That night at eight, Harper and DJ sat in a dark corner of the Library, waiting for the service to start.
When he’d heard where she was going, DJ had insisted on accompanying her, even though his shift at the paper was over.
“You need two sets of eyes at these things,” he’d said. “Plus, there’ll be beer.”
Outside, Miles was positioned in a discreet spot, taking pictures of people as they entered.
A poster-sized photograph of Naomi Scott beamed at them from the bar. It was a beautiful picture—the sun had tipped her dark hair with bronze, and the straps of her floaty, white dress contrasted strikingly with the warm brown of her skin. A smile lit up her perfect face.
A face to kill for, Harper thought, as she scanned the growing crowd.
A cluster of TV reporters were gathered inside the door—their makeup and buoyant hair seemed out of place in a dive bar that tended to be populated by art students.
Anyway, the bar had banned all cameras—so they could only watch. Harper could sense their frustration all the way across the room.
Behind the bar, half hidden by the picture of Naomi, Bonnie and Fitz were pouring drinks. Bonnie had pulled her blue-streaked blond hair back, and wore a simple black shift dress. Her normally sunny expression was serious.
Fitz had combed his shaggy hair, and put on a natty dark suit. He looked like himself again, except that his face was puffy and sagging, broken veins were prominent on his cheeks.
Shielded by the crowd, she studied him curiously.
In her call, Bonnie told her that, when the police arrived, the staff watched as they took Fitz into one of the back rooms of the bar for questioning.
A few minutes later the yelling started. Most of it done by Fitz.
Bonnie overheard enough to know that they’d asked him where he was the night of the murder. When he said he’d been home alone, one of them had suggested he might want to get a lawyer.
“They asked him to go to the station with them. Fitz lost it,” Bonnie said. “Told them to get the hell out of his bar and come back when they had a warrant. After that he started drinking and ranting about how the police didn’t know what they were doing. But, if you ask me, he looked scared.”
Despite this, the police had remained silent about their investigation into Wilson Shepherd. They hadn’t charged him or said a word about where the case was headed.
Harper had spent the rest of the afternoon trying to get anyone to tell her what was going on. But everyone involved was tight-lipped.
Turning in her chair, she searched the crowd. Most were around Naomi’s age—their earnest young faces sober and stunned.
“Who are you looking for?” DJ asked, sipping his beer.
“I’m checking out who’s here,” she said. “I don’t see Naomi’s father.”
As she scanned the room, her gaze rested on a table near the door, where Luke sat with Detective Daltrey and Lieutenant Blazer. Daltrey seemed to be having an animated but hushed conversation with Blazer. Harper couldn’t make out what they were saying, but Daltrey said something angrily and then Blazer cut her off with a quick sweep of his hand, which Harper interpreted as meaning “Not here.”
Luke, his eyes fixed on his glass, was staying out of it.
“Who are those guys?” DJ asked, following her gaze. “They look like cops.”
“That’s because they are cops,” Harper replied. “Detectives, to be precise.”
“That is so cool.” Pushing his glasses back into place, he peered at them. “It’s a shame they look so normal. I always hope they’ll look more like actors. Instead of just … people.”
The place was filling quickly—guests stood at the bar and crowded in the doorway.
The bar was lit by flickering candles—they’d been placed on every table and on the bookshelves that lined the walls. The combination of crowds and candles overwhelmed the air-conditioning—the bar felt hot and airless.
As she turned back, Harper’s gaze lighted on a man leaning with his back against the bar. Something about him was familiar. He was young, and more formally dressed than most of the crowd in dark slacks and a blazer, a tie knotted at his throat. He had dark blond hair with a prep-school cut.
It came to her in a rush.
Peyton Anderson.
“What’s he doing here?” she murmured.
“Who?” DJ asked, following her gaze.
Harper only half heard the question.
“Stay here,” she told him, getting to her feet. “Keep an eye out.”
“For what?”
“Anything.”
Harper strolled to the bar, positioning herself next to Anderson. She pretended to wait for Bonnie to notice her.
She saw Anderson turn his wrist and glance at an expensive-looking watch.
“Guess they’re running late,” she said, catching his eye.
He started, as if he hadn’t expected to be addressed.
His eyes skated across her face. She knew what he’d see—someone only a few years older than Naomi had been, neatly dressed in dark clothes. Before coming in, she’d brushed the tangles out of her auburn hair and fixed her makeup.
“It’s normal, I suppose,” he said, politely. “No one can blame them for losing track of time. Under the circumstances.”
