Keeper of the Bride

Chapter Two

“THIS IS CRAZY,” she said. “This is absolutely nuts.”

“I have to explore the possibility.”

“What possibility? That the bomb was meant for me?”

“Your wedding was scheduled for two o’clock. The bomb went off at 2:40. It exploded near the front row of pews. Near the altar. There’s no doubt in my mind, judging by the obvious force of the blast, that you and your entire wedding party would have been killed. Or, at the very least, seriously maimed. This is a bomb we’re talking about, Miss Cormier. Not a gas leak. Not an accident. A bomb. It was meant to kill someone. What I have to find out is, who was the target?”

She didn’t answer. The possibilities were too horrible to even contemplate.

“Who was in your wedding party?” he asked.

She swallowed. “There was…there was…”

“You and Reverend Sullivan. Who else?”

“Robert—my fiancé. And my sister Wendy. And Jeremy Wall, the best man…”

“Anyone else?”

“My father was going to give me away. And there was a flower girl and a ring bearer…”

“I’m only interested in the adults. Let’s start with you.”

Numbly she shook her head. “It—it wasn’t me. It couldn’t be me.”

“Why couldn’t it?”

“It’s impossible.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Because no one would want me dead!”

Her sharp cry seemed to take him by surprise. For a moment he was silent. Outside, on the street, a uniformed cop turned and glanced at them. Sam responded with an everything’s fine wave of the hand, and the cop turned away again.

Nina sat clutching the rumpled hem of her gown. This man was horrid. Sam Spade without a trace of human warmth. Though it was getting hot in the car, she found herself shivering, chilled by the lack of obvious emotion displayed by the man sitting beside her.

“Can we explore this a little more?” he said.

She said nothing.

“Do you have any ex-boyfriends, Miss Cormier? Anyone who might be unhappy about your marriage?”

“No,” she whispered.

“No ex-boyfriends at all?”

“Not—not in the last year.”

“Is that how long you’ve been with your fiancé? A year?”

“Yes.”

“His full name and address, please.”

“Robert David Bledsoe, M.D., 318 Ocean View Drive.”

“Same address?”

“We’ve been living together.”

“Why was the wedding cancelled?”

“You’d have to ask Robert.”

“So it was his decision? To call off the wedding?”

“As the expression goes, he left me at the altar.”

“Do you know why?”

She gave a bitter laugh. “I’ve come to the earth-shattering conclusion, Detective, that the minds of men are a complete mystery to me.”

“He gave you no warning at all?”

“It was just as unexpected as that…” She swallowed. “As that bomb. If that’s what it was.”

“What time was the wedding called off?”

“About one-thirty. I’d already arrived at the church, wedding gown and all. Then Jeremy—Robert’s best man—showed up with the note. Robert didn’t even have the nerve to tell me himself.” She shook her head in disgust.

“What did the note say?”

“That he needed more time. And he was leaving town for a while. That’s all.”

“Is it possible Robert had any reason to—”

“No, it’s not possible!” She looked him straight in the eye. “You’re asking if Robert had something to do with it. Aren’t you?”

“I keep an open mind, Miss Cormier.”

“Robert’s not capable of violence. For God’s sake, he’s a doctor!”

“All right. For the moment, we’ll let that go. Let’s look at other possibilities. I take it you’re employed?”

“I’m a nurse at Maine Medical Center.”

“Which department?”

“Emergency room.”

“Any problems at work? Any conflicts with the rest of the staff?”

“No. We get along fine.”

“Any threats? From your patients, for instance?”

She made a sound of exasperation. “Detective, wouldn’t I know if I had enemies?”

“Not necessarily.”

“You’re trying your damn best to make me feel paranoid.”

“I’m asking you to step back from yourself. Examine your personal life. Think of all the people who might not like you.”

