Dear Wife(64)

“Sorry about the heat, but this is the only room the kids can’t sneak into and hear us. They’re having a really tough time with this—the separation, I mean. I’m sure you’ve heard that their mother and I are divorcing. She wants to move them to Salt Lake City, where her parents live. Things are about to get ugly.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” The fan stirs the air, sending down a breeze that feels like Emma’s hair dryer after she’s just come out of the shower, hot and humid. Already a steady line of sweat is dripping down my back. “Your daughter looks a lot like my niece, Annabelle. Well, like she used to look, before the chemo. Her hair grew back in red and curly.”

He nods, sinking into the chair across from me. “It’s called chemo curls. The color change isn’t uncommon, either, though I don’t think I’ve ever heard of it coming back red. But hair often picks up pigment as it grows back in so I suppose it’s possible. Who’s her doc?”

“Annie Capelouto.”

“Annie’s the best in town, but Pine Bluff isn’t exactly the center of the medical universe, you know. If your niece ever needs anything, give me a call. I did my residency at Northwestern and still have some pull there. Chicago’s not all that far.”

And that right there is the problem with outsiders like Dr. McAdams, people who swoop into town with their money and their fancy degrees, acting like the people of Pine Bluff should be grateful they’ve come to this podunk town. I never asked for his help. Dr. Capelouto already saved Annabelle once; who’s to say she can’t do it again if the worst happens, and the cancer returns?

He swipes his palms down his thighs. “I’ll move to Salt Lake City if I have to, but not yet. I can’t leave this place. Not until you find Sabine.” He makes a sound, somewhere between a cough and a sob.

I search for a fresh page in my notebook, giving him a moment to pull himself together.

“What about Jeffrey?” He spits the name, his voice hard and hateful.

“What about him?”

“Please tell me he’s your lead suspect. He’s violent and he’s angry and he’s got a two-hour gap in his day, at the exact time Sabine went missing. I told her to change the locks and take out a restraining order, but she wouldn’t listen. She was scared of him—you know that, right?”

“We’re looking into Mr. Hardison, but I’m afraid I can’t discuss the details. What I’d really like to talk with you about is you and Sabine.”

This is what I meant when I said he’s a pit bull. It’s like I didn’t even speak. Excitement is piling up Trevor’s words, and he barely pauses to take a breath.

“And it’s just all too convenient Sabine disappears right before she can file for divorce. Now he’s living in her house, spending her money. Have you checked his emails, searched the files on his computer? Have you looked into his internet history? I mean, I know it’s cliché but maybe he forgot to clear out his cache. You read all the time about how some idiot gets caught because they used Google to help them figure out the best place to bury a...”

He swallows the last word, and his face crumples. “Is that what happened here? If it is, just tell me, Detective. For God’s sake, put me out of my misery. Because I’m trying to be hopeful but people simply don’t disappear into thin air and show up eight days later, alive and well. I mean, somebody must have seen something, right?”

“If that person exists, they haven’t stepped forward.”

A tear nosedives into the scruff on his cheek, and he drops his head in his hands, shoulders quaking. I should have known this would happen. It’s the same stunt he pulls every time a reporter points a camera at his face, blubbering for all the world to see. If he’s faking it, he’s a natural, I’ll give him that. Sabine’s disappearance has made national news, mostly thanks to this guy’s bawling.

“Did you know Sabine was on Lexapro?”

The doctor’s head pops up, and his expression is almost comical. Bugged eyes, unhinged jaw. “Lexapro is an SSRI, a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor. A very potent one. It’s used to treat anxiety and depression. Since when? Who prescribed it?”

“I’m afraid I can’t tell you the details. But according to the Prescription Drug Monitoring Program, she took it for years.”

“Okay.” Trevor says it without conviction, like he’s bracing for what comes next. Like he suspects the prescription is not the only thing I’m about to drop on him. “But Sabine wasn’t depressed. I would have known. And I was with her a lot of the time. I never saw her taking any pills.”

“She went off it last year...” I flip back a page or two in my notes. “In February. She was pregnant, and she was worried it would hurt the baby.”

The doctor nods. “It’s a valid worry. SSRIs have been associated with increased risk for persistent pulmonary hypertension of the newborn. Her doctor would have helped wean her off it, and probably would have switched her to some kind of bupropion like Wellbutrin.”

“That might be so, but she didn’t run it by her doctor. The pharmacy filled it, then reached out to her when she didn’t pick it up.” This part, at least, is true, at least according to the email correspondence I found on her laptop. The pharmacist warned her about going off it too quickly.