Swan Song (Julie O'Hara Mystery Series) (18 page)

Unable to get any kind of work nearby, Hoyt had been tied to the North Street farm…and to his parents. He wouldn’t tell them immediately, but his intention was to land a job further away and move out. The car made it possible.

Maybe that’s why they’re giving it to me. They would never say it, but they’ve gotten used to living in this house by themselves.

Conversation with his parents was difficult…stilted and uncomfortable. Hoyt would retreat to his childhood bedroom, which had begun to feel every bit like the cell he had occupied for seven years. And he wasn’t really needed on the farm. Four years ago, his father had hired a young man from Maine as a full-time hand. The guy lived in an apartment nearby and had become like an adopted son to them. It was clear that his father was not going to let him go.

I’m glad he’s here. It makes it easier to leave.

•

“I’m sorry, Hoyt,” said the sales manager. “I have to let you go. You lied on your employment application.”

“Only because I couldn’t get a damn job!” said Hoyt.

“I understand, but there’s nothing I can do,” the manager said.

It was plain to see that he was no longer enthusiastic about having Hoyt as an employee.

Hoyt signed the “Exit Interview” form, pushed it toward his ex-boss and left, toppling his chair in the process. He was so
angry, he didn’t stop to pick it up. He stormed out to his car and got in, whipping out of the parking lot onto the road leading to Interstate 95…and the farm.

Two damn weeks of driving all over creation for those assholes! I was on straight commission…I wasn’t even costing them anything!

Under the circumstances, Hoyt knew he’d never collect a dime on the two sales he’d made for the farm equipment supplier.

He’d be twenty-eight soon. It was almost a year since he got the Camry he was driving! Being an ex-con wasn’t supposed to make any difference to an employer. What a joke that was.

Will I ever be able to get a job? Will I have to spend the rest of my life working on the farm with my parents?

At times like this, it was hard not to blame Dianna for ruining his life. He’d heard that the
Wielands had moved to Orlando, Florida.

I’m screwed and she’s living in the land of fun and sun.

•

Losing the sales job was so depressing that Hoyt gave up looking for awhile, but eventually the need to live on his own motivated him to try again. This time the jobs he went for didn’t involve a written application that could rule him out or come back to bite him.

At last, Hoyt was hired by a company called Boyer Landscape Service to cut lawns in the summer and plow snow in the winter. Even though the pay was terrible, Hoyt figured he could save up enough to move because he still worked on the farm and lived rent-free.

He was in his room counting his savings from five weeks of work, when he heard the pounding on the front door downstairs. He went to the top of the staircase. Uniformed policemen were trooping in, pushing past his mother and father.

“What’s going on?” he said, running down the stairs.

“Hoyt Geller?” a cop asked.

“Yes. What do you want?”

“You’re coming with us.
Hands behind your back!”

They shoved him against the wall and clamped handcuffs on him.

“What are you doing?!” said Rolf Geller. “Where are you taking him?”

“He’s going to the police station. We have some questions for him.”

With no more explanation, they put Hoyt in the back of a cruiser and took him to police headquarters. There, they grilled him for three hours about a little girl in a neighboring town who had gone missing. After that they threw him in a jail cell. The next afternoon, they pushed him into a line-up.

Hoyt was on the Sexual Offenders List.

A local newspaper picked up the story and Boyer Landscape promptly fired him.

* * * * * 

Chapter
41

Massachusetts, 2006

H
e had given up all hope of a life apart from the farm. He would have to notify the Registry of Sexual Offenders of any move to any other city or state. He had been cruelly reminded that he was a
permanent
suspect.

Hoyt had come to accept the fact that he would never be truly free
.

If he had learned anything from seven years behind bars it was this: There was no point in torturing himself with unattainable dreams. At least he wasn’t a pariah here. His parents loved him, his co-worker was his friend, and there was a girl he’d met during the apple harvest last fall who was accommodating and didn’t care about his reputation.

It’s better than prison.

Hoyt smiled at the hired hand next to him, who was also holding tight to the truck, bouncing along in the back with all their tools and supplies.

It was a sunny day in April and they were circling the farm, checking the fence for winter damage. Rolf Geller was at the wheel navigating the rutted, hairpin road on the rear perimeter of the property which led to the top of Stripe Hill. Katrin had come along for the ride and had brought lunch. The woods on either side of the road were strewn with granite boulders, and the last of the melting snow on higher ground created little waterfalls and rills as it coursed over and between them.

The road dead-ended at a narrow access road at the top and Rolf Geller turned sharp right onto it and stopped. The view was wide open and spectacular, but they were all used to it and paid it no mind.

“The fence is sagging over there, Father,” said Hoyt, pointing to a section of chain-link behind the truck on the left side of the access road.

“Okay. Stay there. I’ll back up,” said Rolf.

Somehow he stepped on the gas before he put the truck into reverse.

The next thing Hoyt knew they were shooting forward, crashing through chain-link, airborne over the granite quarry below. He tried to hold on, but he couldn’t. The truck listed right from the heavy equipment and he went flying out of the bed along with it.

Tumbling…WHAM! Hoyt found himself on his back. He was stunned; he shook his head to clear it

Someone was screaming.

The pick-up was on fire! Not a fireball like in the movies... but it will be!

Jumping from rock to rock, he raced down the incline to the passenger door.

“MOTHER!”

Katrin
was burning. They were all burning…and no one was screaming anymore.

