by Harlan Coben
That got Kierce's attention. "What are you talking about?"
"Never mind." Maya rose and started toward the exit. "Look, you guys waste time any way you want. I'm going to pick up my daughter."
*
They'd impounded her car.
"You got a warrant already?" Maya asked.
Curly handed it to her.
"Fast," she said.
Curly shrugged.
Kierce said, "I'll give you a ride."
"No, thanks."
Maya paged a taxi from her smartphone. It arrived in ten minutes. When she got back to her house, she grabbed the other car--Joe's car--and headed to Claire and Eddie's house.
Eddie was at the front door before she reached it. "So?"
She stayed in the doorway and told him about the night. Behind Eddie, she could see Alexa playing with Lily. She thought about Alexa and Daniel. Such good kids. Maya was result-oriented. You have good kids, you were probably good parents. Did Claire deserve all the credit for that? Who, in the end, would Maya trust most to raise her daughter?
"Eddie?"
"What?"
"I kept something from you."
He looked at her.
"Philadelphia did mean something to me. It was where Andrew Burkett went to school." She filled Eddie in on that connection as well. She debated taking it one more step and telling him about seeing Joe on that nanny cam, but right now she simply couldn't see what that would add.
"So," Eddie said, when she finished, "we have three murders." He meant Claire, Joe, and newly discovered Tom Douglass. "And the only connection, as far as I can see, is Andrew Burkett."
"Yes," Maya said.
"It's obvious, isn't it, Maya? Something happened on that boat. Something so bad that, all these years later, it's still killing people."
Maya nodded.
"So who else was there that night?" Eddie asked. "Who else was on that boat?"
She thought about her email to Christopher Swain. So far, no answer. "Just some family and friends."
"Which Burketts were on board?" Eddie asked.
"Andrew, Joe, and Caroline."
Eddie rubbed his chin. "Two of them are dead."
"Yes."
"So that leaves . . . ?"
"Caroline was only a kid. What could she have done?" Maya peered behind him. Lily looked sleepy. "It's getting late, Eddie."
"Yeah, okay."
"And I need to put you on the pickup list at Lily's school," Maya said. "They won't let you take her out again unless we do that in person."
"Yeah, that Miss Kitty told me. We have to go in together and take an ID picture and all that."
"Maybe we could do that tomorrow, if you're free."
Eddie looked at Lily sleepily playing some sort of patty-cake game with Alexa. "That should work."
"Thank you, Eddie."
All three of them--Eddie, Alexa, and now Daniel--walked Maya and Lily out to the car. Lily again tried to protest their departure, but she was too tired to do it with any sort of two-year-old-tantrum effectiveness. Her eyes were closed by the time Maya snapped the car seat buckle into place.
On the ride home, Maya tried to shake off the dead but of course that was easier said than done. Eddie was right. Whatever was happening now had a direct link to whatever happened on that yacht seventeen years ago. It made no sense, of course, but there it was. She longed for the simplicity of Occam's razor again, but perhaps the more apropos philosophy once again came from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle via his creation Sherlock Holmes: "When you eliminate the impossible what remains, however improbable, must be the truth."
They say you can't bury the past. That was probably true, but what they really meant was that trauma ripples and echoes and somehow stays alive. It wasn't so different from what Maya was still experiencing. The trauma from that helicopter assault rippled and echoed and stayed alive, if only within her.
So go back. What was the initial trauma that started it all?
Some would say the night on the yacht, but that wasn't where it started.
What was?
Go back as far as you can. That was where the answer usually lay. And in this case, Maya could trace it back to the campus of Franklin Biddle Academy and the death of Theo Mora.
The house felt surprisingly lonely when Maya got back. She usually longed for that solace. Not tonight. Lily stayed groggy, far closer to asleep than awake, as Maya bathed and changed her. Maya secretly hoped that Lily would wake up now, that they could spend some time together, but that wasn't happening. Lily's eyes stayed closed. Maya carried her back to bed and tucked her in.
