Twisted Path

by Melissa F. Miller

  The one saving grace was that in addition to being a packrat, he’d been organized. All the paper detritus of his life was sorted and categorized into neatly labeled folders, boxes, and files.

  Thank the good Lord for small favors.

  Even so, the prospect of going through all the documents made Hope’s skin itch. She was the opposite of a saver. She moved through life with as little as possible, shedding papers, clothes, and belongings every step of the way.

  Giles used to tease her about her extreme minimalism, but she’d brush off the comments with a light remark, saying she had her memories of experiences, so she had no need for ticket stubs, programs, and pictures. In truth, though, she scrubbed her memories with nearly as much vigor as she tackled her tangible possessions. Unpleasant or emotional memories were discarded like yesterday’s newspaper.

  At least she had the best ones. Giles’ face lifted to the sun on an early spring day as they shared an impromptu picnic on the university’s green. His fingers fumbling with the nest of pins securing her updo in the hotel room the night they were married. And the sharp intake of breath and yearning gleam in his eye when he removed the last pin and her hair tumbled in a cascade of blonde waves over her bare shoulders.

  Tears welled up behind her eyes. Giles had cherished her in the truest sense of the word. He’d called her his second chance at love, at life, at happiness.

  He never nagged her about leaving a glass in the sink or forgetting to take out the trash or running late. The petty domestic squabbles that erupted between the couples in their circle of friends were absent in their relationship. Losing Raina the way he had made Giles grateful for each day with Hope. He treated her gently, almost reverently.

  And now he was gone in the ugliest way possible, and she was left to pick up the pieces.

  Which is never going to happen if you spend the whole day dissolving into a puddle of tears on the floor, she chided herself.

  Find the life insurance papers. Find the banking documents. Find the will. She knew these tasks, as mundane and soulless as they were, couldn’t wait. That’s why she’d forced herself to come into the study when she returned from her meeting with Detective Gilbert, even though she badly wanted to crawl into bed and shut out the world.

  You can’t.

  When her father died years ago, after his cancer had metastasized to his bones, her mother had lapsed into a depression. Which was totally understandable, Hope knew. But the mortgage company hadn’t been particularly sympathetic.

  Mom missed one payment, the due date wiped from her mind by a wave of grief. Even though she sent the whole amount plus the late fee as soon as she’d realized her mistake, she’d ended up tangled up in a delinquency process that would have been complicated and tricky under the best of circumstances. As it was, Hope had spent hours on the phone, explaining the situation, swallowing her pride and begging for just a smidgeon of humanity while her mother stared helplessly at the stack of threatening letters.

  Hope had to avoid a similar trap. Keep moving forward, keep what was left of her life running on autopilot as smoothly as she was able, until she cleared out the gray fuzz that clung to her brain.

  A cloth-covered storage box labeled ‘Insurance Papers’ looked promising. She lifted the lid and set it aside. Then she walked her fingers through the row of manila folders, arranged in reverse chronological order. 2019, 2018, 2017. Her fingertips came to rest on a folder near the front of the box. A white label affixed to the folder tab read ‘Hope—life insurance denial, 2016’ in Giles cramped, legible printing.

  Life insurance denial?

  Her heart thudded in her chest. She was sure Giles had never mentioned applying for a policy on her life, let alone having it rejected. Her throat constricted and her hands felt as if they were frozen, encased in ice.

  After a long moment, she forced herself to remove the slim file from the box. She placed the folder over her knees and gingerly opened it, as if she feared a firecracker might go off. The file contained just two sheets of paper.

  She skimmed the top document. It was a short letter, dated three months after their wedding date, and it informed Giles in terse, unapologetic language that his new wife was not qualified for the policy he’d chosen due to her ‘preexisting medical condition.’

  She flipped the page over and turned her attention to the second document. It was a sheet torn from Giles’ notepad, dated just a few days after the letter. His handwritten notes memorialized a phone conversation he’d had with someone named Javier Morales, who worked in the insurance company’s applications department. She scanned the summary. Giles had called asking for more information, certain there’d been some mistake. He’d written ‘Hope is healthy’ and had underlined healthy twice. Morales confirmed there was a HIPAA form on file from Hope’s primary care physician and her pharmacist.

  Had she consented to sharing her medical information with Giles?

  She honestly couldn’t remember. It seemed shocking now that she would have. But in the blissed-out glow of the first months of marriage, she’d probably seen no harm in doing so. They were a team. Giles and Hope. Husband and wife. No secrets.

  Only, she’d had some secrets, after all.

  Morales explained that the cyclosporine, the immunosuppressive medication she’d been taking, indicated a previous battle with either acute lymphoblastic leukemia or acute myeloid leukemia, either of which disqualified her from coverage under the plan Giles had chosen. Morales recommended a different plan, higher premiums, lower payout. Giles had dutifully printed the plan details on the sheet.

  She could see where his pen had stopped. A blot of dark ink spreading under the word ‘leukemia.’ She imagined him sucking in his breath sharply, his hand frozen on the letter ‘a’ as his brain processed the news he’d received from a faceless stranger at an insurance company. Information his wife hadn’t shared.

