“You should go,” Daisy tells him, a stern note in her voice that I’ve never heard her use before.
We watch him amble back across the street, and Daisy shudders. “I know I shouldn’t say this, but he gives me the creeps.”
“I think underneath it all, he’s a good kid,” I say. “Adolescence is hard.”
“Where’s Mark?”
“Work. I tried calling him, but he’s not picking up.”
“And Cole’s at school?”
I nod.
“You poor thing,” she says. “Any idea what the police are looking for?”
“None. This whole thing is a total shock to me.”
We turn and stare at the house. The door opens, and a uniformed officer steps out carrying our home computer. It sends a chill through me, although I can’t put my finger on exactly why. I know in my heart I had nothing to do with Rob Avery’s murder, and they can’t possibly find something on there that doesn’t exist. But what if my Google searches get misconstrued? Or even worse, what if someone else put something on there that implicates me, like the Tinder app on my phone? Leah and Dustin had both told me that files and apps could be installed remotely. Maybe that happened with my computer. I take a step forward.
“Hey, that’s our computer.” As soon as the words leave my mouth, I realize it’s a stupid thing to say. At the same time, the female officer watching me takes a step in my direction as if she’s going to physically stop me from moving forward. She holds her hand up like a traffic cop.
“Everything removed from the house will be accounted for.”
“I just feel like I should be there when you look at it, to explain stuff.”
“If the detectives need your assistance, they’ll ask for it.”
“But they won’t know.” I turn to Daisy. “They won’t know what’s real and what was put on there by someone else.”
Daisy narrows her eyes, clearly confused. “Allie? You’re not making sense.”
“Someone remotely installed the Tinder app on my phone. I didn’t do it, but it’s there, and I’m worried whoever did that put something on my computer, too.”
“Okay, okay, calm down.” She rubs my arm. “It’s going to be all right. Do you have a lawyer?”
“Sort of. I called and left messages, but I can’t reach him. I don’t know what to do. This is insane. They’re taking my things! Can they just do this?” I sound hysterical, even to my own ears. I take a deep breath. Losing it on the street is not going to help. I glance down at the end of the block. What had been a few people has grown into a wall of onlookers. Daisy follows my gaze. “Ugh, why don’t they go home? I’m just glad Cole isn’t here to see this. He’s been kind of anxious lately, and this would freak him out.”
“C’mon,” she says. “Let’s go sit in my car.”
I feel a bit better once we are safely ensconced in the warming leather seats of her car. Daisy taps on her phone, and soon dreamy synth music fills the car.
“This is my Spotify Chill Out playlist,” she says. “I use this to lower my blood pressure when my stepdaughter, or a client, is driving me crazy.”
She asks me how the sale of the house in Westport is going and whether Barb DeSoto has been helpful. I answer her questions curtly. I know she is just trying to help by taking my mind off what is happening, but I can’t concentrate on anything other than the fact that the police are swarming my house. “I just wish I knew what they were looking for.”
“I know I shouldn’t be surprised,” Daisy says, tapping at her phone, “but I can’t believe how quickly this got on the Facebook page. And with photos.” She tilts the small screen toward me. “Looks like it was Heather. She posts, Does anyone know what’s going on with the police on our block?”
“I can’t believe she did that. I mean, I was right there. Why didn’t she just ask me?”
Daisy shrugs. “Probably didn’t want to bother you.”
I look out the window. I think of the picture Heather took at the pool, the one from the same angle as my fake Tinder profile shot. And the picture of her with that woman wearing an Overton shirt. Lots of strange little coincidences, but what could Heather, the woman who organizes trash-free lunch at Cole’s school, possibly have to do with Overton? When I turn back to mention this to Daisy, to see what she thinks, I see an officer wearing mirrored sunglasses striding to the car, his face in a tight grimace.
“Showtime,” Daisy says.
We follow him, a short bulldog of a man, back to the front of my house, where he hands me my cell phone. “We’re about done here, ma’am. Just some paperwork.” As he scribbles on a stack of papers on a clipboard, I check my phone. Two missed calls from Morningside House and one from Artie Zucker. Just seeing his name floods me with relief.
But that relief is short-lived. When I look up, I see an officer leaving the house carrying a small brown box, the kind Amazon leaves on neighborhood doorsteps every day.
“What’s that box?” I ask the officer.
“The list of items seized is right here, ma’am.” He taps his finger on one of the papers he just handed me.
I look at the list, which is not long. The third item is: Brown cardboard box containing liquid Ambien.
30
Twenty minutes after the police leave, I am driving around Chevy Chase Circle, on the phone with Artie Zucker.
“As soon as we hang up, I’m going to make some phone calls and find out exactly what’s going on,” he says in a booming voice. “By the time I come by your place this evening, I should have more information.”
“I don’t feel good about this.”
“Of course you don’t! Why would you? I’ll see you tonight.” With that, he hangs up. I
