Little Comfort

by Edwin Hill

  “You’ll find out soon enough,” Detective White said.

  “Is she dead?”

  “Why do you ask that?”

  “Because of what you said.”

  “You’ve never seen her?”

  “No. Never.”

  “Even if you saw her on the Red Line or wandering around Davis Square, it would be helpful. You never know where something might lead.”

  Gabe took the photo. He touched Twig’s face, her rosy cheeks. Her smile. She looked kind. Did she have a boyfriend or a cat? Did she belong to a book club or keep a Snickers hidden in the depths of her purse? He wondered what she regretted most in life, what she’d do over or undo or try her whole life to make up for.

  “She’s a good woman,” the detective said. “She’s on the board of charities. She likes sailing and dogs. And she’s missing. We don’t know anything beyond that, but people are worried. Her parents are despondent. Who knows, maybe she’s in Acapulco and we’ll all go to bed happy, but right now I’m worried too.”

  She stopped talking and waited for Gabe to fill the silence. He knew enough to know that she wanted to bond with him, that she’d come on her own and had to be good and bad, and now she was good. But knowing her tricks didn’t mean he wasn’t susceptible. “That’s terrible,” he said. “But I don’t know anything. I wish I could help.”

  “She was supposed to go to a party. The same one your roommate attended.”

  Gabe handed Twig’s photo to the detective. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t even know her name.”

  “It’s Laura. Laura Ambrose.”

  “Well, I hope Laura is in Acapulco,” Gabe said. “I could stand to be there myself.”

  Detective White smiled. “I guess I could too,” she said, and as she turned to leave, she stopped herself, as though a thought had just come to her. “If we asked,” she said, “would you let us check your computer? See what we can find? What you’ve erased. You know you can’t erase anything these days? Once you hit the keys, it’s out there forever.”

  Back to bad. Gabe almost liked bad better. The thing was, he didn’t even have a porn account, though maybe he should register for one. It would make him less suspicious. He had looked up that article about the body in Holderness, though. And he’d downloaded the photo of Hester. Those were connections he wished weren’t there. “I can get it for you,” he said. “Look for whatever you want.”

  “Thanks, but not today. We’ll be in touch if we have more questions.” She handed him a card. Her name was Angela White. Did her friends call her Angie? “If you see your roommate, have him call.”

  “I will,” Gabe said, and then watched as she headed down the front path. She climbed into an unmarked car and drove away, all the while watching him in the rearview mirror as she sped through the stop sign at the end of the street.

  Gabe stood in the sun for a moment. He imagined what she was like away from work, and who she had waiting for her at home. He wondered what she looked like when she wasn’t bundled up in winter clothes, when she wasn’t protecting the world from people like him. He bet she was soft. That she was a good cook. That she watched reruns of Rizzoli and Isles and saw herself in those TV detectives.

  His phone vibrated in his pocket. It was Sam.

  “Why?” Sam said, as soon as Gabe answered. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  Gabe swallowed. “I was about to call you,” he said. “She just left.”

  “She came to find you there again?”

  “She was asking about the party. She had a picture of Twig.”

  “How the hell does she know about Twig?” Sam asked.

  “She’s a police officer,” Gabe said.

  Sam sighed. “The cop was there too? Fuck! What did you tell her?”

  “Exactly what we practiced.”

  “And what did you tell Hester Thursby?” Sam asked.

  “Who?”

  “Shut up,” Sam said. “I know you saw her again. She’s a private investigator. Someone hired her to find us.”

  “I barely spoke to her,” Gabe said.

  “Well, fuck me,” Sam said. “Don’t talk to her again. If she comes by, don’t open the door. In fact, don’t talk to anyone till I get there.”

  Then the phone clicked off.

  Sam was panicked. And when Sam panicked, there was no telling what could happen. It had happened with Ellen, that call in the early morning, Sam sobbing about the Marin Headlands, and the Golden Gate Bridge, and the way Zach had clung to loose soil and grass. “Please,” Sam had said. “She knows. I know she knows. I need you.”

  Gabe put his coat on and headed out. He needed to undo this. He needed to make it right. Somehow, he needed to warn Hester away.

