Dear Wife(66)

“Okay then. Let’s talk about your wife.”

His spine straightens. “Shelley? What about her?”

“I understand she’s in Chicago. Since when?”

“Since last We—” He stops himself, shakes his head. Grows an inch in his chair. He was about to say Wednesday, the day Sabine disappeared. “No. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t. Shelley may be hurt and angry, but she’s not a monster. She is the mother of my children. No way.”

“Still. I’d love to talk to her in person, hear her say those words to me herself. When is she back?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’ve been leaving messages on her cell. Maybe you could give her a little nudge, ask her to call me back.”

He blasts me with a cold, sharp stare. “Look elsewhere, Detective. My wife has been through enough.”

My wife. I let the words linger in the steamy air long enough that the doctor looks sheepish. He’s the possessive type, another strike against him.

And if he thinks I’m going to overlook his wife just because he wants me to, he’s crazy.

The door behind him opens, and a gust of cooler air sweeps across my sweaty skin. Not enough, but still, a relief, and for both of us. The doctor looks beyond grateful for the interruption.

“Daddy, I’m hungry,” his daughter says, but she’s looking at me.

He stands and moves to the door, reaching for his daughter’s hand, but his gaze never leaves mine. “Detective, what are you currently doing to find Sabine? What steps are you taking? What leads are you exploring?”

“I’m sorry, sir, but I—”

“Can’t discuss the details. I know. Fine.” He picks up his daughter, hoisting her onto a hip in one smooth move. “How about instead of sitting here, wasting my time with this baloney line of questioning, you get out there and find Sabine?”

He stops there, but his words, his tone—they both carry the unmistakable weight of a threat. “I hope you’re not implying what I think you are. Did you just threaten an officer of the law?”

“Do your job, Detective. Do your job, or else I will find someone who will.”



BETH

For the rest of the day, all anyone can talk about is the missing money. Where it is. When it went missing. Whether or not it’s going to magically reappear in Charlene’s desk drawer before the deadline tomorrow. But mostly, which one of us took it.

It doesn’t take a genius to know I am the main suspect. Sure, people float in and out of the executive offices during the day, but I’m the only one besides the church ladies who’s here all day long, from 8:00 a.m. until closing time, and the only one besides the Reverend with access to the keys in his drawer. They all look at me differently now. Their formerly friendly smiles have turned pinched around the edges, and they’ve closed ranks, stopped being so nice. They wouldn’t put it past me.

Everybody steers clear of Charlene’s desk, presumably to give the thief (me) opportunity to repent her (my) sins and return the money to the bag, but they haven’t thought their strategy through. All afternoon, they linger in the offices lining the hall, pretending to discuss church business while one of them keeps an eagle eye on the reception area. Any time anybody comes within a twenty-foot radius of Charlene’s desk drawer, they drop the pretense and come running. It’s probably the most excitement this place has seen in ages, maybe ever.

The news has spread through the church like a deadly virus, infecting the staff with a Hunger Games kind of fear, the sinking knowledge that one person will take us all down. I know because Martina has been texting me all afternoon, saying that things downstairs have turned ugly. The rest of the cleaning staff is pointing fingers, and their fingers all seem to be pointing to me.

They’re convinced that you took it. Well, everybody but Ayana, but she’s never been the brightest votive in the chapel. They want me to tell you to put it back before you get us all fired.
I try not to be hurt by their easy assumption of my guilt. I tell myself the only opinion I care about is Martina’s. The others don’t know me, don’t know my situation or my thoughts, but the accusation still stings.

And you? I type back. What do you think?

Her answer lights up my screen.

IDK I’m still trying to decide.
A thunk comes from the double doors, and a foot kicks one of them open. The Reverend shoulders his way through carrying a cardboard box half his size, concealing his upper body, his face, all but the tips of his hair. But I know it’s him from the shoes, the well-loved sneakers he changed into earlier, under his navy suit pants. I slip my phone in my back pocket and rush to hold the door.

“Oh, thank you, Beth,” he says, flashing me a smile around the side of the box. “That’s very kind of you.”

If the Reverend suspects me of anything—of whatever he saw or didn’t see in his computer’s history files, of swiping the cash from Charlene’s drawer, of not being who I claim to be—I can’t detect it in the way he looks at me. It’s the same way he looks at the men and women who stand before his altar when he pats their shoulders or folds his hands in prayer. Like I am a sheep to be saved.

Which will make it all the more awkward when I sneak out the back door tomorrow afternoon, right before he makes good on his promise to call the cops. Jorge’s good, but he’s not that good. One look at my license, and the cops will slap on the cuffs.