Laura urged me to come to Hench’s office in the morning, and I really wanted to see if he had anything new to say about the case, but I waffled, saying I’d have to see how Dad was and let her know first thing. I didn’t have positive feelings about Dad’s condition, but you never know. I forced one of my sleeping pills on Laura with the command to get some rest for God’s sake, then went back to my room, where I laid out the same pair of travel slacks I’d worn on the plane and a fresh cotton blouse. Via FaceTime I found out that Carlo was doing well without me, and wasn’t going to eat the chili I left in the fridge for him. Somebody told me that leaving food for your husband was treating him like a child, and maybe that’s so, but like I said, I’m still learning how to do this marriage business.
“I thought you liked my chili,” I said.
“I’ll have it tomorrow.”
“So what did you eat?”
“Do you really care what I ate?”
“No. I just like the sound of your voice and want you to keep talking.”
“You talk. What’s happening over there?”
I told him about Dad first, then said, “Remember how you said Laura must have a good reason for taking on this case? Well, what if the reason is that she’s fallen in love with a condemned man?”
Carlo briefly pressed his lips together and shut his eyes, blocking out that possibility. When he opened them again he said, “That would be very bad.”
When we disconnected I called my brother, Todd.
“I’m in town,” I said.
“Cool,” Todd said. Pause, then, “Listen, about that thing with Gemma-Kate.”
That was as close to an apology as I was ever going to get, for the phone conversation where he called me the slang term for part of the female anatomy. Not even in our family is that what you’d call a term of endearment. I said, “There’s no problem with that thing. We were both—”
After the events of a few months before, there had been plenty of more reasonable conversations about Todd’s daughter, who had come to stay with us, and I’m sure Todd talked about it with Mom and Dad, so it wasn’t totally creepy that we didn’t discuss it now. We were both nuts at the time, but now I felt a little regret at the way Gemma-Kate was pushed into the shadow. Another story, another time.
“That’s right” was all Todd would say. Rather than say Oh, we must get together he asked, “How long will you be here?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe a week.”
“Have you seen the folks?”
“I stopped there first. Dad looks really sick. You need to go see him. Mom is asking.”
“I will.”
“Todd, what do we do if he dies?”
“Bury him, probably,” Todd said.
I felt a little click in my heart. “That’s not funny, even for a Quinn.”
“Not meant to be. You know I hate the old bastard.”
“We’re going to have to talk about this at some point, and don’t think you’ll be able to just shove the surviving parent at your big sister.”
“Isn’t that why you’re here?” he asked.
“Mostly.” I explained the other reason for my presence. He got more engaged in the conversation then, other people’s murders being so much easier to talk about than familial responsibility. He was aware of the Creighton case, though he hadn’t worked it. He knew the guy up in Vero Beach who did.
“Solid?” I asked.
“Solid.” Todd cleared a minor frog from his throat. “Well, not directly, a friend of mine knows him.”
So when did Quinns start having friends? The throat frog told me that the friend was female, and likely more than a friend. I was curious. “When I get back from seeing Creighton’s attorney and Dad, do you want to have lunch or something? With your friend? Once I get more information I might have some questions.”
Being needed was even one step better than murder shop talk. He quickly agreed.
I turned on my iPad to read a little more of the court transcripts so I wouldn’t look too ignorant the next day if I went to see William Hench. Tracy Mack would be a waste of bullshit. I wanted to see what Shayna Murry, the other damning piece of testimony, had to say.
TESTIMONY OF SHAYNA MURRY
Shayna Murry, having been duly sworn, was examined and testified as follows:
By Attorney Lancer:
Q: Ms. Murry, would you please tell the court why you’re giving testimony today?
A: I was Mr. Creighton’s mistress.
Q: Would you please point to the person in the courtroom to whom you’re referring?
A: (Points to Marcus Creighton.)
Q: Thank you. How did you meet?
A: The Creightons were decorating a house in Vero Beach, and happened to see my studio up the road in Sebastian.
Q: Did they buy anything?
A: No. Not that day. But Marcus, Mr. Creighton, stopped by a week later and said he wanted to commission a gift for his wife’s birthday. Nothing I had in the studio, but something different, and would I work with him on it.
Q: Please tell the court about your collaboration with Mr. Creighton.
A: At first he came by the studio. Then he started taking me out for lunch, wonderful lunches up in Melbourne in restaurants that had private rooms and the waiter knew his name and discussed the wine with him. I grew up dirt poor and he made me feel like Cinderella. He was so kind and handsome, older than me, but in a Sean Connery kind of way. It wasn’t sleazy, and he was no more of a flirt than any other guy. At first we talked about art. Then he started asking me personal questions about my life. What did I do for fun? And then, I must have a boyfriend, what was my boyfriend like, was he an artist, too? After a while we stopped pretending to talk about art.
Q: Please be more specific.
A: I became his lover.
Q: Thank you. How long did your affair go on?
A: About a year. But the pattern, having lunch and then going back to my place for sex, it began to feel like a dead end. I only saw him once a week and it wasn’t enough. Once I told him I wanted to wake up beside him, and he got this look on his face like someone had stabbed him. I should have been smart enough to stop it then. What happened after was as much my fault as his.
Q: Would you please describe the last time you saw Marcus Creighton before today?
A: Marcus showed up around two in the morning and pounded on my door. It was raining, and he was soaked. I let him in and gave him a towel to dry off. After he wiped his face I could see the water wasn’t just from the rain. He was crying.
Q: Then what happened?
A: I asked him what was wrong. He … he said he loved me. He had never said that word before. He went down on his knees. Seeing him cry, and on his knees, he was always so strong.
Q: What did you answer?
A: (no response)
Q: Please, Ms. Murry, you’re doing fine and you’re almost finished. What did you answer?
A: I told him I … loved him, but he was married. I said we should never have started. I started to cry, too.
Q: How did he react?
A: Then he said, I can get a divorce and we can start again like everything was new. And I said, Marcus, you’ve got three kids. And he said, I can still keep a relationship with them, you’ll like them. And I said, they’ll hate me. I started out as Cinderella and I’d end up like the wicked stepmother.
Q: And what did he say? The words as precisely as you can recall them, please.
A: He said … oh God. I thought I could do this part. I’m not sure I can.
Q: That’s all right, Ms. Murry. You take all the time you need.
A: He said, he said, I don’t care about anything but you. I’ll do whatever it takes to have you. He got up off his knees and patted my arm like I was one of his children needing reassurance. Then he repeated those words. Then he left.
The Court: Ms. Murry.
Murry: I’m sorry. (unintelligible)
The Court: Ms. Murry, would you please repeat for the record?
Murry: I can’t get those words out of my head.
By Attorney Lancer:
Q: One more question, Ms. Murry. Would you please tell the court on what date you had this meeting with Mr. Creighton?
A: It was April twenty-third.
Q: Please let the record show that this meeting was seven days before the murder of the Creighton family. Ms. Murry, was there any other contact with Mr. Creighton within the seven days after your meeting?
A: (crying) One. He called me the night of the murders and said, No matter what you hear, tell them I was with you.
If the Marcus Creighton that Murry described was really who he was, I didn’t like him much. This transcript made me more concerned about Laura falling for another unobtainable jerk. Yet there it was, Creighton’s Get Out of Jail Free card. If they found the phone records, and the records showed he didn’t call her at all, but instead called his home number from her place, she was lying. I started to have some what-if thoughts that were very unappealing.