Page 71 of The First Gentleman

“Sure, Mama.”

My mother comes in and sits down gently on the edge of thebed. She reaches over to stroke my hair. “So you just planning on staying in bed forever?”

“Why not?” I feel her strong fingers against my scalp, then her warm hand on my shoulder. “Mama? Is this what it was like for you when Pops died?”

It had been so sudden. Pops died of a heart attack at work.

She leans over and kisses my forehead. “I know that time was hard for you too. Don’t forget, you learn to live with the pain and love the memories.” She pulls my hand out from under the covers and squeezes it. “Put your worries and your trust in the Lord, Brea. You’ll get through this, I promise.”

I know my mother would be hurt if I told her that I don’t have much belief in the Lord anymore. Not after being a public defender and seeing how His children got used and abused. Not after what happened to Suzanne Bonanno. And Amber Keenan.

And Garrett.

It’s been one week today.

Three days after he was murdered, his body was released to his family in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.

I think Garrett’s parents were a little surprised that Garrett made me the executor of his will, but they were okay with it. It’s not like he had a huge estate to settle. It took me only a few days to pay off his credit cards and close his bank accounts. He’d made the will himself on LegalZoom. He left me the Subaru, his precious guitar, his book royalties, and, as he wrote in the codicil, “anything in the house that’s not nailed down.”

At the funeral service, Garrett’s folks were polite, but I think they blame me for what happened.

For all I know, they’re right.

“Oh, Mama, I miss him so much!”

“I know, I know. Just try to think of better times.”

I try. But right now, that hurts too much.

CHAPTER

68

Concord, New Hampshire

Detective Sergeant Marie Gagnon takes a chair across from the deputy AG’s desk. It’s been a week since their nighttime chat at the grave site, and Bastinelli wants an update. He doesn’t waste any time.

“So, Marie, where do we stand?”

“Without the original records, I’m mostly working blind,” Gagnon says. “I’ve been able to put together some bits and pieces from talking to a couple of the old investigators, but you know how that goes.”

“I do,” says Bastinelli. “Memories get porous.”

Gagnon glances down at her laptop. “I talked to a retired detective named Foster down in Fort Lauderdale. He sounded a bit wonky, but he’d kept some of his original notes. Said he interviewed a stadium attendant who said she heard Cole Wright talking rough to Suzanne once. Saying, ‘I’ll wring your neck,’ or something like that.”

“Did his memory include the attendant’s name?”

Gagnon nods. “Stacey Millett. She’s a coach at a girls’ school in Milwaukee. I called her. She still tells the same story. But she doesn’t know if Cole was serious. She says he might have just been talking tough. And she volunteered that she’s a big supporter of President Wright.”

“That doesn’t help,” says Bastinelli. “Easy to impeach her testimony. What about the watch?”

“We found a serial number stamped along the ridge of the watch face. Traced it back to a New York manufacturer, Zahn Fine Watchcraft. Nice watch, but hardly a Rolex. It was shipped to a jewelry store in Hanover, New Hampshire, twenty-four years ago.”

“So the timing lines up.”

“I can do better than that,” says Gagnon. “The store was Schmitt’s Jewelers. Still in business. Third-generation German family. Meticulous recordkeepers.”

“So they know who bought the watch?”

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