Nina sank back in the seat. All the people who might not like me. She thought of her family. Her older sister Wendy, with whom she’d never been close. Her mother Lydia, married to her wealthy snob of a husband. Her father George, now on his fourth wife, a blond trophy bride who considered her husband’s offspring a nuisance. It was one big, dysfunctional family, but there were certainly no murderers among them.

She shook her head. “No one, Detective. There’s no one.”

After a moment he sighed and closed his notebook. “All right, Miss Cormier. I guess that’s all for now.”

“For now?”

“I’ll probably have other questions. After I talk to the rest of the wedding party.” He opened the car door, got out, and pushed the door shut. Through the open window he said, “If you think of anything, anything at all, give me a call.” He scribbled in his notebook and handed her the torn page with his name, Detective Samuel I. Navarro, and a phone number. “It’s my direct line,” he said. “I can also be reached twenty-four hours a day through the police switchboard.”

“Then…I can go home now?”

“Yes.” He started to walk away.

“Detective Navarro?”

He turned back to her. She had not realized how tall he was. Now, seeing his lean frame at its full height, she wondered how he’d ever fit in the seat beside her. “Is there something else, Miss Cormier?” he asked.

“You said I could leave.”

“That’s right.”

“I don’t have a ride.” She nodded toward the bombed-out church. “Or a phone either. Do you think you could give my mother a call? To come get me?”

“Your mother?” He glanced around, obviously anxious to palm off this latest annoyance. Finally, with a look of resignation, he circled around to her side of the car and opened the door. “Come on. We can go in my car. I’ll drive you.”

“Look, I was only asking you to make a call.”

“It’s no trouble.” He extended his hand to help her out. “I’d have to go by your mother’s house anyway.”

“My mother’s house? Why?”

“She was at the wedding. I’ll need to talk to her, too. Might as well kill two birds with one stone.”

What a gallant way to put it, she thought.

He was still reaching out to her. She ignored his outstretched hand. It was a struggle getting out of the car, since her train had wrapped itself around her legs, and she had to kick herself free of the hem. By the time she’d finally extricated herself from the car, he was regarding her with a look of amusement. She snatched up her train and whisked past him in a noisy rustle of satin.

“Uh, Miss Cormier?”

“What?” she snapped over her shoulder.

“My car’s in the other direction.”

She halted, her cheeks flushing. Mr. Detective was actually smiling now, a full-blown ate-the-canary grin.

“It’s the blue Taurus,” he pointed out. “The door’s unlocked. I’ll be right with you.” He turned and headed away, toward the gathering of cops.

Nina flounced over to the blue Taurus. There she peered in disgust through the window. She was supposed to ride in this car? With that mess? She opened the door. A paper cup tumbled out. On the passenger floor was a crumpled McDonald’s bag, more coffee cups, and a two-day-old Portland Press Herald. The back seat was buried under more newspapers, file folders, a briefcase, a suit jacket, and—of all things—a baseball mitt.

She scooped up the debris from the passenger side, tossed it into the back, and climbed in. She only hoped the seat was clean.

Detective Cold Fish was walking toward the car. He looked hot and harassed. His shirtsleeves were rolled up now, his tie yanked loose. Even as he tried to leave the scene, cops were pulling him aside to ask questions.

At last he slid in behind the wheel and slammed the door. “Okay, where does your mother live?” he asked.

“Cape Elizabeth. Look, I can see you’re busy—”

“My partner’s holding the fort. I’ll drop you off, talk to your mother, and swing by the hospital to see Reverend Sullivan.”

“Great. That way you can kill three birds with one stone.”

“I do believe in efficiency.”

