“Nobody saw anything?”
“Not a thing,” Frank confirmed. “She walked here from her house. Pete says she comes here every Monday after the lunch rush.”
Jeffrey managed a tight nod, walking into the diner. The Grant Filling Station was central to Main Street. With its big red booths and speckled white countertops, chrome rails and straw dispensers, it looked much as it probably had the day Pete’s dad opened for business. Even the solid white linoleum tiles on the floor, so worn in spots the black adhesive showed through, were original to the restaurant. Jeffrey had eaten lunch here almost every day for the last ten years. The diner had been a source of comfort, something familiar after working with the dregs of humanity. He looked around the open room, knowing it would never be the same for him again.
Tessa Linton sat at the counter, her head in her hands. Pete Wayne sat opposite her, staring blindly out the window. Except for the day the space shuttle Challenger had exploded, this was the first time Jeffrey had ever seen him not wearing his paper hat inside the diner. Still, Pete’s hair was bunched up into a point at the top, making his face look longer than it already was.
“Tess?” Jeffrey asked, putting his hand on her shoulder. She leaned into him, crying. Jeffrey smoothed her hair, giving Pete a nod.
Pete Wayne was normally a cheerful man, but his expression today was one of absolute shock. He barely acknowledged Jeffrey, continuing to stare out the windows lining the front of the restaurant, his lips moving slightly, no sound coming out.
A few moments of silence passed, then Tessa sat up. She fumbled with the napkin dispenser until Jeffrey offered his handkerchief. He waited until she had blown her nose to ask, “Where’s Sara?”
Tessa folded the handkerchief. “She’s still in the bathroom. I don’t know—” Tessa’s voice caught. “There was so much blood. She wouldn’t let me go in.”
He nodded, stroking her hair back off her face. Sara was very protective of her little sister, and this instinct had transferred to Jeffrey during their marriage. Even after the divorce, Jeffrey still felt in some way that Tessa and the Lintons were his family.
“You okay?” he asked.
She nodded. “Go ahead. She needs you.”
Jeffrey tried not to react to this. If not for the fact that Sara was the county coroner, he would never see her. It said a lot about their relationship that somebody had to die in order for her to be in the same room with him.
Walking to the back of the diner, Jeffrey felt a sense of dread overcome him. He knew that something violent had happened. He knew that Sibyl Adams had been killed. Other than that, he had no idea what to expect when he tugged opened the door to the women’s bathroom. What he saw literally took his breath away.
Sara sat in the middle of the room, Sibyl Adams’s head in her lap. Blood was everywhere, covering the body, covering Sara, whose shirt and pants were soaked down the front, as if someone had taken a hose and sprayed her. Bloody shoe and hand prints marked the floor as if a great struggle had occurred.
Jeffrey stood in the doorway, taking all this in, trying to catch his breath.
“Shut the door,” Sara whispered, her hand resting on Sibyl’s forehead.
He did as he was told, walking around the periphery of the room. His mouth opened, but nothing would come out. There were the obvious questions to ask, but part of Jeffrey did not want to know the answers. Part of him wanted to take Sara out of this room, put her in his car, and drive until neither one of them could remember the way this tiny bathroom looked and smelled. There was the taste of violence in the air, morbid and sticky in the back of his throat. He felt dirty just standing there.
“She looks like Lena,” he finally said, referring to Sibyl Adams’s twin sister, a detective on his force. “For just a second I thought…” He shook his head, unable to continue.
“Lena’s hair is longer.”
“Yeah,” he said, unable to take his eyes off the victim. Jeffrey had seen a lot of horrible things in his time, but he had never personally known a victim of violent crime. Not that he knew Sibyl Adams well, but in a town as small as Heartsdale, everyone was your neighbor.
Sara cleared her throat. “Did you tell Lena yet?”
Her question fell on him like