“Are you Mr. D’Angelo?” the doctor asked.
“Yes. Darius. I’m Sunny’s husband.”
“Good. I’m Dr. Papageorgiou. I’ve been attending your wife.”
“Yes?” Darius said, more a question than a statement.
I eyed the doctor with impatience. Why didn’t he put all of us obviously anxious people out of our misery and tell us Sunny was fine?
“That was a very, very close call, Mr. D’Angelo, but I believe your wife will be all right.”
Collectively, all our shoulders sagged in relief.
The doctor continued. “We’d like to keep her overnight for observation. Her breathing and heart rate are still a bit sluggish.”
“Sure. Of course,” Darius said. “When can I—”
“And I’d also like to set up a consult with an attending psychologist tomorrow morning,” the doctor interrupted. “She’ll need a psych eval before I’m comfortable releasing her.”
“A . . . psych eval?” Darius asked.
Dr. Papageorgiou focused an intense look at Darius. “Your wife attempted suicide, Mr. D’Angelo. You’ll need to come to grips with that and support any psychological counseling, therapy, and/or evaluation at a mental health facility.”
We all audibly gasped at that.
“She didn’t . . . ,” Darius said, shaking his head vigorously. “Doctor, I swear, Sunny isn’t suicidal.”
The doctor’s firm tone and level gaze never wavered. “She’s severely underweight, dehydrated, and exhausted, not to mention that she consumed enough Ambien tonight to kill herself. And she very nearly succeeded. Those markers alone give me great cause for concern. Still, I’ll hand over the decision to have her committed to my colleague tomorrow morning. We need to be sure she no longer presents a threat to herself or others, Mr. D’Angelo.”
Darius simply continued to shake his head, and for the first time, the physician’s expression turned compassionate. “There’s nothing you can do for her tonight. I suggest you go home and get some rest yourself.”
Darius stopped shaking his head and simply stood there with his jaw agape and a dazed look on his face. It was like he couldn’t form the words to insist that it’d all been a big misunderstanding. That Sunny probably hadn’t been in her right mind when she took all those pills.
But then it hit me: People who were suicidal weren’t in their right minds by definition. What if Sunny had been fully conscious when she left to drive herself to the park? She’d taken only a half a dose, and that must’ve worn off by the time she woke up around seven thirty or eight to leave Tiffany and Finley behind, right?
“Hey,” Shepherd said, causing me to jump. He’d come right up to me, and I hadn’t even been aware. “Is there news? How’s Sunny?”
Darius turned to him, a pained, astonished look on his face. He didn’t seem capable of answering.
“And you are?” Dr. Papageorgiou asked.
“Detective Steve Shepherd,” Shep said, pulling out his badge and flashing it for the doctor. “I’m Sunny’s twin brother.”
“Ah,” the doctor said. “She’s stable but has been moved to the ICU for further monitoring through the night.”
“Thank God,” Shepherd said after letting out a sigh of relief. “Can we see her?”
The doctor’s gaze flashed to Darius, then back to Shepherd. “I’ll allow one person to visit with her briefly. Five to ten minutes only. She’s stable, but I can’t have her agitated or further exhausted until she’s evaluated tomorrow morning.”
“Evaluated?” Shepherd asked.
“I’ll fill you in,” I whispered to him.
Darius turned to us. “Thanks for coming, guys. I’ll go back and see her. Steve, I’ll call you tomorrow to give you an update.”
Shepherd’s brow furrowed. “I want to see her, Darius.”
Papageorgiou rocked back on his heels. “As I said, I can allow only one visitor, gentlemen.”
“I’m her husband,” Darius said firmly.
“I’m her twin!” Shepherd countered. It was surprising to see him insist on cutting the line and getting in front of his brother-in-law. I was fairly certain that by way of their marriage, Darius’s access to Sunny trumped Shepherd’s.
“Do you have a medical directive or power of attorney?” Papageorgiou asked him.
Shepherd glared at the doctor, his lips a thin line of anger. “No, but I am an officer of the law.”
