Austin nods, solemn. It irks Clare that she must use her charms to gain the upper hand, that Austin’s weakness is so predictable. Still, she needs him on her side. She cannot risk the details of her life emerging now. Her phone burns in her pocket. The video. Clare knows that Somers is the only person she dares trust with it. She will text her as soon as she can and ask Somers to meet her in the hotel lobby tomorrow morning. But right now, Clare will stay here with Austin until he finishes his wine, steering the conversation as far away from herself as she can.
FRIDAY
Clare lies flat on the bed, no memory of the dream that woke her. She’s in her hotel room. It’s Friday morning. She lifts her phone from where it charges on the bedside table. 7:52 a.m. She arrived back here around midnight, setting her gun in the drawer, then peeling her clothes off to tumble into the bed. Her mouth is dry, her head screams. In the bathroom Clare chugs three glasses of water and leans forward to meet her own stare in the mirror. You’re just tired, she mouths to her reflection. She turns on the shower and jumps in.
Back in the room, wrapped in a towel, Clare checks her phone again. There is a text from Somers.
I’m in the lobby. Where are you?
Quickly Clare dresses and brushes her teeth. Her stomach is pulled tight with hunger. The hotel hallway is empty but for an abandoned cleaning cart at the far end. Clare stares at her reflection again in the tinted mirrors of the elevator. In the lobby she finds Somers seated at a cluster of lounge chairs. She stands as Clare nears.
“Sorry,” Clare says. “My alarm didn’t go off.”
“You don’t look that hot,” Somers says. “Where’d you go last night?”
“Nowhere. I’m just tired.”
“Okay. So what’s up? Why the late-night texts?”
“Something’s come up,” Clare says. “At least, I think it’s something. It’s a video file. It won’t open on my phone. I figured we can use your laptop. Is there somewhere more private we can go?”
“Give me a second,” Somers says, all-business.
Somers proceeds to the front desk and flips open her badge to the clerk. Clare slumps in the chair and tracks the business travelers who come and go, their wheeled carry-ons clicking along the marble floor. Despite the coolness of the lobby, Clare’s back and neck are coated with sweat. Somers returns, waving a key, and directs Clare to follow her down a hallway at the rear of the lobby. She unlocks a small boardroom and hits the lights. Clare and Somers fan out to opposite sides of the conference table. Somers unpacks her laptop.
“While I love a good mystery,” Somers says, “can we cut to it?”
Clare digs her phone from her pocket and unlocks it to access her email. “I’m going to email you the file,” she says. “It’s large. I received it yesterday from an encrypted email address. No sender name.”
“Okay,” Somers drawls, hitting at the keys of her laptop. “What is it?”
“Like I said, I couldn’t open the file on my phone. But I think it depicts Jack Westman’s murder.”
Somers gapes at Clare. “Someone emailed this to you?”
“Yes,” Clare says. “Last night.”
“How do you know that’s what it is?” Somers asks. “If you haven’t watched it.”
“I don’t know. The file name implies it. I might be wrong. But I have a hunch.”
Somers’s baffled stare is broken only by the ding of an arrived email.
“Okay.” Somers taps at her laptop again. “I’ve got it. Let me try to open it.”
They roll their office chairs closer until their elbows touch. Somers allows the first few seconds of the video to play. The camera circles the table. Clare recognizes Roland’s, the booth. The shot stops on Colleen Westman. Somers hits the pause button.
“Jesus.” Somers slaps the table. “You were right.”
“I knew it.”
“Okay, listen. This is what we do. We watch it once through. Once. Then we share what we saw. What we noticed. Then we watch it again and hash it out.”
“Why?” Clare asks.
“Because we both know what we’re going to see next. A guy comes in and shoots another guy. We don’t know who took this video, or who’s seen it, or what else is in it. I’ve seen the case file and I know for a fact that the cops haven’t declared a video as evidence. If any of them have seen this, they buried it. So we watch, and we see what we notice. Fresh eyes. Okay?”
“Okay,” Clare says.
“It’s not going to be pretty,” Somers says. “You up for it?”
“Just play it.”
Somers aligns the mouse to restart the video. Clare feels like she might vomit. The video window opens on the screen. At the bottom, Clare notes the running time at just under two minutes.
“Ready?” Somers says.
She presses play.
Again, Colleen Westman. The video is shot from the same vantage where Clare sat yesterday at Roland’s. The booth. To Colleen’s left is Jack Westman, to her right, Zoe. Charlotte must be filming, Clare thinks. Desserts sit untouched in front of them. Among the three of them, only Colleen is smiling.
“How old are we today, Mom?” the filming voice says. Yes. Charlotte’s voice.
“Oh, forty-five,” Colleen says with a dismissive wave. “Not a day older, I swear.”
Charlotte laughs. “Then I won’t ask how old you were when you had me,” she says.
It unsettles Clare to see Zoe Westman animated like this. Alive, talking. How many people have told Clare that she looks like Zoe? And as the camera zooms close, Clare sees it too. It is remarkable, she thinks, their hair and pale skin tone, but even something in the mannerisms. The smile. You remind me of someone, Malcolm had said to her at the end of their first case. Clare leans closer to the screen.
The camera shifts to take
