Envy

chapter 7

MOIRA WINDSOR KNEW THAT GREATNESS was never going to come from writing for the “What’s Up” section of the North Kitsap Herald, but at twenty-three, she’d been saddled with student loans and no prospects for a better job, at least until the economy bounced back. Whenever that was supposed to happen, no one seemed to really know. Moira was also being strategic. She knew that a toehold in a real journalism position was a must in building the credibility that she was sure she could spin into a spot next to Matt Lauer on Today. That was if, and only if, that overly sincere Ann Curry didn’t work out and got booted off the air.

A slender redhead with a nice figure that she used to her advantage, Moira waited outside house number 19, composing her thoughts before knocking on the Ryans’ front door. Even though it was freezing outside, she unzipped her jacket a little to showcase what God and a Victoria’s Secret push-up bra had given her. She peered through the six panels of rippled glass that ran alongside the solid, painted door. She pulled back and planted a smile on her face as footsteps approached.

Kevin Ryan, wearing gray sweatpants and a ratty, stained Got Crime? T-shirt that Valerie had tried to discard by stuffing it into the bottom of a Goodwill bag more than once, swung open the door and smiled.

A little cleavage always works. Moira had learned that technique trying to get men to reveal things that they ordinarily might not. All told, Moira had about an eighty-seven percent success rate with it.

“Mr. Ryan? I’m with the North Kitsap Herald. I’m a huge fan. Can we talk?”

Kevin studied her, then looked at her eyes. He’d seen that purported “huge fan” look before a dozen times. She was young, excited. Like most reporters who sought an interview, this one probably was more interested in advancing her dream of writing books than in interviewing him about anything he’d been doing.

“I’m sorry,” he said, hesitating a moment. “I didn’t catch your name.”

“Moira Windsor,” she said, with the kind of confidence that suggested he ought to know who she was. “I’m with ‘What’s Up.’”

Kevin never turned down a chance for publicity, but he had one cardinal rule on the subject: Never do any media unless you have a book to sell.

“Right. Moira, I’m sorry, but I didn’t get a heads-up from anyone at the Herald that you’d be visiting. I don’t have a book coming out.”

“I’m a huge fan of your work,” she repeated.

“You said that already,” Kevin said as politely as possible.

Moira fidgeted with her purse and pulled out a slim reporter’s notebook.

“Actually,” she said, opening the notebook, “I wanted to talk to you about Katelyn Berkley. I apologize for not having the whole background yet. My editor called me and told me the basics. I’m all about research, so bear with me. Go ahead, now tell me.”

Valerie had warned him that a reporter was snooping around, but Kevin didn’t like where the impromptu—no, ambush—interview was going.

“Why would you want to write about her? It was a personal matter. A family tragedy.”

Moira ignored the warning that she felt was mixed into his response. “Yes, a suicide or an accident. I get that.”

“Of course you do,” he said. He could feel his adrenaline pulse a little, and he willed himself to say calm. He might need her one day for publicity, but not that day, not about that subject. “And as far as I know, your paper doesn’t cover personal tragedies.”

Moira nodded. “This one is different.”

If Moira was going to press the point, Kevin was going to let her. “How so?” he asked, clearly testing her.

“I think you know why.”

He did, but he stayed firm in his refusal to say so. “No, I don’t.”

“Katelyn was in the Hood Canal Bridge crash.”

Kevin glanced away for a second, his awareness no longer on the annoying young woman standing in front of him but on his girls, who were just steps away from the door.

“I guess she was,” he said. “So what?”

“Well, so were your daughters … and now they are the only surviving children of the accident.”

Kevin’s jaw tightened. “We don’t talk about the crash.”

“The paper really would like to do something … you know, coming on the heels of Katelyn’s tragic death and the ten-year anniversary of the accident.”

A child’s death plus a ten-year anniversary equaled a newspaper reporter’s one-two punch for a spot on the front page.

“I’m sorry. Can’t, won’t, help you.”

“I can mention your last book.”

“Thanks, but no thanks. Please do yourself a favor and, more important, the people of this town a favor, by not pursuing this.”

“I can’t do that, and you of all people should understand. You’ve always been about the truth, haven’t you?”

Kevin Ryan nodded, his casual smile no longer in place. “Please go, Ms. Windsor. We’re all out of patience here.”

He closed the door harder than a polite man might have done. He couldn’t help it. The ten-year anniversary of the crash was looming and with each minute passing, it brought a deluge of hurt and more confusion.

No one knew what had caused the crash or why only three girls and one adult had survived.

“Who was that?” Hayley asked as her father turned around.

“Reporter,” Kevin said.

“Why was she talking about Katelyn?”

“Looking for a story, that’s all.”

“Oh,” she said.

Kevin started toward the kitchen, but Hayley’s words stopped him like a rope of razor wire.

“When are you going to talk to us about the crash, Dad?”

He turned around, his heart beating faster and his face now flushed. “We’ve talked about it already.”

“Really, Dad? I still have questions about it,” Hayley said.

“Look,” he said, clearly not wanting to have another word about it with Hayley, Taylor, or probably anyone else, “can we just table it?”

Now Hayley’s red face signaled her own frustration. “Table it for how long? Are we not going to talk about it for the rest of our lives?”

Kevin refused to answer. Instead he put his hand up as if the act could really just push it all away. Dads all over the world thought they could win an argument with a teenage girl. Those dads were pretty stupid.

“Sorry, honey,” he said. “But not right now. Please don’t ask again.”

SOMETIMES GOOD NEEDED A HAND in dealing with evil. Both Taylor and Hayley knew that statement to be truer than the fact that their eyes were blue or that their dog, Hedda, a long-haired dachshund, was a bed hog of the highest order. They did wonder, however, if it had always been that way in the outside world. Sometimes it seemed that beyond the borders of Port Gamble, people were caught up in so much conflict, so much hate, incessant evil—whatever word a person would choose to call the ugly that was routinely done to each other.

The Ryan twins had a slightly warped front-row seat to evil and the criminal-justice system. As a little girl, their mom lived in a prison run by her father, and she now worked as a psychiatric nurse. Their dad made his living writing about murderers. What they unequivocally knew from their parents was that there were two kinds of evil: accidental and intended.

The twins, and especially Taylor, could empathize with the drunk driver in Seattle who staggered behind the wheel and plowed into a group of teenagers waiting to get into a dance club. Accidental evil might occasionally be forgiven; the driver had not killed on purpose. Plus, there was hope for the truly sorry.

However, the girls felt no mercy for those who perpetrated evil intentionally. Their souls were dark and always would be.