  CHAPTER 18

  Sam’s phone rang almost as soon as he hung up on Gabe. It was Detective White, who asked him to come by the police station. “Of course,” he said, his voice smooth and controlled. “I’m happy to help in any way I can.”

  An hour later, he sat in the waiting room and checked his phone. Again. Felicia had promised to meet him so they could talk to the detective together, but here Sam was by himself, surrounded by the miscreants of society in this god-awful building. Felicia was always, always late, especially when she really needed to be on time. Who the hell kept the police waiting?

  He dialed her number and listened to the phone ring, and when it clicked to voice mail he stabbed at the cancel button. Felicia was the type who ignored calls, and then sent text messages to follow up. He’d told her how much he appreciated promptness, and she’d actually laughed and said that he probably wouldn’t like her all that much, and right about now he wanted to punch her in the face and break her nose and knock out every tooth in her mouth and listen to her beg as he watched her bleed. Then he’d kick her in the ribs. She bugged the shit out of him.

  He sent her a text and asked for her ETA. He stood and paced the waxed floors and then realized that pacing was a bad idea. The cops were watching. That’s why they’d kept him waiting. They wanted to see how he handled the stress and whether he showed signs of guilt. But why would he? This was all Twig’s fault. Sam turned the pacing into a purposeful visit to the bathroom, where he splashed cold water on his face. In the mirror, his face was red and dripping wet. He was sweating. Could they turn down the fucking heat in this building? Save the taxpayers some money? He closed his eyes again and counted to ten. Calm. He couldn’t show them anything but mild annoyance. Innocent people were annoyed when they waited more than an hour for an appointment, but not so annoyed that they said anything stupid. They answered quickly and to the point and glanced at the time. They might tap a finger silently against a thigh, or mention that they were missing an important meeting. Innocent people had never met Twig—Laura—so they could only sympathize on a theoretical level, but they couldn’t truly imagine the feeling of having a sister or a daughter or a friend disappear until it actually happened. They couldn’t empathize.

  Sam had been lucky, he reminded himself. Always. And there was no reason for that luck to run out today. He was lucky that no one remembered seeing him with Twig at the party. He was lucky that Jamie had those garden clippers. He was lucky that everyone on earth had heard of PTSD and knew what it made soldiers do. And he’d always felt lucky to have found Gabe, to have taken him away from that Jenkins woman. He’d saved Gabe all those years ago, he’d helped him exact revenge, and Gabe owed him. He always would.

  Sam stepped away from the mirror. Good. He was ready. He went to his seat. He checked the time impatiently. He did have places to be.

  “Oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God.”

  Felicia slumped in the seat beside him, twisting her hands together nervously.

  “Where have you been?” he asked.

  “Where do you think I’ve been?” she whispered. “Talking to that detective. They whisked me in there the second I got here. I’ve been in there for a half hour.” Felicia glanced over each shoulder. She couldn’t have looked guiltier.
“They were relentless.”

  “In what way?”

  “Questions,” Felicia said. “The same questions over and over, trying to trip me up, trying to get me to contradict myself. Oh, my God, it was like on TV. I can’t believe Wendy even told them I was at that party. This whole thing was a nightmare.”

  “What did they ask?”

  Felicia gave an almost imperceptible shake to her head. “I’m not supposed to say,” she said.

  “But you can tell me,” Sam said.

  Felicia shook her head again. Her eyes widened, and she glanced up over his should as Sam felt someone behind him. A middle-aged black woman wearing sensible shoes stood in the doorway to an office.

  “Detective White?” he asked.

  “Thanks for making the time,” she said with a smile. “And sorry to keep you waiting. Ms. Nakazawa had plenty of information for us.”

  Sam gathered his coat and bag and smiled at Felicia as he stood. “I’m sure,” he said. “Wait for me, okay?” he added.

  “It’s okay,” Detective White said to her. “You can still be friends. And breathe. It’s all over.”

  Sam followed her into a windowless interview room.

  “Your friend’s nervous,” the detective said. “Any idea why?”

  “I think she’s watched too much Law & Order,” Sam said.

