Lie to Me

by J. T. Ellison

  Ivy came into the kitchen, so quietly they didn’t hear her until she said, “Ethan, you need to tell them everything.”

  Ethan saw the cops both start slightly.

  “Ma’am?” Graham asked.

  “We are very concerned Sutton may have harmed herself. She has been having a hard time lately,” Ivy said.

  “Mr. Montclair mentioned things have been tenuous with her.”

  “Tenuous. That’s a good term. She’s been on edge, upset, angry, and crying.”

  Ethan shot Ivy a glance. Whose side are you on here?

  “What’s had her upset, ma’am?”

  “What hasn’t? I mean really, can you blame her? First her baby, then her career? Anyone would be laid low. Sutton is a brilliant artist. She’s sensitive.”

  Ethan stepped closer to Ivy, put his hand on her shoulder. “Ivy and Sutton are very close. She’s been helping me search for Sutton.”

  Officer Graham looked at him again, this time with wariness on her lovely face. He dropped his hand, in case it looked bad. He wouldn’t want her to think there was anything untoward happening with Ivy.

  “Was she suicidal? Being treated with medication?”

  “Not now. No. Other than the incident with her publisher, she’s been fine.” A lame word, fine. What did it really mean?

  “If she’s fine, recovered from these two blows, as Ms. Brookes calls them, why do you think she harmed herself? Why now? Why not right after the baby died, or when she lost her contract?”

  He took a deep breath. “It’s confusing for me, too. Sutton went off the rails after Dashiell died. Not that I blamed her. She was very distraught.”

  “And how were you after this unfortunate incident, Mr. Montclair? Did you cope well with your son’s death?”

  The police officer had pretty eyes, hazel, changeable. They’d softened when she’d heard about Dashiell’s death. She wore the barest hint of pink lipstick. He wondered what she was like in the sack. She seemed like she might be a wild one. The sweet ones usually were; she had that look.

  “I coped,” he said, cringing a bit at how sharp he sounded. “It was difficult, of course. You shouldn’t have to bury a child. Not only did I lose Dashiell, I lost Sutton, as well. After the baby...died, she went to a very dark place. We feared for her life. Then this fuss with the reviewer happened. We had to have her committed. Please keep that between us. She is very ashamed of her breakdown. Very upset. It’s been a difficult time. But she’d managed to pull herself back from the brink. She was getting better.”

  Ivy shifted next to him. “I think we’re all simply concerned she wasn’t bouncing back the way we thought. She could hide her despair very well when she needed to.”

  The young cop tapped her finger against her gun strap. Tap, tap, tap. It was the sergeant who said, “Mr. Montclair, please be straight with us. Do you think your wife is taking a break from the marriage, or are you reporting her missing because you’re afraid she may have harmed herself?”

  Ethan heaved out a sigh. “Officers, let me be very clear. I don’t know. I don’t know anything anymore.”

  He cracked then, finally. The tears began. “I can’t lose her, Officers. Not after losing Dashiell, too. Please, help me find my wife.”

  H. Graham held out a hand as if to touch him, to comfort him, but stopped, realizing it made her look unprofessional.

  Robinson came to life in the corner. “I think this should cover it. What do you say, Roy? Should we mount a search? Might put everyone’s minds at ease.”

  Moreno looked from Ethan to Robinson and back again. “We’ll look into this and get back to you. No sense wasting resources if the lady doesn’t want to be found.”

  “Fair enough, fair enough.”

  Hands were shaken, cards exchanged. They took Sutton’s laptop and datebook. Glanced around a few more times while they stood on the porch.

  When the door shut on the cops, Robinson turned to Ethan. “You idiot. I told you. You’re completely screwed.”

  THE INVESTIGATION BEGINS

  “Tell me, Holly. Do you believe him?”