They drove in silence. She saw no point in trying to dredge up polite talk. Politeness would go right over this man’s head. Instead, she looked out the window and thought morosely about the wedding reception and all those finger sandwiches waiting for guests who’d never arrive. She’d have to call and ask for the food to be delivered to a soup kitchen before it all spoiled. And then there were the gifts, dozens of them, piled up at home. Correction—Robert’s home. It had never really been her home. She had only been living there, a tenant. It had been her idea to pay half the mortgage. Robert used to point out how much he respected her independence, her insistence on a separate identity. In any good relationship, he’d say, privilege as well as responsibility was a fifty-fifty split. That’s how they’d worked it from the start. First he’d paid for a date, then she had. In fact, she’d insisted, to show him that she was her own woman.

Now it all seemed so stupid.

I was never my own woman, she thought. I was always dreaming, longing for the day I’d be Mrs. Robert Bledsoe. It’s what her family had hoped for, what her mother had expected of her: to marry well. They’d never understood Nina’s going to nursing school, except as a way to meet a potential mate. A doctor. She’d met one, all right.

And all it’s gotten me is a bunch of gifts I have to return, a wedding gown I can’t return, and a day I’ll never, ever live down.

It was the humiliation that shook her the most. Not the fact that Robert had walked out. Not even the fact that she could have died in the wreckage of that church. The explosion itself seemed unreal to her, as remote as some TV melodramas. As remote as this man sitting beside her.

“You’re handling this very well,” he said.

Startled that Detective Cold Fish had spoken, she looked at him. “Excuse me?”

“You’re taking this very calmly. Calmer than most.”

“I don’t know how else to take it.”

“After a bombing, hysteria would not be out of line.”

“I’m an ER nurse, Detective. I don’t do hysteria.”

“Still, this had to be a shock for you. There could well be an emotional aftermath.”

“You’re saying this is the calm before the storm?”

“Something like that.” He glanced at her, his gaze meeting hers. Just as quickly, he looked back at the road and the connection was gone. “Why wasn’t your family with you at the church?”

“I sent them all home.”

“I would think you’d want them around for support, at least.”

She looked out the window. “My family’s not exactly the supportive type. And I guess I just…needed to be alone. When an animal gets hurt, Detective, it goes off by itself to lick its wounds. That’s what I needed to do…” She blinked away an unexpected film of tears and fell silent.

“I know you don’t feel much like talking right now,” he said. “But maybe you can answer this question for me. Can you think of anyone else who might’ve been a target? Reverend Sullivan, for instance?”

She shook her head. “He’s the last person anyone would hurt.”

“It was his church building. He would’ve been near the blast center.”

“Reverend Sullivan’s the sweetest man in the world! Every winter, he’s handing out blankets on the street. Or scrounging up beds at the shelter. In the ER, when we see patients who have no home to go to, he’s the one we call.”

“I’m not questioning his character. I’m just asking about enemies.”

“He has no enemies,” she said flatly.

“What about the rest of the wedding party? Could any of them have been targets?”

“I can’t imagine—”

“The best man, Jeremy Wall. Tell me about him.”

“Jeremy? There’s not much to say. He went to medical school with Robert. He’s a doctor at Maine Med. A radiologist.”

“Married?”

“Single. A confirmed bachelor.”

“What about your sister, Wendy? She was your maid of honor?”

“Matron of honor. She’s a happy homemaker.”

“Any enemies?”

“Not unless there’s someone out there who resents perfection.”

“Meaning?”

“Let’s just say she’s the dream daughter every parent hopes for.”

“As opposed to you?”

Nina gave a shrug. “How’d you guess?”

“All right, so that leaves one major player. The one who, coincidentally, decided not to show up at all.”

Nina stared straight ahead. What can I tell him about Robert, she thought, when I myself am completely in the dark?

To her relief, he didn’t pursue that line of questioning. Perhaps he’d realized how far he’d pushed her. How close to the emotional edge she was already tottering. As they drove the winding road into Cape Elizabeth, she felt her calm facade at last begin to crumble. Hadn’t he warned her about it? The emotional aftermath. The pain creeping through the numbness. She had held together well, had weathered two devastating shocks with little more than a few spilt tears. Now her hands were beginning to shake, and she found that every breath she took was a struggle not to sob.

