Last Night, page 29
“I didn’t want you to go up there,” Conor said. “And that was before I knew how involved she was. She was in on the murder plot, and you were alone with her. If she had seen you take that photo . . .”
“But she didn’t,” Kate said. “I told you—I’m always careful.”
Hadley could see that Conor was full of emotion, as Hadley herself was. Genevieve could have killed Kate. They might have never seen her again.
“She probably destroyed the painting after I left,” Kate said. “Once she figured out their whole plan was falling apart. I stood outside the door and heard her talking on the phone. I assume it was Isabel.”
“I think you’re right,” Conor said.
The day after the winter solstice, when Isabel and Johnny were arrested and the Garsons caught at Logan, Joe told them that Johnny had agreed to take a plea bargain in return for testifying against Isabel and the Garsons.
Hadley felt raw from his betrayal. He was her business partner. Even more, he had once been her brother-in-law, and he was the father of Maddie’s baby. He hadn’t killed her, or steered the plot, but there had been so many opportunities for him to stop the Almeidas. To protect Maddie.
No one had been there for Maddie. She had trusted, even loved, the people who had conspired against her. Johnny, her lawyer Jeanne, and Isabel—a woman who had pretended to be her friend, who had convinced her she would protect her from the outside world.
On the day before Christmas Eve, Hadley learned that the state’s attorney would be filing charges against Jeanne Gladding and others at Cross, Gladding, and White. She tried to call Bernard, but he didn’t answer. She figured he was still shooting his TV show and making excuses. Hadley kept waiting for CeCe to ask if she would see him at Christmas, but she didn’t. It was as if CeCe had the inner wisdom of someone much older, as if she already knew her father wasn’t coming.
Instead, she asked about Ronnie.
“Where is Ronnie?” she asked that afternoon, when they were in the suite, making cookies for their friends who would be coming over the next night to celebrate Christmas Eve.
“He’s in jail,” Hadley said, watching CeCe’s face. Her niece seemed to be concentrating on cutting out dough with a Santa cookie cutter. CeCe didn’t speak for a few moments, but then she looked up with a very serious expression.
“Is he okay?” CeCe asked.
Hadley wasn’t sure how to answer that. She knew that Ronnie, like the others, was being held without bail at a correctional facility. And Hadley wanted it that way. The plan might not have been his idea, but he had pulled the trigger and ended Maddie’s life. He was only fifteen, but he had killed her sister and terrified CeCe.
“He’s in trouble for what he did,” Hadley said. “He did some really terrible things.”
“I know,” CeCe said. “He cried, though.”
“He did?”
“He said he was sorry,” CeCe said. “That’s what he told me. ‘CeCe, I’m sorry,’ he said. He was crying.”
Hadley waited for her to say more. CeCe had told the police many details about her experience, but how many more was she holding inside? As Conor had said, traumatic memories could stay locked inside a person for days, for years, or forever.
“His father was bad to him,” CeCe said, picking up the Santa-shaped cookie dough and, with vigor, squishing it into a shapeless blob between her two palms. She rolled it into a ball and held it. “Zane, that was his name. He was very mean.”
“I know,” Hadley said. “The police caught him, too.”
“He’s in jail, too?”
“Yes,” Hadley said. “He’s not going to hurt you anymore, CeCe.”
“Or Ronnie?” CeCe asked.
“No, he’s not going to hurt Ronnie anymore, either,” Hadley said.
CeCe nodded, her expression neutral as she pressed the dough down on the marble counter, patting it flat, getting it just the way she wanted it, then using the cookie cutter to turn it back into Santa.
Hadley had invited the Reids to join them for Christmas Eve, so the next night, CeCe’s people gathered around the tree in the Sea Garden suite. Signs of Maddie were everywhere. Her black coat was still in the hall closet; her velvet slippers were tucked under the table in the foyer; her notes and sketches were scattered on the desk. The snow had stopped, so the night was clear. There was no wind. The sound of the waves came through the closed windows, gentle and peaceful, a reminder that the ocean was forever.
Other things were, too.
Hadley stood with her back to the fireplace, gazing at her niece. CeCe sat on the floor, drawing pictures on the low table in front of the sofa. Hadley couldn’t help but see that CeCe took after Maddie when it came to line and color. She drew with a suggestion of magic behind the images on the paper.
