Breakwater

13

Just after dark, Special Agent Kowalski knocked on Quinn’s porch door. She’d spotted his car pull up in front of her cottage, but still her heart pounded when she saw him through the door’s window. She had difficulty unlocking the door, her fingers stiff from the cold air and her long, difficult day. When she let him in, a breeze stung her face, her skin raw from crying. Another time, she might not have wanted an FBI agent-anyone-to see her in such a state, but tonight she didn’t care.

“Are you spending the night in Yorkville?” she asked him as he walked past her into the small living room. “It’s getting late.”

“I live in Spotsylvania. It’s not too far from here.” His expression suggested he hadn’t come for chitchat. “We found Alicia Miller’s car.”

“How-where?”

“We received an anonymous tip. It was out by an old boathouse on the waterfront, about two miles up the loop road from here. It’s closer by water. Apparently it’s a favorite spot for kayakers to launch.”

“I know it well. It’s an easy paddle over to the wildlife refuge from there. But Alicia must have headed back this way, since she ended up in the marsh.” Quinn’s voice caught. Had Kowalski hoped to catch her off guard? She noticed her quilt on the couch, her running shoes under the coffee table, her bowl of cold crab stew, but stayed focused on what he’d just told her. “When did you get this anonymous tip?”

“I didn’t. The local police did, maybe an hour ago.”

An hour. Had Diego Clemente recognized her description of Alicia’s car and phoned in the information anonymously, not wanting to use his name and have to answer questions?

“Quinn?”

“If Alicia had her head together enough to drive out to the boathouse to launch, don’t you think she’d have checked the weather? At least worn a life vest?”

“Happens all the time. People don’t pay attention.”

“But she must have just arrived back from Washington -”

“If she’d been agitated, then stuck in a car for three or four hours, she could have cut corners in her rush to get out on the water,” Kowalski reasoned.

Quinn sat on a 1950s wooden-armed chair, its cushions covered in a flowered fabric that went with the plaid on the couch. Alicia had helped her pick it out. “Alicia always wore a life vest. I insist anyone using one of my kayaks wear one. I keep several sizes in the shed. It’s not like her to go without.”

Kowalski didn’t respond right away. “Have you had anything to eat?”

His question took her by surprise. “Crab stew-”

“Uh-uh.” He pointed to her bowl, still on the side table. “You’ve had, what, three bites?”

Not even that much. She didn’t answer him. “Does Huck Boone know you found Alicia’s car? He was with me this morning-”

“I know. I can’t discuss the details of an ongoing investigation with you.”

“The black sedan that picked Alicia up in Washington -it hasn’t turned up?”

Kowalski sighed at Quinn. “You are tenacious, aren’t you? Why didn’t you sign up for the FBI? What are you now-thirty?”

“Thirty-two.”

“You still could. You’ve got four years. Then you can run an investigation and ask people questions.”

“If I weren’t a former Justice Department employee-”

“I treat everyone the same.”

She snorted. “Ha.”

“I know a couple guys planning to sit in on your workshop at the academy.”

“If you tell me things you’re not supposed to, I’ll give them A’s.”

That got him to crack a smile. “Good to see you have your sense of humor. It’ll help you in the coming days.”

But she sensed he was trying to tell her something more. “And?”

“And leave the investigation into your friend’s death to law enforcement. Don’t meddle.”

“What makes you think I’ve meddled?”

“Good night, Miss Harlowe.”

“A minute ago it was Quinn.”

He leaned toward her. “Eat. Get some sleep. Go back to Washington in the morning and make up a hard test for my friends.” But he sighed, shaking his head. “I know it’s been a rough day for you. I’m truly sorry about your loss.”

“Thank you.”

After Kowalski left, Quinn took her crab stew to the kitchen and popped the bowl in her ancient microwave. If she had something to eat, she thought, she might be able to figure out how T.J. Kowalski had discovered that his anonymous tipster was Diego Clemente and she’d asked him about Alicia’s car, because obviously he had. Otherwise why read her the riot act about minding her own business?

Kowalski must have gone to the waterfront motel himself and asked people hanging around if they saw anything. Ordinary legwork. He’d talked to Clemente and figured out he’d provided the tip about Alicia’s car. Had Clemente actually told him that Quinn had been asking questions?

The microwave dinged. The stew was bubbling hot, but she didn’t think it had come to a boil. She opened another sleeve of saltines and sat at the table, and after three spoonfuls of the rich, flavorful stew, she knew what she was doing and why Kowalski had warned her off. She was grasping at straws and looking for distractions-meddling in a law enforcement investigation-in order to alleviate her own guilt, to take her mind off her shock and grief and, even for a few moments, the image of Alicia in the marsh.

However she’d died, she was gone, and Quinn didn’t want to accept that reality.

T.J. Kowalski hadn’t made the effort to come to her cottage and tell her in person about the discovery out of any sympathy for her, or because he’d needed to ask her more questions.

He’d wanted to tell her to butt out.

Message delivered, message received.

Quinn stared at her crab stew. It had turned gloppy, and she had lost any urge to eat. She forced herself to take a few more bites, but couldn’t really taste anything. Finally, she gave up and, as she washed out her bowl, she wondered what T.J. Kowalski knew that he wasn’t telling her. Or was she just grasping at more straws?

She thought of Huck Boone. He worked for Breakwater Security-he could have his own read on the investigation.

Maybe she’d look him up tomorrow and ask him what he thought.

Feeling better, Quinn fell back onto the couch and wrapped up in her quilt, listening to the wind and the tide and trying not to think.