I think about the letter I received, and the warning it contained. Why didn’t I listen?
My hands hurt. I picture the knife again, and my knees feel like jelly.
Using the garage walls for support, I stagger to a shelf at the back and take down a can of animal repellent—a foul-smelling powdered mixture of fox, bobcat, and cougar urine that I bought by mail order. It is intended to keep deer away from gardens, dogs away from borders. The smell of predators will raise their hackles, send fear through their blood. My woodsman father taught me the potion has another use: when spread in the wild, rather than repelling, it will attract the species of animals that excreted the urine.
Ever since my father’s death, we have stayed connected in spirit, through the myth of a mountain lion said to live deep in the woods nearby. Perhaps that big cat is a ghost, just like my father, just like members of the Nehantic and Pequot tribes who lived here before us. But I have seen and tracked large paw prints, collected tufts of coarse yellow fur for my work, and I have seen his shadow. Could that have been the caterwaul I heard just as I was supposed to die?
The smell of the mixture will throw off the dogs. They will be intrigued by the possibility of a wild animal; they will sniff along the boundary line I will create. They will not cross it, and they will forget about their quarry—me. My father’s lessons along with years of loving the forest, observing the behavior of its inhabitants, will help me escape.
I find a beach towel in the cupboard and use it to put pressure on my head wound. The blood soaks through—I am shocked by the amount because there is already a pool on the floor. How much have I lost?
I feel weak, and I bobble the tin. Some urine powder falls to the floor. I try to wipe it up, but the putrid stench nearly makes me vomit. When the search dogs get here, they will growl and back away from this corner; they will be on guard before they even begin.
I start to walk and trip on the rope around my neck. If I can’t untie the knot, I can at least cut through it. I look around the Range Rover for the knife my attacker used, but it’s not here. He must have taken it.
Garden clippers hang on a rusty nail; I use them for pruning roses and hydrangeas. The handles fit my hand, but it hurts to maneuver them. Do I have the dexterity to snip the line instead of my artery? I nick the skin, but victory—the rope falls to the floor. This effort has taken all my energy, so I sit down and hope I’ll be able to stand again before the police arrive.
Griffin’s police departments throughout eastern Connecticut will investigate my disappearance with the full force of his office behind them. Suspicion will fall on violent criminals he sent to prison—he will make sure of that. People will assume someone wanted revenge. Detectives will investigate every recently released convict. They will question the families of prisoners still incarcerated.
My husband will hold a news conference and say that the police will catch whoever harmed me, abducted me, or killed me and removed my body, and he very personally will prosecute that person, get justice for me. The tragedy will burnish his image: public servant, grieving husband. I will become a hashtag: #JusticeForClaire.
But he, someone on his force, or one of his political backers with too much to lose will find and murder me first.
Terrified and half-dead, I choke on a sob. I had loved my husband more than anyone, this man who now wanted me dead. I am dizzy, can barely stand. I think, for half a minute, of going to my studio behind the house, grabbing the letter. But why? I ignored it when it mattered most, when it could have saved me. Let it stay in its hiding place. If I die, if I never return, it will be a record of what happened.
It is time for me to set off on a journey that will be short in distance, endless in effort. Maybe I’m delirious, just coming back from having been deprived of oxygen, but I sense that big cat padding silently in the woods ahead of me—my destination—and I walk cautiously. Fear is the gift.
It’s how I will stay alert and alive.
2
CONOR
Conor Reid arrived at the Woodward-Lathrop Gallery at four forty-five, fifteen minutes before Claire Beaudry Chase’s opening was scheduled to start. His girlfriend, Kate Woodward, owned the gallery in the center of Black Hall, and his sister-in-law, Jackie Reid, managed it. Kate was flying a private charter and wouldn’t be back in time. Conor had promised he would show up to celebrate their friend Claire.
Conor was a detective with the Connecticut State Police and had just finished interviewing witnesses to a hit-and-run on the Baldwin Bridge. A speeding black pickup had clipped a Subaru, smashing it into the guardrail. There were no fatalities, but the car’s driver had gone to the hospital with a head injury. No one had gotten the truck’s license number.
It was the Friday of Memorial Day weekend, and the madhouse of summer on the shoreline was just starting.
“Hey, you made it,” Jackie said, walking over to give Conor a hug. She was married to his older brother, Tom—his first marriage, her second. Conor had liked Jackie and her two daughters right away. Tom was a coast guard officer, often at sea on patrol, and Conor saw how happy Tom was to come home to her.
“Looks like you’re expecting a big crowd,” Conor said, glancing at the bar and catering table, loaded with bottles of wine and platters of cheese and bread and smoked salmon.
“We are,” she said. “Everyone’s excited to see Claire’s new installation, but I think we’ll also get a lot of people curious to meet the candidate. Judging from the calls I’ve gotten, I expect more political than arts reporters. Do you think Griffin will win? Be our next governor?”
“Seems he has a good chance,” Conor said. He had worked with Griffin Chase on many cases. Chase played hard and knew what it took to come out on top.
People began streaming through the door. From being with Kate, Conor knew that there were three types of people who attended art openings in Black Hall: true collectors who intended to buy, serious art lovers who were there to appreciate the work, and people who came for the free food and wine.
On the bar table were plastic glasses and bottles of red and white wine, both from southeastern Connecticut vineyards. Someone had calligraphed a card for the wine: Courtesy of Griffin Chase. Smart, Conor thought: showing that he supported Connecticut businesses.
“Come on,” Jackie said. “Take a walk around with me; check out the work.”
“Sure,” Conor said. He had never been that interested in art; Kate had taught him pretty much everything he knew. Kate was a huge fan of Claire. What she did couldn’t exactly be called paintings, collages, or sculptures, but it had aspects of each. She made shadow boxes, driftwood frames filled with objects from nature, especially the beach.
“Who buys these?” Conor asked.
“Claire has devoted collectors,” Jackie said. “One actually commissioned her to do a private piece for him and his wife.”
“Which one is that?” Conor asked.
“She’s not putting it in the show. It’s back in her studio,” Jackie said. “She told me it’s ‘guarding her secrets.’”
“What secrets?” Conor asked, but Jackie just shook her head. He felt a ripple that sometimes signaled the start of a case, but he figured he was overreacting.
He saw Jackie glance at her watch.