The Thinnest Air

by Minka Kent

  My chest is weighted with each breath, tiny shudders rippling through my body as every nerve ending fires. Standing before the window, paralyzed, I consider dashing up the stairs and waking Andrew, but for what? So he can laugh at me, roll to his side, and go back to sleep?

  Pacing the living room, I check the window again and again. This house is vast and its late-night darkness is unsettling in this moment, but if I turn a light on, I won’t be able to see outside, and anyone looking in will be able to see my every move, my silhouette behind every curtain.

  Tiptoeing to the kitchen, I pull my phone off the charger and scroll through my contacts.

  I don’t want to bother Ronan this time of night—in fact, I don’t want to bother him at all after that silly bout of infatuation last month—but I don’t have anyone else.

  My thumb hovers over his name.

  Detective Ronan McCormack.

  Even his name sounds strong, shielding.

  Holding my breath, I make the call.

  “McCormack.” He answers on the third ring, his voice groggy as he sucks a slow breath past the receiver, and I wonder if he always answers his personal phone like that.

  “It’s Meredith.” I keep my voice down, padding across the house to the farthest corner, away from the twenty-foot ceiling in the foyer that makes everything echo. My intentions are innocent this time, but I don’t want to wake Andrew. “Meredith Price.”

  “Right, right.” He pulls in another breath, and I hear the rustle of sheets in the background. He’s climbing out of bed.

  “I’m so sorry to bother you. I know it’s late.”

  “Don’t worry about it. What’s going on?”

  “I found an envelope in my mailbox today.” I tell him about the letter, about his business card and the advertisement from the coffee shop.

  “Well . . . fuck.” The phone swishes. He says something inaudible. It sounds like he’s up, walking around, stumbling through the dark and flicking on lights.

  “But the reason I’m calling,” I say, “is I just saw a parked car outside my house. It was black. Four doors. It sped off before I could see anything else. Maybe it was nothing . . . coincidence or something . . . but it freaked me out. That’s why I called.”

  “You want me to call down to the station? See who’s on duty and have them patrol your street?” he asks.

  “That’d be nice,” I say. Andrew would never know, and the peace of mind just might help me get some sleep tonight.

  “I’m on it.”

  I love that he takes me seriously, that he doesn’t laugh or brush my fear off like I’m a child complaining about monsters under the bed.

  Monsters are real.

  They’re real, and they’re capable of doing the unspeakable.

  And they don’t hide under beds or in closets—they hide in plain sight. You just don’t always notice them.

  “You going to be okay?” he asks.

  “Yeah, yeah.” I massage the back of my neck, pacing the main floor guest room I’ve sequestered myself in so I can talk on the phone.

  “Get some rest, all right?”

  I intended to sleep in here tonight, but the thought of being alone with some creep outside is almost worse than sleeping next to my insensitive husband.

  I’m going to have to pick my poison.

  And tonight, I choose Andrew.

  CHAPTER 16

  GREER

  Day Four

  The cab drops me off outside Glacier Park’s hole-in-the-wall police station, and I march toward the front desk like a woman on a mission.

  And I am.

  “I need to speak to Detective McCormack,” I tell the woman peering over the top of her glasses and trying to pretend like she isn’t minimizing her game of Spider Solitaire. “Immediately.”

  She’s wearing red librarian frames, perhaps an attempt to be different or kitschy at a job that requires her to dress like everyone else. Her mouth forms a straight line. “I’m sorry. He’s not available. He’s out of the office. I can have you speak with Detective Bixby if you’d like.”

  My lips turn down at the corners. “When will he be back?”

  She looks away for a moment, pulling in a taut breath before clearing her throat. “He’s on paid administrative leave pending the outcome of an internal investigation. I’m not allowed to give out any information beyond that, ma’am. I’m sorry.”

  Ma’am?

  I’m easily ten years younger than this woman.

  “Wait, what?” I laugh because this woman has to be joking. “I just talked to him yesterday. I’ve been working with him every day this week. What the hell happened?”

