“Let’s see what Melissa knows,” Savich said.
Melissa Ivy was rocking back and forth on the expensive burgundy leather sofa, her beautiful face slack, her eyes vague, unfocused. A female officer held a cup of no doubt very sweet tea in her hand, encouraging her to drink, then holding the cup to her mouth as she sipped, all the while speaking quietly to her, telling her to breathe.
Melissa was wrapped up in two afghans that looked to be hand-knitted, Sherlock thought, probably by Peter’s mother. It was odd that she was sitting in a living room as modern as Wakefield Hart’s house in Tunney Wells.
The female officer moved aside, and Savich sat beside Melissa, took her limp hand. “Melissa? Do you remember you called me? I’m Agent Savich. I need to speak with you, all right? I need your help.”
There was no sign of life from Melissa, not a sound, not a blink, only her relentless rocking back and forth. It always surprised him at how quickly shock could leach the life out of a person. Even Melissa’s hair looked dull under the cold light of the fluorescent lamps scattered around the living room.
Sherlock sat down on the sofa on Melissa’s other side, slipped her hand beneath the brilliant blue afghan, and lightly stroked her forearm. “Someone killed Peter, Melissa. Do you know who it was?”
Melissa slowly turned her head to look at Sherlock, looked through her, really, Sherlock thought. “Did you see someone, Melissa? We want to catch the person who killed Peter. Can you help us?”
Melissa licked her lips, leaned toward Sherlock, and whispered, “I didn’t know who you were until yesterday. Isn’t that strange? And now you’re stroking my arm because Peter’s dead. Three days—Tommy and Peter are both dead. Stony, too. How can that be?”
“Talk to me, Melissa. Did you see anyone? Hear Peter speak to anyone?”
Her voice was so thin Sherlock imagined she could see through it. “I talked to Janelle, Stony’s girlfriend. It was horrible she found Stony’s body. Just like I found Peter.”
“Yes, I know.”
“I wanted her to know how sorry I was. She . . . she couldn’t stop crying. She was waiting for her parents to drive in from Delaware to take her home.” She turned deadened eyes to Sherlock. “There isn’t anyone for me to go home to.”
“Do you want me to call your folks?”
“No, they’re in Kentucky, and they really wouldn’t want to come here. Do you know, I was thinking that Peter probably did drug me, even if he wasn’t using me for an alibi. I didn’t tell you, but I was real sore Saturday morning, like he’d done things to me he shouldn’t have. Peter was like that; he was cruel, he used people. Peter didn’t love me, not like Tommy did.”
Her voice fell into a pit. She lowered her face in her hands, but she didn’t cry.
Sherlock met Dillon’s eyes over Melissa’s head. His eyes were cold and flat, but he didn’t know what to say to this girl who’d gotten together with the wrong boy, a boy craven enough to give his girlfriend a roofie in her wine. In their first meeting with her, she’d lied through her perfect white teeth, but not now, she was too shocked, too strung out. She was only twenty years old, young enough to have believed even a week ago the world’s doors would be flung open for her. She was beautiful enough, surely, to attract boys with money to help her with her bills and tuition. But she’d never counted on a Peter Biaggini, and now her world was in tatters. She would have nightmares for a very long time, maybe for the rest of her life.
Sherlock pulled Melissa into her arms and rocked her. Still, Melissa didn’t weep, didn’t move. Sherlock stroked her long, straight hair, then said against her cheek, “Why did you come over to Peter’s apartment, Melissa?”
Silence, then a whisper: “He begged me to come over, said he needed me. I thought he wanted to apologize after our fight yesterday, wanted to make up. Now I’ll never know what he wanted to say to me.”
Sherlock said, “Let’s go back a minute. You spent much of Saturday with Peter because both you and he were upset about Tommy?”
“I think I was more upset than Peter was. He was quiet for a long time on Saturday, like he had a lot on his mind, like he was really worried rather than sad, or maybe he was scared of something.”
Sherlock said, “Did you ask him what was wrong? If he was scared and why?”
“He wouldn’t tell me anything. I started crying, not about how cold he was being, but about Tommy. I told Peter Tommy had really been a nice guy, and Peter gave this ugly laugh and said I was wrong about that. He said Tommy was no saint.