Fool Me Once(58)

Joe had given her this song. Their relationship had been a mad whirlwind, but that had been Maya’s disastrous romantic history. Forty-eight hours after meeting at that charity function, Joe had suggested flying down to Turks and Caicos on the Burketts’ private plane. Maya had swooned and acquiesced. They spent the weekend at a villa at the Amanyara resort.

She had expected this new relationship to follow her normal impetuous pattern: intense, sizzling, over-the-top, maniacal romantic connection—followed in short order by a quick cut to black. Sizzle to fizzle. Love to good-bye. For Maya, everyone she fell for became her Jean-Pierre. For maybe three weeks.

So after week one, when she woke up to find that Joe had made her an online playlist, she listened hard to every song, ciphering out hidden meanings in the lyrics, while lying on her back like a teenager and staring at the ceiling. She loved his taste in music. The songs had done more than speak to her. They had penetrated her defenses, weakened her, left her ripe for, sexist as it might sound, education.

Still, Maya knew it took two to tango. She had relished whirling helplessly in Joe’s vortex—drink, song, travel, sex—but from the start, like with every one of her romantic entanglements, she could see the end in sight. That was okay for her. She had a life in the military. Marriage, kids, Soccer Days—they were not part of the plan. By all rights, Joe should have ended up being another good memory.

Her relationships eventually turned bad. But the memories didn’t.

Except Maya ended up getting pregnant, and in her ensuing confusion about what to do, Joe stepped up big-time. There was the proposal on one knee while violins played. He promised her happiness. He promised her love. He told her that he was proud of her military service and swore to do all he could so that she could achieve her career goals. They would be different, he said, living by their own set of rules. Joe’s passion was a force unto itself. It swept her along, and before she knew it, Captain Maya Stern was a Burkett.

Lykke Li faded away and Oh Wonder’s “White Blood” came on. Why on earth, she asked herself, was she listening to Joe’s heartbreakers? Simple answer: because she liked the songs. In a vacuum, forgetting where it had all gone, these songs still reached inside her and touched her, even this one, even with the gut-wrenching opening lines: “I’m ready to go, I’m ready to go,

“Can’t do it alone . . .”

Beautiful but bullshit, Maya thought as she spotted Tom Douglass’s boat by the garage. She was ready to do it alone.

Before Maya could ring the bell, the front door opened. Mrs. Douglass was there. Her face was drawn, the skin pulled tight. She looked left and right, opened the screen door, and said, “Get in.”

Maya stepped inside. Mrs. Douglass closed the door behind her.

“Is someone watching us?” Maya asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Is your husband home?”

“No.”

Maya kept silent. The woman had called her back because she wanted something. Let her say what it was.

“I got your phone message,” Mrs. Douglass said.

Maya barely nodded.

“You said you knew what work my husband was doing for the Burketts.”

This time Mrs. Douglass waited her out. Maya kept it brief.

“That’s not what I said.”

“Oh?”

“I said I knew why the Burketts were paying your husband.”

“I don’t see the difference.”

“I don’t think he did work for them,” Maya said. “Unless accepting a bribe is work.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Mrs. Douglass, stop jerking me around, please.”

Her eyes went wide. “I’m not. Please tell me what you learned.”

Maya could hear the desperation in the woman’s voice. If she was lying, she was pretty good at it.

“What did you think your husband was doing for the Burketts?” Maya asked.

“Tom’s a private eye,” she said. “I assumed that he was doing confidential private investigation work for a powerful family.”

“But he never told you what the work specifically entailed?”

“I told you. His work was confidential.”

“Come on, Mrs. Douglass. Are you telling me that your husband would come home from work every day and never tell you anything that went on at the office?”

A tear escaped and ran down her cheek. “What was Tom doing?” she asked, her voice a whisper. “Please tell me.”

Again Maya debated which road to take and settled on the most direct route. “Your husband was in the Coast Guard. When he was serving, he investigated the death of a young man named Andrew Burkett.”

“Yes, I know. That’s how Tom met the family. They liked the work he did on that case. So when he opened up his own place, they hired him to do more.”

“I don’t think so,” Maya said. “I think they wanted him to report the death as an accident.”

“Why?”

“That’s what I need to ask your husband.”

Mrs. Douglass sat on the couch as though her knees had given way. “They paid him for so many years, so much money . . .”

“Money isn’t a problem for the Burketts.”

“But that much? That long?” She put a trembling hand to her mouth. “If what you’re claiming is true—and I’m not saying it is—then it had to be big.”