looked like any other house on the street. Fairly nondescript. But inside it was completely redone. The colors were muted, but not washed out. Calming, warm. Almost pastel, but not quite that feminine.
“Cheerful” was the word. Homey. The bookcases had books. The closets had organizers, and were organized. The kitchen smelled of herbs and spices and he could see implements in jugs, and a coffeemaker, and a teapot. None of it placed for effect.
This kitchen was used.
It was open to the living room, and the ceiling was beamed.
It was a home, Jean-Guy knew, he could easily and happily see his own family living in.
It took half an hour to search the place. There was nothing that screamed, or even whispered, a secret, or a double life. There was some erotic literature. Some cigarettes. He sniffed them to make sure that’s all they were. They smelled and felt stale.
On the dresser in the bedroom, he picked up a photo. Four of the people he recognized. The fifth he did not.
“From the Université de Montréal,” said Beth. “First year. Lifelong friends. Hard to believe she met Patrick that long ago. So young.”
“Do you mind if I keep this?” Beauvoir asked.
He wrote out a receipt. It was the only thing he took.
They headed slowly over to Katie’s parents. He was about to tell them when Beth broke in. And broke the news. And when it was over for him, but just beginning for them, he drove home. To hug Annie and kiss Honoré and read him to sleep, before returning to Three Pines.
CHAPTER 24
Patrick Evans was rocking back and forth, back and forth, on the sofa of the B&B.
What had been a chilly November day had become a cold November night.
“I don’t understand,” he kept repeating. “I don’t understand.”
At first the words were said as a statement, an appeal. But as time had gone by and no explanations came, and all efforts to comfort him had failed, the words and the rocking became simply rote. A primal whisper.
Matheo had tried to comfort Patrick. His instincts were good, but his technique was lacking.
“Shove over,” Lea had said. “He’s got grief, not gas. You look like you’re burping him.”
Matheo had been patting Patrick on the back and repeating, “It’ll be all right.”
“And by the way”—Lea leaned over and lowered her voice—“it won’t be all right.”
Matheo watched as his wife took Patrick’s hand. Patrick looked at Lea, his focus still hazy after the pills and the sleep.
Matheo felt a pang of the old jealousy.
What was it about Patrick that brought out the mother in women? Whatever it was, it brought out the bully in Matheo. All he wanted to do was kick the guy in the ass.
Even now. He knew it was unreasonable, even cruel, but he wanted to scream at him to get a grip. Sit up straight. Do something besides rock and cry. They had to talk. They had to work this out. And Patrick, once again, was no use at all.
Matheo got up and walked to the fireplace, taking his frustrations out on the logs. Hitting them with the poker.
This was first-year university all over again. Lord of the Flies all over again.
When they’d all intertwined. And never really disentangled.
That first year, when they met. When this all began. The events that had brought them to this terrible place in a beautiful spot.
“I thought you might like something,” said Gabri, standing in the archway between the dining and living room of the B&B, holding a tray with a teapot. “I’ll have dinner ready before long. I didn’t think you’d want to go to the bistro.”
“Merci,” said Matheo, taking the tray from him and setting it on the coffee table beside the brownies he and Lea had bought at the bakery.
Gabri returned a minute later with another tray. Of booze. And put it on a sideboard by the crackling fireplace.
Then, bending over the grieving man, he whispered, “I don’t understand either, but I do know they’ll find out who did this.”
But the words didn’t comfort Patrick. He seemed to collapse more into himself.
“Do you think so?” Patrick mumbled.
“I do.”
As Gabri straightened up, he wondered if the lament, I don’t understand, was about more than his wife’s murder.
He also wondered why he had the insane desire to slap the man.
Gabri returned to his kitchen and poured himself a bulbous glass of red wine. And sat on a stool by the counter, looking out the back window into the darkness.