Free Summer People by Aaron Stander Page A

again.”
    Sue glanced about her, “There are so many beautiful things, don’t you want any of them?”
    “No,” said Tawny, “they don’t mean anything to me. They’re part of someone else’s life. I don’t want anything that will remind me of what happened.”
    “What will happen to the house?”
    “I talked to Randy’s lawyer at the funeral. He will look after getting rid of the place; his sister might be interested in it. Randy once told me that she wanted it. I think the fact that he got the place when their parents died had a lot to do with their falling out. I guess they hadn’t talked in several years, and I had never met her before Randy’s funeral, but she was very nice. The James’ called her after Randy was killed. They drove me down state for the funeral and invited me to stay with them, but she insisted that I stay with her. She handled all the arrangements for the funeral. I was a complete basket case.”
    “What are you going to do now?” asked Sue.
    “I’ll go on just like before. I’m scheduled to work next week. I just need to get on with my life.”
    “Don’t you have family or someone that you can fall back on for support?”
    “No family to speak of. My father died when I was little, and I never got on with my mom. I left home as soon as I graduated from high school. I haven’t made any effort to keep in contact, and my mom hasn’t either. I don’t believe in keeping relationships going that do more harm than good.”
    As Sue was locking the cottage, Ray came up the drive. She stopped and waited. “Do you want to go into the cottage?” she asked after he emerged from his car.
    “Not really. I do want to talk with Mrs. Holden for a few minutes.”
    “Can we sit at the beach, Sheriff?” Tawny asked. She motioned toward the cottage, “I’ve said my last good-byes to the place. I’d rather not go back in.”
    “I’d prefer it,” said Ray.
    They settled into the three metal lawn chairs facing the water.
    “It is beautiful here,” said Ray looking out at the lake.
    “Yes,” agreed Tawny. “I’m a beach and water person. My place in California is only a block from the ocean.”
    Ray looked at her as she was talking. Her rich tan and sunbleached hair confirmed her love of the beach. But as he looked at her attractive face, he could sense her pain. He couldn’t exactly tell what gave him the impression, but he felt that she seemed terribly worn for her years.
    “I know the last few days have been very difficult for you,” he began, “but I was wondering if you had any more thoughts about who might have wanted your husband dead?”
    “I spent a lot of time thinking about that, Sheriff. Do you use visualization?”
    “Visualization? I don’t quite follow you.”
    “I was trying to think about the past given what has happened. I tried to visualize conversations Randy and I had; I tried to see if I could put another interpretation to things. I also tried to remember the phone calls I’d overheard; was there anything I might have missed?” She paused and looked at the lake.
    “And,” prodded Ray
    “I don’t think I missed anything. If Randy thought someone was out to kill him, he didn’t give me a hint that anything was going on. The hard part about this is that I’ve had to admit to myself I didn’t really know him very well. It’s strange, you meet someone, you get involved, you share your life, you share your body, but that doesn’t mean you really know them. I don’t think I’m naive, but I took everything that he told me at face value. You meet lots of men in my kind of work, you can usually spot the hustlers a mile away. They’re incredibly obvious, although they seem to think that they are unusually subtle. Randy was sweet, he was kind to me, and he wanted more than my body for a night or two. I have no misgivings, he was clearly no saint, but he was better to me than any other man I’ve known.”
    Ray waited for a few moments, then said, “I