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Drex turned to Gif. “Relay all that to Locke. Their guys can do the fact-checking.”
Gif left the room to make the call. Drex glanced at the clock. “Menundez texted that Rudkowski is going to interview you downtown at police headquarters.” He looked her over, taking in her dishabille. “You’ll need to be ready in twenty minutes or so in order for Mike and Gif to get you there by ten o’clock.” He pushed back his chair and stood.
“Aren’t you coming with us?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“I’ve got other things to do.”
She stood up. “Such as?”
“Such as going after your husband without being hamstrung by red tape. Good luck.”
“Wait. What’s going to happen with this Rudkowski?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“Guess,” she said tartly.
“Well, if I were to guess, he’ll spend most of today taking turns grilling you hard, then leaving you alone for long stretches of time to search your conscience, to ruminate on and perhaps reassess your position. Don’t say a word unless a lawyer is with you.”
“You’re worried about my welfare?”
“No, I’m worried about testimony being tossed out because it was obtained without counsel present. Rudkowski may claim you as the feds’ own, but if Locke is also allowed to interrogate you, he’ll be the good cop. Menundez is young and yet to prove himself, so you can probably count on him to be tougher. But you probably won’t see anyone familiar. Except your lawyer. I hope you have a good one.”
“What about them?” She indicated Mike, who was inspecting what was left of the doughnut selection, and Gif, who’d just returned and announced that Rudkowski’s plane had landed.
In answer to her question, Drex said, “The three of us are out of Rudkowski’s favor and unsure what form his payback will take. Could be a slap on the wrist, or much harsher discipline. Mike and Gif have volunteered to face his wrath and that of the bureau, giving me a head start tracking down your lawfully wedded husband.”
“Who could be dead!”
“He isn’t.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do. Furthermore, so do you, Talia.”
“I know no such thing.”
“Come on. You don’t believe for a second that he’s foundering out there in the ocean, praying for rescue. Know how we know? Tell her, Gif.”
The other man said, “If you thought that your husband was in a struggle to survive a watery grave, you would be hysterical.”
Drex rounded the table and bore down on her so that she had to grab hold of the back of her chair to maintain her balance. “Hysterical. As in out of your mind. Frantic. You’d be tearing at your hair and raising hell with the Coast Guard, with every damn body, to find him, save my husband.” He leaned in closer, and added softly, “You haven’t.”
She angled away from him, but he only made a countermove to keep his face within inches of hers. “When you were told there was a man at the helm of Elaine’s boat, and I was ruled out, it was no mystery to you who it was. Which leaves Mike, Gif, and me, and all the other cops working this case, with only two possible conclusions.
“One, you knew who the man was all along because you two conspired to kill Elaine. Or,” he said, slapping his palm against the file lying on the table, “you believe Jasper Ford is the latest incarnation of our man. You believe he harmed these eight women. Now nine. He befriended them, robbed them, killed them, and disposed of them.”
She hi
ccupped a sob. “I don’t want to believe it.”
“But you do, don’t you?”
Drex was stirring her long-held, secret fear that she didn’t really know her husband. Ambiguities and uncertainties, which she had staved off, rationalized, chalked up to an illicit affair, and even taken blame for, were now closing in on her. They were so cruel and frightening, she tried to keep them at bay. “What evidence do you have against him?”