Tom had invited his wife, Jackie, and they sat in chairs flanking the sofa where Conor and Kate leaned against each other. The Ocean House had sent up trays of cheese, charcuterie, and desserts. The sommelier treated them to bottles of champagne and a pot of hot chocolate for CeCe.
Hadley had arranged for Maddie’s last painting to be delivered. Kate was an expert at hanging large canvases, so she had measured the wall, determined the proper height, and directed Conor on where to place the hooks.
Last Night now hung in Maddie’s beloved suite. At first, Hadley had worried that it would be too terrible to face every day: a tableau illustrating Maddie’s death. She wasn’t sure if she could stand it, and she was even more concerned that it would trouble CeCe.
But it turned out to be the opposite. CeCe seemed to take comfort in the painting—the peaceful image of her mother asleep in the snowy night. And it wasn’t blood. It wasn’t a stream of red ribbons. It was a garden of red roses. Low over the ocean, the stars glowed, telling stories in the night sky.
“She’s a snow angel,” CeCe had said the moment she first saw the painting.
“She is,” Hadley had said.
Now, with people who loved CeCe surrounding her, talking, drawing, Hadley felt it was a celebration. Maddie hadn’t wanted a funeral. She had wanted to be remembered for her art. Someday down the road, Hadley and CeCe would take her ashes to museums. They would dance in front of her favorite paintings.
Maybe they would do that in the spring.
“Okay, everyone,” Kate said, standing up and raising her champagne glass, “are we ready?”
“Yes,” everyone except CeCe said.
“Ready for what?” CeCe asked.
“For your medal,” Conor said. “Remember?”
A huge smile filled CeCe’s face. “When you picked me up and carried me away from Isabel,” she said.
“That’s right,” Conor said. “I said you were a hero. I also said—”
“You were going to give me a medal,” she said, smiling even wider.
“And here it is,” Kate said.
Hadley knew that Kate had gone foraging in local antique shops until she found the perfect plain silver disk. It had originally been a pendant on someone’s necklace, suspended by a leather cord. But she’d found a length of red-white-and-blue-striped satin ribbon at the same vintage store, slid it through the ring atop the silver disk.
Hadley had imposed on an artist friend in Charlestown, who made jewelry out of metal and precious gems, to do the engraving as quickly as possible.
Conor slid the ribbon over CeCe’s head.
CeCe looked down, held the disk in her hand, tried to read the inscription.
“It’s upside down,” she said. “What does it say?”
“CeCe the Hero,” Conor said.
“Look on the back,” Hadley said.
CeCe turned it over, and there, etched in the silver, was the image of a snow angel.
“Mommy,” CeCe said.
“Yep,” Hadley said.
“Forever,” CeCe said.
“She is,” Hadley said, looking around the room, feeling all that love for CeCe pouring from their friends. Then she looked at the painting on the wall, the one that her sister had done of the last night of her life, and she knew that the love was for Maddie, too.
They all sat by the fire, drinking champagne and hot chocolate, admiring CeCe’s drawings, telling her how proud her mother would be of her. They put on music, and CeCe pulled Hadley to her feet so they could dance.
CeCe had gotten everyone dancing, and Conor felt the heat rising. He held Kate in his arms, doing a slower dance than the music called for. She was his best friend, his true love. She stood on tiptoes, arms around his neck, gazing up at him with an odd smile.
“I’m a terrible dancer,” he said.
“No, you’re not,” she said.
“I’ve never been good at it,” he said.
“You’re wonderful at it.”
“I get nervous.”
“Maybe you just need some fresh air,” she said.
She crossed the room ahead of him and opened the french doors. While everyone else stayed inside by the fire, Conor and Kate walked onto the terrace. There was no wind. He heard the waves breaking—gently, not crashing. He noticed how dark and still the beach looked. The police had left, taken their lights with them. It was a scene of perfect peace. He took a deep breath and realized it was the first he’d taken since that night when they had found Hadley kneeling beside Maddie’s body.
They could see the five windmills, miles across the water, on the far side of Block Island. Their red lights flashed in the distance, landmarks that would always remind him of this night. He and Kate would look back and remember how their lives had changed on Christmas Eve.
“This is what I’ve always wanted,” he said to Kate.
“Me, too,” she said.
“I brought you here to the Ocean House because . . . ,” he began, the words he’d planned to say for so long running through his mind. He reached into his pocket, and that’s when the panic hit him. He’d had the ring with him every minute since arriving at the hotel. And now it wasn’t there.
