ALL I COULD THINK ABOUT for the rest of the morning was Joe’s admonitions and how he’d acted. My creativity was gone and I couldn’t concentrate. I made it through my first appointment on pure instinct. My eleven o’clock was an on-site conference with the younger sister of a girl I dated back in high school. Pulling into the parking lot of the Deagan Dance Center a few minutes early, I parked next to a black Mazda van lettered with the school’s logo. I’d driven by this place thousands of times, but had never paid much attention to it. The grounds were well-kept and framed with gigantic oak trees budding with new life and dripping with long strands of Spanish moss.
I entered a spacious lobby plastered with dance-related posters, informational signs, photographs, and three large TV monitors high on one wall each showing a different empty classroom. Long wooden benches lined three sides of the lobby, and there was a receptionist center
WHEN I OPENED THE DOOR, Sam slapped a search warrant into my hand and walked in without invitation. As a photographer followed, a knot tightened in my gut. There are times when you draw the line and dare someone to cross it, and times when you open wide and take the drill. This was a root canal without Novocain. Staten went immediately to dusting the den for fingerprints. Lizard Lips headed for the kitchen and the photographer stuck out his hand to shake.“I’ve always wanted to meet you, Mr. Baimbridge. Danny Butler.” He carried a fairly inexpensive digital camera with a Metz strobe. I forced the warrant into the pocket with the panties and shook his hand. “I really hope to have my own studio someday,” he said, “and do the kind of work you do.”“Don’t wait too long to get started,” I said, my voice flat. “Dreams have a way of slipping away.”“Yeah, I’ve been thinking about that.&
I STARED AT THAT FLASHLIGHT and the red smear feeling as if I was standing before my father once again being accused of something I didn’t do. Don’t lie to me! The skin on my back felt as if it was crawling around under my shirt. “Is this your flashlight?” Sam asked. “It…looks like it.” “What’s it doing here?” “I don’t know. I didn’t put it there.” “You think Ashleigh did?” The photographer nudged in next to me focusing his camera on the flashlight. I stepped back. “I swear to you I have no idea how it got there.” The strobe went off and the camera beeped. “Could Ashleigh have done it?” Lizard Lips asked. My mouth felt hot. “Of course she could have. I was passed out on the deck. Anybody could have done it.” The man’s tongue danced back and forth across his lower lip. “But, did she?” My stomach soared and I burped. “As far as I know there were only two of us and I was passed out in the rain.” An
AFTER DIRECTING A SUCCESSFUL run of Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire my first year back, and Neil Simon’s California Suite the second, I was asked by the Board of Directors of the Thalian Association to direct Stephen Patterson’s brilliant new play, Laying Down the Law, making its world premiere that fall in Wilmington. It was the break I needed. It would open a great many doors for me and might even change the way my father saw me.Unlike most directors, I insisted on longer rehearsal periods and, since the theatre’s rehearsal halls were not available yet, used my own studio. I pushed all the equipment in the 40x60 camera room back against the walls, arranged a couple pieces of furniture in the center of the room, and aimed a few lights down from overhead to simulate a “stage.”As Sam and his team pawed through my house, I headed off to our first rehearsal. From the moment the first actor arriv
AT POLICE HEADQUARTERS, they moved the cuffs around to the front and escorted me into a room with four metal chairs, a metal table, and what I was sure was a two-way mirror. Forty-five minutes later Sam Jones joined me tossing a thick manila envelope on the table. He had a strange look on his face as he set up a tape recorder on the table and started it recording. He then sat, identified the two of us for the tape, propped his elbows on the table rubbing his face with both hands.“I’m going to help you, Richard,” he said, his voice calm, quiet. “I’m going to do everything I can for you.”“I appreciate that, Sam. So why am I here?”He smiled the smile of a man who had the answers to the test before he took it. “I know you did it. Ain’t no sense denying it.”“What the hell are you talking about, Sam?”He rubbed his eyes with his hands. “I’m going to do everythin
PEARL BAIMBRIDGE SAT on the edge of her daughter’s bed as the Channel 3 News began: “A local photographer was taken into custody for questioning earlier tonight in the case of missing twenty-three-year-old Ashleigh Matthews.”Pearl clutched Martha’s hand. “This is going to devastate your father.”“Teresa Hedge has more in this live report.”The picture changed to a female reporter standing in front of Ashleigh’s house holding a microphone.“Police arrested Wilmington photographer Richard Baimbridge earlier this evening on suspicion of murder in connection with the case of missing twenty-three-year-old Ashleigh Matthews.”Martha had taken a Percocet tablet that left her groggy and thick-tongued. “Oh, Richie,” she moaned as they played video of Richard being paraded through a crowd of reporters and pushed into the back of a police car. Tears strea
A WEEK EARLIER, I HAD SECURITY, a good reputation, and a thriving business. Everything except a woman to share my life. Then one stopped by. A woman. Just for an hour. But that’s all it took to destroy everything that had taken me a lifetime to build. One hour. One lousy hour. When will I get it through my head that women and I don’t mix? I’d had no sleep, still wore the clothes I’d been arrested in, and was growing more panicked by the minute. What was taking so long? Why haven’t I heard from Joe? Finally, shortly before noon, he showed up and there was someone with him. “Scott McGillikin, Rich Baimbridge,” Joe said introducing us as a guard let them in. “Scott’s a criminal attorney.” Scott extended his hand and, clearing his throat, waited for the guard to leave before speaking. “The Grand Jury just returned an indictment, Mr. Baimbridge. On what are they basing that?” he asked, his eyes cold, uncaring. “I was in her house the nigh
WHEN I CAME TO, the pain in my head was so intense I couldn’t open my eyes. I lay on my back on the cold stone floor and tried to focus, but my brain wasn’t ready to function. The side of my face rested in a gooey puddle and my shirt collar was wet and sticky. As I lifted my head, nausea settled over me. Holding my breath and waiting for it to pass, I remembered going to rehearsal, talking with Dad, and finding the reporters all gone when I got home. Had someone struck me as I came through the door?The house was dark except for the silvery moonlight coming in the windows. The room spun around me as if I’d pulled a cheap drunk. I sat up drawing deep breaths to clear my head. My hair, shirt, and jacket were wet. I pressed a hand against the back of my head and found a lump at the base of my skull. The room seemed to wheel up on its side. I braced myself to keep from tipping over and vomited between my knees.I was shaking, dizzy, and weak. I c
AFTER DARK, I slipped into the laundry room and lifted a slat in the blind to get a look at Ashleigh’s house. The place was dark. I visualized the inside and tried to recall anything she’d said that might be a clue, but nothing came to mind. I located another flashlight, slipped into a dark windbreaker, and stepped out into the night. It was cave black.The darkness was alive with a thousand sounds. Endless rhythms and patterns of drumming, chirping, buzzing, rustling. Nature’s symphony. The sounds of life. Sounds one would rarely hear locked away in prison.I squeezed into the row of bushes at the back of the lot and emerged about thirty feet from Ashleigh’s steps. There was a large seal on the door that hadn’t been there Sunday night. Otherwise, it looked exactly the same: potted plants hanging along the edges of the porch and a pair of dirty tennis shoes sitting by the entrance.I moved forward, lifted the police tape, and starte