“Is this a police matter?” the doctor retorted, and I could tell he was firmly on Darius’s side.
Shepherd’s jaw clenched and unclenched. “No,” he finally admitted.
Papageorgiou turned back to Darius. “She’s in room two-ten. Follow the green line to the elevators.” Papageorgiou paused to point to a series of colored lines on the floor. “I’ll let the ICU nurse know that you’re cleared to visit with your wife for no longer than ten minutes.”
“Thank you,” Darius said in relief, and with one last defiant glance at Shepherd, Darius left us to head to the elevators.
When he and the doctor had both departed, I filled Shepherd in.
“That’s ridiculous,” he snapped. “Sunny isn’t suicidal.”
“How do you know?” I asked him, genuinely curious.
“What do you mean, how do I know?”
“I mean, Shep, that there was a time fifteen years ago when my sister was very, very depressed after a breakup, and she confessed to me later that she’d contemplated taking her life, and I never knew. There were no overt signs, other than she seemed sluggish and foggy every time I talked to her, and I always chalked it up to her being tired out because of her job.”
“Her psychic work?”
“No, this was before all that. She worked at a bank back then, and there was a lot of pressure on her. Anyway, the point is that it never occurred to me that she was in such a perilous state.”
“M.J. went through something like that when she was in college,” Gilley said, breaking the silence. He was still standing next to me.
Shepherd and I looked at him in surprise.
He shrugged and added, “Her mom died when she was in fifth grade, and her dad started drinking right afterward. She never got therapy or counseling, and I think she pushed it all down for as long as she could, but when she was about twenty, it caught up to her, and there was a time when I made sure to stick close to her so that she didn’t do anything stupid.”
“How’d she pull out of it?” I asked Gilley.
“I finally convinced her to get some therapy at the university clinic, and she got on some antidepressants, which made a world of difference.”
I nodded. “Abby too. She still takes them, I believe.”
“Guys,” Shepherd said, holding up his palms to us. “You gotta believe me, other than what happened with my parents five years ago, Sunny’s life has been relatively gentle.”
“Your parents passed away?” Gilley asked.
Shepherd nodded. “Mom died from ovarian cancer, and Dad passed away within six months of Mom’s funeral. The strain on him through her sickness was too much for his heart.”
“Did Sunny ever get counseling?” I pressed.
“Definitely. And she dragged me with her. Seriously, Sunny’s on top of her mental health. Always has been.”
“Maybe this time she was too quickly overwhelmed by insomnia and the duties of being a mother to a fussy toddler to recognize the oncoming depression,” I suggested. “And don’t forget how hard the pandemic was on everyone,” I added. “I swear we’re all walking around with a good case of PTSD.”
Shepherd frowned and stared at the floor. “Yeah,” he finally admitted. “That was kinda tough on her. Damn, I should’ve been paying more attention.”
“We all should’ve,” I told him. And then I reached out and took his hand. “It’s not your fault, lovey.”
He lifted his gaze to mine. “Then why do I feel so guilty?”
“Because that’s what you do,” Gilley told him. “You ride
in on your white horse and save the day so often that this time it caught you off guard.”
Shepherd slid a sideways glance at me. “Since when did Gilley get so wise?”
I chuckled. “Oh, trust me, Gilley is far wiser than he lets on.”
Gilley beamed. “It’s my side hustle,” he said, adding a curtsy. “Now come on, you two. I’m exhausted, and there’s nothing more we can do here. Let’s get the three of us home.”
Shepherd pulled me to his chest and kissed the top of my head. “I can’t,” he said to both of us. “I gotta get back to the scene.” And then he paused a moment and added, “Scenes. Good God, this night is like a bad dream that just won’t end.”
“We’ll walk you out,” I said, hugging him tightly before taking both his hand and Gilley’s to exit the hospital.
