Тесс Герритсен - I Know a Secret

“They assumed she was drunk and careless.” Kevin gave an angry shake of his head. “That would not be Sarah. She was never careless. Yeah, she liked a drink or two at bedtime, but that doesn’t mean she’d get intoxicated and sleep through a fire. That’s what I told the police, the fire investigators. The problem was, the more I insisted it couldn’t be an accident, the more they looked at me . They asked if I’d had any affairs, or if Sarah and I were arguing. The husband’s always the prime suspect, right? So what if I was in China when it happened? I could have hired a killer to do it! After a while, I just had to accept that it must have been an accident. Because who’d want to hurt her? No one.” He focused on Jane. “Then I got your call. And now everything’s changed.”

“Not necessarily,” said Jane. “This is simply part of a larger investigation. We’re looking at two homicide cases in Boston and trying to determine if they have any links to your wife’s death. Does the name Timothy McDougal mean anything to you?”

Kevin shook his head. “I don’t know that name.”

“What about Cassandra Coyle?”

This time he hesitated. “Cassandra,” he murmured, as though trying to conjure up a face, a memory. “Sarah did mention a friend named Cassandra, but I don’t remember her last name.”

“When was this?”

“Early last year. Sarah said she’d gotten a call from some girl she knew as a kid, and they were going to have lunch together. I never got the chance to meet the friend.” He shook his head in self-disgust. “Probably because I was on some goddamn business trip.”

“Where was your wife raised, Mr. Basterash?” asked Frost.

“Massachusetts. She moved to Newport after she found a job here, at the Montessori School.”

“Did she visit the Boston area very often? Have friends or family there?”

“No, her parents are both dead, so there was really no one left for her to visit in Brookline.”

Jane looked up from the notepad she’d been writing in. “Sarah grew up in Brookline?”

“Yes. She lived there until she graduated from high school.”

Jane and Frost glanced at each other. Both Cassandra Coyle and Timothy McDougal had grown up in Brookline.

“Was your wife Catholic, Mr. Basterash?” asked Jane.

He frowned, clearly bewildered by Jane’s question. “Her parents were Catholic, but Sarah left the Church years ago.” He gave a sad laugh. “She said she was still traumatized by growing up Catholic.”

“What did she mean by that?”

“It was just a joke. She used to say that the Bible should be rated R for violence.”

Jane leaned forward, her pulse quickening. “How much did your wife know about Catholic saints?”

“A lot more than I do. I was raised agnostic, but Sarah could look at a painting and say, That’s Saint Stephen, who got stoned to death. ” He shrugged. “I guess that’s what they teach kids in Sunday school.”

“Do you know which church she attended as a child?”

“I have no idea.”

“Which high school?”

“I’m sorry, I don’t remember.” He paused. “If I ever knew.”

“Do you know any of her childhood friends from Brookline?”

For a long time he thought about this question but failed to answer it. Instead, he looked at the window, where curtains had not been hung, because this was not really a home yet. Perhaps it would never be a home but merely temporary lodging for Kevin Basterash, a place to grieve and heal before moving on.

“No,” he finally said. “I blame myself for that.”

“Why, sir?” Frost asked gently.

“Because I was never here for her. I was always traveling for business. Gone half the time, living out of a suitcase. Hammering out deals in Asia when I should have been home.” He looked at them, and Jane saw guilt shining in his eyes. “Here you are, asking these questions about Sarah’s childhood in Brookline, and I can’t answer a single one.”

Maybe someone else can, thought Jane.

She had not spoken to Elaine Coyle in weeks, and as Jane dialed the woman’s number, she dreaded the question that Elaine would almost certainly ask her: Have you caught my daughter’s killer yet? It’s the one piece of news every victim’s family wants to hear. They don’t want more questions. They don’t want excuses. They want an end to their uncertainty. They want justice.

“I’m sorry,” Jane had to tell Elaine. “We don’t have a suspect yet, Mrs. Coyle.”

“Then why are you calling?”

“Do you know the name Sarah Basterash?”

A pause. “No, I don’t think so. Who is she?”

“A young woman who recently died in a fire in Rhode Island. She grew up in Brookline and I wondered if she knew Cassandra. She was about your daughter’s age, so they may have attended the same school or the same church.”

“I’m sorry, but I don’t remember any girl with the last name Basterash.”

“Her maiden name was Sarah Byrne. Her family lived less than a mile from—”

“Sarah Byrne? Sarah’s dead ?”

“Then you did know her.”

“Yes. Yes, the Byrnes used to live down the road from us. Frank Byrne died of a heart attack a few years ago. And then his wife—”

“There’s another name I need to ask you about,” Jane cut in. “Do you remember Timothy McDougal?”

“Detective Frost asked me about him last week. That’s the young man who was killed on Christmas Eve.”

“Yes. But now I’m asking about a boy named Tim McDougal. A boy about your daughter’s age, who may have gone to school with her.”

“Detective Frost never told me the dead man grew up in Brookline.”

“We didn’t think it was relevant at the time. Do you remember him?”

“There was a boy named Tim, but I’m not sure what his last name was. And it happened so long ago. Twenty years...”

“ What happened twenty years ago?”

There was a long silence. When Elaine finally answered, she spoke in barely a whisper. “The Apple Tree.”

“When the apple Tree Daycare abuse case went to trial, I was still in high school, so I don’t know any more than you do. But you should be able to find what you need in these documents,” said Norfolk County Assistant DA Dana Strout. Though she was only in her mid-thirties, gray roots were already peeking out in her hair, visible testimony to her stressful job as a prosecutor and a schedule too demanding for a much-needed visit to the hairdresser. “These boxes should get you started,” Dana said as she dropped yet another load of files onto the conference room table.

Frost stared in dismay at the half dozen boxes that were already lined up on the table. “This is just to get us started ?”

“The Apple Tree Daycare case was one of the longest criminal trials in the history of Norfolk County. These boxes contain the documents for just the pretrial investigation, which lasted over a year. So you’ve got a lot of homework. Good luck, Detectives.”

Frost asked, with a note of desperation, “Can someone in this office give us the CliffsNotes version? Who was the prosecutor on the case?”

“The lead prosecutor was Erica Shay, but she’s out of town this week.”

“Is there anyone else who remembers the case?”

Dana shook her head. “The trial was twenty years ago, and the other attorneys on that case have all moved on. You know how it is in public service, Detective. Too much work for too small a paycheck. People move on to better jobs.” She added, under her breath, “I’m thinking about it myself.”

“We need to track down all the children who gave evidence in that trial. We can’t find their names anywhere,” said Jane.