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It’s a horribly blunt question for a woman who’s recentlylost her husband, but Emma suddenly senses that it’s not only grief that’s tearing Lilly up inside.
Lilly scoffs. “Mighthave been? By the beginning of this year, I’d figured out he was a total womanizer, and since he died, I’ve been learning the full extent of it. Though it seems totally masochistic, knowing more is helping me feel like less of a fool. Turns out there was even a woman in Bonaire with him when he died.”
“Oh god, how awful.”
“I know, and it makes the situation so... so complicated right now. People assume I’m nearly prostrate with grief, but it’s something else entirely—a whole mixed bag of anger and sadness and disappointment. And then all the guilt I feel for not mourning him twenty-four seven.”
Emma can’t believe what she’s hearing. It’s like an echo from her own mind.
“Had you thought about leaving him?”
“More than thought. Before Chris took off for Bonaire, I told him I was filing for divorce in the next few weeks. So now I have that to contend with, too—that I somehow woke up the karma gods and set his death in motion.”
“You can’t think that way, Lilly. And isn’t karma supposed to be aboutbalance, anyway? If it was really at work here, Chris would have come home alive and well to find you in bed with Ryan Gosling.”
Lilly chuckles. “Thank you for that, Emma. I’m sorry to be dumping all this on you. But I needed you to know why I asked such a batshit crazy question.”
“I’m glad youdiddump it on me. Because... because I’ve gone through something similar.” She takes a breath andexhales loudly. Finally, after all this time, she’s about to utter the truth. “Derrick was a real prick to me, and though I’m sorry he lost his life so young and so brutally, I’ve never missed him, even for a second. I had to fake my grief, too.”
It takes her a couple of seconds to realize that tears of relief are running down her cheeks. Lilly lays a hand on top of Emma’s.
“I really appreciate you sharing that with me. Maybe we could start a support group—the Unwailing Widows.”
Emma smiles softly. “Count me in.”
“How long has it been? About two years, right?”
“Yeah, two years ago this past March. Strangely enough, on my way here just now, I was a stone’s throw from the alley where he died, which I’d visited only once. It’s a couple of blocks north, next to a parking garage on Greene Street.”
Lilly bites her lip and swivels slightly in her chair to gaze out of one of the oversized windows. “I knew the murder happened downtown,” she says finally, “but I wasn’t aware it was that close to our apartment.”
And then, in an instant, Lilly’s expression morphs from pensive to stricken, and Emma feels the skin on the back of her neck prickle.
“Is everything okay?” she asks gently.
“It’s probably nothing, but Chris was supposed to get together with Derrick here the day before he died.”
Emma hears the words, but they’re sliding across her mind like a car on ice, failing to gain traction. “I’m sorry,what?”
“They had a plan to have coffee here at the apartment on Friday morning. The reason I remember it so specifically isbecause we heard about Derrick’s death just a couple of days later.”
The revelation almost knocks the wind out of her, but Emma manages another question. “And did they?” she says. “Meet?”
“No, Chris canceled on him at the last minute, supposedly because of a work emergency, which was so typical of him. But I think Derrick might have already been in the neighborhood when he got the call.”
“Oh my god.” One question has finally been answered after more than two long years. “Well, that solves a part of the mystery.”
“What do you mean?”
“Derrick was attending a conference in Midtown that weekend and no one’s ever understood why he parked so far away from the hotel where it was being held. I bet he picked a garage near here because of his meeting with Chris. After Chris canceled, Derrick must have jumped on the subway rather than bothering to drive the car uptown.”
Lilly groans. “I feel terrible. Chris had a piece of the puzzle all this time.”
Itisa piece of the puzzle, Emma thinks, one she’d never imagined despite how much she racked her brain. It’s not like Derrick and Chris had been close, after all, and she certainly hadn’t considered him making a stop before the conference. She’ll have to inform Webster, though Emma doubts a canceled appointment could shed much light on a murder that happened over thirty hours later.
“You can’t blame yourself, Lilly,” Emma says. “Andbesides, it still doesn’t explain another key mystery—why he came back down to the garage the next night.”
“He wasn’t picking up his car to go home?”
