A Good Marriage(36)

“Show Millie that puzzle,” my mother said, pointing until I’d sat dutifully. “The one from school you did for me yesterday. She could use some distraction.”

Be kind, I could hear my mother silently commanding. Do a good thing for this sad woman who is my friend. And so, even though I wanted to dive under the table, I did as I was told.

“I hear your dad has killed the summer trip to Greece again this year,” Millie said once my mother was gone.

I shrugged, trying to hide my surprise that my mother had shared that with her. “I guess.”

“Don’t worry. I’m not going to ask you lots of questions,” Millie went on. “I actually don’t want to be sitting with you either.” My eyes shot up. But Millie’s expression was straightforward, not like she meant it meanly, but like it was the truth. She leaned in closer to whisper. “I mean, we’ll just pretend for a few to make your mom happy. We’d both do anything for her, right?”

Once Millie drew closer on the street, I noticed how thin her face was, her skin papery. How long had it been since we’d actually seen each other in the flesh? More than a decade maybe. Longer than I’d let myself think about. Millie and her emails were in a secret box, one that I peeked into as required, but which I otherwise stored far away.

“Look at you,” Millie said quietly, staring up at me from the bottom of Zach’s stairs.

I stood. “I’m sorry, Millie … Your emails—I’ve been really underwater at work, a—”

Millie held up her hand and shook her head as she made her way up the steps. “No, no,” she said. “I’m glad that you called.”

“It’s good to see you,” I said, trying to ignore the burning in my throat as Millie and I exchanged a quick, firm hug. She felt noticeably frail in my arms.

“You know I’m always here to help,” she said. “In any way I can.”

That was certainly true and it was because of her friendship with my mom. Guilt, too. Millie had always felt more responsible than she should have for the way things turned out. Like if she’d been able to find the guy who swindled my dad, my family would have survived.

“Thank you,” I said. “For everything.”

Millie looked for a moment like she might say something more, but instead she nodded and turned to eye Zach’s brownstone. “Now, what the hell happened here?”

Inside, we stood at the edge of the living room side by side, staring at all that blood at the bottom of the steps. I’d given Millie the background on Zach and Amanda, such as it was. I’d explained that Zach and I had been pretty good friends in law school, but that I hadn’t seen him in years.

“Well,” she began, eyeing the staircase, “at least this isn’t your mess to clean up.”

“Look at this,” I said, stepping over to that swirled pattern in the blood on the metal tread of the second to last step. I pointed. “Isn’t that part of a handprint? And maybe one fingerprint?”

Millie moved closer and tilted her head. “Could be,” she said, not sounding especially impressed. “Sure.”

“The police tonight were pretty blasé about taking prints in the kitchen, and that was after I told them I thought whoever was here probably had something to do with what happened to Amanda. I mean, they said they’d put in the request to get a team out here, but who knows? What if whoever was here the first time missed that print? It is hard to make out. I don’t see any fingerprint dust anywhere, either. Maybe they didn’t print anything.”

“Oh, I doubt that,” Millie said. “They’d have run prints. And there’s lots of ways to lift a print, tape and whatnot. Dust is only for latent prints, not visible ones. It is possible they missed this one, with what a disaster this place is. But my guess is they probably did take it. Real issue is what happens when that print doesn’t belong to your guy and isn’t in the system. NYPD will eventually get elimination prints from friends, housekeepers, that kind of thing. But that’ll take time. They get them as they interview people. And what’s the rush when they think they’ve got their man?” Millie frowned equivocally. “There isn’t a police department in the country that’s got the resources to prioritize looking for alternate suspects to undermine a good case. But you know all that. You were a prosecutor. By the way—not that it matters, I’m here to help you, not him—but do you think your client did it?”

“No,” I said without hesitating. But also without elaborating. Because that remained the whole of my opinion on the matter of Zach’s innocence. I didn’t think he had killed Amanda.

“Of course, given the right circumstances, anyone is capable of anything.” Millie turned to look at me. “We both know that.”

“Yeah,” I said, looking away. “We do.”

We stayed quiet then for an awkward moment. I kept my eyes on the stairs. Looking at all the blood was better than facing Millie. Was she going to insist that we talk about everything, right now?

“Can whatever it is wait just a couple more days?” I asked, heading her question off at the pass. I motioned to the stairs. “I need to deal with this first, okay?”

“Okay. A couple more days.” She took a deep breath. “Let me make some calls and see how fast I can get someone of our own down here to lift prints, including that one on the stairs. I’m sure the NYPD will send a team for the kitchen, and I can wait until they get here. Once we’ve got our own prints to work with, we can make whatever comparisons we want. We’ll get a blood spatter person, too. In the meantime, why don’t you try to find the golf bag—the club came from somewhere—and whatever else upstairs might be interesting. Investigators might have ‘overlooked’ something that wasn’t useful to them. Try not to touch anything with your bare hands, though, and take off your shoes. Let’s not corrupt the scene any more than necessary.”