When at last they pulled up in front of her mother’s house, Nina was barely holding herself together. She didn’t wait for Sam to circle around and open her door. She pushed it open herself and scrambled out in a sloppy tangle of wedding gown. By the time he walked up the front steps, she was already leaning desperately on the doorbell, silently begging her mother to let her in before she fell apart completely.

The door swung open. Lydia, still elegantly coiffed and gowned, stood staring at her dishevelled daughter. “Nina? Oh, my poor Nina.” She opened her arms.

Automatically Nina fell into her mother’s embrace. So hungry was she for a hug, she didn’t immediately register the fact that Lydia had drawn back to avoid wrinkling her green silk dress. But she did register her mother’s first question.

“Have you heard from Robert yet?”

Nina stiffened. Oh please, she thought. Please don’t do this to me.

“I’m sure this can all be worked out,” said Lydia. “If you’d just sit down with Robert and have an honest discussion about what’s bothering him—”

Nina pulled away. “I’m not going to sit down with Robert,” she said. “And as for an honest discussion, I’m not sure we ever had one.”

“Now, darling, it’s natural to be angry—”

“But aren’t you angry, Mother? Can’t you be angry for me?”

“Well, yes. But I can’t see tossing Robert aside just because—”

The sudden clearing of a male throat made Lydia glance up at Sam, who was standing outside the doorway.

“I’m Detective Navarro, Portland Police,” he said. “You’re Mrs. Cormier?”

“The name’s now Warrenton.” Lydia frowned at him. “What is this all about? What do the police have to do with this?”

“There was an incident at the church, ma’am. We’re investigating.

“An incident?”

“The church was bombed.”

Lydia stared at him. “You’re not serious.”

“I’m very serious. It went off at 2:45 this afternoon. Luckily no one was hurt. But if the wedding had been held…”

Lydia paled to a sickly white. She took a step back, her voice failing her.

“Mrs. Warrenton,” said Sam, “I need to ask you a few questions.”

Nina didn’t stay to listen. She had heard too many questions already. She climbed upstairs to the spare bedroom, where she had left her suitcase—the suitcase she’d packed for St. John Island. Inside were her bathing suits and sundresses and tanning lotion. Everything she’d thought she needed for a week in paradise.

She took off the wedding dress and carefully draped it over an armchair where it lay white and lifeless. Useless. She looked at the contents of her suitcase, at the broken dreams packed neatly between layers of tissue paper. That’s when the last vestiges of control failed her. Dressed only in her underwear, she sat down on the bed. Alone, in silence, she finally allowed the grief to sweep over her.

And she wept.

LYDIA WARRENTON was nothing like her daughter. Sam had seen it the moment the older woman opened the front door. Flawlessly made up, elegantly coiffed, her slender frame shown to full advantage by the green gown, Lydia looked like no mother of the bride he’d ever seen. There was a physical resemblance, of course. Both Lydia and Nina had the same black hair, the same dark, thickly lashed eyes. But while Nina had a softness about her, a vulnerability, Lydia was standoffish, as though surrounded by some protective force field that would zap anyone who ventured too close. She was definitely a looker, not only thin but also rich, judging by the room he was now standing in.

The house was a veritable museum of antiques. He had noticed a Mercedes parked in the driveway. And the living room, into which he’d just been ushered, had a spectacular ocean view. A million-dollar view. Lydia sat down primly on a brocade sofa and motioned him toward a wing chair. The needlepoint fabric was so pristine-looking he had the urge to inspect his clothes before sinking onto the cushion.

“A bomb,” murmured Lydia, shaking her head. “I just can’t believe it. Who would bomb a church?”

“It’s not the first bombing we’ve had in town.”

She looked at him, bewildered. “You mean the warehouse? The one last week? I read that had something to do with organized crime.”

“That was the theory.”