  “Most people have watched too much Law & Order. Can I get you something to drink?”

  “I’ll be fine,” Sam said.

  “We shouldn’t be too long.”

  Sam tapped his finger on his thigh while the detective asked him basic questions about his background and connection to Wendy Richards. He answered quickly and casually. Aaron Gewirtzman grew up in New York. He’d been paying Social Security taxes for eight years. He moved to Boston in the spring.

  The detective slid a photo of Twig across the table. Sam picked it up. “I’d have called if I recognized her,” he said, and almost before the words were out, he realized they were too snarky. “It’s awful, isn’t it?”

  “Awful,” Detective White said.

  “Yes,” Sam said. “Terrible. Wendy was close to her.”

  “She mentioned that. She thought you’d mentioned seeing Laura.”

  “I don’t think so,” Sam said. “And even if I had, I’d never met her. I don’t know if I’d remember it.”

  The detective made a note. “And when did you leave the party?”

  “Right after midnight.”

  “I spoke to your roommate. Interesting guy. He didn’t go to the party with you?”

  Sam shook his head. He felt his pulse quicken. He’d almost forgotten that Gabe had spoken to the detective, and any interview with Gabe was a bad idea. Gabe stood out, though he didn’t know it. He thought he was invisible. And he could make Sam stand out among a guest list of three hundred.

  Be patient, Sam reminded himself. Be innocent.

  “Do you usually go to parties without your boyfriend?” the detective asked, which surprised Sam, though he supposed she was trying to unsettle him. To get him to react. To trip him up. Should Aaron be angry that she thought he was gay? Probably not. That happened to all attractive men. “He’s not my boyfriend. Just a roommate. I went to the party as Wendy’s date. We’re a couple.”

  Detective White jotted something down. “That’s right,” she said, flipping through her notebook. “She mentioned that. How long?”

  “How long, what?”

  “How long have you been a couple?”

  “I don’t even know if we are,” Sam said.

  “But you said you are.” The detective read from her notebook. “ ‘We’re a couple.’ ”

  “Then I guess we are. Just a few days now.”

  “If it’s just a few days, then you must know since when, right? People remember those things.”

  “Sure,” Sam said. “But I try to be a gentleman.”

  Detective White tapped the photo of Twig. “We don’t deal in gentlemen here. Just the truth. Tell me.”

  “Two weeks,” Sam said.

  “That’s what Ms. Richards said too. See, it’s easy to be straight with me. Now be straight with me again. Have you ever seen this woman?”

  Sam turned up the corner of the photo. “Sorry I can’t be more help. I know Wendy is close with her.”

  “Would you look one more time?”

  “Of course,” Sam said. Innocent people looked, but not for too long. “Poor thing,” he said. “She doesn’t seem very happy.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “I don’t know. It’s a feeling I get.”

  “Do you know anything about her relationship with Wendy? Ms. Richards indicates they were best friends. Best friends, especially women, tend to spend a lot of time together. But you’ve never met Laura?”

  “Things are new between us. Between Wendy and me. We haven’t known each other that long.”

  “So you don’t know much about your girlfriend.”

  The detective was making Sam squirm more than he was used to. He glanced at his phone and tapped an impatient finger on the table. It was time to go. It was also time to be a bit annoyed. “You know, girlfriend sounds a bit too much right now. We’re dating.”

  “Just dating then.” The detective chuckled to herself. “Sounds like you want to play the field. Don’t tell her that, but that’s none of my business.”

  “I haven’t met Laura and didn’t see her on Saturday,” Sam said, letting impatience creep into his voice. “I can’t be much help.”

  “Tell me about the party. Tell me what you remember.”

  Sam folded his arms as though he was thinking about what details to pull out. He told her about the people, the fantastic people, and the hors d’oeuvres and the silent auction for the foundation. He made sure to sound suitably impressed. “I bid on a round of golf,” he said. “But got outbid in about five seconds.”

  “You don’t usually run in these circles.”

