problems between you and Colleen. And now Shelby tells us that you and she slept together only two weeks before your wife was killed. That’s a pretty important detail to omit.”
Keith didn’t look surprised that I’d exposed our relationship. I wanted to sink down through the floor of the barn as I watched his face. I’d done the right thing, but I’d also betrayed him.
“Yes, Shelby and I slept together. That was a mistake. My mistake. It was a huge error of judgment on my part, and I take full responsibility for it. It happened one time and never again, but I shouldn’t have concealed it from you.”
“Was that the only time during your marriage that you were unfaithful?”
“Yes, it was.”
“Did you feel guilty about it?”
“Of course, I did.”
“Did you tell Colleen what you did?”
I watched Keith hesitate. “No.”
“You kept the affair from your wife?”
“Yes.”
“Did she suspect?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Do you think other people in town suspected something between you and Shelby?”
“I don’t know. I don’t see how they could.”
“Was there chemistry between the two of you? Were you attracted to her?”
Keith’s mouth was tight. “Yes. Obviously.”
“Was your wife there for the Halloween show?”
“Yes.”
“Do you think she could see the attraction?”
“I have no idea.”
“Were you acting strangely after the affair?”
“Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Don’t you think your wife knew that something was wrong?”
“I don’t know!” Keith retorted again.
He lost control for only a moment, but his outburst was like the ding in a windshield that begins to grow into a crack. Adam knew it, too. He was wearing Keith down with his questions.