Dear Wife(40)

I extricate myself and give her a tight-lipped smile.

“How are you doing? How are you holding up? Are you eating at all?”

I think of the eggs in the sink, the pizza I shoved out the door along with my brother, right before she got here. “A little.”

“If I had known, I would have made you a casserole.” She waves a manicured hand through the air and laughs. “Oh, who am I kidding? We both know I can’t cook. I would have ordered you some Chinese takeout or something. Anyway, I’m so glad you called.”

“Thank you. And please,” I say, gesturing toward the living room. “Make yourself at home.”

In the sixty minutes it took her to get over here, I cleaned up the place. I dusted and fluffed all the pillows, and I exchanged my running shorts for a pair of khaki slacks and a navy polo over loafers. Nothing too fancy. I don’t want her to think I’m trying too hard.

She steps into the room and gasps, making a beeline to the wall of windows. She stops just beyond the desk, standing before a sheet of glass lit up by the sun. It turns her hair iridescent and makes the fabric of her dress float like a wispy cloud around her body—a cloud that is more than a little see-through. Well, well, well. Amanda Shephard is wearing a lacy red thong.

“You’re so close to the river,” she says without turning. “Like the house is floating on top of it or something.”

“I know.”

“The view is stunning.”

Yes. It is.

She presses a hand into the glass, and the sun turns her skin to fire. Amanda is conventionally beautiful, but up to now, I’ve never found her all that attractive. Too processed, too high maintenance. But standing here, in my cheating wife’s house, I’m beginning to see another side of Amanda. The side that would make a spectacular revenge fuck.

I clear my throat. “The view is what sold us on the house. Turns every window into a piece of artwork. Did you know the river changes colors, depending on the weather and time of day? I didn’t know that until I got to look at it every day.”

She smiles over her shoulder. “Well, Jeffrey Hardison, you sensitive old dog, you. Next thing I know, you’ll be reading me poetry.”

At the south end of the river, a black search boat motors upstream, and multiple people lean over the sides, staring into the water.

“Do you mind if we get started?” I say, pointing Amanda to the couch before she sees the boat. “When we’re done here, I need to get over to the police station and see if there’s any update about Sabine.”

“I just came from there, actually.” She wrinkles her nose, stepping away from the window. “They won’t tell me anything other than that Sabine’s car showed up at the Super1, which in all honesty tells me nothing. Who are the suspects? What are the clues? The people of Pine Bluff deserve to know the truth, Jeffrey.”

“I agree.”

She sinks onto one of the twin three-seaters, and I choose the one opposite her. The search boat has stopped in the middle of the river, the flashlights all trained to one spot. I watch as a man in full diving gear slips over the side.

“I really wish you’d have let me bring the cameras,” Amanda says, dragging a voice recorder from her bag.

I shake my head. There’s an orchid in the air between us, and I shove it to the opposite end of the table. “I already told you, I can’t say or do anything that might get in the way of the police investigation.”

She freezes, one arm stretched halfway to the coffee table. “So this is off-the-record then?” She straightens, holds up the recorder. “Can I even use this thing?”

I lean back in my chair and pretend to consider it.

Amanda loses patience after only a second or two. “You called me here for a reason, Jeffrey. Stop playing around and tell me what it is.”

“Fine. I called you here because I want you to help me set the record straight. The thing is, I’ve seen this movie, and I know how it ends. With the husband serving twenty to life.”

“Only the guilty ones.” She says it teasingly, playfully, letting it hang with obvious implication.

“Come on, Amanda. We’ve known each other for what—fifteen, twenty years?”

She purses her glossed lips. “I won’t tell if you don’t.”

Behind her crossed legs, a stealthy thumb presses down on the record button. I pretend that I don’t notice.

“Long enough for you to know what I am and what I’m not capable of. I may be a dick at times, but I am not the kind of guy who makes his estranged wife go missing. I’m not a murderer.”

She tsks at the word estranged. “Shelley McAdams is a friend of mine. Let’s just say she’s not taking it well.”

The doctor’s wife. At least I’m not the only sucker.

“Yeah, well, no offense to Shelley, but she’s one of the reasons I called you here. The police seem to be assuming this was a crime of passion, but I’m not the only one with a motive. How do we know Shelley didn’t... I don’t know, seek out her own revenge?”

“Because Shelley is in Chicago, interviewing divorce attorneys.” Amanda flashes a sorry-but-I’m-on-her-side smile. “Don’t be surprised if she gets full custody of the kids.”

“Okay, so other people, then. You know the statistics on crime in this town. Sabine has money, she’s gorgeous and she’s often alone in some empty house. There are plenty of sickos out there. How do we know it wasn’t one of them?”