  She closed the folder and sat motionless, staring at the bookshelf without seeing it. He’d known all this time about the leukemia and had never asked a single question. Never commented on her frequent doctor’s appointments or on her occasional exhaustion, the times fatigue tackled her from out of nowhere and flattened her for a day or a weekend.

  What else had he known?

  She swayed to the side, lightheaded, and was grateful she was already sitting. She set aside the folder and lowered herself to lie on her side on the floor. She pressed her cheek against the cool, smooth hardwood and closed her eyes. She wrapped her fingers through the knotted fringe of the area rug where she’d been sitting, pulling on the strands to stay grounded.

  Her head buzzed. She focused on her breath. The buzzing continued, louder and more insistent. At last, she realized the sound wasn’t in her head. It was her cell phone vibrating against the floor.

  She struggled to sit up, still dizzy, and patted the piles of paper, searching for her phone. Finally, she unearthed it from under a stack of student papers Giles had been grading during his last night on earth.

  “Hello?”

  “Hello?”

  The woman’s voice was faint and wobbly. Bodhi could hear her labored breathing.

  “Mrs. Noor?”

  “Yes?”

  “My name is Bodhi King. I’m a forensic pathologist helping the medical examiner look into your husband’s death. I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “Um, thank you.”

  “I know you must be incredibly busy, but I’d like to set up a time to chat, if you’re willing.”

  “Chat?” Her voice was hesitant, almost wary. “I don’t know anything about forensics. I’m not sure how I can help you.”

  “Why don’t I just explain a little bit about what I do, and maybe it’ll be clearer. I’m an independent consultant. I work mainly on thorny cases—cases that can’t be explained using the standard procedures. As a result, I don’t use standard methods. I just want to talk to you about your life with your husband. No science, I promise.”

  She wavered. “But …
I already talked to the detectives. I don’t know what else I could tell you.”

  “I understand,” he assured her in an easy tone. “But, I’m looking at the case from a different angle. Information that might not have seemed important to you or the homicide detectives could potentially help me find your husband’s killer. I know that’s what you want.”

  “Of course,” she shot back instantly. “Why wouldn’t I?”

  Putting this woman on the defensive wasn’t going to get him anywhere. He paused and smiled. Smiling imbued a communication with a friendliness that could be felt, if not seen, such as during a phone conversation. In fact, he often made it a point to arrange his expression into a smile when he typed an email. That’s how convinced he was that it made a difference.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply otherwise. I do need your help, if it’s not too much trouble. There are some … unusual … aspects to this case that I’m trying to work through.”

  Unusual was one way to put it.

  “Oh, I see. You’re trying to figure out why Damon Tenley’s DNA was found at the scene, right?”

  Bodhi fell silent. He stroked Eliza Doolittle’s crown and wondered how Hope Noor knew the results of the DNA typing.

  “Mr. King?”

  Her quizzical voice shook him out of his thoughts. He stopped petting the bird, who head-butted his knuckles to express her displeasure.

  “I’m here. I’m just surprised that the preliminary forensic results were shared with you. That’s not typically done.”

  “Oh. Oh, no, I hope I haven’t caused trouble for Detective Gilbert. He did tell me not to say anything to anyone. I just … well, I assumed you already knew,” she fretted.

  “You were right on both counts, Mrs. Noor. I do know about the DNA results, and one of the knots I’m working to untangle is how the DNA results fit—or don’t fit—with the rest of the forensic evidence.”

  As he reassured her, a warm rush of gratitude washed over him. He was glad the leak had come from the homicide squad rather than the medical examiner’s office.

  Then he frowned. Having an attachment to his former colleagues was dangerous. It could impede his work and lead to tunnel vision. He made a note to examine his emotions on the subject later.

  “Oh, okay,” Hope Noor exhaled audibly, her relief apparent.

  “So, could I come see you sometime in the next day or two? Or we could meet at the medical examiner’s office, but I thought perhaps you’d be more comfortable in your own home.”

  Whenever he could, he liked to conduct interviews on the witness’s home turf. He had a few reasons for his preference. The first was just as he’d said: she’d be more at ease and, as a result, more apt to open up. The second was that environment was part of a person’s larger essence. Being in the space where Giles and Hope Noor lived would create context and help him complete his picture of the dead man.

  “I … yes, I guess. Could you come tomorrow afternoon?”

  “That would be great. Does 3:30 work?”

  He could ride his bike to the Noor’s Squirrel Hill home and then meander down the hill to Shadyside for his dinner with the David family, filling the time between commitments with a stop at his favorite used bookshop/tea shop. He’d have to remember to tell Saul he wouldn’t need a lift after all.

  “Yes, that’s fine. You have the address?”

  “I do. Thanks for agreeing to see me.”

  “Um, sure. I hope this doesn’t turn out to be a waste of your time. Like I said, I’ve already told the police everything I know.”

  “You’d be surprised by how often seemingly irrelevant details end up being helpful,” he told her.

  “I guess so.” Her voice was still filled with uncertainty and hesitation.

  “I know so,” he assured her before they ended the call.

  Chapter Eleven

  Bodhi started his Thursday morning peacefully. Later, he’d be grateful for those first minutes of calm.

