Want to Know a Secret? (55)

He nods. “Yes, it’s very sad.” His eyes dart between the two of us. “I’m afraid I gotta ask you both a few questions. You have time to talk?”

Elliot raises his face to look at the detective. He reaches out for the banister and shakily gets back to his feet. “Of course. Whatever we can do…”

Hanrahan clears his throat. “Can you tell me where you were during the late evening last night?”

Elliot rubs his neck. “I was home. I was here the whole night. With my son.”

“Me too,” I quickly add. “We were here together.”

Hanrahan raises his eyebrows. “So you two were together here the whole night?”

“Well,” Elliot says, “except for the time when April went to her book club.”

Why? Why would he say something like that?

“You went to a book club meeting last night?” Detective Hanrahan asks me.

“Yes,” I say. Technically, it’s true. I did go to the book club meeting. But Lucy wouldn’t let me in the door.

I flinch as the officer studies my face. “What book?” he says.

“Excuse me?”

“What book were you reading for your book club?”

“Oh!” My smile feels so phony. He must see through it. “We were reading Life of Pi.”

He gives me a crooked smile. “I always meant to check that one out. Any good?”

I did read the book, but that doesn’t mean I have anything intelligent to say about it. “Yes. I enjoyed it very much.”

He nods, like this is a key piece of information. “And the other members of the book club could vouch for you that you were there?”

“Yes.”

My stomach feels like it’s full of rocks. Why did I lie like that? Nobody at the book club will vouch for me. I have no alibi at all for last night. It will take the detective five minutes to walk over to Lucy’s house and find out I was lying through my teeth.

My head starts to spin as I realize what is happening here. Brianna has been murdered, and I have both motive and a lack of an alibi.

I look over at Elliot, who seems like he’s going to throw up. I wonder if we should just tell this detective everything. Admit to him that Elliot was having an affair with Brianna. She was pregnant. It was his. And then admit to him that I wasn’t at the book club last night.

Of course, that last bit of information is damning. I can’t bring myself to hammer that nail into my own coffin.

“Mr. Masterson,” the detective says, “do you have any idea who might have done this to Miss Anderson?”

Elliot shakes his head slowly. “No… No one I can think of.”

“Did she have a boyfriend?”

He runs his hand over his skull. “Um. Maybe. I don’t know. We didn’t discuss things like that.”

“Her roommate said she was seeing someone.” Detective Hanrahan reaches into his pocket and pulls out a little notebook. He consults it for a moment, then looks back up at us. “She said Miss Anderson was seeing a married man. You got any idea who that could have been?”

He shrugs helplessly. “I don’t know.”

The detective stands there for a moment, scratching at his reddish-brown hair. Does he know Elliot was the man Brianna was seeing? He must at least suspect. Or maybe he doesn’t. He doesn’t seem like he thinks one of us is a murderer.

“Do you have any other questions?” Elliot finally says.

Detective Hanrahan shakes his head. “Not at this moment. Thank you for your time. But if you could make yourself available in the future, I’d really appreciate it.”

“Of course.” Elliot manages a half-hearted smile. “I want to cooperate in any way I can.”

The detective turns around and heads for the door. I feel a rush of relief. He’s leaving. He hasn’t accused me of anything. He doesn’t even seem that suspicious of us. But then, just before his fingers touch the doorknob, he turns around.

“One more question,” he says.

Elliot raises his eyebrows. “Yes?”

“Who was Courtney Burns?”

I feel all the blood rush out of my face. That is the last question I wanted to hear right now.

“Courtney Burns?” Elliot repeats. He’s stalling for time. He knows very well who Courtney Burns is.

“That’s right.”

“She, uh…” Elliot squirms. “She used to be my receptionist. About five or six years ago.”

“And what happened to her?”

“She, um…” I can almost hear him swallow. “She killed herself. It was very… unfortunate.”

“Wow.” Detective Hanrahan shakes his head. “Two dead secretaries in five years. That’s pretty bad luck.”

“Right.” Elliot drops his eyes. “Like I said, it was unfortunate. But Courtney had… a lot of problems.”

“I’m sure she did.” The detective’s light blue eyes are locked on my husband. I get this horrible sinking feeling in my chest—that nice guy routine from a few minutes ago was just to get us to let down our guards. The detective thinks Elliot killed Brianna. It’s so obvious. “Anyway, I’ll leave you to your breakfast. But don’t go anywhere. In case we have more questions.”