Zane shook his head, at a loss. An awkward silence began to creep in as they stood in the hallway staring at each other. Zane thought maybe Nick was holding his breath, and he suddenly realized why. “If he asks me directly if I know anything, I’ll tell him to talk to you. Otherwise, it’s none of my business to tell him, right? You’ll do it when you’re ready.”
“Thanks, Garrett.”
Zane nodded and made to step away, but Nick reached for his arm and stopped him.
“And . . . thank you for being concerned and ready to help. I know it’s not easy to come up to someone like that. That’s solid.”
“I’m just glad I didn’t have to give you my rehab speech.”
Nick barked a laugh. He put his arm around Zane’s shoulder, patting his back and steering him toward the great hall. He let him go before they reached the door, and they rejoined Ty and Kelly just before Stanton addressed the crowd.
They set Nick up in the game room. A billiard table and a long shuffleboard table sat along one wall, and a disconcerting stag head glared from over the fireplace. Nick pulled a stool behind the wet bar and laid out a notepad, several pens, and his iPad, feeling vastly unprepared for the task ahead of him.
After Stanton’s announcement, people had been edgy and nervous, but no one had outright objected to the questioning. Nick was expecting some hostility, though, and it was going to be awkward as hell when he started interviewing people he knew. He also felt naked without his badge.
Susan Stanton was nearly inconsolable during her interview. “Ernest was a good man, he didn’t deserve to die like that. Oh my God.” She put her fingers to her lips and closed her eyes. “Poor, poor man. He wasn’t even supposed to be here! He and Theodore had some last-minute things to work on so he came on the plane with us.”
Theodore Stanton was less flustered when Nick interviewed him. “We were working on a project, yes. He insisted he come along so it could be finished. He was like a bulldog when it came to the government work.”
Livi Stanton cried through her entire interview. “If it hadn’t been for Mr. Milton, Deacon and I would never have met, did you know that? He went to Deacon for his stress problems, and he noticed Deacon’s limp. He gave him my card and told him to try it.” She broke down into tears again, and Nick was forced to call Deuce to come get her. He didn’t comfort crying women unless they were gutshot.
“Yeah, you know I’d forgotten that,” Deuce admitted. “He did give me her card. Jesus, now I feel kind of bad. I mean I felt bad anyway, you know, but now I feel worse. I mean I feel bad that he died at my wedding, not because I killed him or anything. Why are you looking at me like that? Why are you writing that down? Oh my God, Deacon, stop talking.”
Mara Grady babbled through her entire interview just like her youngest son. “What was he doing out on that beach at night? That’s so dangerous, you know he wasn’t down there for anything good. Nicholas, dear, you look tired. You need some coffee.”
When Earl Grady entered the room, he was carrying a plate and a steaming mug. “The wife said to bring you this,” he said as he placed them at Nick’s elbow. “I saw the dead man at dinner. He kept checking his watch like he had somewhere to be. And he was on his cell phone the whole time. Figured it was a sat phone since everyone seems to have shit for service out here.”
“There isn’t a damn bar of service on this stupid island,” the maid of honor told him. She was a pretty woman with copper-colored hair. Her eyes were drawn to Nick’s notepad. “Oh, I’m sorry. I’m Nikki Webb. I hate being here, okay? My entire body itches and I can’t get it to stop, and my hair is frizzy as hell because of all the rain, and I can’t even have phone sex with my boyfriend because we’re out in the middle of damn nowhere. I mean I love Livi, but so help me God this marriage better last forever.”
Nick had already met one of the bridesmaids, Catalina Cruz, at the dinner last night. She was a looker, and she had the kind of fire that Nick enjoyed. He’d spent a while talking with her, and if not for Kelly, they probably would have been each other’s alibis last night. “Let me guess, Nikki spent ten minutes complaining about the phone service? I’m rooming with her. She spent at least an hour last night wandering the halls, desperate for a bar of service. She almost fell over the balcony railing holding it up to the sky. No one should get that wrapped up in a guy, you know what I mean?”
The next bridesmaid to sit across from him spelled her name for him. “Miyoko Mason.” She was tall and possibly too thin to be healthy, with an exotic look that spoke of an Asian ancestry. “I talked to him for a while. He could quote Sun Tzu. That’s The Art of War, in case you didn’t know. He was very smooth, like a spy in some novel. He kept saying he had to meet with someone and checking his watch. He didn’t say who.”