  He stood on the small wooden deck just off the kitchen and watched the sun rise, pale orange in the crisp winter sky, with his hands wrapped around a steaming mug of tea.

  Five hundred miles to the west, Bette would be watching the same sun poke its head up over the deep green trees that abutted her property. He breathed in the sharp, cold air and greeted the day and Bette under his breath.

  When had he become so sentimental? He pondered the question as he finished his tea. After his chance encounter with Eliza last year, he decided. Running into his medical school girlfriend, the woman whose heart he’d treated callously, had filed away the edges of some of his firmly held beliefs about nonattachment.

  He shook his head, still slightly bemused, and headed inside. He should call Eliza and see how she and her boyfriend were doing. Funny how they both ended up involved with chiefs of police.

  As he closed the door behind him, Eliza Doolittle squawked, “Phone call for Bodhi.” She added a dead-on imitation of his cell phone ringtone for good measure.

  “Thanks, Eliza Doolittle.”

  He gave the top of her head a few scratches and refilled her water before picking up his phone from the kitchen counter to check for a message.

  He had two.

  He pressed the speaker button and played the messages while he refilled the tea kettle with water from the sink.

  Bette’s throaty voice filled his kitchen:

  “Morning. I’m watching the sun kick off its day and you popped into my mind. I was thinking I could leave Johansson in charge for the weekend and pop out to visit you. There’s a discount flight to Pittsburgh from O’Hare tomorrow afternoon. I’d need to be back by midday Sunday. Let me know.”

  He considered the idea, a smile playing across his lips.

  Then the second message began to play. It was from Saul, and his frantic tone was a stark contrast to Bette’s easy drawl:

  “Bodhi. It’s Saul. When you’re finished meditating or returning insects to the outdoors or whatever you’re doing, get into the office as soon as you can. Someone leaked the DNA results to the media and Meghan’s on the warpath. She’s called a team meeting for eight o’clock.”

  He raised an eyebrow at the news and reached for the hard cake of fermented tea that Bhikkhu Sanjeev and Roshi Matsuo had pressed into his hands before he’d left Onatah. The aged pu-erh tea was a special gift in China, and the monks had thought it a fitting gesture to send him home with a disc after he’d solved the murder of a Chinese man on their retreat center’s grounds.

  Eliza Doolittle whistled. He paused in his tea preparations to turn and look at her. Her neck was bent at a sharp angle so she could eye him with one shining black eye.

  “Bodhi’s in trouble. Go to work. Call Bette. Big trouble.”

  He sighed. The macaw was intelligent and bossy. Living with her was like having an officious personal assistant. And he knew if he didn’t respond, she’d just repeat her orders until he did.

  “Thanks, Eliza Doolittle. I’m on it.”

  He took his mug and his phone and headed upstairs to shower.

  First he returned Bette’s call. He was disappointed but not surprised when the call rolled to her voicemail.

  “Good morning, Bette. I was thinking about you while I watched the sunrise, too. I’d love for you to visit but this weekend might not be the best time. Someone just leaked investigation details to the local press, so … well, I don’t have to tell you. All hell’s broken loose. If I had to guess, I’d say, we’ll be scrambling all weekend to clean up the mess. But let’s talk and figure out a time we can squeeze in a visit. I … miss you.”

  The admission startled him even as he said the words.

  He ended the call, took a long swallow of hot, earthy tea, and turned on the shower full blast.

  Eight minutes and thirty seconds later, he was dressed and ready to go. He rinsed his mug and placed it in the kitchen sink and said goodbye to the macaw. Then he clicked his bike helmet strap closed under his chin and wheeled his bicycl
e out the door and down the stairs. He made a point to pause before he mounted the bike. He stood motionless and allowed the quiet and calm of the early morning to seep into his muscles and bones.

  When the stillness settled into his chest, he swung his leg over the frame, adjusted his messenger bag across his chest, and began to pedal.

  Chapter Twelve

  January 2013

  * * *

  The halls of the homicide squad were unusually hushed. The post-holiday lull in murders had been compounded by a bitter cold snap that was keeping people inside. Domestic violence calls were up, as cabin fever and boredom sparked flare-ups between family members trapped inside together. But, thankfully, none of those calls had escalated to murder.

  Yet, Burton thought, as he trudged down the hall to the commander’s office. Give it time. Another week of sub-zero temperatures and arctic winds, and the tempers will reach a boiling point.

  He turned the corner and spied Chrysanthemum Martin loitering outside Commander Noonan’s office. She shot him a look of dread as he neared her.

  “You, too, huh?” He jerked his head toward the door.

  “Yeah. You have any idea what this is about?”

  He shook his head. “Nope.”

  That wasn’t strictly true. There hadn’t been any murders in the past several days, so they weren’t about to catch a case. Which meant they were about to catch hell.

  Noonan was a hands-off commander. He only interacted with the homicide detectives to assign them cases and ream them for transgressions, real and imagined.

  From the expression on Chrys’ face, she shared Burton’s view of what lay on the other side of the door.

  “Well, let’s get it over with,” she muttered as she raised a fist and rapped on the door.