  “Like I said, I’m not at liberty to share that with you, ma’am.”

  My fists tighten. “I’m Meredith Price’s sister, and I’ve been—”

  “Again, I’m sorry. I can’t share anything with you at this time.” Her compassion, which I’m convinced was nonexistent in the first place, is replaced with impatience the second the phone rings. She swivels her chair away from me, snatching the receiver and cradling it on her shoulder as she plugs her other ear with a finger.

  I’ve been stonewalled.

  Storming outside, I order another cab, chewing the inside of my lip as I wait on a nearby park bench next to a weathered bronze statue of a beaming police officer holding hands with two grinning children.

  Beneath it is a plaque, engraved with the words CHIEF EDWARD PRICE. THANK YOU FOR 35 YEARS OF DEDICATED SERVICE.

  Sneering, I exhale. Meredith told me once that Andrew was Glacier Park born-and-bred and that the Prices were a well-respected family in this area. I’m willing to bet money that Edward Price was Andrew’s father and that the Glacier Park police take care of their own.

  Small town departments usually do.

  The thin blue line isn’t reserved only for those with badges and guns; it extends to their loved ones as well. At least that’s what one of my regulars told me at the shop one day. A twenty-year veteran of the NYPD, that man had stories for days and little time for bullshit.

  My kind of guy.

  Scrolling through my seldom-used social media accounts, I see someone’s started a website called FindMeredithPrice.com, encouraging followers to use hashtags like #findmeredith and #whereismeredithprice to raise awareness.

  I peruse the photos and posts. The outpouring of sympathy is appreciated, but sharing a post from the comfort of your sofa isn’t going to find my sister. If these people truly cared, they’d spend less time surfing Facebook and more time actually looking for her. I bet when they lay their heads on their little pillows tonight in their cozy houses with locked doors, my sister will be the last person they’re thinking about.

  People might care, but only ever for a moment.

  Down the road a Yellow Cab barrels this way, coming to a short stop in front of the station.

  “Don’t they usually give you a bus ticket or something?” the middle-aged driver asks. He’s easily fifty pounds overweight, his salt-and-pepper hair in desperate need of a haircut. Clearly not a local.

  “I realize I’m dressed in all black and I look like I haven’t slept or had a good meal in days, but I assure you I’m not an inmate.” I roll my eyes as I climb into the back seat.

  He lifts a thick-knuckled hand. “Sorry. Little cabdriver humor. I pick up a lot of folks from here. County jail is just behind the station. Where you headed?”

  “Twenty-Two Spring Grove Lane,” I say, reciting a cute little address that has no business belonging to an enormous, dark mansion.

  “Ah. Nice area.” He flicks on his blinker. “Then again, this entire town is nice. Not a rough neighborhood in sight. You know, years ago they had an older part of town, smaller houses and such. The developers, they tore them all down, put up a bunch of fancy McMansions.”

  I hate that word—McMansion. Everyone who uses that word thinks they’re being clever and witty when they’re really being banal and unoriginal.

  I peer out the w
indow, silently wallowing in how much I loathe small talk.

  “You’re not from around here, are you?” he asks, punching the brakes at the next light. My hands brace against the back of the front seat so I don’t end up in his lap. I should probably wear a seat belt.

  “What gave it away?”

  Checking my phone and debating whether or not to fake a phone call to get out of this painfully stale conversation, I scroll through my Internet history and pull up the Glacier County Assessor page, the one I used to find the names of all Meredith’s neighbors.

  On a whim, I type in Ronan’s name and press enter.

  A single listing is presented on the next page. A modest ranch—by GP standards anyway—with cedar shingle siding and a one-car garage. It doesn’t look like the typical abodes that are so prevalent in this pretentious city, but the address is local.

  “Change of plans,” I say to the driver. “Drop me off at Sixty-Four Highland Road.”