He had the smooth, patrician accent of the Savannah upper class. It poured honey over each sentence and gave even single-syllable words a complexity and length they didn’t ordinarily have.
Abandoning the pretense of waiting for a drink, Harper turned to face him.
“Were you a friend of Naomi’s?” She kept her voice appropriately hushed and sympathetic.
“We went to law school together,” he said. He looked at her as if trying to place her. “Did you know her from school?”
“No. I knew her through the Library,” she explained. “My friend is a bartender here.”
“Ah, Bonnie,” he said, glancing over to where Bonnie was pouring wine into glasses. His eyes lingered on her figure. “Naomi liked her.”
“I didn’t know Naomi well,” Harper said, drawing his attention back to her. “But she seemed so talented and full of life. It’s hard to believe this could happen.”
“It’s simply awful,” he said, shaking his head. “I worry about our city. The crime is out of control.”
Interrupting himself, he held out his hand. “I’m sorry, I should introduce myself. I’m Peyton Anderson. I didn’t catch your name.”
Harper hesitated. She hadn’t thought he’d ask who she was. She couldn’t give a fake name—too many people here knew her. There wasn’t time to come up with a plan for avoiding the question.
“I’m Harper.” She shook his hand. His fingers were cool and smooth.
He had a good grip, but he held her hand too long.
“Harper. What an unusual name.” He studied her with flattering interest, as if she were the only person in the room. “It sounds familiar. Are you sure we haven’t met?”
“I’m positive.” Politely extricating her hand from his, she changed the subject. “So … Were you and Naomi close?”
There was a brief but noticeable pause before he replied.
“If I’m honest, we were more than friends, at times. We went out before she met her current boyfriend.” He leaned closer, confidingly. “I suppose you’ve read that he’s been arrested?”
“Yes, I heard,” she said. “Do you know the boyfriend? Oh, now, what’s his name?” She pretended to think. “Wilson Shepherd, right?”
“Yeah, we’ve met.” His tone cooled. “I never thought he was capable of something like this. It’s frightening if you think about it. He seemed like a nice guy. Not all that bright, maybe. But not a killer.” He turned to look at the picture of Naomi propped up at the center of the bar, eyes lingering on her face. “I can’t believe he’d hurt her. She was so beautiful.”
This wasn’t what Harper had expected. The way Jerrod had described Peyton’s relationship with his daughter, it would seem that he should be at least somewhat uncomfortable, but he didn’t give any indication of that. Instead, he appeared confident and relaxed.
She wasn’t sure what to make of it. But she didn’t have time to think it through. Across the room, the people packed in the bar’s doorway moved aside, and Jerrod Scott entered the bar, accompanied by a protective cluster of family and friends.
Harper looked over and saw Daltrey and Blazer watching Scott attentively. Luke, though, wasn’t looking at him. He was looking at her and Anderson.
Their eyes met across the room. His expression was inscrutable. He could have been thinking anything. Or nothing. Then Daltrey said something to him and he turned away to listen.
She had to force herself to keep her attention on Anderson.
“I feel so sorry for her father,” he was saying. “I know they were close.”
Harper thought of what Naomi had told her dad—that he wasn’t to speak to Peyton under any circumstances. And wondered what the hell all of this meant.
But Jerrod was almost to the front of the room now, and there was no time to pursue it further.
“Looks like things are about to start,” Peyton said, turning to her with those penetrating eyes that seemed to see more than she would have liked. “I’m going to take a seat. It was a pleasure talking to you, Harper. I’m sure we’ll meet again.”
The service was emotional. Jerrod and some of Naomi’s friends spoke about her beauty and lost potential. A preacher led everyone in prayers for her and the city: “Which on days like today can seem to be losing its soul.” A choir from Naomi’s church sang her favorite songs. People cried.
The second it ended, Harper was out of her seat, fighting through the crowd. She needed to talk to Jerrod Scott and find out if he’d spoken to Shepherd. But she couldn’t immediately find him in the crush.
When she did locate him, he was near the door, talking to Blazer, their heads close together.
She dropped back to the bar, waiting for them to finish. The next time she looked, she couldn’t see either of them.
With a sigh of irritation, she started her search again. The small, packed bar wasn’t getting any less crowded. Most people were staying, keeping Fitz and Bonnie busy mixing drinks.
Finding a spot near the bar with a good view of the room, Harper waited for people to leave. It was ten o’clock. She still had time before her midnight deadline.