We parted in the parking lot, and walking to our car, I lagged behind Gil while I watched Shepherd’s retreating form. He walked a little hunched over, like he carried the weight of the world on his back. I couldn’t imagine being in his shoes, with so much responsibility and his own personal tragedies swirling in the mix.
“Cat?” Gilley called.
“Coming,” I said absently and watched Shepherd for a few more seconds, feeling like I wanted to run to him and hug him tightly one more time.
Looking back, I really wish I had.
Chapter 7
The next morning, I woke up to the smell of coffee wafting up from my kitchen. And something else was flavoring the air with the scent of pastry and raspberries. After rolling over, I picked up my phone to check the time. It was six fifteen. On a Saturday.
I moaned and uttered a small curse under my breath, pondering if I should attempt to go back to sleep or head down to the kitchen to see why in God’s name Gilley thought it a good idea to be up baking at this hour in my kitchen rather than his.
With a heavy sigh, I reasoned that Gilley got out the early morning baking tins like this only when something was troubling him. So, I did what any good friend would do—I rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, which worked for about fifteen minutes, or until exactly the point at which I was just starting to drift off when Gilley took his anxiety to a new level and began to loudly clang pots and pans together, creating an all-out ruckus in the kitchen.
With heavy-lidded eyes—and a glint of fury—I grabbed my silk robe from the knob behind the bathroom door and descended the stairs quietly while he kept up the racket.
I found him literally drumming the bottom of a saucepan with a wooden spoon, his back turned to me as he stared out the window.
“Catchy tune,” I said.
Gilley jumped, then whirled around, holding the spoon like a weapon. “Ahhh!”
“Relax!” I said, putting up my hands. “It’s just me.”
“Oh,” he said, immediately calming down.
A bit too quickly, I thought.
“Good morning, Cat. You’re up early.”
I plunked down on one of the barstools along the kitchen island. “Gee, Gilley, ya think?”
Gilley made a little moue face. “Couldn’t sleep, huh?”
I stared dully at him. “No.”
He nodded like he fully understood. “Me either.”
I laid my forehead down on the island. “Why are you here, Gilley?”
“Your oven is more temperature sensitive, and I’m making a Gouda-apricot coffee cake, and the temp needs to be precisely one hundred and eighty degrees Celsius for twenty minutes, or it will overbrown.”
I lifted my head to frown at him. “We have the exact same oven.”
I’d personally made sure that Chez Kitty was equipped with top-of-the line appliances, just like at Chez Cat.
Gilley set down the spoon he’d been holding, and took up a dish towel. Fiddling with it, he said, “The lighting is better over here. And there’s more room to spread out all the ingredients. And I was completely out of cake mix, but then I remembered you had a box in the pantry here.”
“Gil?”
“Yeah?”
“Something troubling you?”
Gilley’s shoulders sagged. “You know me so well.”
I got up off the barstool and ambled around the island to the cabinet where I kept my French press. “Sit,” I said to him. “I’ll make us some coffee, and we can talk.”
Gilley flounced over to a chair and took up a seat. I waited until I’d prepped the French press with fresh coffee beans and started the kettle, then set out twin mugs, cream, sugar, and two spoons before I spoke next to him. “Tell me what’s on your mind.”
“Michel left me a message this morning. I didn’t hear my phone. I was in the shower.”
I waited for Gilley to continue, but he’d paused, with a faraway look in his eyes, so I prompted him. “And?”
Gilley sighed. “He just said, ‘I think we need to talk.’”
I winced. “Ouch.”
Gilley’s gaze locked onto mine. “That’s bad, right?”
“Did you tell him about Spooks?” I asked, hoping that was all Michel wanted to talk to Gilley about.
“No,” Gil said. “I was waiting for a good time to break the news.”
I didn’t confess to Gilley that I believed it was now past a good time, choosing instead to focus on a more optimistic approach. The kettle began to smoke with steam and I paused our conversation to pour the hot water over the beans in the French press. When that was done I said, “Maybe he just wants to tell you that he’s booked another job and won’t be home at the end of the month.”
“He’s already texted me that,” Gilley said.
