by Shari Lapena
As she walks past the Pierce residence, she stares hard at the house. The blinds are all drawn, giving the house the look of a blank stare. She wonders if Robert Pierce is in there, behind the blinds. Suddenly she hates him, and Amanda, too, for coming into their quiet neighborhood and rocking it to the foundations. He probably killed his wife, she thinks bitterly, and they are all suffering for it.
As she walks up the driveway and to the front door of the Harris’s place—a cute house with dormer windows—she has a bad moment when she realizes that Larry might be home. He won’t be at the office on the weekend. She doesn’t want to see him.
She rings the doorbell and waits nervously. Finally she hears footsteps and the door opens. It’s Becky. She’s obviously not expecting visitors; she’s wearing yoga pants and a long T-shirt that looks like she might have slept in.
“Hey,” Olivia says. Becky doesn’t say anything. “Can I come in?”
Becky seems to be considering it, then pulls the door wide. Olivia enters the house, her nerves flaring. “Is Larry here?” she asks.
“Did you want to talk to him?” Becky asks in surprise.
“No,” Olivia says. “I just want to know if we’re alone.”
“He’s not here.”
Olivia nods, sits down at the kitchen table. Becky doesn’t offer to make coffee. She just stands there, her arms folded in front of her.
“We need to talk,” Olivia begins. Becky just stares at her and waits. “I need to know if you’ve told me everything.”
“What do you mean?”
“You implied Paul might be having an affair with Amanda. You saw him in her car.”
Becky nods. “That’s true, I swear.”
“Is there anything else that you know, or saw, that you’re not telling me? Is there anything else you told the police? I need to know,” she says.
Becky takes a deep breath and exhales. “Olivia, we’ve been friends for a long time. I’ve always been honest with you. That’s all I saw. Just that night, the two of them in the car, arguing. I assumed they were having an affair, because why else would they be there, at that time of night? And you know what a—a siren she was. Maybe I was wrong. That’s all I know. And that’s all I told the detectives.”
Olivia exhales loudly, puts her hands over her eyes, feels herself tearing up. She nods.
“You want coffee?” Becky asks.
Olivia sniffs and looks up and nods again, suddenly unable to speak. She’s so glad that they aren’t going to be enemies. As Becky prepares the coffee, Olivia wipes her eyes with her hands and asks, “Have you heard anything more about the investigation? Do you know what’s going on?” She doesn’t want to ask directly about Larry. She waits to see if Becky will confide in her.
Becky finishes with the coffee machine and turns around and leans against the counter. She shakes her head. “No, I don’t know anything. They’re not saying much, are they? There’s nothing in the news either.”
“I hope they figure it out soon,” Olivia says. “And that this will all be over.”
Becky pours the coffee and carries the mugs to the kitchen table and sits down. “Olivia, I’m not trying to convince the detectives there was something going on between Paul and Amanda. I told them what I saw. It’s up to the detectives to find out the truth. I’m not out to destroy your life to protect my own. I wouldn’t do that.”
Olivia looks at her gratefully.
“Why are you so worried about Paul?” Becky asks.
Olivia flushes slightly and says, “They were over at the house this morning, those two detectives.”
“Really?”
Olivia nods. “They wanted to know if Paul had an alibi.”
Becky stares back at her. “And does he?”
“No, not really,” Olivia admits. “He was visiting his elderly aunt—and there’s no way she’ll remember it and be able to vouch for him.” Olivia adds nervously, “She’s got dementia.” She doesn’t mention that Paul’s cell phone was turned off that Friday night.
“Looks like we’re kind of in the same boat,” Becky says. “Larry doesn’t have much of an alibi either.” Olivia looks at her, expecting more. “He was at a conference at the Deerfields Resort that weekend.” She hesitates and then says, “You know where that is?” Olivia nods. “But that Friday he went up to his room and did some work and then fell asleep and missed most of the reception. So he doesn’t have anyone to vouch for him either.”
* * *
—
Robert Pierce paces restlessly around the house as evening closes in.
He thinks about Larry Harris, next door. Does he miss Amanda the way Robert does? He feels a cold, hard hatred for Larry Harris. He wonders how Larry felt when he found out that his wife had been sleeping with his next-door neighbor. Robert already knows how that feels. He wonders how Larry feels now, with the police snooping around, asking questions. Robert knows what that feels like, too.
Robert thinks, too, about the other man that Amanda was seeing. Have the police found out about him yet?
And he thinks about this kid who broke into his house. Worries about whether Carmine will, in fact, go to the police about it.
* * *
—
Next door, Becky has the local TV news on in the kitchen while she prepares supper. She hears the name Amanda Pierce and realizes that her shoulders are hunched up around her neck; she’s holding her entire body so tightly that it aches. She takes a deep breath and consciously lowers her shoulders. This can’t go on. She mutes the TV.
She has changed over the last few days. She thinks of herself a week ago, how silly she was—with her girlish fantasies about her next-door neighbor. She’s not silly anymore. Amanda is dead, viciously murdered, and as far as she can see, the two most likely suspects are Robert Pierce and her own husband, Larry.
