by Dete Meserve
I’m sure he saw the kiss.
We were laughing about something we’d seen on the TV above the bar, then his lips were on mine, soft and warm, erasing everything that had come before it. I closed my eyes and soaked in the perfection of the kiss—the smoky taste of tequila, the way his hands held my face, and what his lips were doing with mine. It was the kiss of a lover, expressing a meaning I couldn’t yet grasp.
“Any idea what else he saw?” James’s voice brings me back to the moment.
“I have an idea, yes,” I say quietly.
“How long has that been going on?”
I feel the heat rush to my face. “I don’t have to answer that.”
He rubs the back of his neck. “We’re going to need to monitor your phones, your cell phone, your personal email.”
“Why? Because you think that what the bartender saw somehow has something to do with Ben’s disappearance?”
“Actually, I do.”
My mouth goes dry. “We were celebrating. We had too much to drink and things got out of hand.”
“You’re oversimplifying the situation, Sarah. I got a call from one of your husband’s partners, Richard Jenkins. He says Ben’s lawsuit is a smoke screen to cover up the fact that Ben was stealing millions from them. They say he disappeared with the money.”
“Richard told me the same story. But where’s the logic in his theory? If Ben was stealing money from them, why would he disappear, leaving his wife and son behind?”
He cocks his head to the side. “Maybe things are not so great between him and his wife.”
The weight of my own guilt presses down on me. I’m silent for a long moment. “Even if you believe that theory, what about our son? You think he’d leave Zack behind?”
“Marriages, families, relationships are complicated. People don’t always act the way you think they will.” He drains his coffee. “The way I see it, if Ben did steal the money from the partners, and if there was trouble between the two of you . . .”
“Shouldn’t you be looking instead into what happened to Ben after he was shot and his bodyguard was killed? Was he abducted? If so, by whom? Where did they take him?”
He laces his fingers behind his head. “Several of my partners are chasing down those leads. But my focus? My focus is you, Sarah. I need to understand everything that was going on in Ben’s life before he disappeared. And you are the key to that.”
“I’ve told you everything I know.”
“You know what I find most of the time? The truth is often obscured by the facts that are directly in front of us. The truth lies around the edges. And that’s where I’m going to keep looking.” He tucks his notebook into his jacket pocket then abruptly changes the subject. “What do you know about his new partner in New York?”
I feel like I’m outside my body, watching from a distance. I make sure every word I say is true. “Ben has been trying to buy restaurants in New York and Chicago, but he never said anything about any particular partner. Why?”
“Richard claims Ben’s working with this new partner to hide the money. Any idea who he’s talking about?”
“He’s trying to blind you with sunlight.”
“What do you mean, ‘sunlight’?”
“He’s distracting you with some shiny and unexpected premise, forcing you to chase down useless theories in order to keep the focus off of himself.”
He shrugs. “Sounds like you’re doing the same thing. You’re telling me your husband never told you the name of his new partner in New York?”
“Do you have a wife, Detective?”
“Not yet. No.”
“Well, if you did, I don’t think you’d bore her with the details of every person you spoke with during your workday. Especially if you’ve been married for fifteen years. Especially if she had her own demanding career. And if you did share those details, you can bet you wouldn’t be married very long.”
His lips curve slightly but he doesn’t smile. “If you ask me, that sounds like an excuse for not knowing much about your husband. You don’t talk to him for three days, you ignore two phone calls from him because you’re . . . drinking with a colleague, you don’t know who he partners with, what kind of car he drives. You don’t even know he hired a bodyguard. Tell me, Sarah, what do you know about your husband?”
His words slice through the air, leaving me breathless. “The things I know about my husband . . . are the things that aren’t . . . relevant right now.”
He rises from the couch and faces the Christmas tree. “They’re probably more relevant than you think.”
The words slip from my mouth before I can stop them. “I know that he loves Formula One racing, he’s religious about eating granola with blueberries for breakfast, he’s completed six marathons in the past three years. He loves our son, sucks at math, makes a mean tri-tip on the Fourth of July, and . . . he decorates one helluva Christmas tree.”
My eyes well up with tears, but I blink them away. I’m describing a life I once lived. A life that suddenly feels far away, as though I had dreamt it. How long has it been since I sat with him while he ate granola and meandered through the Sunday paper? When was the last time we’d spent the Fourth of July at home, instead of on opposite sides of the continent on business?
He stands. “I’m sending some technicians over later this morning to set up the monitoring of your emails. And your phone.”
I place my coffee cup on the table next to his. I haven’t taken a single sip. “I want to consult with an attorney first.”
“If you don’t have anything to hide, this shouldn’t be a problem. Or, think of it another way. You can either agree to it, or I can get a warrant to make it happen.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Anyone who studies the cosmos must accept that darkness is an inescapable fact—an astronomical certainty. We need darkness in order to experience the light of the stars. Still, I cannot understand the blackness and confusion that has descended on me. After my presentation about our discovery of Earth’s Trojan asteroid, I’d been elated that we’d unlocked a secret of our solar system. Now I feel a heaviness in every step. It’s as though a massive gravity pull has drained all the light from my world.
