Since when does Sasquatch bury his victims? Constable Roberts wanted to ask the man. But he knew better.
“I’ve had no reports of any missing kids from Brightwood.”
“It just happened. Last night.”
“Fine. I’ll call them. Do you want me to call your wife?”
“Naw. That bitch doesn’t want me.”
“Can’t say I blame her,” the constable said.
“You’re a fucked-up asshole, Constable Roberts. Think you’re so high-and-mighty—”
“All right. I think we’re done here. Now, you want to sleep it off in my cell? Or do you want me to take you to the hospital? You look like you need a dry-out, Brett.”
“Fuck you and the horse you rode in on.”
Constable Roberts felt bad. Brett Jarvis was a loser and a fuckup, but everyone hoped he would get sober, because on the rare occasions he did, he was a tender and sensitive man. It was that man, Constable Roberts suspected, that Gertrude still hoped would return. He couldn’t blame her. It was a blessing they didn’t have kids, because Brett would make a lousy father.
“Yeah. Fuck you,” Brett reiterated as he stumbled out into a misty cold day.
The constable followed him.
“At least let me give you a ride home,” the constable said. He didn’twant Brett behind the wheel of his car. He also didn’t feel like wrestling the man down. Brett could be a scrapper. The constable had ended up bruised more than once in their encounters.
“Naw,” Brett said, crawling into the back seat of his car. “I’ll just take a nap here.”
“Give me your keys, Brett.”
The man handed them over.
“I’ll give them back later,” the constable said. “When you feel a bit better.”
“Fuck you,” Brett said again, in case he had forgotten to say it before.
23
Constable Roberts thought of that long-ago encounter now, as he sat across from Amanda in her hotel room. It had taken over an hour for him to arrive, because of fallen trees from the storm.
Amanda sat on the bed, her blue eyes like steel, her hair at her shoulders. Larry stood next to her, looking like a pissed-off bulldog.
“What did he look like?” the constable asked.
Outside, Charlie was picking up branches that had blown into the parking lot, and Aspire was standing down the street with Gertrude, talking about what had happened to Amanda. By now, everyone knew—and Larry wasn’t even sure how.
“I couldn’t see his face,” Amanda said.
She held her own face in her hands, as if she were going to cry. But when she looked up, her eyes were dry. Amanda had cried a lot as a child. The years of feeling like an outcast, forever standing outside special-education classrooms while the kids who attended regular classes passed her by, had made her tearless. And tough.
“It’s all right,” Constable Roberts said soothingly. “You say you had left Larry’s cabin. Who knew you were there?”
Amanda thought carefully.
“I guess anyone could have seen me walking there. I went down the beach road and then up the hill. I came back the same way.”
The constable thought of the woods. The cemetery. There were a dozen places for someone to hide and watch.
“I’ll get right on it. Though I’m not sure where to start. Do you feel safe here?”