"Hey, sweetie, how about a story?"
Maya could hear the neediness in her voice, but Lily did not stir.
She stood over the bed and watched her daughter. For a moment, she felt wonderfully normal. She wanted to stay here, in this room, with her daughter. Whether that desire came from being a brave sentinel or a scared-to-be-alone mom, Maya couldn't say right now. Did it matter? She pulled up a chair and sat by the dresser near the door. For a long time, she just stared at Lily. Various emotions rose and crashed like waves at the beach. Maya didn't stop them or judge them. She just let them roll through with as little interference as possible.
She felt oddly at peace.
There was no reason to sleep. The sounds would come alive if she did. Maya knew that. Let them stay quiet a little while longer. Just sit here and watch Lily. Wouldn't that be far more restful and peaceful than hopping on that nightmarish nocturnal gerbil wheel in her head?
Maya wasn't sure how much time passed. An hour maybe. Could have been two. She hated to leave the room, even for a second, but she needed to grab her notebook and a pen. She did so quickly, suddenly afraid to have her daughter out of her sight for even a few minutes. When she came back into Lily's room, she took the same seat by the door and started to write the letters. The pen felt odd in her hand. She rarely wrote anymore. Who did? You typed your missives on a laptop and then you clicked the send button.
But not tonight. Not for this.
She was finishing up when her mobile phone vibrated. It was almost morning. She checked the caller ID and hurried to answer when she saw it was Joe's sister, Caroline.
"Caroline?"
The voice on the other end was a whisper. "I saw him, Maya."
Maya felt her blood go cold.
"He's back. I don't know how. He said he'd see you soon."
"Caroline, where are you?"
"I can't tell you. Don't tell anyone I called. Please."
"Caroline--"
The phone clicked off. Maya called the number. It went to voicemail. She didn't bother leaving a message.
Deep breaths. In and out. Flex, release . . .
She wouldn't panic. That would simply not do. She sat back down, tried to dissect the call rationally, and for maybe the first time in a very long time, things started to clear.
But that clarity didn't last long.
Maya heard a car pull into her driveway.
Caroline's voice came back to her: "He said he'd see you soon . . ."
She hurried to the window, expecting to see . . .
What exactly?
Two cars pulled up the driveway and stopped. Roger Kierce got out of his unmarked police vehicle. Curly got out of his Essex County police cruiser.
Maya turned away from the window. She took one more look at her daughter before she headed down the stairs. Fatigue was starting to fray her edges, but Maya fought through it. The end was in sight. It might be in the distance. But it was finally in view.
She didn't want them ringing the bell and waking Lily, so she opened the door as they made their approach.
"What is it?" she asked with more impatience than she intended.
"We found something," Kierce replied.
"What?"
"You're going to have to come with us."
Chapter 28
Miss Kitty managed to keep the bright smile plastered on, even though she had re
cognized the unmarked police car from Maya's first visit. Before Maya could say anything, Miss Kitty raised her hand in a stop gesture.
"No need to explain."
"Thank you."
As had quickly become customary, Lily went to Miss Kitty with no reservations. Miss Kitty opened the door to that sun-bright yellow room. The happy laughter seemed to swallow her daughter whole. Lily disappeared without so much as a backward glance at her mother.
"She's a wonderful girl," Miss Kitty said.
"Thank you."
Maya left her car in the Growin' Up lot and got into Kierce's. He tried to start a conversation during the ride, but Maya was having none of it. They drove to Newark in silence. Half an hour later, Maya was ensconced in a classic interrogation room in the county police station. There was a video camera set up on a small tripod on the table. Curly made sure that it was facing her and then switched it on. He asked her if she was willing to answer questions. She said yes. He asked her to sign a sheet indicating that. She did.
Kierce had big hands with hairy knuckles. He placed them on the table and tried to give her a "relax, it's all good" smile. Maya did not return it.
"Do you mind if we start at the beginning?" he asked.
"Yes."