  “You could say that, but I fit in anywhere. It was a fun night. Full of possibility. The veterans were the only ones who looked uncomfortable. They stood in a cluster and drank Bud Light, you know what I mean? They didn’t want to mingle. We invited them and then showed them off like circus freaks. I’m sure they couldn’t get out of there fast enough.”

  Detective White dug through a folder and slid a list of names across the table. “Who are they?” she asked.

  Sam read through the list and checked off the names that he knew. He paused when he got to Jamie’s name under “W.” “I was at Jamie’s house this afternoon,” he said. “He’s a good guy.”

  “Is there a ‘but’ there?” the detective asked.

  “No,” he said. “Why would you say that?”

  “Because it sounded like there might be.”

  “Not at all,” Sam said. “Jamie’s struggled. He got shot in the head, so it’s amazing he’s even alive. But, no. I don’t mean to imply anything at all. He’s a great guy. He lives over in Everett.”

  Even Detective White couldn’t hide her tell on that one. She ended the meeting almost immediately, thanking Sam for coming in. Out in the waiting room, Felicia stood as soon as she saw Sam and followed him out of the station. “That was a disaster,” she said as soon as they were on the street.

  “A disaster? How?” Sam asked.

  “Where do I start? Maybe with the fact that I’m even here? Don’t you watch TV? These types of things always lead somewhere bad. They dig up information that has nothing to do with the case.”

  “It’s sad, though, isn’t it? Don’t you wonder what happened to her? Wasn’t she your friend?”

  “I guess,” Felicia said.

  Sam exhaled for what seemed the first time that day. He stepped down the sidewalk and felt the rays of winter sun shining on his face. He looked around at the people hurrying by, at the police officers in their heavy blue parkas, at the cars speeding down the street. He watched as his frozen breath drifted away on a breeze. How long would it be ti
ll the police searched that shed behind Jamie’s house? How long would it be till they found the bloodstained clippers with Jamie’s fingerprints on them? Maybe sooner would be better than later, after all. He needed them to find the body before they ran a background check on Aaron Gewirtzman.

  When they stepped into the next intersection, Sam noticed a man walking toward them as Felicia prattled on about calling Hero and going on a coffee date. The man wore a gray coat over a shirt opened to a tanned chest, despite the cold. A handsome stranger. Sam hadn’t gotten lucky in days. Their eyes met as they passed each other, and the man stopped on the corner to wait.

  “I have to be somewhere,” Sam said to Felicia.

  “I thought we were going for a drink?” she said.

  “Were we?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, I can’t now. Tomorrow maybe?”

  Felicia glared at him. “You’re that type, aren’t you,” she said. “You only want what you want.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Never mind. Sure. Call me tomorrow. If that’s what you want.”

  Felicia lifted the strap of her bag onto her shoulder and headed off down the street. Sam waited for her to turn toward him, to smile and wave, to let him know they were still okay, but she didn’t. She waddled around the corner and disappeared, and then Sam leaned against a streetlamp and waited. The man in the gray coat tossed a cigarette into the street. “Oliver,” he said in a smooth English accent.

  “Victor,” Sam said.

  It would be good to have a distraction. To forget about Twig and Wendy and Felicia and Jamie. And Hester.

  “I’m at the Back Bay Hotel,” Oliver said.

  Sam grinned. “And I’m feeling lucky.”

  CHAPTER 19

  It was easy enough for Gabe to find Hester at her house, and then to follow her in his Zipcar when she drove to a bookstore in Porter Square. He took an old copy of Moby Dick from his bag. Moby Dick was the kind of book he imagined college students spent their semesters reading and rereading, and it was a book he suspected Hester would know about, being a librarian and all. Inside the bookstore, he found a seat by the café counter that gave him a clear view of the whole store. His heart pounded when she stepped out from around a shelf in the fiction section. Today, she wore a chartreuse cardigan over her shoulders and had tied her hair into a spinsterish bun. She’d taken her coat off and hung it over her arm. The dog waddled at her feet, and more than one customer crouched to scratch her ears. Gabe imagined strolling up and taking those square glasses from Hester’s nose and seeing her hair tumble around her shoulders. He imagined offering her a bouquet of purple irises, and that she wanted him as much as he wanted her.