Pretty Little Wife(23)

Twenty minutes after he showed up unannounced, Ginny walked into the interrogation room with a blank notepad in her hand and the video running. The office recorder cataloged everything that happened except when a conversation occurred between a person and their attorney or when someone from the department turned the equipment off. Today it was up and running.

She slipped into the seat across from the principal and watched him fidget and squirm in the metal chair. “Did you need to tell me something, Brent?”

He put his joined hands on the table then lowered them to his lap again. “Any word on Aaron?”

She bit back a sigh. “We’re investigating.”

“What does that mean?” The chair scraped across the cement floor as he leaned forward, elbows on the table now. “Look, you have to know this isn’t normal. There’s no need for delay . . . or whatever is happening.”

She knew how he felt about the investigation needing to move very quickly because he’d told her. He’d also told Pete when he went to visit the school to ask follow-up questions yesterday. He made it clear one last time when he called the office for a status check earlier that morning. The one thing that Brent had done was make his point.

She leaned back in her chair, taking on a more relaxed stance as Brent’s frustration ratcheted up. “What do you think is happening?”

“I don’t . . . it’s just . . .” He sat up again, mirroring her position, then slammed his back against the chair.

So many jerky movements. An air of nervousness. Every twinge highlighted how uncomfortable he felt.

Some people got twitchy around officials with a badge. She got that, but she found it hard to believe this guy could handle a lecture hall full of teens without falling apart, but not her. “It feels like there’s something specific you want us to know.”

“You’ve met Lila.”

Ah. This could get interesting.

“I really like her. She’s very nice.” He was speed-talking now. “I mean, not nice in the usual sense. More like . . . do you know what I mean?”

“No.” There was no way she was helping him through this babbling.

He returned to shifting and moving and generally making her dizzy. He lifted his cell phone out of his pocket and checked the screen. Whatever he saw there had him frowning.

She could hardly wait to analyze the video from this meeting. “Brent?”

“Okay.” He put the cell facedown on the table. “She’s . . . attractive. She has this thing about her.”

“What thing?” Ginny thought Lila had a thing, but who knew if they were talking about the same thing.

“Aaron liked to show her off.”

Creepy but okay.

“Like she was some sort of prize.” Brent stopped and gulped in a big breath. “He never said, look what I snagged, but you could feel the pride. He liked that people saw them a certain way. She’s beautiful, apparently really smart, but aloof. It gives her this almost larger-than-life feel.”

“What are you trying to tell me?”

He gave her full-on eye contact. “It all stopped.”

Ginny slipped her pen out of her pocket. She wasn’t sure what to write, so she waited. “What did?”

“Them. They stopped working.”

“That’s a big statement.” The kind that could matter and provide motive. “When?”

“More than a month ago.” He rubbed his palm with the thumb of his other hand. “Something happened.”

“What?”

Brent shrugged. “Who knows? They’re super private.”

Not helpful. She tried again, crossing one leg over the other, aiming for calm. She hoped that would ease some of the tension he sent jumping around the room. “What makes you think there was a problem?”

“Again, I just want to be clear. He didn’t say there was. He actually insisted everything was okay, but it wasn’t.”

One more time. “How do you know that?”

“He stopped mentioning her.” He cut her off before she could ask for clarification. “I know that sounds ridiculous.”

“Confusing, yes.”

“Being married to her matters to him. It’s part of his persona. He has this mysterious, glamorous wife who rarely comes to anything school-related, but he’d drop references about her. Something she said or somewhere they went. It was kind of a teacher’s lounge joke that no one would believe she existed except we had met her or seen her around town.”

“Okay, but—”

“He didn’t tell bad stories about Lila. Ever. If they fought, you’d never really know, because he never mentioned a negative thing.”

“Brent.” She held up her hand to get him to stop talking at record speed. “I don’t think I’m getting your point.”

“Starting a few weeks ago, he acted as if she no longer existed. Not a word about her or anything that’s happening away from work since then.” Brent stopped moving. “And now he’s missing.”

“Do you think Lila did something to Aaron?” That sounded to her more like Aaron had done something to Lila, but that wouldn’t explain the missing husband.

Brent frowned. “I think something happened that changed everything between them. Figure out what it was and you’ll find Aaron.”