I fix my gaze on Jupiter, shining like a promise in the evening sky. I train my telescope on it and look past its tawny bands to locate its moons—tonight I can see three of them, hovering like bright fireflies.
Where is Ben? Can he see Jupiter and its moons tonight? I don’t—won’t—allow myself to think that he’s dead. But I have no narrative for where he is if he is alive.
I try to focus my attention on Jupiter and its moons, but the questions swirl around me like giant clouds of dust. What is Ben’s connection to the dead Rebecca Stanton? Was it just a coincidence that he met with her Friday night and she was dead Saturday morning?
I step off the patio and into the garden, where the scent from the pathway lined with sprawling lavender envelops me. Ben had spent a fortune to hire one of LA’s foremost landscape architects to design the backyard gardens. She’d planned them to stimulate all the senses—plants in an array of colors bloomed in every season; citrus and fruit trees hung heavy with guava, avocados, tangerines, and lemons; and countless plants and herbs threw their scents into the nighttime air—rosemary, lavender, jasmine, and the sweet, haunting fragrance of lilac. Ben had grown up in Chicago, where lilac flourishes everywhere, but in the warm temperatures of LA, only low-chill varieties grow, and they are fussy, requiring extra care from the gardener.
In the moonlight, I notice one of the small lilac bushes has fallen over, perhaps dug up by a neighbor’s dog or one of the many raccoons that sometimes roam our yard after feasting on the koi in a neighbor’s pond.
As I push the lilac back into place, I notice a glint in the dirt. At first I think maybe it’s an illusion caused by the moonlight reflecting off some sandy soil, but when I look more closely, I can see something metallic just under the surface. I kneel down and sweep my hand
across the dirt.
Beneath my fingers is a gun.
This isn’t like the one I found in the bedroom. It’s smaller, not new. Not loaded.
I suddenly know what shock feels like. My mouth goes dry, and I’m not sure if I want to run or hide. My mind cannot grasp why the gun is here, hiding in plain sight. It’d be so easy to spot in the daylight. It’s as if someone deliberately left it here. For me to find?
My heart feels like it’s stopped beating. I lift the gun out of the dirt and drop it on the smooth brick path. It makes a metallic thud, then lies there, taunting me with its mystery. In the mocking moonlight, I stare at it and feel sick, as though I’ve just exhumed a body.
All capacity for rational thinking vanishes, leaving only the reptilian part of my brain to respond—adrenaline jolts blood through my veins, and my entire body breaks out in a cold, nervous sweat.
I don’t have to examine the gun to suspect that it’s the weapon that killed Rebecca Stanton. But I cannot think through whether Ben hid it or whether someone deposited it here to frame Ben. Or to frame me.
For a brief moment, I consider showing it to Detective Dawson. But if this is the murder weapon, handing it over to police will surely seal Ben’s fate as the prime—and perhaps only—murder suspect.
Is this why Ben erased the DVR? Because he had killed Rebecca Stanton and he didn’t want any evidence that he’d buried the murder weapon here?
As I peer at the gun in the moonlight, I decide there can be only one conclusion. The gun must not be found.
I race to the garage and grab a shovel. I dig out the lilac and, with what feels like superhuman strength, hollow out a deeper hole, a foot deep, perhaps.
With the sweet scent of lilac rising up on a warm breeze, I lift the gun and carry it in my outstretched palms. I feel as though I am making an offering, a silent prayer that this gun is not what it appears to be. Using a lilac leaf, I remove any possible fingerprints, and with a trembling hand, lower the gun into the hole.
My breathing is shallow as I cover the gun with dirt then replant the lilac. I run back to the garage for a broom, sweep away any telltale dirt on the pathway, then race to return the tools to the garage.
“Mom.” Zack’s voice startles me from behind.
I whirl around and clutch a hand to my chest. “You scared me.”
“Some guy from the FBI is at the front door.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Zack is wrong. There are two FBI agents on my doorstep. The tall African American man is carrying a large plastic bottle of water, nearly empty. The petite woman next to him wears a black suit, her long dark hair parted on the side. Her blue eyes are so pale they remind me of the eyes of white ibis I’d seen wading in the Gulf in Florida.
“Samuel Nelson, FBI,” he says, shaking my hand.
“Elizabeth Elliott,” she says.
They both produce their gold “Federal Bureau of Investigation” badges, which, in the soft light from the porch sconces, look real enough. I peer at the photos in the identification cards next to the badges. They also seem real, even though the moment doesn’t.
“It’s late,” I say, nodding toward Zack beside me. I’m pretty sure FBI agents aren’t supposed to show up on your doorstep unannounced late into the night.
“Yes, and we’re sorry,” Elizabeth says, as though she means it. “We had intended to get here earlier but got stuck in some serious traffic on the 405.”
I can’t figure why FBI braved the 405 freeway during rush hour to come to my house unannounced.
“Do you have a moment to talk?” Samuel asks.
“About what?”
“About your husband.” He has an accurate way of speaking, as though he wants there to be no ambiguity about what he’s saying.
“I’m already talking with LAPD.”
“Yes, we’re working with the LAPD, and we have those records,” he says.