Hoyt grabbed for his mother anyway, but flames raced up his left arm.

He fell back, pulling off his burning jacket and scrambling far away from the horror of the now fully engulfed truck.

Numb from shock, Hoyt sat staring at the blazing truck.

Why wasn’t anybody coming?

Then he realized it was Sunday. No one was at the quarry.

The shock was wearing off and suddenly he felt tremendous pain in his left hand. He cried out as he raised it, palm up, to look. It was red and blistered.

Not charred…that’s good…got to get home.

•

The climb out of the quarry was difficult, but not as bad as the trek to the farmhouse. The more time that passed, the more unbearable the pain became. Hoyt stumbled into the house and climbed the stairs, crying all the way.

He went directly to his parents’ medicine cabinet. He was looking for a pain reliever that was prescribed for his father after shoulder surgery. Just recently, his father had been talking about it, how it made him “dizzy”, how he “only took it for one day”…the name was
oxy
-something. Hoyt searched frantically through the medicines.

There
…
Oxycontin.

He took one and then stuck his hand under cold water.

“OW!”

He yanked the hand out, unable to bear the pain.

Infection. Burns get infected.

He found some gauze and gingerly dried his hand. Then he spread an antibacterial ointment all over it, wincing and grimacing in pain. Finally, he wrapped it loosely in the gauze. Breathing hard, he sat down on the toilet seat.

His Mother’s bathrobe hung on a hook on the wall.

The pain of losing them ripped through Hoyt again and he sat there for an hour, crying convulsively, unable to do anything else. Finally his sobbing eased and he went into their room and lay down on their bed. His painful, pulsing hand woke him three hours later. He took another
Oxycontin, returned to their bed and slept once again.

•

When the sun came up, Hoyt dragged himself to his feet. His whole body was bruised and hurting. But his hand….it throbbed so painfully it felt like a horrible alien thing…something apart from his body. He took another pill and sat on their bed.

His grief was profound; Hoyt had nothing left, not even a friend.

What did he have to live for?

He
should have been the one to die with his parents.

* * * * * 

Chapter
42

“I
’m going to lunch, Janet,” said Joe, as he grabbed his keys and headed for the door.

“I might not be back this afternoon; I’ve got to talk to Merlin. I’ll call you.”

“Okay, Boss.”

Joe quickly crossed the foyer between the two offices and walked into Julie’s.

“Hi,” he said, “is she busy?”

“No doubt,” said Luz, “but nobody’s in there with her.”

“Okay, thanks,” said Joe, going down the hall.

Julie was at her computer working on her manuscript,
Clues.
The editor had called Julie’s agent to put pressure on Julie to either approve or correct the recent galleys sent by the publisher. Julie felt rather guilt-ridden that she’d let it go so long…and now here was Joe. When would she get this done?

“Hi,” she said. “What’s up?”

“He’s dead.”

“Who’s dead?”

“Hoyt Geller,” said Joe, handing her a fax. It was a copy of a Boston Globe newspaper article dated Tuesday, April 10, 2006:

Middlesex County
THREE KILLED IN
QUARRY CRASH

Quarry workers arriving for work on Monday found the smoking body of a Ford truck which had crashed through a chain link fence high up on a neighboring farm. The driver and two passengers were killed in the crash. They have been identified as Rolf Geller, 65, his wife, Katrin, 62, and their son, Hoyt, 28.

The
Gellers owned the adjacent apple orchards and were apparently repairing fencing above the quarry. The disposition of North Street Farm was not immediately available.

The crash is under investigation.

“Oh, my God…that poor family.”

“Yeah, it is sad,” said Joe. “Seems like bad luck was the only kind they had. Anyway, that takes Hoyt Geller out of the equation, Merlin.”

“Yes.”

“So where do we go from here?”

Julie rubbed her forehead, thinking.

“To Sabrina Nolen.”

* * * * * 

Chapter
43

E
xpecting Sabrina’s resistance to another meeting,
they decided that Julie should go alone. Joe would drop her off, crutches and all, at Nolen Title, killing time in the area himself until Julie called him to pick her up. They had deliberately timed the unannounced visit just prior to the lunch hour. Once again, Sabrina was in the middle of a closing and Julie took a seat in the anteroom and perused the magazines.

Before long, Sabrina came out of the conference room leading eight people, everyone carrying folders. It looked like a class of some type, but it was actually a set of parents and their adult children who were jointly purchasing property, along with the sellers and two real estate agents. Sabrina was giving them her usual congratulations and reassurance.

Julie was bracing for a swift change of attitude as soon as they left.

“Julie,” said Sabrina, “What happened to your leg? Have you got time for lunch?”

Surprise, surprise.

•

They went to Press 101, right across the parking lot. It was busy, but they were fortunate to grab an outside table on the edge of the crowd where Julie could stow her crutches and prop up her leg.

It was obvious that Sabrina wanted to unburden herself of something, but they eased into it, making small talk until their sandwiches were delivered.

“I have to tell you something that may have a bearing on what happened to Dianna Wieland,” said Sabrina. “I don’t think it
does
, but I’m glad to have somebody other than the police to discuss it with.”

“Of course,” said Julie, leaning forward in her best listening pose.

“First of all, you need to know that Mike Menello lives with me, Julie. We’ve been together ever since he lost his house in that Quill Creek fiasco. Do you know about that? About the lakefront lots he bought there?”