Chapter Twenty-One

The cemetery overlooked the schoolyard.

Myron could not believe, after all these years, he was back. He took a few deep breaths before getting out of the car. Ben Staples, Cecelia Callister's ex, had asked to meet here because, his assistant explained on the phone, it was now Cecelia and her son Clay's final resting place. That reasoning didn't seem to track, but here Myron was.

He could see Ben Staples up ahead in a grassy clearing where the cemetery remained mostly unoccupied. Myron didn't plan it, didn't even want to, but he found himself veering over to the older graves, as though guided by some higher power. He had not been to this cemetery in years, but he still knew exactly where to go. His body started to tremble as he walked, and soon he was there. The name on the tombstone was Brenda Slaughter. Myron read her birthdate and then let his eyes travel right to the date of her death. So young. So terribly, awfully, tragically young. The familiar pain came back to him all at once, like a stab, and Myron felt his knees buckle.

Myron stood there for a moment and let all the bad memories wash over him. Had he loved Brenda? No. Too early for that. But after her death, he'd had something akin to a mental breakdown. He drank too much, ran away from everyone, and met a strange woman who was hurting too. Their mutual misery bonded them, and so they'd run off together to a private island for a quick, therapeutic fling. A rebound, if you will. A way to heal.

That woman's name was Terese Collins. She and Myron were married now.

Man plans, God laughs.

It wasn't worth it, of course. If he could go back in time, he'd rather have saved Brenda and never met his current wife, awful as that might sound. But that's what he'd do. And the best part, one of the many reasons he fell so deeply and passionately in love with Terese, is that she would get that too.

We are our mistakes. Sometimes they are the best part of us.

Ben Staples had neatly groomed salt-and-pepper hair. He wore a black turtleneck under his overcoat. For a man who had once been married to a woman who was on every "Most Beautiful" list, Staples was nondescript in the looks department. If a sketch artist tried to prompt you, there would be little to say. Normal nose. Normal chin, maybe a little weak. Oval face. Average height. He held a plant in front of him with both hands like an offering. He stared at the two mounds of dirt. No tombstone yet. Still too soon.

"Thanks for meeting me here," Ben Staples said.

Myron moved next to him so that they stood shoulder to shoulder, facing the dirt.

"Cecelia is on the left. Clay is on the right. There were name placards here on Monday. Now…" Ben Staples gave his head a world-weary shake as if the missing placards explained everything. "I told the guy in the chapel over there." Ben gestured with his chin. "But he says it was probably some kids who took them as souvenirs." Another shake of the head. "Souvenirs."

"I'm sorry for your loss," Myron said.

"Thank you." He looked down at the plant in his hands as though it had suddenly materialized there. It looked like a cactus of some kind. "She didn't like flowers. Cecelia. I mean, she liked them, but she thought they were a waste. That they died too soon. She liked things that lasted, so she preferred when I sent her succulents. Like these. So that's what I bring."

"Nice," Myron said, because he had no idea what else to say.

"I still loved her."

"I'm sure you did."

"Did you know that Joe DiMaggio sent roses to Marilyn Monroe's grave for twenty years?"

"I think I read about that somewhere."

"He felt guilty when Marilyn died. Supposedly his last words were ‘I finally get to see Marilyn'—even though they'd been divorced over forty years by then."

"Do you feel guilty?" Myron asked.

"I don't know. I guess. But I couldn't save Cecelia from herself."

"What do you mean?"

He shook his head. "You represent Greg Downing."

"Yes."

"I haven't seen him in forever. Haven't really thought about him even. And now he's in jail for murdering the love of my life."

Myron was going to remind him that it was just an arrest and it was all alleged, but that seemed like the wrong move. "You knew Greg, right?"

"Yeah, way back when."

"Do you think he killed Cecelia?"

He gave Myron a half shrug. "The cops say they have solid evidence."

"I want to know what you think."

"I don't know. I find it hard to believe. I mean, what's his motive?"

"You have another suspect?"

Ben gave a firm nod. "Lou."

"Lou Himble, Cecelia's husband?"

"They were separated. Cecelia hated him. You know what he did, right?"

"Some kind of Ponzi scheme."

"Like Madoff. Not that big. Lou isn't that heavy a hitter. But yeah, he stole a lot of people's money. The feds wanted Cecelia to testify against him. She agreed right away. Didn't ask for immunity because she knew she was innocent. She just wanted to do the right thing. Then suddenly, poof, Cecelia ends up dead." He shrugged. "So you tell me."

"Sounds like you were in regular touch with Cecelia."

"We were still close. You married?"

Myron shifted his feet. "Yes."

"A long time?"

"No," Myron said. "It's new."

"I bet she's pretty."

"She is."

"But I hope she's not"—Ben Staples made quote marks with his fingers—"‘a supermodel.' That's what they called my wife. Not a model. A supermodel. Like she was in the Avengers." He smiled. "Anyway, don't marry one. It's a mess in so many ways. She walks in a room, she knows everyone's looking at her. Judging her. Hoping her looks will be a disappointment so they can say, ‘I don't get what the big fuss is about.' Supermodels worry about aging all the time. Everyone hits on them. Even your closest friends."

"Did Greg?" Myron asked.

"Probably. I don't know. Everybody wanted to screw my wife. I'd be lying if I didn't say that was a high too. I had what everybody else wanted. You know what I mean?"

Myron gave a small nod.

"But I was so na?ve, so overconfident."

"In what way?"

