The Lies I Told(16)

I could have said the same about you. Thankfully, you’d survived your car accident with only minor lasting effects. The hair, of course, and the lost days. Critical days. And so far, you didn’t remember me. Us.

Your lost time was divinely inspired. It had given me the second chance I’d been hoping for as I watched you these last two months.

Maybe Clare was our guardian angel. Our matchmaker.

Lucky for me. Lucky for us.





9


MARISA

Saturday, March 12, 2022

Noon

The wedding photos went like clockwork. All according to plan. But my client wouldn’t have had it any other way.

I tucked the cameras in my carrying case and hoisted it onto my shoulder as my Uber arrived. The drive to the Richmond Police station took less than ten minutes. Normally, it would’ve been walkable, but with the camera gear, it was a bit of a stretch.

Detective John Richards often worked Saturdays, and I knew my best chance of catching him was before lunch, provided there’d been no homicide to pull him away. I’d told Kurt we had an appointment, but it wasn’t exactly official. The time was cemented in my mind, but I just hadn’t told Richards.

It was always hit or miss when I called the detective, and more often than not, I landed in his voice mail. He usually returned my calls, but his answers generally were curt and unhelpful. No suspects. No new evidence. No breaks.

But today I was feeling lucky.

I pushed through the front doors of the station and walked up to the front desk. It’d been a different sergeant every time I’d been here, so no chance of camaraderie.

Adjusting the camera bag on my shoulder, I walked up to the woman wearing a black Richmond Police uniform, bars on her collar, dark hair smoothed back, and a grim expression. The brass nameplate read Collier.

The room was full of people, most of whom seemed to be waiting. The smell was stale, and the room painted a grim gray.

“Sergeant Collier,” I said.

The woman looked up. “Can I help you?”

“My name is Marisa Stockton. I’m here to see Detective Richards. We have an appointment.”

Small lies for the greater good were okay.

The sergeant eyed me as she reached for her phone and punched a few buttons. Her frown suggested my chances of success were low. I expected to hear Richards wasn’t in the building or was in a meeting. A face-to-face meeting was a long shot. But faint hearts never win.

“He’ll be right out,” Sergeant Collier said.

“Really?” I cleared my throat. “Thank you.”

Tightening my hand on my camera bag strap, I walked to a wall sporting crime prevention and community outreach posters, the Officer of the Month’s picture, and a fire exit floor plan.

A side door opened. “Ms. Stockton.”

I turned to see Detective Richards’s tall frame move toward me. At age sixty-five he remained as fit as he had been thirteen years earlier. He still wore his hair short, though there was more salt than pepper. Same dark suit, light-blue shirt, tie, badge clipped to his belt. No jacket. His face was long, angled, with cavernous brow lines etched deeper in blue-black skin.

“Detective Richards.” I extended my hand and matched his firm grip with one of my own. “I wasn’t sure I’d catch you.”

His gaze clung to mine. He was judging my sobriety. A fair test. I’d not always been sober when I’d seen him.

“Not many more days,” he said, releasing my hand.

“When is retirement official?”

“Two weeks.” He nodded toward the door. “Come on up to my office.”

If I’d just been subjected to a test, it appeared I’d passed. “Thanks.”

“Can I carry your bag?”

“No, thank you,” I said. “I’ve hauled these around so much, they’re an extension of me.”

Opening the door, he waited for me to pass. “Business is good?”

“Can’t complain.”

I followed him up two flights of stairs, doing my best not to huff and puff, and then through a familiar maze of cubicles. Like him, the place was more careworn, but not much had changed in the last thirteen years. He led me to the same cubicle I’d sat in as a teenager. The desk was still covered with stacks of files, pink message slips, and large yellow pads covered in notes written in block letters. I glanced at the pictures of his three kids, who’d morphed from young teenagers to late twenties. No wedding band on his ring finger these days.

“Where was the wedding?” he asked.

“At the courthouse. Very casual. Nice to see a couple not focused on all the bells and whistles.”

“My first wedding was like that. Big family event, friends on my wife’s side I didn’t know. Second one was smaller but still had about fifty people. Next time, it’s going to be just the two of us.”

“Next time?”

“Getting married at the end of the summer. Hoping now that I’m not working unmanageable schedules, I’ll have a chance.”

“Fingers crossed.”

He motioned toward a worn plastic seat next to his desk as he sat in the swivel chair. “Happy belated birthday.”

“You remembered.”

“I remember a lot about your sister’s case. Thirty now, right?”