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Emma shrugs, indicating she doesn’t have a clue. Does Webster really expect her to announce she’s had some bombshell epiphany in the past twenty-seven months but failed to share it with the police?
Webster says nothing, just crosses her arms and appearsto wait, her body language suggesting that if Emma only thinks a bit harder, something will come to her.
“The only thing I wondered since,” Emma adds, caving into the pressure, “is that maybe he’d forgotten something in the car and went down there to retrieve it. The police did find Derrick’s camera in the glove compartment, but there didn’t seem to be any reason he would have gone all the way downtown for it. He could have used his phone to take pictures at the conference.”
“Right,” Webster says, still looking dissatisfied. “How long had you and Derrick been married?”
“Two years—and we’d dated for almost two years prior to that.”
“So you were”—she glances down—“about twenty-nine when you met?”
Emma nods. “Right.”
“Was it a happy marriage?”
Has the detective decided to dispense with social niceties? Emma’s stomach clutches again, and though her first instinct is to look away, she manages to wrestle it down.
“I thought so.” She decides to get something on the table right then and there, especially since it would be in the file anyway. “The police asked me at one point if I thought he’d been having an affair and had headed downtown to meet someone, but I never had any reason to suspect he’d been unfaithful.”
Another lie—of sorts. He’d had a colleague named Zoe who he’d grown increasingly flirty with, at least according to the texts Emma had stolen a glance at (i.e., Him:You had every guy in the room eating out of the palm of yourhand; Her:Is that right? Are you including yourself in that group?; Him:I’m going to plead the Fifth on that one.Her:Hmmm.). Though Emma didn’t think they’d crossed the line, she’d assumed a fling might be in the cards.
She realizes that Webster must be aware of the texts, too, but she doesn’t mention them, and Emma’s hardly going to volunteer the information. It wouldn’t be smart to come across as a woman who snooped on her husband—especially one who had reason to be boiling mad at him.
Emma waits as Webster thumbs through her notes again. The detective hasn’t brought up Emma and Derrick’s financial situation, but that’s not surprising because there was never any there there. Their net worth as a couple consisted mainly of a house with a fairly large mortgage, two small 401(k)s, and a very modest, pretty young investment portfolio. They also hadn’t gotten around to buying life insurance, all of which meant Emma lacked a big financial reason to kill her husband.
There was one detail that must have piqued the cops’ interest, at least initially: At the age of forty, Derrick was due to come into a decent-sized trust fund set up by his late parents, who had died in a single-engine plane crash a few years before Emma and Derrick met. But their will decreed that if Derrick married and predeceased his wife, the money would go to several charities the parents had supported.
There was also the matter of the paintings: the Rands had left each of their three children two very expensive pieces from their collection. Derrick inherited an oil-on-paper work by Mark Rothko and a painting by Helen Frankenthaler. That had actually been part of the reason he’d wanted to hosta party—the house was finally decorated and the paintings hung.
When Derrick’s estate was sorted out, according to the terms of the Rands’ will, the Frankenthaler went to his sister, and the Rothko to Kyle. His brother immediately willed his to a museum, getting a very nice tax write-off but no money in his pocket.
Webster’s voice snaps her back to attention. “Just one more question, and then I think we’re done for now.”
Thank god, Emma thinks. She can’t bear another second of this.
“Your husband left on Friday morning for the conference, and the first time you spoke to him was when he called you Saturday evening. Is there a reason the two of you weren’t in touch before then?”
A faint siren sounds in Emma’s head, like a car alarm she’s hearing from a block away. She’d been questioned at the time about the Saturday night phone call, but the cops had focused on what Derrick had said during it, whether his words revealed any clue to why his life was about to be snuffed out. None of them had seemed troubled by the frequency of their contact as a couple that weekend.
“No particular reason. We’d talked Friday morning before he left and then, um, I guess we both got busy.”
“And there was no time to even send a text?” Webster smiles, her expression pleasant this time. “It’s just that most couples I know don’t seem to go a full day without texting.”
The urge to look away is too strong this time, and in spite of herself Emma glances toward the window, then forces her gaze back at the detective
“I don’t remember not texting, but if that’s what the records show, they must be right.”
Webster shifts slightly, uncrossing her legs. “Here’s something I’d love your thoughts on,” she says finally. “An idea I’ve been toying with a bit since I took over the case. Let’s say your husband actually did park downtown for the reason you suggested—to avoid Midtown traffic. What if he went back down there that night to pick up his car and drive home, back to New Jersey?”
“Home?” Emma asks. She has no idea where Webster’s going with this. “But the conference still had a half day to go.”
“I’m wondering whether after speaking to you on the phone, he felt a sudden desire to come home. Maybe he realized he missed you and wanted to surprise you. Or perhaps you two had had some kind of slight misunderstanding during the call, and he wanted to address it in person?”
“Uh, no, there was nothing like that,” Emma says, trying not to sound flustered, though she can feel blood pooling in her cheeks. “He told me he was enjoying himself, that the speakers were good. He didn’t mention anything about coming home.”
Webster nods, but less like she’s agreeing with Emma, and more like she’s weighing her words on a scale, then stuffs her notebook back into her bag. “All right, it was only a theory. Thank you very much for your help. I’ll let you get back to your evening.”
Get back to her evening,right. What kind of evening is she supposed to have after this conversation?