"Pardon?"
"You said you have some new information," Maya said.
"That's correct."
"So why don't you start there?"
"Bear with me a second first, okay?"
Maya said nothing.
"When your husband was shot, you identified two men who you claimed tried to rob you and your husband?"
"Claimed?"
"It's just terminology, Mrs. Burkett. Do you mind if I call you Mrs. Burkett?"
"Nope. What's your question?"
"We found two men who fit those descriptions. Emilio Rodrigo and Fred Katen. We asked you to identify them, which you did to the best of your ability, but according to your testimony, they wore ski masks. As you know, we couldn't hold them, though we are prosecuting Rodrigo on a weapons charge."
"Okay."
"Before your husband's murder, did you know either Emilio Rodrigo or Fred Katen?"
Whoa. Where was he going with that? "No."
"You've never met either one of them before?"
She looked at Curly. He was a stone. Then she turned back toward Kierce. "Never."
"You're sure?"
"Yes."
"Because one theory is that it wasn't a robbery, Mrs. Burkett. One possible theory is that you hired them to kill your husband."
Maya again looked at Curly, then again back at Kierce.
"You know that's not true, Detective Kierce."
"Oh? How do I know that?"
"Two ways. One, if I had hired Emilio Rodrigo and Fred Katen, I wouldn't have identified them to the police, would I have?"
"Maybe you wanted to double-cross them."
"Sounds risky on my part, don't you think? From what I understand, the only tie you had to these two men was my testimony. If I don't say anything, you never go after them. So why would I identify them? Wouldn't it be in my best interest to keep mum?"
He had no answer to that.
"And if for some odd reason," she continued, "you do think I, what, hired them and then set them up, why would I say they wore ski masks? Wouldn't I just positively ID them so you could make the arrest?"
Kierce opened his mouth, but Maya, taking a page from Miss Kitty, stopped him with a hand gesture.
"And before you give some bullshit excuse, we both know that's not why I'm here. And before you ask how I know that, we are in Newark, not New York City. We are in the jurisdiction of Curly here--sorry, I don't remember your name."
"Essex County detective Demetrius Mavrogenous."
"Great, do you mind if I stick with Curly? But let's stop wasting all of our time, shall we? If this was about Joe's murder, we would be in your Central Park Precinct, Detective Kierce. Instead, we find ourselves in Newark, which is Essex County, the jurisdiction for Livingston, New Jersey, which was where the body of Tom Douglass was located last night."
"Not located," Kierce said, trying to regain any kind of momentum, "but found. By you."
"Yes, well, that's not new information, is it?"
She stopped and waited.
"No," Kierce finally said. "It isn't."
"Great. And I'm not under arrest, am I?"
"No, you're not."
"So stop with the games, Detective. Tell me what you found that led to my being here this morning."
Kierce looked at Curly. Curly nodded.
"Please look at the screen to your right."
There was a flat-screen television hung on the wall. Curly picked up a remote, turned it on, and a video came to life. It was from a CCTV security camera at a gas station. You could see one gas pump and, in the background, the street and a traffic light. Maya couldn't say where this gas station was located exactly, but she had a pretty good idea of where this was going. She sneaked a glance at Kierce. Kierce was watching her for a reaction.
"Hold up," Curly said, "right here."
He hit the pause button. He started to zoom in, and Maya could see her car at the red light facing right. The camera focused in toward the back of her car. "We can only make out the first two letters, but they match your license plate. Is that your car, Mrs. Burkett?"
She could argue and say that there were probably other BMWs with license plates that started with those two letters, but what was the point? "It appears to be."
Kierce nodded at Curly. Curly lifted the remote and pressed the button. The camera moved toward the passenger-door window. All eyes fell to her.
"Who is that man in the passenger seat?" Kierce asked.
There was too much glare on the window to see more than a baseball cap and a smudge that was unmistakably a person.
Maya did not reply.
"Mrs. Burkett."
She stayed silent.