“When?”
“Yesterday, during your meeting with the count.”
So much had happened in the past twenty-four hours that yesterday afternoon felt like it was ages ago. “Now I understand what led you to the Humane Society’s home page.”
Gilley gave me a crooked smile, but there was tremendous sadness in his eyes. “Vogue is going to stream fashion videos to its online subscribers. Photos of models will now become videos of models, and Michel is working to make that transition happen by teaming up with a documentary filmmaker in South Africa. He’ll be gone all of October and most of November.”
“Oh, Gil,” I said. “I’m so sorry.”
He shrugged and fiddled with his coffee spoon while staring at the counter. Sniffling, he whispered, “I really thought we’d make it.”
It broke my heart to see him like this, and I quickly went around the counter to wrap him in a fierce hug.
I knew this heartbreak. It was more than simply the realization that you wouldn’t spend the rest of your days with the person you’d married—it was the fact that in letting go of them, you had to let go of the dream of what you thought your life would be. The certainty of it and the comfort of that certainty were such tremendously difficult things to lose.
For a long time, I simply hugged Gilley, and I knew he was quietly weeping by the occasional sniffle and the small damp spot on the back of my shoulder that formed from his tears.
“I know, honey,” I whispered to him.
I felt him nod slightly. He knew I knew.
The moment was interrupted by a bing from the timer over the oven. Gilley jerked out of my grasp and wiped his eyes. “The coffee cake is ready.”
I stroked his hair and kissed his cheek. “Sit. I’ll take care of it.”
After moving over to the oven, I pulled out the scrumptious-looking cake and set it on the wire rack to cool. The mouth-watering aroma filled the kitchen with a heavenly scent.
“It needs to cool for about fifteen minutes,” Gilley said.
I turned back to him, and he seemed more composed, although his eyes were wet and red.
“What can I do for you?” I asked him, and I wasn’t talking about breakfast.
“I need a distraction,” he said.
Pouring coffee into both of our mugs, I said, “We could take a day trip somewhere. Ooh! I know. We could head into the City and take a walk in t
he park. The leaves are just starting to turn, and I bet it’d be good for us.”
Gilley sighed and shook his head. “I want to be close to home in case they call me about Spooks.”
“Then how about a walk along the beach?” I pressed. Gilley needed fresh air and a little exercise. The weather had turned colder overnight, and it wasn’t especially sunny out, with overcast skies, but at least it wasn’t raining yet.
Gilley sighed again, as if he couldn’t make up his mind. “I don’t feel like it, Cat,” he finally said.
“How about a Netflix marathon, then? We could stream some Grace and Frankie. You love that show.”
“Because Jane Fonda is a living, breathing goddess, and Lily Tomlin is a national treasure!” Gilley all but yelled.
We both laughed. That was his standard line every time I mentioned the show. It felt good to see him chuckle.
But then he sobered and said, “Yeah, I don’t know that I’m in the mood for that, either.”
“Did you want to call Michel?” I asked gently.
“No!” Gilley snapped. I pulled my chin back in surprise, and he quickly apologized. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to bite your head off. I just . . .”
I reached across the counter and put my hand over his. “I know,” I said. I’d put off having “the talk” with Tom until he cornered me in my home office and wouldn’t allow me to escape it. I’d known what he was going to say, but those were words that couldn’t be walked back, and I didn’t judge Gilley one bit for not being ready to hear them just yet.
“What would you like to do, then?” I asked him after a moment.
“I want to visit Spooks,” he said. “Even though he’s not my dog yet, I keep thinking about how lonely he must be in that kennel, not knowing that he’s going to be coming home with me.”
“I love that idea,” I said.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. And we can ask the shelter if it’s okay to take Spooks for a walk. Maybe along the beach?”
Gilley rolled his eyes. “You really want me to get some exercise, huh?”
I cut a slice of coffee cake for him and handed it over with a winning smile. “It’ll do your mind some good, lovey,” I said. “And I’m sure Spooks would love it!”
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