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I could feel the unease coming from Vaughn over what he had to do. The grief of Daniel Oglesby’s death was still raw and new, and I knew if I could feel the tension then Jack could too.
Jack crumpled up his napkin and tossed it onto his empty plate. “So are you going to tell me what’s wrong?” he asked, looking at Vaughn.
Vaughn let out a deep breath and then told him without stopping about his relationship with Daniel, almost robotic in tone. Sometimes that was the easiest way. Just to get it out as precisely as possible while blocking off your emotions. Once the dam broke, it was sometimes hard to plug up again.
Jack laid his hand on Vaughn’s shoulder and squeezed. “I’m sorry, man. I didn’t know the two of you were close.”
“We kept it quiet,” Vaughn said. “We had to.”
“Oglesby did a good job of staying out of the public eye all together,” Jack said. “I’d only seen him around town a couple of times myself. And I make it a point to try and know most everyone in Bloody Mary at least well enough to say hello in passing.”
Vaughn laughed a little and grabbed another beer. “I guess that says something about your church-going habits, considering the man had been there every Sunday for the past four months.”
“I go about as often as you. I’ve been busy.”
“That’s the excuse I like to use too,” Vaughn said. They both turned to look at me.
“I don’t need an excuse,” I said, grabbing a second beer for myself. “I just don’t like to go because I can nap at home without having to put on a dress.”
“Daniel actually felt the same way about the church, believe it or not,” Vaughn said. “He wanted to make some changes that would bring in the younger crowds. I guess attendance is down and so is the money from the offerings, considering most of the congregation lives on Social Security. But Reverend Thomas stonewalled him every time he had a new idea. And Lorna never liked him anyway, so she wasn’t exactly an ally.”
“Why didn’t Lorna like him?” Jack asked.
A flush of red heated Vaughn’s cheeks and he picked at the paper label on the bottle. “I think she knew. About Daniel, I mean. About us. He and I went to dinner one night in Richmond. We were feeling comfortable together. It was a good night,” he said reminiscently. “Daniel didn’t see her as we left the restaurant, but I did. And I could tell by the look in her eyes that she knew we were together. I mean, like a couple.”
Jack and I shared a look. That would certainly explain why Lorna had been so nervous when we’d been questioning her and the Reverend that morning.
“The Reverend and Lorna never made Daniel feel like he belonged here. They saw a young guy with new ideas and a radical way of thinking and decided to ignore him before he’d been here a month. So Daniel took as many of the hospital and home visits as he could so he wouldn’t have to work inside the church office with the two of them. He spent a lot of time over at the youth center in King George too. Those kids really loved him.”
“Did anyone else besides Lorna know that Daniel was gay?” Jack asked.
Vaughn blew out a breath and his brow furrowed in concentration. “I’d say no, but if Lorna knew then everyone could know. Daniel was very careful to keep his private life private. I never stayed at his house overnight. We never met for dinner around here. And he wasn’t seeing anyone else before or after me.”
“When was the last time you saw him?” Jack asked.
Vaughn sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “Saturday night. He stopped by here on his way home and we talked for a while.”
“Did he seem okay to you? Was anything bothering him?”
“Ha,” Vaughn said tiredly. “You mean other than what to do about me? He was a little flustered, I guess. He said a car had almost hit him while he was out running early that morning. He sometimes had a hard time seeing if he wasn’t wearing his glasses.”
“Did he say who it was?” Jack asked.
“No, and I didn’t ask. It was just conversation to fill the time, you know? He just said a big white Cadillac ran him off the road.”
“You know I won’t stop until I find the people responsible,” Jack said.
“I know. But that doesn’t bring him back.” Vaughn stood and tossed his empty bottles in the trash before shrugging on his coat. “I need to get going. I’ve got to open the store tomorrow. Thanks for the sandwich and the beer.”
We sat in silence after Vaughn left, and I could feel the awkwardness between us creeping in. I tried hard not to think of the things Vaughn had told me, and I tried even harder not to remember what that initial spark between Jack and I had felt like. It was getting harder and harder to ignore.
“You know I’ve got to put Vaughn on the short list of suspects,” Jack said. “I don’t think he was a part of this, but I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t follow up.”
“Sometimes our jobs suck.”
“There ya go,” he nodded. “Tell me about our victim.”
“You’ve got a thirty-six year old male who’s 6’5” and weighs 230 pounds. He’s in good shape. I found evidence of knee replacement surgery from several years ago, and Vaughn confirmed he was a runner, so that explains that. But he was taken down with a hypodermic needle filled with Diprivan. It would have rendered him unconscious in seconds, and he wouldn’t have been able to fight back. By the time he regained consciousness—somewhere between six and eight hours later considering the dosage—he would have been well restrained and too groggy to put up much of a struggle.”
