All the Dark Places(10)
“You can stay with us.”
“Thanks, but you guys don’t need me underfoot. Willow needs you.” Kim and Josh’s daughter is only four. She was born seven weeks premature and suffers from developmental delays that have her in therapy twice a week, so Kim’s got her hands full.
“Willow’s fine. You know you’re her favorite person.”
“I don’t want her to see me like this. I’m okay here for now.”
“Do you want us to come over?”
I sniff back tears, nod, though she can’t see me. “Can you?”
“Of course. We’ll drop Willow off at my mom’s.”
“Thanks, Kim.” We hang up, and I dial Laken.
“Hello?”
“Laken, it’s Molly.”
“Oh my God, Moll.” She sniffles. “How are you holding up?”
“I’m okay. I was pretty out of it this morning. I don’t even know what I told you.”
“Someone killed Jay? How can that have happened? I can’t believe it.” Laken takes a big teary breath, mumbles something to, I assume, her husband. “We can’t believe it. Cal’s been a basket case since you called this morning.”
“I can’t believe it either,” I say. “We were just all together.”
“Do you want us to come over?”
“Please. Kim and Josh are coming too.”
“Of course. We’ll be over as soon as we can. But we got a call from a detective. They’re coming here to talk to us. We’ll come after that. Okay?” I hear her blow her nose. “Poor Jay,” she mumbles. “God, I can’t believe it.”
“Oh, I’m at Corrine’s, by the way. My house is a crime scene.” I drop my head in my hand.
“Did someone break in after we left?”
“I don’t know. The door to the office was open when I came downstairs.”
Laken sniffs, lets go a deep breath. “Did it happen this morning, do you think?”
“I don’t know.” I run my hand through my hair and glance around at the green pastel walls with their expensive artwork. It seems strange that Corrine’s apartment is just the same. Everything is the same except my house and my life. And I don’t even know why.
I hear noise in the background of the call. A doorbell. “Wait a sec,” Laken says. A minute ticks by. “Those detectives are here,” she whispers. “We’ll come over as soon as they leave.”
CHAPTER 6
Rita
THE FERRISES SIT SIDE BY SIDE ON A GRAY SECTIONAL. MRS. FERRIS IS tall, with long straight blond hair, makeup perfect, glamorous even on a Sunday when her friend’s husband has been murdered. Calvin Ferris is also tall, dark-haired, and wears scholarly-looking glasses, a handsome man but in a studious, serious way. They don’t look like they ought to be together, like someone got their wires crossed on a dating app.
She’s crying softly into a clump of tissues, while he pats her back and looks utterly confused as if he’d just heard aliens had landed at Fenway.
Chase and I sit across from them. I pull out my notebook. Chase, as usual, is taking notes on his phone, which even after months together, I find strange. Most of the younger cops use their phones for this purpose now. But for me, I like the heft of my notebook, the relative permanence of it, and it allows me to make sketches.
“Mr. Ferris, you and Dr. Bradley are friends?” I ask.
“Yes.”
“Anything bothering him lately?”
He shakes his head. “No. I don’t think so.”
Mrs. Ferris leans forward. “Do you think one of his patients did it? When we left last night, everything was fine!” she half yells at us.
“Could be,” I say. “You have any reason to believe it was one of his patients?”
She retreats into the couch. “No. Jay doesn’t discuss his work with us.”
Mr. Ferris nods in agreement. “But it could be, right?”
Two little boys skid into the room in their stocking feet. I don’t know much about kids, but these two must be twins, carbon copies. Mrs. Ferris jumps up.
“Did you finish your lunch?” She herds them back into the kitchen. “You can each have one brownie. Come on.”
When they leave the room, Mr. Ferris drops his head in his hands. “Jay was my friend,” he says dejectedly, working his fingers through his thick hair. He glances up and meets my eyes. “How’s Molly? Is she okay?”
“Doing as well as can be expected,” I say.
His phone rings, and he reaches into his pocket and shuts it off. When Mrs. Ferris returns, we have them walk us through the previous evening, and it jibes with what Dr. Westmore and her husband told us. Everyone was having a good time. Nothing out of the ordinary. They all left before midnight. No one had been out in the office.
Chase and I head back to the station. I want to check in with Dr. Gaines and the tech guys. See what they’ve come up with.
My office is freezing cold. For some reason, Sundays are particularly cold at the station, as though law enforcement stops on the weekend. Chase is out in the squad room at his desk, and I sit and spread out my notes.
We still need to talk to the Pearsons. Neither of them has answered their phones, so I left messages. But I’m assuming they’ll have the same story—everyone was having a good time, no sign of trouble.