Brian looked up suddenly at Louis, as if for understanding. “I was sixteen. I was a fucking virgin. I didn’t know. . I didn’t think. .” He stopped, pulling in a deep breath and the rest of the words came out in a torrent. “I grabbed her and tried to kiss her. She was trying to pull away and all I wanted to do was kiss her. And then she screamed.”

He stopped abruptly, looking away.

“What did you do?” Louis said.

“I slapped her.”

Louis took a slow breath to calm himself.

“She looked at me, then started screaming again. I think I put my hand over her mouth, I’m not sure. I was so scared someone up at the house was going to hear and come down.” Brian stopped. “Then suddenly, Scott was there.”

Louis pushed off the tree and came closer.

“He was home for Easter, and I remember how embarrassed I was, Scott seeing me in my underwear with her there. I was afraid he would call me stupid or something in front of her. But he wasn’t looking at me, he was looking at her.”

Louis could see it in his head; he could see Scott looking at Kitty.

“She was crying, holding her cheek,” Brian said, “And then she went to Scott and started begging him to take her home. She was yelling that I tried to rape her.”

“What did Scott do?”

Brian closed his eyes. “He locked the door.”

Louis felt his fist clench.

“Then Scott shoved her backward. She fell on the floor, against the wicker chair. There was some bags of stuff the workers had left in a corner. She was curled up against them in a ball.”

Brian’s voice cracked. “Scott looked at me and he said ‘I’m going to show you how it’s done, little brother.’ ”

Louis turned away.

Brian looked up at him, his eyes red. “Do you want to hear all of it?”

Louis nodded.

“He was on her before I could move,” Brian said, “I didn’t want to look, I didn’t want to. .” Brian had wrapped his arms around himself. “He pulled off her bra and panties and held her down. I couldn’t. .” He was rocking slightly. “He was grunting and pushing at her and she was crying. It seemed to last forever.”

Brian drew in a shuddering breath. “Then it was quiet. I looked over at her. She was behind the wicker chair, curled up in a ball, naked. Scott picked up her uniform and threw it at her. He said something about how she smelled like grease.”

“What were you doing through all this?” Louis asked.

Brian shook his head. “Nothing. . nothing.”

“What happened next?” Louis said tightly.

“She got dressed. I could hear her trying to hold back her sobs and I wanted to go help her but I couldn’t. . I just wanted to get away from there.” Brian hesitated. “That’s when she said it.”

“Said what?”

“She looked at us and said, ‘I thought you were better than us.’ ”

Jesus. .

“Scott spun around and backhanded her and she fell down hard.” Brian stopped suddenly. “And she just laid there.”

Brian had shredded the Kleenex. “I guess she must have hit her head against the bag of cement. Scott rolled her over with his foot, but she didn’t look like she was breathing. I was so scared. I. . I puked up the beer, and when I looked up Scott was gone. And then he came back and he was carrying that thing, that tool. He said we had to make it look like a sex murder and that we had to stab her.”

Louis could see Brian’s face clearly now. His eyes were fixed on the headstone. “I just stared at him and he told me it didn’t make any difference because she was already dead.”

Louis thought of what Vince had told him, that Kitty had not died of the head wound. For a second, he thought of telling Brian that Kitty had been alive before she was stabbed. But he couldn’t; he needed to hear all of it.

“I wouldn’t do it,” Brian said in a whisper. “So. . so. .”

He squeezed his eyes shut. “Scott knelt down, I saw that, but then I closed my eyes. I kept them closed, but I could hear the sound it made. I could hear it.” He took a breath. “I can still hear it.”

Louis looked up at the sky, deepening to a coral as the sun broke the horizon.

“When I opened my eyes, I didn’t look at her,” Brian said. “But I could see the blood. It was everywhere. I was just sitting there on the floor and Scott was talking, telling me what we had to do. But I couldn’t move.”

Louis couldn’t look at him. He just keep staring at the sky.

“I guess that’s when he pulled down the shower curtain and wrapped her up in it. I don’t remember, I was just sitting there. Then Scott was shaking me and yelling at me to get up, get dressed, telling me I had to help.”

“What did you do?” Louis asked.

Brian shook his head, like he wasn’t sure. “We carried her out and put her in the trunk. Then we went back to the cabana. There was blood everywhere and Scott said we had to clean it up. I saw something and picked it up. It was her gold necklace. I remember she had it on in the pool. I put it in my pocket.”

Brian stopped again.

“What did you do next?” Louis prodded.

“Scott was mad at me because I was just standing there staring at the blood. So he told me to go get rid of her.”

“Did he tell you where?”

Brian nodded woodenly. “The gardener’s dump. He said it had to be the gardener’s dump.”

He let go of the shredded Kleenex and it fluttered to the ground. “It was way across town. It took me a long time to get there. Then I had trouble carrying her. She was heavy and I dropped her.” He paused. “Then I set her down in the. . I set her down and I ran. I ran back to my car and when I went to get my keys out of my pocket, I felt the necklace. I went back. I went back and laid it around her neck.”

Brian closed his eyes and bowed his head. He covered his face with his hands. It was quiet except for the chirping of the birds overhead and the faint sound of a lawn mower starting up somewhere far off.

“Things were different after that,” Brian said quietly. “We never talked about it, but it was like we shared something, like we were closer somehow. More like brothers.”

Louis stared at the Brenner headstone. All the feelings that had been churning inside him for the last hour were now settling into one deep ache.

Brian looked up, tears in his eyes. “She was so pretty,” he whispered.

The quiet was broken by the thud of a car door. Louis turned. A figure was coming over the rise toward them. It was Scott.

Chapter Forty-Three

Scott paused on the top of the hill, a silhouette against the rising gray mist. Brian looked up at him, tears streaking his face.

“I should have known you would come here, Brian,” Scott said quietly. “It took me a while to figure it out. But I should have known.”

Scott came toward them, looking over at Louis, then back at his brother.

“What did you tell him, Brian?” Scott asked.

Brian shook his head.

Louis was watching Scott. His face was composed, almost serene. Standing there in his perfect gray suit, he seemed almost a part of the morning vapor, like a benign spirit.

But he was a man. And Louis could see him, his body covering Kitty’s. He could see him thrusting at her, his grunts mixing with her sobs.

Louis looked up into the tree’s canopy, feeling his chest tighten. God, don’t let me kill the bastard.

“What did you tell him?” Scott said.

“Everything,” Brian said.

Scott came over to Brian and stood in front of him. Louis thought he was going to hit or slap him, but Scott didn’t lift a hand.

“You stupid sonofabitch,” Scott whispered.

“I didn’t know about the other girl,” Brian said softly. “I didn’t know. I thought you were. . Oh, Jesus, Scott.”

“I told you,” Scott said. “I told you that you don’t talk, you don’t admit anything. I told you, it’s just a problem, something to be fixed.”

Scott turned from his brother and crossed to his father’s headstone.