"You told us last night that you were alone when you found Mr. Douglass's body, isn't that correct?"
Maya looked at the screen. "I don't see anything here that contradicts that."
"You're clearly not alone."
"And I'm clearly not at the body shop where the body was found."
"Are you telling us that this man--"
"You sure it's a man?"
"Pardon?"
"I see a smudge and a baseball cap. Women wear baseball caps."
"Who is this, Mrs. Burkett?"
She was not about to tell them about Corey Rudzinski. She had agreed to come here with them because she wanted to know what they had. Now she knew. So again she asked, "Am I under arrest?"
"No."
"Then I think it's time I left."
Kierce grinned at her. She didn't like the grin. "Maya?"
No more Mrs. Burkett.
"That's not why we brought you in."
Maya stayed where she was.
"We spoke to Mrs. Douglass, the widow. She told us about your visit."
"No secret there. I told you that last night."
"And so you did. Mrs. Douglass told us that you came because you believe that your sister, Claire, had questioned her husband. Isn't that correct?"
Maya saw no reason not to admit this. "As I already told you."
Kierce gave her the head tilt. "How did you know your sister visited Tom Douglass?"
That she didn't want to answer. Kierce had clearly expected that.
"Did you get another anonymous tip from a mystery source?"
Maya didn't answer.
"So, if I have this right, you got a tip from a mysterious source about Claire reaching out to Tom Douglass. And then you got a tip from a mysterious source about Tom Douglass's storage unit. Tell me, Maya: Did you back up either of those tips on your own?"
"What do you mean?"
"Did you have any proof your mystery source was telling the truth?"
She made a face. "Well, I know that Claire did visit Tom Douglass."
/> "Did she?"
Maya started to feel a niggling at the back of her neck.
"And while I agree Tom Douglass was indeed at the storage shed--that was certainly a good tip--your mystery source kind of left you holding the bag, wouldn't you say?"
Kierce rose and walked toward the television screen. "And I assume," Kierce said, pointing at the baseball cap smudge, "that this is your mystery source?"
Maya said nothing.
"I assume that this man--just for the fun of it, let's say it's a man; I think I see facial hair--was the one who led you to the storage shed?"
Maya folded her hands and put them on the table. "And if he did?"
"He was clearly in your car, correct?"
"So?"
"So"--Kierce came back over, placed his fists on the table, and leaned toward her--"we found blood in the trunk of your car, Mrs. Burkett."
Maya stayed perfectly still.
"Type AB-positive. The same blood type as Tom Douglass. Do you mind telling us how it got there?"
Chapter 29
They had a blood type, but the DNA test confirming that the blood in the trunk of her car belonged to Tom Douglass was still pending. There wasn't enough to hold her.
But they were getting close. Time was running out.
Kierce volunteered to drive her home. She accepted this time. For the first ten minutes of the ride, they both sat in silence. Kierce finally broke it.
"Maya?"
She stared out the window. She had been thinking about Corey Rudzinski, the man who, in a sense, started this all. Corey had been the one who released the copter combat video that started her tailspin. Again she could go back even further in time, to her actions on that very mission, to her decision to join the military, all of that. But really, what started her world unraveling, what had directly led to the deaths of Claire and Joe, was releasing that cursed tape.
Had Corey the Whistle played her?
Maya had been so anxious to get him to trust her that she had forgotten that maybe it wouldn't be wise to trust a man who had done so much to destroy her. She replayed his words in her head. Corey had said Claire had come to him, that she had reached out via his website. Maya had accepted that. But was it true? Think about it for a second. It did in some ways make sense that Claire would contact Corey and try to stop him from releasing that audio. But it also made sense, just as much sense, maybe even more sense, that Corey would reach out to Claire, that he could use the audio to either manipulate or straight-out blackmail her into gathering information on the Burketts and EAC Pharmaceuticals.
Had Corey manipulated Maya too?
Had he gone so far as to manipulate her into taking the fall for Tom Douglass's murder?