  A red truck is parked in front of the garage, fresh mud on its tires. The house looks just like the one on the assessor page, except maybe some of the bushes have grown. There’s a light on, and a dog barks from behind a cedar privacy fence in the backyard.

  I ask the cabdriver to keep the meter running, telling him I won’t be long.

  Rapping on the thin glass storm door, I catch what sounds like footsteps on the other side that come to an abrupt stop. I’m sure he’s peering through his peephole, debating whether or not to let me in, but I’m not going to unstick my thorn from his side until I find out why the hell he was placed on leave.

  The door opens a few seconds later.

  This all-American Boy Scout looks like he’s seen better days. His hair is disheveled, his white T-shirt wrinkled, and his once rigid posture slightly slumped, defeated.

  “What the hell happened?” I fold my arms across my chest.

  He exhales, widening the door and letting me in. His other hand falls, hitting against his side.

  “It’s a long story,” he says.

  “I bet.”

  Taking a seat on the edge of his plaid sofa, I fold my hands in my lap, cross my legs tight, and give him my undivided attention despite the annoyingly distracting dog out back that won’t shut the fuck up for two seconds.

  He glances outside once more before closing the door and taking a spot on the chair across from me. Resting his elbows on his knees, he drags his hands down his tired face before releasing a hard breath.

  “Your sister,” he says, “and I . . . we had this thing. On the side. This secret thing. Nobody knew about it.”

  I’m straddling the line between comprehending what he’s saying and trying to imagine my lovestruck sister straying from her “happy” marriage.

  This bombshell is heavier than the last one, weighing down my shoulders, slowing my breath, and busying my mind.

  I didn’t know her.

  I didn’t know her at all—at least not the person she’d become.

  “Forensics was able to analyze her cell phone records and linked her to me. I knew it was going to happen, just didn’t know it’d be this soon,” he says. “The department’s placed me on paid administrative leave. Conflict of interest and all that. And they have to rule me out as a suspect now that they know we were . . . romantically involved.”

  I study Ronan as if I’m seeing him for the first time all over again, trying to recall little moments, red flags, anything that would so much as hint that he had anything to do with this.

  “Why didn’t you come forward right away?” I ask. “That alone seems like it might have some insinuations, don’t you think?”

  “I know how this looks.” He buries his face in his hands again. “But there’s so much you don’t know.”

  “What do you mean?” I lean forward. “What are you talking about? What haven’t you told me?”

  My questions launch at him, one after another, and he lifts a hand in protest.

  “I’ll tell you everything,” he says, though now I’m not sure if I can believe anything he says.

  “Go on.” I wave my hand at him, sitting up straighter.

  “I didn’t come forward right away because I wanted to be on this case. I wanted to find your sister. I wanted to be as close to all the developments and evidence as possible because I knew her well. I knew who she hung out with and where she went and what she liked to do. I thought that’d give me an advantage, help me find her quicker. And being the lead on the investigation meant I’d be able to keep a close eye on Andrew.”

  My head cocks. “So you think it was Andrew?”

  “There’s no solid evidence yet,” he says. “But based on what I know? Based on everything Meredith’s told me over the last couple of years? He’s the only one with a motive.”

  “And what might that be?”

  “For starters, she was pregnant,” he says. “And Andrew didn’t want her to have kids—not yet. First time she was pregnant, she said he freaked out on her.”

  “The first time?”

  “It was shortly after they were married,” he says. “Before I knew her.”

  The fact that Meredith neglected to tell me that stings, but I bury my hurt and focus on squeezing every last ounce of information out of this man.

  “So you were sleeping with her, like, you two were having a full-blown affair?” I ask.

  He nods. “Off and on, yeah. It was complicated.”

  “Did she love you? Were you in love? Were you planning to be together at some point?”

  “She was waiting,” he says. “Said she had to save up money or something. She had nothing. The house, the cars, the credit cards—everything was in Andrew’s name. He had full control over everything. She couldn’t leave if she wanted to.”

  Her trust fund.

  She was waiting for her trust fund.