Along with Jerrod, she needed to talk with Fitz. If the police were looking at him for Naomi’s murder, she had to find out why. And there was no way the cops were going to tell her.
The crowd parted briefly and she spotted Luke and Detective Daltrey standing at the edge of the room, observing the audience, much as she was.
Harper noticed Fitz glance at them from time to time and then look away quickly, his lip curling. Whatever had happened that afternoon, he was still angry about it.
DJ strode up to her, holding a full glass of beer.
“I love wakes,” he announced. “The booze is half price and they say there’s going to be food later.”
“Why don’t you go see if you can get some quotes first?” Harper suggested, tilting her head to where the choir had clustered near the jukebox. “Start with them. Find out if Naomi was in the choir. Were any of them her friends?”
Most of the singers were young women, and she saw DJ’s face brighten.
“You got it.” He hustled over to them obediently.
While he ingratiated himself with the singers, Harper made her way to the bar, waving to catch Bonnie’s eye.
“Well, that was depressing,” Bonnie said, as she mixed a vodka and soda.
She forced a light tone, but Harper didn’t miss the fact that her mascara was smeared and her nose was red.
“Yes, it was,” Harper said, glancing down the bar at the Library’s owner. His face was set in deep, sad lines as he measured wine into glasses. His hands were unsteady.
“How’s Fitz?” she asked, quietly.
Bonnie glanced at her boss before answering.
“Not great,” she said, quietly. “He’s hardly spoken since the cops left today. He drank all the way through the ceremony.”
“Did you find out any more about why the police came for him?” Harper asked. “Did Naomi complain about him?”
Motioning for her to wait, Bonnie took a drink to someone farther down the bar. When she returned, she leaned close.
“Not Naomi,” she whispered. “Someone else.”
“Someone else complained?” For some reason, Harper hadn’t expected this. “Who?”
“Two years ago.” Bonnie glanced back at her boss to make sure he couldn’t overhear. “We had a bartender—beautiful girl. She only lasted a few months. Said Fitz wouldn’t leave her alone. She didn’t like being alone with him. After she quit, he went to her house drunk, late at night, pounding on her door. She called the cops.”
Harper didn’t know what to make of this new information. It didn’t sound like Fitz. He was an amiable, laid-back guy. He seemed to get along with everyone.
“Did you believe her?”
Bonnie hesitated before replying.
“His wife had left him.” She held up her hands, as if that statement explained everything.
“Oh for God’s sake,” Harper said. “What is wrong with men?”
“Amen to that, sister.”
“I need to have a word with him,” Harper said. “Just in case he’ll tell me anything about what’s going on. Do you think now’s a bad time?”
Bonnie’s shrug was eloquent. “I don’t think there’s ever going to be a good time for that conversation.”
“I’ll make it fast.”
Harper waited for a lull at the bar, then headed over to where the owner was now stacking glasses.
“Hi Fitz,” she said. “Beautiful ceremony.”
He barely glanced at her, hands mechanically cleaning the already clean bar.
“It was,” he said.
“Bonnie told me the cops were hassling you today. What’s that about?”
He blinked at her, blearily. It was obvious that he was drunk. His eyes were unfocused.
“They’ve already got somebody and now they want to blame me, too.” Bewildered, he turned to the photo of Naomi still resting on the bar. “I treated her like a daughter. The way I treat all my girls.” He gestured at Bonnie, who was absorbing herself in cleaning the bar. “I wouldn’t ever hurt her. You believe me, don’t you?”
“Of course I do,” Harper assured him. “But why? Why are they targeting you? Did something happen between you and Naomi?”
He held up his hands, a cleaning rag flopping from one.
“They said they wanted to check everything out. Be sure. But they already have someone in jail for it. Why’d they think I’d hurt her? I don’t understand. I never hurt anyone, Harper. Never hurt anyone.”
He was too drunk and morose for her to question further. Even about the case Bonnie had mentioned. She needed to catch him sober.
“Okay, Fitz,” she said, stepping back. “You hang in there.”
She left him shaking his head, and mumbling to himself.
The room was getting louder. Harper got the feeling some were there for the service and others were regular drinkers who’d stumbled in.
Across the room, DJ was chatting with the choir, who’d surrounded him like birds around a feeder.
Harper was scanning the crowd for Jerrod or Blazer when her phone vibrated in her pocket.
It was Miles.
“Hey,” she said, lifting it to her ear. “What’s up?”
“I just pulled up at the police station,” he said. “Get down here. They’re letting Wilson Shepherd go.”