  Sergeant Roy Moreno was head of the homicide unit, and Holly Graham’s current superior officer, about six times removed, seeing as she was a simple patrol officer, and he was in charge of homicide. He was her superior, in all ways. Moreno knew a lot about this town, about investigations, and lucky for her, had shown an interest in her from the beginning. Not in the creepy way some of her fellow cops had, but a sincere interest in her as a person and an investigator. It was her dad’s doing, probably.Derek Graham was a well-respected district attorney, but who cared? Holly was getting a chance to work with the old horse directly, and that was going to be nothing but good for her career.

  The old horse in question was currently sucking on a toothpick, staring out of the windshield of the patrol car. The laptop between them glowed. They were parked in the lot of the five-star Mexican joint down the street from the Montclairs’ lovely home, having rolled away just as a news truck came sharking around the corner. She watched the truck pull to a stop at the curb. Heading to the Montclairs’ gorgeous Victorian mansion, perhaps? The media in Nashville were very good at ferreting out drama, and the missing wife of a major author was bound to pique their curiosity.

  “Should we do something about that?”

  She glanced over at Moreno. Not only an old warhorse, a veteran of the force, he was a genuinely good man. She was lucky to have him riding with her to do some investigative training. His son was on the force, too, a few years ahead of Holly.

  “Montclair’s a big boy. Let him handle them. I asked you a question.”

  “He’s very believable. But I also think he knows a lot more than he’s saying. Something wasn’t right in that house. Did you see the bloodstain on the counter near the refrigerator?”

  “I did.”

  “It’s in the kitchen, so anything could have happened, from a nosebleed to a knife cut. It was such a small amount, and it was old, it had been there for a while. Who knows? We’ll have to pull the incident reports, look at the details on the domestics. But add in a deceased child, the wife’s supposed history of mental illness, the husband being a minor celebrity, a recent online kerfuffle, and the fact that he hired one of the best criminal defense attorneys in the state before he called us? There are so many angles we can take it’s not funny.”

  “Robinson being there made me sit up and take notice, too. Makes him look guilty as sin.”

  “I don’t know, Sarge. This day and age, people are always thinking three steps ahead. And like Robinson said, he’s a friend of the Montclairs.”

  “You’re right. So. What do you suggest we do?”

  “First, we put Sutton Montclair in the missing persons database, let the MP detectives see what they can find on her. Check her passport, bank accounts, tear apart their lives a little bit. I want to find out more about the online situation with the reviewer. Stalkers have hurt people before.”

  Moreno looked over at her. “You think she was telling the truth that her account was hacked?”

  “No idea. But it’s worth a look. Might explain where she went, or if she was in danger, where she’s been taken.”

  “What’s your gut say? Do you think she’s missing, or that she’s being held against her will somewhere, or she got sick of the pretty boy and her pretty life and hoofed it?”

  “Too early to make a proper assessment, sir. Like I said, something doesn’t jibe. I’d like to know more, about them both, before I make any decisions about what might or might not have happened.”

  “It’s probably just a domestic gone wrong. She’s tired of the fighting and takes off. Might even have a piece on the side who helped. It’s been known to happen.”

  Holly tapped her pen against her teeth. “I don’t know, Sar
ge. Not to play devil’s advocate, but if she’d really left him, why would he talk to a lawyer and bring us in? He knows we’ll be digging into everything. He knows any investigation on our part will draw attention. Is he doing it for personal gain, wanting his fifteen minutes in the spotlight? Did he hurt her, but he’s clever and wants to look innocent? I don’t know, but toward the end I got the sense that he was truly distraught and feared for her life.

  “Sutton Montclair may not want to be found, she may have wandered off, may have hurt herself, or she may have been kidnapped. We don’t have all the pieces of the puzzle, but I don’t think he killed her, either. It felt like he really was worried for her.”

  “But?”

