Page 80 of Think Twice

Still, Jackie might get lucky. She might have an airtight alibi. She might get assigned a public defender who cared. She may not end up spending the rest of her life in prison.

In short, you are giving Jackie Newton a fighting chance.

And that’s something you’ve never given to anyone else.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

The cemetery overlooked the schoolyard.

Myron could not believe, after all these years, he was back. He took a few deep breaths before getting out of the car. Ben Staples, Cecelia Callister’s ex, had asked to meet here because, his assistant explained on the phone, it was now Cecelia and her son Clay’s final resting place. That reasoning didn’t seem to track, but here Myron was.

He could see Ben Staples up ahead in a grassy clearing where the cemetery remained mostly unoccupied. Myron didn’t plan it, didn’t even want to, but he found himself veering over to the older graves, as though guided by some higher power. He had not been to this cemetery in years, but he still knew exactly where to go. His body started to tremble as he walked, and soon he was there. The name on the tombstone was Brenda Slaughter. Myron read her birthdate and then let his eyes travel right to the date of her death. So young. So terribly, awfully, tragically young. The familiar pain came back to him all at once, like a stab, and Myron felt his knees buckle.

Myron stood there for a moment and let all the bad memories wash over him. Had he loved Brenda? No. Too early for that. But after her death, he’d had something akin to a mental breakdown. He drank too much, ran away from everyone, and met a strange woman who was hurting too. Their mutual misery bonded them, and so they’d run off together to a private island for a quick, therapeutic fling. A rebound, if you will. A way to heal.

That woman’s name was Terese Collins. She and Myron were married now.

Man plans, God laughs.

It wasn’t worth it, of course. If he could go back in time, he’d rather have saved Brenda and never met his current wife, awful as that might sound. But that’s what he’d do. And the best part, one of the many reasons he fell so deeply and passionately in love with Terese, is that she would get that too.

We are our mistakes. Sometimes they are the best part of us.

Ben Staples had neatly groomed salt-and-pepper hair. He wore a black turtleneck under his overcoat. For a man who had once been married to a woman who was on every “Most Beautiful” list, Staples was nondescript in the looks department. If a sketch artist tried to prompt you, there would be little to say. Normal nose. Normal chin, maybe a little weak. Oval face. Average height. He held a plant in front of him with both hands like an offering. He stared at the two mounds of dirt. No tombstone yet. Still too soon.

“Thanks for meeting me here,” Ben Staples said.

Myron moved next to him so that they stood shoulder to shoulder, facing the dirt.

“Cecelia is on the left. Clay is on the right. There were name placards here on Monday. Now…” Ben Staples gave his head a world-weary shake as if the missing placards explained everything. “I told the guy in the chapel over there.” Ben gestured with his chin. “But he says it was probably some kids who took them as souvenirs.” Another shake of the head. “Souvenirs.”

“I’m sorry for your loss,” Myron said.

“Thank you.” He looked down at the plant in his hands as though it had suddenly materialized there. It looked like a cactus of some kind. “She didn’t like flowers. Cecelia. I mean, she liked them, but she thought they were a waste. That they died too soon. She liked things that lasted, so she preferred when I sent her succulents. Like these. So that’s what I bring.”

“Nice,” Myron said, because he had no idea what else to say.

“I still loved her.”

“I’m sure you did.”

“Did you know that Joe DiMaggio sent roses to Marilyn Monroe’s grave for twenty years?”

“I think I read about that somewhere.”

“He felt guilty when Marilyn died. Supposedly his last words were ‘I finally get to see Marilyn’—even though they’d been divorced over forty years by then.”

“Do you feel guilty?” Myron asked.

“I don’t know. I guess. But I couldn’t save Cecelia from herself.”

“What do you mean?”

He shook his head. “You represent Greg Downing.”

“Yes.”

“I haven’t seen him in forever. Haven’t really thought about him even. And now he’s in jail for murdering the love of my life.”