"You have a wife like that, you can't even trust your friends. But I did. Cecelia was the ultimate notch on the belt. I loved her. I really did. But did I like the jealous stares from other guys? Who wouldn't? I thought it didn't matter. No way she'd give in to that. But now, after what happened to us, I was just so dumb. Now it all seems so…"

Ben Staples turned his attention to the pile of dirt on the right now. "Clay wasn't my son, you know. Cecelia confessed that to me right away. Didn't pretend otherwise. It was the worst day of my life. We're married, I'm a na?ve happy dope, she comes in, she sits me down, she takes my hand, she tells me she's pregnant and it's not mine. Just like that."

Ben Staples swallowed, looked away. A bird started cawing. A car drove by with its windows open, blasting something with a heavy Latin beat.

"That must have been awful," Myron said, knowing the words were inadequate, but again what else can you say? Then as gently as he could: "Did Cecelia tell you who the father was?"

"No."

"Never?"

He shook his head. "And I never let the public know Clay wasn't mine. He was a good kid. We had a nice relationship. Not father-son obviously. But I wasn't just his mother's ex either."

"Did Clay know who his father was?"

"Not until years later. It's complicated."

Myron waited.

"I don't know why I'm telling you all this," Ben Staples said.

"They were murdered. I want to find out who killed them."

"You're not a cop."

"No."

"But I asked some friends," Staples said. "They told me you're good at this—that you're on the side of the righteous."

"I try," Myron said. "You were saying something about Clay finding out about his father?"

"Cecelia didn't want him to know. She said it wasn't relevant. But when Clay was old enough, he put his DNA into a few of those genealogy databases."

"And he matched with his father?"

"It wasn't that simple. I don't know the details. Clay found a first cousin. He talked to them. He sought out relatives in that cousin's circle. Process of elimination. Or maybe once Clay got close, Cecelia told him. She didn't want him knocking on the guy's door."

"Did Clay knock on the guy's door?"

"I don't know. It seemed to me once Clay found out, he let it go. But I don't know."

"Was your divorce with Cecelia amicable?"

He turned to Myron. "Do you think—?"

"No, not at all. This is about Greg. I heard that Greg seemed upset about the divorce. Did you notice that at all?"

He thought about it. "Now that you mention it, yeah. Greg trashed Cecelia a bit. But he wasn't alone. To the world, she got pregnant with another man and dumped me. That's what everyone saw. Hell, that's what happened, when you think about it."

"Ben?"

"Yes?"

"I don't know how to ask a lot of this delicately, so I'm just going to dive in, okay?"

He nodded. "Part of the reason I agreed to see you."

"I'm not following."

"I figure you are here because you know more than you're saying," Ben explained. "So here's the deal: You want to learn from me—and I want to learn from you. So go ahead. Don't pull punches."

Fair enough, Myron thought. Then: "Was your wife acting differently before she asked for the divorce?"

"Yes."

"How so?"

"She was moody, withdrawn. Depressed, really. I wanted her to see someone. She wouldn't. I think she was taking pills a friend got for her."

"When was this exactly?"

"A month, maybe two before she told me she was pregnant. Hard to remember. But if an affair is supposed to lift a woman's spirits, this was doing the opposite. It seemed to be crushing her."

Myron didn't know how to soften the blow, so he said it: "Did Cecelia ever tell you that she was raped?"

His head snapped as though someone had punched him in the jaw. For a few long moments, he didn't say anything. He just stared at Myron. Tears filled his eyes. When he finally spoke, his voice was soft.

"Was she?"

"That's what she told a friend."

"Oh my God." He closed his eyes and lifted his face toward the sky. "What friend?"

"Emily Downing."

"Greg's wife."

"Yes."

Ben Staples stood there, frozen, staring at the mound of dirt. "Does she know who…?"

"No," Myron said.

It took some time for Ben Staples to process this. Myron gave him the space.

Then Ben asked, "Why wouldn't Cecelia tell me?"

Myron figured that he was asking himself that more than he was asking Myron, but he still said, "I don't know."

"And Emily told you this?"

"Yes."

"What else did she tell you?"

Myron filled him in as best he could. Ben's expression moved from anguish to anger. There was a reckoning of some sort going on here or, at the very least, something dawning on him. When Myron finished telling what he knew, he didn't give Ben Staples a chance to ruminate.

"You know who did it," Myron said.

"I think so, yes."

Myron waited.

"He kept talking to her about getting her a lead in a new Broadway play. I knew it was a come-on. I mean, so did she. Every male producer suddenly had the perfect role to launch her as a serious actress. But a lead in a Broadway play? Cecelia couldn't act. I told her that once too. I'm like, ‘You get what's going on here, right?' I shouldn't have said that. Even if it was true. I should have been more supportive."

"Who raped her, Ben?"

"I'm not sure I should say."

"Why not?"

"Because obviously she didn't want the world to know. I don't know if her death changes that."

"This guy, this rapist, he may be connected to her murder."

"He's not."

"How can you—?"

"Because he's dead. It was Harold Mostring. She had a late-night"—again with the sarcastic finger quotes—"‘audition' with him a few months before our divorce. I even thought, I mean, it crossed my mind—this was before all the awful stuff about him coming out—I actually did wonder if he was Clay's real father. Like maybe she just wanted the role so badly."

Howard Mostring had been a well-known Broadway producer/predator who, by the time he got into a courtroom, had more than fifty accusations of sexual assault over the past quarter century. Howard's lawyers got him out on bail under the condition he wear an ankle bracelet. Howard went home to his swanky penthouse apartment on Park Avenue, opened up the sliding glass door to his terrace, and jumped. It may have been the perfect ending except that destructive people too often end up being destructive to the very end. He landed on a young woman who had just gotten engaged, killing her too.

"One last victim for Howard Mostring."

That was what the media called that poor woman.

"I still don't get it," Ben Staples said.

"Get what?"

"How does Greg Downing end up taking the fall for all this?"