He patted his pockets again. Could he have dropped it on the terrace floor? Or inside, while they were dancing? When had he last felt it? He knew for sure he’d had it when he was standing on the verandah with Tom and Joe.
It was a beautiful ring, a sapphire, Kate’s favorite stone, flanked by two diamonds because Conor felt that Kate deserved all the diamonds in the world.
“Kate,” he said, “I can’t believe this. I have something. I can’t find it, though . . .”
“You dropped it,” she said, “when you put the medal around CeCe’s neck.”
She opened her hand, and he saw the ring glinting in her outstretched palm. He took it from her, and then he held her hand, and they both laughed. The laughter didn’t last too long before he noticed that her eyes were wet. So were his.
This was their night, his and Kate’s, but it was CeCe’s, too. From the moment they had come upon Maddie murdered in the snow, their families had become entwined. It had happened in an instant. In other cases, solving the crimes had eased the strong bonds between him and the victims. He would always care, but he might not ever see the victims’ families again. That hadn’t happened here, and it wouldn’t. CeCe and Hadley were in his and Kate’s lives now, and that wasn’t going to change.
“I hadn’t expected to do this on a terrace with a bunch of people just inside,” Conor said, gesturing at the french doors.
“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Kate said.
Conor glanced over. Through the glass, he saw his brother and Jackie, Hadley and CeCe, all dancing by the fire. Above them, Maddie seemed to be watching them, looking out from the canvas of Last Night. He felt the challenge: there were promises to be made.
“Kate, will you?” he asked.
“I will,” she said.
He slid the ring onto her finger. She stood on her toes and kissed him, and they were surrounded by the sounds of the waves coming from the beach and the soft voices of the people they loved coming from inside the suite. He thought of the promises demanded by the moment, by the painting: life had to be lived, and love had to be held on to, as tightly as possible.
So he held Kate tighter and tighter. They stood there on the terrace of the Ocean House for a long time, in the cold, still night, until one last kiss, when it was time to go inside and tell everyone what he was pretty sure they already knew.
“Hey,” Conor said, holding the door open for Kate as they stepped back into the warm suite, arms around each other, smiling at the family. “We’re getting married.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The Ocean House is one of my favorite places in the world, and it is my home away from home. I’ve written parts of many novels there, including this one. It captures my imagination, so forgive me if storytelling has occasionally swept past reality throughout these pages. Every grand hotel deserves a fictional murder tale, so I offer this one to the dear Ocean House.
I am so grateful to my friend Deborah Goodrich Royce. She is a bestselling author and the founder and host of the Ocean House Author Series. She brings writers and readers together in this literary haven by the sea and has created a great community for all of us. Thank you to the booksellers at Savoy Bookshop and Café for their tremendous energy and support.
I have deep gratitude for everyone who works at the Ocean House. They make it feel like home. There are too many to name, but every single person means a lot to me and is forever in my heart.
All my love and thanks to Maureen, Olivier, and Amelia Onorato.
Endless thanks to my lifelong friend William Twigg Crawford.
Much gratitude to Susan Fisher, Amelia Onorato, Cara Lopilato, and everyone at the Mystic Museum of Art.
Big thanks to Matt Cavaco for sharing stories of his experience in the United States Coast Guard. Thank you for your service, Matt.
Once again, I thank Rob Derry for generously answering my questions about law enforcement in Connecticut.
Thank you to Patrick Carson, my very talented social media manager.
I am incredibly lucky to work with my editor, Liz Pearsons; my developmental editor, Charlotte Herscher; and my whole team at Thomas & Mercer. Gracie Doyle, thank you for believing in me.
Andrea Cirillo has been my agent forever. I am so grateful to her, Jane Berkey, Jessica Errera, and everyone at the Jane Rotrosen Agency for all our years together, for making everything possible.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo © by Kristina Loggia
Luanne Rice is the Amazon Charts and New York Times bestselling author of thirty-eight novels, including The Shadow Box and Last Day. Several have been adapted for television, including Crazy in Love and Blue Moon, as well as Follow the Stars Home and Silver Bells for Hallmark Hall of Fame and Beach Girls as a Lifetime miniseries. For more information, visit www.luannerice.com.
Rice, Luanne, Last Night