“We have a few questions we’d like to ask you. They might help us locate your husband,” Elizabeth continues.
She says it casually, as if the questions they’re going to ask are about Ben’s favorite color or where he likes to vacation.
“Do you know what’s happened to him? Is that why you’re here?” Zack asks.
Elizabeth smiles without showing her teeth. “If it’s okay, we’d like to continue this discussion with just you, Mrs. Mayfield.”
“We’ve brought coffee,” Samuel says with a forced smile.
“Let me turn on some lights around here, then I’ll meet you in the kitchen,” I tell the FBI agents, disguising my trembling stomach with a cheery tone.
I follow Zack upstairs to his bedroom and reassure him that I’ll tell him everything in the morning. Then I stumble through the house turning on lights while making a quick call to Stuart, filling him in on the FBI’s visit. He suggests an attorney who could accompany me during the interview. If there was any time to hire a defense attorney, it feels like it would be now. Still, I resist. I know that the top brass at CIT and others would see that hire as proof that I had something to hide.
I hang up and gaze into the living room, where moonlight drifts through sheer curtains, casting black and silver shadows on the walls.
Have I made a mistake hiding the gun? If it is evidence against Ben, I think I’m doing the right thing by burying it. Or am I merely helping a dead man?
That thought sends a chill through my core. I have a sense Ben is not dead. We scientists call that “motivated reasoning”—believing something because we want it to be true, even if the evidence mounts up otherwise. I’m aware that my belief is a defense mechanism, a way to protect me from the unthinkable. My motivated reasoning silences my scientific mind, the part of me that would examine the data and seek to reach an accurate conclusion.
I wonder if I’ve been building a family—a life—with someone who is capable of murder. Was everything I knew about Ben an illusion?
I part the living-room curtains and gaze at the moon one last time. I know that its light is an illusion, too. Moonlight is actually the reflected light from the sun, bouncing off the moon. Still, I sense hope in its rays.
“An asteroid?” FBI agent Samuel Nelson asks. “Following Earth around?”
“Well, actually, it’s the other way around. The Trojan asteroid dances in front of Earth, getting closer then farther as it orbits,” I say.
“Closer then farther.” I’ve lost him in the abstractness of my description. “So it might crash into us someday?”
“Nope. Like a good dancer, this asteroid always avoids blundering into its partner.”
“Dancing, huh?”
I know he’s stalling, trying to appear engaged before he asks his questions.
“Right. Earth is playing follow the leader,” I explain. “We’re chasing this dancing asteroid around the sun.”
We’re sitting around the kitchen, seemingly old chums catching up over tea and coffee. Samuel is wearing a tan suit that’s two sizes too big for his narrow shoulders.
He and Elizabeth wanted me to be somewhere comfortable, some place we could talk. The kitchen is that, although at this hour only the pale moonlight trickles through the mullioned windows. Even the bright pendant lights over the table can’t throw off enough light to cast away the gloom.
“We want to ask you a few questions about Ben.” Elizabeth says his name with soft emphasis. “He was in New York last week. Can you tell us why?”
“He’s been looking to open up another restaurant in Manhattan.”
“Do you know who he was meeting with while he was there?” Samuel asks.
“I’ve already told Detective Dawson that I don’t know about his business dealings. Ben really doesn’t share that with me.”
Elizabeth mimics the placement of my hands on the table, palms down. “What did he talk about when he returned from New York?”
“I only saw him briefly before I had to leave for the airport. We talked about, you know, married couple stuff. Our son, house repai
rs. Mundane things.” I leave out the part about discussing our broken marriage.
“There is . . . evidence that Ben was present at a crime scene. Did he mention anything to you?” Elizabeth asks.
Present at a crime scene.
My palms are sweaty, and my mind flashes to the DVR where I first saw Ben talking with Simone about Rebecca’s murder. What if that DVR has actual evidence that Ben murdered Rebecca?
“No. What kind of crime scene?”
Samuel takes a long slug of his coffee. “A woman named Rebecca Stanton was murdered—shot to death—on the rooftop patio of her apartment building in Manhattan.”
“Murdered? What does this have to do with Ben?”
Elizabeth leans forward and lowers her voice. “What we’re getting at here is that your husband had met with her earlier the night before. We understand he was in the midst of buying the restaurant she owns, Paragon, but she severed the deal just hours before she was found dead.”
I know my cheeks are scarlet now. “Are you sure you’re talking about my husband? Ben Mayfield?”
“Witnesses saw them arguing Friday night,” Samuel says, evading my question.
“And we identified his fingerprints at the crime scene,” Elizabeth adds.
The room goes dead silent. I look from Elizabeth’s face to Samuel’s, trying to understand what they’re getting at. My voice is a raspy whisper. “Are you saying Ben is somehow involved in this woman’s murder?”
“We’re not in a position to say what his involvement is yet,” Samuel says curtly. “But we can say that we have an eyewitness who saw someone matching your husband’s description leaving Rebecca Stanton’s apartment early that morning.”
Their evidence explains almost everything. Ben’s disappearance has nothing to do with the lawsuit against his partners or their accusations that Ben was stealing from them.