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Celeste
It’s the young cop,his dark skin shining with perspiration as he stands on my porch, struggling to keep his face impassive.
Don’t ever play poker, Officer Montrell Coleman. You’ll lose your shirt.
I glance behind him for his older partner, but again, the young man is alone, his colleague abandoning him to this task.
“Yes?” I inject a note of hope in my voice, and when his face spasms, I regret the cruelty of letting him think I might actually believe he’s come with good news.
“We found Mr. Garey,” he says.
I must perk up even more... because his face contorts in fresh spasms, his eyes widening.
“No,” he says quickly. “I mean, we didn’t find...” He squares his shoulders. “May I come in, Ms. Turner?”
I step aside, and he walks into the cool, dark house.
“What did you...?” I trail off and swallow.
He faces me, meeting my gaze. “I regret to inform you that we’ve discovered Mr. Garey’s body.”
“W-where?”
His gaze slides to the rear of the house. Then he says, “I’m not at liberty to say, exactly, ma’am, but it was in the wetlands out back.”
“What happened?”
“An autopsy will be required to determine that.”
“Is there anything...? Anything I need to...? Should I be going somewhere to ID the body? He doesn’t have family in Florida. His ex-wife lives in Tampa, but I’m not sure that’s appropriate.”
“We may need you to identify him, but we’re examining our options right now. Hopefully, you won’t need to do that.”
“It was... bad, then?”
He assures me that he simply meant viewing any dead body can be traumatic. I note that he does not say the body isn’t in bad shape. I can only imagine what snacked on it during the twenty-four hours it lay out in the wild.
No open casket for you, Liam.
Young Montrell is still fumbling with vague reassurances when his partner shows up, having allotted enough time for Officer Coleman to do the shit job of telling the grieving girlfriend.
Asshole.
There are more questions then. The same ones I answered yesterday, allegedly to see whether I’ve remembered something new, but also checking whether my answers have changed. I stick to the facts of my story, but I add a few details that I’ve remembered since.
After they retread the ground preceding Liam’s disappearance, they launch into the new questions. Had he argued with anyone recently? Complained of trouble? Mentioned an unhappy client? I answer as best I can. Liam was a lawyer who practiced criminal law and took on the worst his firm had to offer because he wasn’t easily spooked.
“I worry—” I swallow. “Worried about him sometimes. The sort of people he defended. He always said that’s where the money is.”
Officer Coleman nods.
“I guess he was right,” I say. “He certainly was doing well for himself. I know he never complained about paying alimony. He bought the Rover a few months ago. He has his Tampa condo and an oceanfront place in St. Pete Beach. He sent me a hundred-dollar bottle of scotch the other day. Definitely good money, even if his clientele made me nervous.”
The officers exchange a look.
Officer Coleman asks more questions, prodding further into Liam’s finances while his partner finger-taps with impatience.
Sorry, Officer... I read his name tag. Mazur, is it? I fear, Officer Mazur, your young partner’s career is going to shoot past yours. I suspect that’s the way you like it, though. Train the new dogs and watch them zoom on to bigger, better—and more stressful—jobs.