The infatuation she’d had for Robert Pierce has fallen away since he’d grown cold to her, and since she realized she might have been used—that Robert might only have slept with her to get back at Larry. Had he known? And if so, how? Had Amanda told him? Had she taunted him with it? Or had he followed her and seen her with Larry? Was Robert ever attracted to her at all?
Now when she thinks about Robert, she doesn’t think of his sexy smile at her over the fence, or of how he was in bed with her. Instead, she remembers how he spoke to her that last time, over the fence—how smoothly he told her that he hadn’t suspected Amanda was having an affair. But he was lying, and they both know it. He knew Amanda was having an affair. And she thinks the crafty bastard knew exactly whom she was having an affair with. He just wanted to be sure she wouldn’t tell the police. Maybe she should.
She has too much to lose if her husband is hauled through the criminal justice system. She has her children to think of. She can’t let this destroy them all.
* * *
—
Saturday night, the usual strife. Glenda rattles around the house, feeling like she’s jumping out of her skin. She’d tried to get Adam to stay home, and not go out tonight. She’s worried he’ll drink too much again, do something impulsive, something they’ll all regret.
She’d enlisted Keith’s help, but he’d been just as ineffective as she was. Adam doesn’t listen to either one of them anymore. Keith avoids her, and she wanders around the silent house, waiting anxiously for Adam to come home.
* * *
—
On Sunday morning, Webb and Moen are at the station when one of the officers approaches Webb and says, “Sir, there’s a Becky Harris here to see you. She says it’s important.”
They escort Becky Harris into an interview room. Webb notes the change in her; the first time she came to the station she was nervous and tearful, afraid that her marital indiscretions would become known. Now she looks more composed, more wary. Like she has far more to lose. Or like she has something to
bargain with.
“Can I get you anything?” Moen asks.
Becky shakes her head. “No, thank you.”
“What brings you in?” Webb says, as they all sit down.
She looks briefly uncomfortable, but she meets his eyes and says, “There’s something I didn’t tell you, before.”
“What’s that?” he asks, remembering all the other things she didn’t tell them, before. That she and Robert Pierce were lovers. That she’d seen Amanda arguing with Paul Sharpe. What will it be today?
“It’s about Robert Pierce.” She flicks her eyes nervously between him and Moen.
“Go on.”
“That night we were together, on the Saturday the weekend that Amanda disappeared—he told me that he thought his wife was having an affair.”
“Why should we believe you?” Webb asks. She’s obviously startled by his tone. What had she been expecting, with her track record?
“Because I’m telling the truth!” she says.
“You said you were telling the truth before, too,” Webb points out, “when you told us he never said anything to you about suspecting his wife. What’s changed?” Perhaps, Webb thinks, her husband has confessed to the hotel visits with his lovely neighbor.
She gives him an annoyed look and takes a deep breath. “He told me not to tell you. He was rather intimidating about it.”
“I see.”
“He made me promise not to tell. It was—more like a threat.” She leans forward. “So you see, he did think she was cheating. He had a motive.”
“I thought you said he wouldn’t be capable of killing his wife, that he wasn’t the type?” Moen says.
“That was before he threatened me,” Becky says, sitting back and glancing at Moen. “I saw another side of him. He was—different. He scared me.”
“Anything else?” Webb says.
She looks back and forth between him and Moen and says, “Are you even interested in him as a suspect?”
“We’re interested in lots of people,” Webb says, “including your husband.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Becky says, bristling.
“Not really,” Webb says. “You see, we have security footage of your husband taking a room at a hotel with Amanda Pierce, on multiple occasions.”
* * *
—
Becky stumbles out of the police station. For a minute, she can’t remember where she parked her car. Finally, she finds it with the help of her keychain fob. She gets inside the car, out of the wind, and locks her door. She stares out the windshield, seeing nothing, breathing rapidly.
The police have video of her husband with Amanda Pierce at the hotel. She knew this would happen, as soon as he told her. The police aren’t idiots. But that stupid bastard she married is.
She has to find out the truth. She has to know, one way or another, what happened to Amanda. And then she will figure out what to do.
She stifles a sob in the front seat of her car. How did she get here? She’s just an average woman, married, with two almost-grown kids, living in the suburbs. It’s unbelievable that she’s caught up in this—nightmare. A woman she barely knew has been murdered by either her own husband or Becky’s husband. If it was Robert, she no longer cares. No—she hopes he’s caught and convicted, the bastard. If it was her husband, Larry—she can’t even think about that right now.
TWENTY-FOUR
Early Sunday afternoon Carmine finds herself going for another walk around the neighborhood. She’s spent the last week talking to everyone she can about the break-in. In the grocery store. At her yoga class. She’s frustrated that nobody else admits to having been broken into. It bothers her that she appears to be the only one. Maybe it was a lie, that there were others. Maybe it was just her. Maybe she has been targeted, the object of some kind of prank. If so, it makes it more personal. Is it, she wonders, because she’s new here? An outsider? She’s more determined than ever to turn the tables on this teenage creep.
