“Celeste,” he says.
“Leave,” she says. She opens the door. She feels faint. “Shooter. Please. Please.”
He stares at her for a long moment with those hypnotic blue eyes. Celeste clings to the small piece of herself that knows this is the right action, the only possible action.
Shooter doesn’t press. He steps out, and Celeste shuts the door behind him.
Saturday, July 7, 2018, 5:15 p.m.
NANTUCKET
Nick has just heard from the Chief: His interview with Featherleigh Dale is suddenly very important. Tag Winbury, the father, is still a person of interest but the Chief isn’t convinced he did it.
“He admitted he took the girl out in the kayak,” the Chief said. “He said she jumped off, on purpose, and he yanked her back up by the wrist, which is consistent with the ME’s report. He admitted to pouring the shots, so a reasonable explanation is he slipped a mickey into one of the shots, but forensics found nothing in the bottle or the shot glasses. He didn’t know about the cut on her foot. He said she must have cut it after they got back to dry land. We need to check with Featherleigh about the cut. And Tag said Merritt drank a glass of water that Featherleigh Dale got from the kitchen.”
“Water?” Nick said. “There wasn’t a water glass at the scene.”
“Exactly,” the Chief said. “So maybe he’s lying. Or maybe…”
“Someone got rid of the water glass,” Nick said. The mother, Greer Garrison, had been in the kitchen at some point, getting champagne. Nick still has a feeling she’s hiding something. “If Greer knew about the affair…”
“And the baby…” the Chief said.
“Maybe she slipped a pill into the drinking water,” Nick said. “And then went back and cleared the glass. Ran it through the dishwasher on the power-scrub cycle. But how would she know Merritt would then go for a swim?”
“Maybe the father and mother are in it together,” the Chief said.
“Both of them?” Nick said. “The night before their son’s big wedding? A wedding they’re paying for?”
“Another thing,” the Chief said. “Tag Winbury is a smart guy. If he’d used the kayak ride to drown our girl, he would have made damn sure he locked the kayak up when he got back. Right? To cover his tracks?”
“Are we overthinking this?” Nick asked. “Was it just an accident?”
“Be thorough with Featherleigh,” the Chief said.
“You know me,” Nick said. “I’m a bloodhound.”
Nick is waiting in the interview room when they bring Featherleigh Dale in. He hears her squawking a bit out in the hallway: She’s going to miss her flight to JFK. She needs to get back to London. Luklo swings open the door to the interview room and ushers Ms. Dale inside. Nick stands.
He and Featherleigh Dale regard each other.
She says, “Well, you’re a tasty morsel, aren’t you?”
Luklo smirks and Nick extends a hand. “Ms. Dale, I’m Nick Diamantopoulos, a detective with the Massachusetts State Police. I just have a few questions and as soon as we’re through here, assuming we’re satisfied with your answers, I’ll have Officer Luklo get you back to the airport and on your way.”
“If I had known the detective would look like you,” Featherleigh says, “then I would definitely have committed a crime.”
“If you’ll just have a seat,” Nick says.
Featherleigh wheels in her roller bag and sets a handbag bursting with stuff—a paperback novel, a hairbrush, an open bag of pretzels, which spill all over the floor—on top of the suitcase, then she grabs a smaller clutch purse from within the bag and brings it with her to the table, where she proceeds to put on fire-engine-red lipstick.
Nick waits for her to get settled and thinks, This woman is too disorganized to kill anyone, even accidentally. But maybe he’s wrong. Featherleigh Dale is in her mid-forties. She’s a bit chunky, she has hair halfway between blond and red—it looks like she changed her mind in the middle of a dye job—and she’s wearing what looks like a jumpsuit issued by the air force in 1942, minus the sleeves.
“Can I get you anything to drink?” Nick asks.
“Not unless you have a decent chardonnay,” she says. “You interrupted my lunch.”
Nick takes a seat. “Let’s get started, Ms. Dale—”
“Feather,” she says. “My friends call me Feather.”
“Feather,” Nick says, and he nearly smiles. There used to be a transvestite prostitute on Brock Avenue in New Bedford named Feather. He pauses to remind himself that this is serious business and he needs to be thorough. “Let’s start with how you know the Winburys.”
Featherleigh, now Feather, waves a hand. “Known them forever,” she says.
“Meaning?”
“Meaning, let’s see… Tag Winbury went to Oxford with my older brother, Hamish, may he rest in peace, so I’ve known Tag since I was a kid. I reconnected with the family at my brother’s funeral, and after that, our paths kept crossing. I own a business finding antiques for people like Greer, people who have more money than God and don’t mind plunking down thirty thousand quid for a settee. I found her some salvaged windows from a church in Canterbury. Those went for ten thousand quid apiece and I’m pretty sure she’s still got them in storage.”
“So you have a business relationship with the Winburys, then,” Nick says.
“And personal,” Feather says. “We’re friends.”
“Well, yes,” Nick says. “You came over from London for the wedding. How well do you know Benji and Celeste?”
“I know Benji a little bit,” Feather says. “Celeste not at all. Just met her last night. Her and her friend. Shame what happened.”
