Crash & Burn (Tessa Leoni, #3)(34)

“She met someone new, was threatening to leave him.”

“Or . . . ,” Wyatt prodded.

Kevin got it. “He met someone. Wanted to leave his wife, but not halve his assets.”

“Meaning maybe we’re not looking for a male friend. We’re looking for a woman. Who could’ve parked somewhere on the top of the hill. Headlights out, no one would notice the vehicle—and wait for her lover boy to get the job done.”

Neither of the detectives commented on what kind of woman would do that for a man; frankly they’d seen it too many times before.

“We should return to the gas station,” Wyatt said after another moment. “Pull their video footage from the last week. Study it for any vehicles that pass by multiple times in a short span of time. Say, because they’re scoping out the road—”

“Or it’s part of their regular commute.”

“Which will be easy enough to rule out during the follow-up interviews. We can also revisit the night in question. See if anyone was hanging out between four and six A.M. Particularly a female, in a nondescript sedan, waiting for a call from her lover.”

Kevin nodded. Not a fun plan; reviewing hours of grainy security video was much more difficult than a person might think. But it was a doable plan, and frankly, they needed traction.

“Still think the husband did it,” Kevin said as they climbed back into their vehicle. “But I don’t think we’ll find him on tape. Guy’s a pretty cool customer. Feels like the push down the basement stairs, the shove out the front door, were warm-up acts. Now he’s getting serious about things.”

“Then she shouldn’t have been wearing a seat belt,” Wyatt muttered.

Kevin didn’t answer. They drove in silence to the gas station, got back to work.





Chapter 14




I FLOAT ALONE in the darkness. Shades drawn. Yellow quilt pulled up high. Door of the bedroom shut tight. I think my head is on fire, but as long as I keep my eyes closed, I can manage the pain. I like the darkness. It is cool, comforting.

I finger the quilt and think again of the woman who made it. I miss her, have always missed her. Funny, because you’d think the passing of years would make it easier, dull the ache. But if anything, I feel her absence more acutely now.

I don’t like to dwell on it, so I call up Vero instead.

Snapshots. Three years old. Six years old. Ten, twelve, fourteen. They blur through my mind, refusing to focus. When I try to slow the parade, I get only her skeleton, asking, “Why me, why me, why me?”

A noise. Footsteps, moving downstairs. Thomas, I think, prowling the house. I wonder what he’s been doing since the police left. Tending to household chores, cleaning up evidence? The police questions bother me. Just how likely is it for one woman to suffer three accidents in only six months? A woman without family or friends. A woman who, by all appearances, is solely dependent upon her husband. Though he tells me that’s my fault, my rules of engagement.

Is it? I honestly don’t know. Something about it sounds right, but why would I insist on such a thing? And what kind of man would truly leave everything, do anything, for a girl he’s barely met?

I feel there’s more here I should know, except the harder I try, the more the details slip away. I don’t find my memories welcoming. They don’t invite me closer. Instead, they whisper restlessly, Beware, beware, beware.

I understand that muscle memory is easier for me. Rote actions, things I do, versus things I think. By those terms, shouldn’t I be able to recall putting on a coat, grabbing car keys, before my late-night drive? Or what about climbing into the car or backing out of the driveway? I try, but my mind remains blank. I see only darkness, nothing else.

Which makes me think the police might be right—I’d already been drinking that night.

I consider scotch. Eighteen-year-old Glenlivet. Best of the best. I picture a crystal tumbler filled with liquid gold, feel the smooth taste warming my tongue. On cue, saliva glands water. There’s no doubt about it; I could use a drink.

Then something comes to me. An old memory.

Do you know the best place for a wife to hide something from her husband? Not her jewelry box; too obvious. Certainly not under the shared marital mattress. Or in a medicine cabinet, or in a cookie jar or stashed behind the turkey in the freezer.

No, there’s one place no self-respecting husband would ever search: his wife’s box of tampons, tucked beneath the bathroom sink.

More footsteps below. In my mind’s eye, I can follow Thomas’s progress to the rear of the house. A faint screech. The back door opening. A slight bang; back door falling shut. He’s left the house, headed toward his work shed. I know this without thinking.

The temptation is immediate and overwhelming.

I push back the butter-yellow quilt, rise to standing. Then—there’s no other word for it—I sneak across the hall to the guest bath.

A single sink, undermounted in earth-tone granite, topping a hickory cabinet. Next to it is the toilet, then to the far right the bathtub. My bathroom. I used it to shower without thinking first thing this morning. Moving on memory again; reach for the plate, don’t stop to think where the plate is. And sure enough, the top drawer had held my toothbrush, hairbrush, a quilted paisley bag filled with makeup.

Now I open the lower cabinet to discover a collection of bathroom cleaners, a blow dryer and, yes, a box of tampons.