forensic computer examiner; Ethan brought him to the game to meet with me.
Wayne Reynolds was not what I expected. In my head, computer technicians looked more like Revenge of the Nerds and less like crime show TV stars. Wayne’s burnished red hair was slightly untidy, his tie askew. The rumpledness only added to his appeal, gave him a disheveled charm that made you want to smooth his collar, brush away the loose strands of hair from his forehead. He was tall and athletic while at the same time touchable. Highly touchable.
I spent the entire forty-five minutes of our first conversation with my hands fisted by my sides so I didn’t do anything that would embarrass me.
He talked about computers. How to copy hard drives. How to analyze unused data chunks for hidden content. The importance of using the proper forensic tool.
I watched his long legs eat up the school corridor. I wondered if beneath his tan slacks, his thighs and calves were as elegantly muscled as they appeared. Did he have light reddish hair all over his body, or only on the top of his head? Would it feel as silky as it looked?
By the time we returned to the gym for the end of the basketball game, I was slightly out of breath and Ethan regarded me suspiciously. I kept my gaze away from his uncle. Ethan was a frighteningly perceptive boy, as I’d already learned the hard way.
Wayne left me with the name of a hard drive to purchase. I tucked it, along with his business card, in my purse, then took Ree home.
Later that night, after putting Ree to bed, I memorized Wayne’s e-mail address and phone number Then I ripped his business card into tiny little pieces and flushed them down the toilet I did the same with the hard-drive information. At this stage, I couldn’t afford to be careless.
Jason came home after two A.M. I heard his footsteps in the family room, the creak of the old wooden chair as he pulled it out from the kitchen table and took his customary seat at the family desktop.
I woke again at four A.M., just as he was coming into the bedroom. He didn’t turn on any lights, but undressed in a corner of darkness. I wondered about my own husband this time. What ripples of lean muscle might lurk beneath the long pants and plain, button-down shirts he always wore? Did he have waves of thick black hair on his chest? Did it form a silky line down to his groin?
After Brokeback Mountain, I used to pretend that Jason was gay, that’s why he wouldn’t touch me. It wasn’t me, I told myself He simply preferred men. But from time to time, I’d catch him watching me with a dark, hooded gleam in his eyes. Some part of him responded to me, I was certain of it Unfortunately, it was only enough to keep me, not enough to love me.
I closed my eyes as my husband crawled into bed. I feigned sleep.
Later, four-thirty, five A.M., I rolled over and touched my husband’s shoulder I spread my fingers upon the warm T-shirt covering his back. I felt the muscles ripple at contact, and I thought he owed me at least that much.
Then his fingers closed around my wrist He removed my hand from his shoulder
“Don’t,” he said.
“Why not?”
“Go to sleep, Sandy.”
“I want a second baby,” I said. Which was partly true. I did yearn for another child, or at least someone else who would love me.
“We could adopt,” he said.
“God, Jason. Do you hate me that much?”
He didn’t answer. I stormed out of bed, stomped downstairs, sat at the computer Then, just to be childish about things, I checked the empty recycle bin, and the three URLs left in the computer’s web history: New York Times, USA Today, and the Drudge Report.
At that moment, I despised my husband. I hated him for taking me away, but for never really saving me. I hated him for showing me respect, but for never letting me feel wanted. I hated him for his silences and for his secrets and for a lone black-and-white image of a terrified little boy who still haunted me.
“Just what kind of monster are you?” I demanded out loud. But the computer had no answers for me.
So I logged on to my AOL account. Then, working from memory, I wrote: Dear Wayne, thanks for meeting with me. I am working on our project now. I hope to see you again, at the next Thursday basketball game…
“What do you mean you can’t find the money? It’s four million dollars, for God’s sake. It takes a little more than a piggy bank to cart that much around.” D.D. was ranting into her cell phone, held tight against her ear. They were exiting the Jones residence and half a dozen photographers were snapping away at them. The class they should have at detective school and don’t: How to Always Have Photo-Ready Hair.
“No, I don’t want the Feds involved. We’ve traced money before; we can do it again… Okay, okay, so it’s not a one-day project. I’ll give you two more hours…I know, so get cracking.”
D.D. flipped the phone shut, scowling.
“Bad news?” Miller asked. He was stroking his mustache selfconsciously, obviously not liking the glare of the media spotlight any more than she did. They paused at the base of the porch stairs, not wanting to have this conversation in earshot of the press, who were already banging out questions.
“Cooper hit a wall chasing Jones’s assets,” D.D. reported. “Something about the money was wired into Jones’s current bank from an offshore account, and offshore banks are a little uptight about disclosing information. According to Cooper, we need to charge Jones with a crime first, then they might see things our way. Of course, we need to trace the money in order to expose Jones’s real identity, so we can charge him with a crime. At this point, it’s heads he wins, tails we lose.”
“Bummer, dude,” Miller said.
She rolled her eyes at him, chewed her lower lip. “I feel like we’re stuck in a bad episode of Law & Order.”
“How so?”
“Look at our pool of suspects: We have the mysterious husband who’s probably engaged in online porn, the down-the-street neighbor who’s a registered sex offender, a thirteen-year-old student who’s in love with his missing teacher, a state computer technician who seems to have a very personal stake in the investigation, and, last but not least, the victim’s estranged father who may or may not have known she was abused as a child and has lots of incentive to keep that quiet. It’s all In a case that’s been ripped from the headlines…’ Except I have no idea which fucking headline we ripped off.”
“Maybe it’s like that old movie. Murder on the Orient Express. They all did it. That would be cool.”
She gave him a look. “You have a strange sense of humor, Miller.”
“Hey, this job will do that to you.”
When in doubt, keep everyone talking. D.D. wanted to question Ree again, but the expert, Marianne Jackson, waved her off. Three interviews in three consecutive days would not only be too much for the child, but would appear like badgering. Even if Ree did tell them something useful, a good defense attorney would argue they’d harassed her into disclosing. They needed to give the girl one more day better yet, turn over some new piece of evidence that warranted a third interview. Then they’d be on safer ground.
So D.D. and Miller turned to their cast of suspects. In the past forty-eight hours, they’d hit Jason Jones, Ethan Hastings, Aidan Brewster, and Wayne Reynolds, which left the honorable Maxwell Black. Currently, the judge stood right across the street, working the crowd of reporters much the way a politician might work a room of high-net-