“This was a church. How can they possibly be connected?”

“We don’t see the link either, Mrs. Warrenton. We’re trying to find out if there is one. Maybe you can help us. Do you know of any reason someone would want to bomb the Good Shepherd Church?”

“I know nothing about that church. It’s not one I attend. It was my daughter’s choice to get married there.”

“You sound as if you don’t approve.”

She shrugged. “Nina has her own odd way of doing things. I’d have chosen a more…established institution. And a longer guest list. But that’s Nina. She wanted to keep it small and simple.”

Simple was definitely not Lydia Warrenton’s style, thought Sam, gazing around the room.

“So to answer your question, Detective, I can’t think of any reason to bomb Good Shepherd.”

“What time did you leave the church?”

“A little after two. When it became apparent there wasn’t anything I could do for Nina.”

“While you were waiting, did you happen to notice anyone who shouldn’t have been there?”

“There were just the people you’d expect. The florists, the minister. The wedding party.”

“Names?”

“There was me. My daughter Wendy. The best man—I don’t remember his name. My ex-husband, George, and his latest wife.”

“Latest.”

She sniffed. “Daniella. His fourth so far.”

“What about your husband?”

She paused. “Edward was delayed. His plane was two hours late leaving Chicago.”

“So he hadn’t even reached town yet?”

“No. But he planned to attend the reception.”

Again, Sam glanced around the room, at the antiques. The view. “May I ask what your husband does for a living, Mrs. Warrenton?”

“He’s president of Ridley-Warrenton.”

“The logging company?”

“That’s right.”

That explained the house and the Mercedes, thought Sam. Ridley-Warrenton was one of the largest landowners in northern Maine. Their forest products, from raw lumber to fine paper, were shipped around the world.

His next question was unavoidable. “Mrs. Warrenton,” he asked, “does your husband have any enemies?”

Her response surprised him. She laughed. “Anyone with money has enemies, Detective.”

“Can you name anyone in particular?”

“You’d have to ask Edward.”

“I will,” said Sam, rising to his feet. “As soon as your husband’s back in town, could you have him give me a call?”

“My husband’s a busy man.”

“So am I, ma’am,” he answered. With a curt nod, he turned and left the house.

In the driveway, he sat in his Taurus for a moment, gazing up at the mansion. It was, without a doubt, one of the most impressive homes he’d ever been in. Not that he was all that familiar with mansions. Samuel Navarro was the son of a Boston cop who was himself the son of a Boston cop. At the age of twelve, he’d moved to Portland with his newly widowed mother. Nothing came easy for them, a fact of life which his mother resignedly accepted.

Sam had not been so accepting. His adolescence consisted of five long years of rebellion. Fistfights in the school yard. Sneaking cigarettes in the bathroom. Loitering with the rough-and-tumble crowd that hung out in Monument Square. There’d been no mansions in his childhood.

He started the car and drove away. The investigation was just beginning; he and Gillis had a long night ahead of them. There was still the minister to interview, as well as the florist, the best man, the matron of honor, and the groom.

Most of all, the groom.

Dr. Robert Bledsoe, after all, was the one who’d called off the wedding. His decision, by accident or design, had saved the lives of dozens of people. That struck Sam as just a little bit too fortunate. Had Bledsoe received some kind of warning? Had he been the intended target?

Was that the real reason he’d left his bride at the altar?

Nina Cormier’s image came vividly back to mind. Hers wasn’t a face he’d be likely to forget. It was more than just those big brown eyes, that kissable mouth. It was her pride that impressed him the most. The sort of pride that kept her chin up, her jaw squared, even as the tears were falling. For that he admired her. No whining, no self-pity. The woman had been humiliated, abandoned, and almost blown to smithereens. Yet she’d had enough spunk left to give Sam an occasional what-for. He found that both irritating and amusing. For a woman who’d probably grown up with everything handed to her on a silver platter, she was a tough little survivor.