  “He didn’t tell us everything. I think we should keep looking at him, hard. Find out what he’s holding back. The friend seemed pretty concerned. If he’d kept the friends out of the loop, I’d lean more toward he hurt her, but that he was worried enough to call in someone who was close to his wife tells me there’s something here. I can’t help coming back to the idea that if he did something and didn’t want to get caught, why would he put himself under such scrutiny? I mean, I know it’s the way psychopaths operate, for the thrill of it all, but he didn’t strike me as a psychopath. Only a man looking for answers.”

  Moreno took the toothpick out of his mouth, wrapped it in a napkin, and stashed it inside his empty Starbucks cup. Stared out the windshield some more. Holly knew he was a thinker; she’d grown accustomed to his silences while they worked.

  Finally, he said, “I like how you think, Graham. I like that you’re not jumping to conclusions because of what he’s told you, or because Robinson was there. So we’re going to play this a bit unorthodoxly. You’ve had excellent training, and you have a background in this, with your dad’s work with the DA’s office. We all know what your trajectory holds. You’re only a few steps from plainclothes, and every uniform wants their chance to play detective, so this is your go at it. I want you to run the case as it moves forward. I think you made a connection with Montclair, and it might pay off later in this investigation.”

  Holly couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Yes, she was going to be a detective, everyone expected it, and she wanted it, bad. It just wasn’t supposed to happen for another year. But if Moreno wanted to bump her up the line, she wasn’t going to quibble.

  “Of course, sir. I’m happy to.”

  “We’ll give it a few days. See what shakes out. Sound like something you can handle?”

  “It is, sir. Not to look a gift horse in the mouth, but why me?”

  Moreno smiled at her, his eyes crinkling with good humor. “When you’re a full-fledged detective, you’ll figure it out soon enough, Officer Graham. I’ll tell you this, when a suspect makes a connection with an officer, we don’t ignore it. Now, get to work. I want everything you can find on the Montclairs by morning.”

  READ ALL ABOUT IT

  It happened like a lightning strike, fast and furious and devastating. Somehow, the whole world knew Sutton Montclair was missing.

  The reporters started calling and knocking and ringing the doorbell and peering over the backyard fence about twenty minutes after the police and Robinson and Ivy left.

  Ivy had reassured Ethan as she walked out the door. “It’s going to be okay. We’ll find her. I’ll talk to the girls, dig around, see if anyone’s talked to her. They might be more willing to open up to me instead of you.” He hadn’t seen her since. Robinson hadn’t called. He’d been so alone, just him and the bottle, and the intrepid media seizing the meaty story in their carnivorous jaws.

  The fucking reporters, who were much more interested in the news of Sutton Montclair going missing than the police were, wouldn’t leave him alone. He didn’t want to answer the phone—what if Sutton called?—but he had no choice.

  So he drank, and shouted no comment into the phone. Every time it rang, he answered with a breathless, “Sutton?” Every time, it was a stranger. New voices, same requests.

  “Mr. Montclair? This is Tiffany Hock from NewsChannel 5. We understand your wife has been reported missing, and we’ve been trying to reach you, we’d really like to speak with you—”

  He didn’t even bother saying no comment, just hung up. Moments later, the phone rang again. He eyed it like it might poison him. Lifted the receiver. It was a man this time.

  “Ethan Montclair? Tim Mappes, New York Times. I understand your wife, Sutton Montclair, is missing. Would you like to give me a comment?”

  Click.

  The doorbell rang. He could hear someone calling his name, a strange woman’s voice. “Mr. Montclair? Mr. Montclair? Will you come talk to us?”

  Holy Christ, he was under siege.

  You knew this would happen, didn’t you, Sutton? You knew the whole world would want to find you. Well played, wife.

  Finally, exhausted, drunk, but unable to sleep, he turned off the ringer, took one of Sutton’s Xanax, and passed out cold for a few hours.

  * * *

  Ethan woke to a blinding headache. The front of the house was dark. He’d passed out on the couch.

  Smart move, idiot.

  He groaned as he sat up, perched on the edge of the couch with his feet on the floor and his head in his hands until the worst waves of nausea passed. Managed to make it to the kitchen and put on some tea. Popped three Advil, drank a bottle of water. The kettle took forever to boil. When it started whistling, pain rippled through his head.