  “Did she say how she was going to get this money to leave him?”

  “She didn’t tell me any details, just that she was possibly coming into some money, and she was going to leave him after that.”

  “Did he know she was planning to leave?”

  Ronan shrugs. “No idea. For all I know, she told him, and he did something to her. Nobody actually saw her at the grocery store that day. All we have is an empty car and an abandoned purse and phone.”

  “So what are you suggesting?”

  “I’m suggesting that anything is possible,” he says.

  My stomach twists, hardens. When I close my eyes, I can’t help but picture Andrew, his hands around her neck, tears streaming down her cheeks. Bile rises, burning my throat, but I swallow it away.

  “Her trust fund is going to be endowed later this month,” I say. “On her birthday. If she’s declared dead . . . it’ll go to Andrew. All five million of it.”

  Ronan pinches the bridge of his nose, his tired eyes squeezing shut. “That son of a bitch.”

  “Let’s not jump to conclusions.” I stand because I can’t sit still anymore. Pacing his small living room, I tuck my hair behind my ears. “We need proof. We need something we can take to the police.”

  Ronan scoffs. “The Price family owns the police department. Not literally, but his father was the chief of police for over three decades. His grandfather started that finance firm Andrew runs. Made his first million managing the department’s pension accounts. That name is pure gold in Glacier Park, untouchable. The moment I so much as suggested to Chief Rolland that we should do some surveillance on Andrew, he damn near ripped my head off and spat down my throat.”

  “How can he get away with that?”

  “Nothing bad ever happens here. Our crime rate is practically zero. The only reason they have a full-time detective is because the residents complained and city council approved it.” He rises, moving toward the window and glancing outside, as if he’s being watched. “They’re going to try to pin this on me.”

  My nose wrinkles. “Why would you say that?”

  “This is the biggest thing to happen in Glacier Park. T
his is a chance for the department to shine. To get their fifteen minutes.” He shakes his head. “They’re desperate to solve this case as soon as possible. Letting it go cold when the rest of the world is watching is the last thing they want to do.”

  “They can’t pin anything on you. There’s no evidence, no body, nothing.”

  “Nothing yet,” he corrects me. He lingers in silence, lost in thought for a moment. “We have to find her.”

  “We will.”

  “I just want to know she’s safe,” he says. “And then I’m going to destroy the son of a bitch who took her.”

  Checking my watch, I glance toward the door. “I should go.”

  Ronan nods.

  “I appreciate your being so candid,” I add, forcing civility into my tone. I’m not exactly pleased with the way he withheld this detail from me, but blowing up at him would serve no purpose at this point. Besides, with limited resources, I’m not exactly in a place to start burning bridges, and I’d hate to burn the wrong one. “Just wish you’d have come forward earlier.”

  He doesn’t meet my gaze; he simply stands there, his hand dragging across his mouth as he widens his stance. I suppose there’s nothing more to be said.

  “Anyway, I should go,” I say.

  I may have given him a pass for now, but that doesn’t mean I won’t be watching every move he makes, analyzing every word he breathes. I want to believe Ronan’s as good a man as he appears to be, but the truth is, all I know is that I know nothing.

  And until I know something, everyone’s a suspect.

  CHAPTER 17

  MEREDITH

  Twenty-Five Months Ago

  “Do you think this is wrong? What we’re doing?” I’m seated on the passenger side of Ronan’s pickup, sipping gourmet hot cocoa from the Winterbean Café in downtown GP as we drive around the countryside on a lazy Monday morning. I’m supposed to be at yoga. He’s supposed to be at work.

  “Hanging out?”

  I smirk, lifting my cup to my lips. “Is that all this is?”

  “Yeah,” he says, turning to me and flashing his signature disarming grin. God, I love his smile. It’s one of my favorite things in the world, I’ve decided. When I close my eyes at night, it’s one of the last things I think about lately. “I haven’t so much as touched you. Right now, we’re just two friends, hanging out.”