She’s pretty sure that Olivia Sharpe is the woman who wrote the letter. But she’s not going to approach her again—at least, not for now. She’s going to talk to her son, Raleigh. She’s been asking around about him. By all accounts, he’s a nice kid. A whiz with computers. He even had a little business last summer offering to fix people’s computers. She wonders if he did any snooping then.
She knocks on the door of 50 Finch and a sullen-looking teenage boy answers. She recognizes him immediately as the drunken boy at the end of her driveway the other night. She can tell by his wary expression that he recognizes her, too. But she’s not going to mention it. He’s got dark hair and eyes and he definitely reminds her of Luke at that age. She asks him if their house has been broken into recently, but he just looks at her as if she’s grown two heads. So instead she asks him if he knows of any local boys around his age who might be good with computers; she’s having problems with hers. Sure enough, he suggests Raleigh Sharpe.
At that moment a woman arrives at the door wiping her hands on a dish towel. She has short auburn hair and freckles and a pleasant expression. “Hello, can I help you?” she asks, as the boy slinks back inside.
“Hi, my name is Carmine.” She holds her hand out. “I’m new to the neighborhood. I’m at Number Thirty-two.”
The woman gives her a smile, shakes her hand and says, “I’m Glenda.”
“My kids are all grown,” Carmine says, trying to make conversation. “Nice-looking boy you have.” She’s not going to say where she’s met her son before. “Do you have other kids?” she asks.
“No, just Adam,” the woman says. She doesn’t seem to want to talk. She probably wants to get back to her dishes.
“I was broken into recently and I’ve been going around talking to people, telling them to be on their guard. There was no one home here last time I knocked.”
“Well, we haven’t been broken into,” the woman says rather abruptly, her pleasant expression disappearing.
Lucky you, Carmine thinks. “That’s good,” she says, hiding her disappointment. “Awful about that murder,” Carmine says, thinking this will get the woman talking. She leans in conspiratorially. “People seem to think that her husband did it.” She adds, “Do you know him?”
“No, I don’t.”
“I actually knocked on his door, just to find out if he’s been broken into. I didn’t have the nerve to say anything about his wife. But he hasn’t.”
“Well, it’s nice meeting you,” the woman named Glenda says and shuts the door firmly.
* * *
—
The phone rings, shattering the quiet. Olivia jumps. She grabs the phone in the kitchen, hoping it’s Glenda. “Hello,” she says.
“Mrs. Sharpe?”
She recognizes the voice. It’s Detective Webb. Her heart immediately starts to pound. “Yes?” she says.
“Is your husband there?”
Wordlessly, she hands the phone to Paul, who is standing in the kitchen watching her. He takes the phone from her.
“What? Now?” Paul says. Then, “Fine.”
Olivia feels a sickening jolt of adrenaline.
Paul hangs up the phone and turns to her. “They want me to come down to the police station. To answer some more questions.”
She tastes the acid in her throat. “Why?”
“They didn’t say.”
She watches him put on his jacket and leave the house. He doesn’t ask her to come with him, and she doesn’t suggest it.
Once he’s gone, Olivia gives in to her anxiety, pacing restlessly around the house, unable to quiet her mind. Why do the police want to talk to Paul again?
“Mom, what’s wrong?”
She turns and sees Raleigh watching her with concern. She imagines how wretched she must look, caught off-guard. She smiles at him. “It’s nothing, honey,” she lies. She makes a
sudden decision. “I just have to go out for a bit.”
“Where are you going?”
“I have to visit a friend who’s going through a hard time.”
“Oh,” Raleigh says, as if not quite satisfied. He moves over to the refrigerator and opens the door. “Are you feeling okay?” he asks. “When will you be back?”
“I’m fine. I’m not sure exactly when I’ll be back,” Olivia says, “but definitely in time for supper.”
* * *
—
Raleigh is up in his bedroom when the phone rings. He wonders who’s calling. Both his parents are out. Maybe it’s one of his friends, reduced to looking up the family’s landline number because he still doesn’t have his phone.
He makes it downstairs to the kitchen in time to snatch the phone off the hook. “Hello?” he says.
“Hi.” It’s a woman’s voice. “May I speak to Raleigh Sharpe?”
“Speaking,” he says, suspicious.
“I’m having some problems with my computer and a neighbor told me that you might be able to help. You fix computers, don’t you?”
“Yeah, sure,” Raleigh says, thinking fast. He didn’t have many clients last summer, after he distributed his flyers; he certainly didn’t expect anybody to call now. But he’s happy to earn some spare cash and he’s got time on his hands. “What’s the problem?”
“Well, I don’t know,” she says. “Can you come have a look at it?”
“Sure. Now?”
“If you can, that would be great.”
“What’s your address?”
“It’s a laptop. I thought we could meet in a coffee shop. Do you know the Bean?”
“Yeah, sure.” He wouldn’t normally be caught dead in there, but he can make an exception.