  He needed...something. Help. Support. Getting pissed and passing out wasn’t going to solve things. The media wasn’t simply going to walk away because he told them to. There was a story here, and everyone knew it.

  The phone was sitting quietly on the counter, innocuous. He picked it up, ignoring the wave of burning bile that forced its way into his throat, and turned the ringer back on. It started to ring immediately. This number he recognized, and wasn’t entirely unwanted.

  “Hullo, Bill.”

  “Hullo? That’s all you have? Where the fucking hell have you been? I’ve been trying to call you for two hours!”

  “Asleep. Drunk. Like most normal people.”

  “It’s been half a day, Ethan. You’re not a normal person, and you’re definitely not in a normal situation. The New York Times is printing a story about Sutton being missing. Since you’ve been ignoring me, I have a flight to Nashville first thing in the morning. We have to coordinate a plan, figure out how we present this—”

  “Would you calm down? It’s my wife who’s missing.”

  “And I’m your agent. You should have called me the minute you realized this was turning into a story. I could have helped. You really don’t have any idea where she is?”

  Shafts of light cruised across the kitchen, first there, then gone, then back again, fading. The beams from the news trucks as they shuffled positions out on the street. The on-again, off-again light reminded him of the past few months with Sutton. If only he could count on the clouds parting. He managed a sip of tea.

  “For Christ’s sake, Bill, if I knew where she was I wouldn’t have called the police to start looking for her.”

  “You called the police?”

  Ethan hadn’t known a man could shriek, but Bill had just offered a full-fledged shout that would make a pterodactyl proud.

  “And a lawyer.”

  Bill started moaning into the phone.

  “Listen to me. Sutton left a very ominous note. I am worried sick. I’m worried she may have hurt herself. She asked for time, but now...something’s not right. She left everything behind, and...it feels wrong. She’s been gone too long. I had to involve the authorities. I needed help. So get off my back.”

  “Bullshit. She’s just trying to hurt you. She could be holed up with some lover, laughing up her sleeve while the police make a case against you. We gott
a get out in front of this. Right now.”

  Ethan rolled his eyes. “Bill, you read too many novels. There is nothing to get out in front of. I’ve done nothing wrong, and neither has Sutton. It’s been a bad time for us both. She’s had a lot to deal with, and I’m praying all she’s done is take off for a few days, like her note said.”

  “There’s your quote. I’ll call the Times, say that exactly.”

  “No story. Seriously. You have to quash it. I can’t face the scrutiny.”

  “It’s too late. And it sells books, buddy.”

  “You didn’t just say that to me. Go away, Bill. Make sure the story isn’t run. Don’t come down. I’ll call if I have news.”

  He hung up. The phone rang immediately. He debated for a moment, then turned off the ringer again. Drank some more tea. Foraged in the refrigerator, found some prosciutto-and-mozzarella wraps. He needed fuel. The idea of eating was repugnant, especially with the constant visions of Sutton lying dead and broken in a ditch that inundated him, but he’d do her no good drunk and empty.

  Ethan ate. He looked out the window. The media were still lined up, camera lights on, beautiful young reporters fluffing their hair and straightening their ties. The local evening news was about to start.

  He debated for a few moments: Turn it on? See what Sutton had wrought?

  Then: Dashiell.

  The thought of his dead son, of the things the reporters would be saying, made him want to crawl right out of his skin. Bolts of panic shuddered through his body. He was stuck in the house; he knew the moment he tried to step foot outdoors, the media would pounce on him. Stuck, trapped in this moment in time, unable to walk away, unable to function. He simply didn’t know what to do.

  He watched the scrum of reporters on his front step. He decided to stay away from the TV, decided against any internet reading. He was afraid what he might see there. Himself cast as the villain. Sutton, his beautiful Sutton, dragged across the coals again. The baby, resurrected and killed, all over again.