They both loved camping, Led Zeppelin, the New York Giants, and the Detroit Red Wings. They shared a love of spare ribs and fried chicken, Oreos and Coca-Cola. She was a dancer, something he found alien and fascinating. He had a passion for skiing and music, which she insisted on hearing more about.
Simply put, they fit. They fit perfectly. And as the years went on, as they each headed off in different directions-she to Princeton, he to Boston College -their love never waned. In fact, it continued to grow past college and in each and every year of marriage.
That was not to say they didn’t have their disagreements. While few and far between, their fights were spectacular, as their passion for each other was equaled by their passion for being right. But the disagreements, always over the mundane things like white bread or wheat, roses or tulips, never lingered and were resolved by spectacular lovemaking.
NICK LOOKED OUT the window of his high-ceilinged great room, at the evidence of last week’s get-together with some friends: the deck chairs scattered around the pool, the tables and grill still a mess, three bags of garbage that he was supposed to have thrown out last Sunday. And amidst all the chaos, the pool was calm, the waters smooth and undisturbed, standing in sharp contrast to his current emotions.
The great room looked to be in its usual order: neat and clean but for the painting that had leaned against the far wall for the past six months, which he promised Julia he would hang, and the host of newspapers and magazines that lay on the ottoman, which he had yet to read. The dining room appeared as it usually did, the table perpetually set for a last-minute dinner party.
As Nick looked around his house, he couldn’t imagine this to be a random murder. He thought maybe it was some opportunistic criminal who chose to profit in chaos. With everyone so focused on the plane crash, the town was collectively distracted, law enforcement stretched thin. But the randomness… something was surely missing, some unseen fact, a key to her death that would also be the key to her salvation.
Nick looked at his home with fresh eyes, searching for anything out of the ordinary, anything out of place or missing, anything that would provide a clue to why Julia was murdered.
He opened the pocket doors to his library and shined the Maglite around. Far smaller than Marcus’s, more like a den, it was filled with the evidence of Nick and Julia’s life together. If this single room were to survive a nuclear blast and were to be found intact five hundred years from now, an archeologist could draw an amazingly accurate picture of the lives of Nick and Julia Quinn. Their history was laid bare by the locked cabinet filled with trophies and medals from swimming, hockey, and lacrosse that they were too embarrassed to display but too nostalgic to part with; by the shelves of pictures and keepsakes, photos from their prom, graduation, and wedding, with dramatically different hairstyles but unchanged smiles; and by the dozens of pictures of their travels and family holidays. But mostly there were the goofy photos, the just-for-fun, what-the-hell pictures of snowball fights, carnival photo booth silliness, and ice-cream-covered faces that showed them unguarded and at their most natural.
Nick turned to his mahogany desk, moving aside the letters and files stacked to the side, and found his personal cell phone still in its charger. He picked it up and tucked it in his pocket. He had taken to carrying two phones: one personal and one for business, choosing to keep the two worlds separate. Having spent the day working from home, he’d left the personal cell in its charger and was thankful that he had done so as the police had taken his business phone along with his wallet and wristwatch when they brought him into the precinct on suspicion of Julia’s murder.
Nick crouched and opened the cabinet behind his desk, shining his flashlight at the small green safe behind the stack of books. There was not a scratch on it, no evidence of a breach.
He headed out of the library and, with the bright beam leading the way, went down the stairs to the lower level. The unfinished basement was his favorite part of the house. A makeshift gym with a treadmill, an elliptical trainer, a stationary bike, and racks of free weights, this was the area that not only kept their bodies tuned but, likewise, their minds. A place to relieve stress, whether by hitting the heavy or speed bags or just by pumping iron, it was a room that was the ultimate detoxification sanctuary. Nick’s flashlight bounced off the old dressing-room mirror that lay against the wall, refracting about the space, at the dance bar affixed to the wall, the mats on the floor. He could still smell the faint odor of Julia’s perfume from her last workout.
The remainder of the cavernous, concrete space would one day become a playroom, maybe a home theater, but that was years from now. For the time being, it would exist as a storage room with boxes of Christmas decorations, forgotten wedding gifts, and unsorted junk lining the gray walls.
Making his way up the basement stairs, Nick continued to the second floor, quickly passing what would one day be the nursery, past the three unused bedrooms, and arrived at his and Julia’s bedroom.
The cream-colored room with its tray ceiling had an enormous four-poster bed that faced an unlit fireplace teeming with cut flowers for the summer. Nick checked Julia’s side table, its small drawers, but nothing was out of the ordinary, nothing was hurriedly ruffled or out of place. He checked her walk-in closet, checked his own and the cabinet hidden behind his tie rack, but again, nothing was disturbed. Both their bathrooms were as they’d left them in the morning, towels, toothbrushes, and toiletries in their respective spots. The unused sitting room still had a slight sheen of dust and pollen from the flowers in the fireplace, offering no evidence of an intruder. The French doors to the small terrace were locked, just as he’d left them this morning after Julia surprised him with breakfast.
As Nick walked from room to room looking for anything that might help point him in the direction of Julia’s killer, he realized that they had built a perfect home, every room finished and paid for, the envy of many, but it was missing the most important thing. They had dedicated themselves to work, to money, spending their time on acquiring life and things, but had left out the most important part. While they loved each other, never being selfish, they had no legacy, no children to fill the home they had created. With bedrooms lying in wait, it was always one more year and then we will have it all. Now, Nick was beginning to realize they were always counting on that one more year, but who was to say if it would ever come. All that planning, all that money, and now…
They had forgone what Nick knew to be the most important thing, and now it was too late, unless he could somehow find a clue to her death and stop it before it happened.
Nick took a last look at the bedroom, really the only area of the upstairs they used. It had not been ransacked; nothing was disturbed. If whoever killed Julia came for something, it wasn’t up here.
Heading back downstairs, Nick opened and stepped through his front door. He walked past the open garage bay doors, glanced in at his eight-cylinder Audi, and continued into the driveway proper. Julia’s Lexus SUV was right where she left it. Nick quickly checked it, finding the doors open and the keys in the ignition, a sight that was a confirmation that this was no random act, no snatch-and-grab robbery. Her fifty-thousand-dollar car wouldn’t be left behind by even the dimmest thief.
He walked to the end of his cobblestone driveway, stood between the two stone entrance pillars, and looked down at the skid marks where Julia’s assailant had torn out of the driveway. Nick was smart, and thought he could piece her murder together in time to save her, but he wasn’t an educated detective. The width of the rubber skid meant nothing to him, it didn’t tell him anything about the type of car or about its driver, or give him some great aha moment as in some TV show.
He looked around their cul-de-sac and down the road, one of the wealthiest sections of Byram Hills, with streets filled with million dollar minimansions, perfect lawns and gardens, all tended by massive crews of gardeners, all except Nick and Julia’s home. Nick cut his own grass, planted his own flowers, tilled his own gardens. He enjoyed riding the tractor, cutting the lawn, digging holes. Their house had been Julia’s favorite since she was a child, riding by it on her bike. It had been her fantasy home, and Nick had helped her realize that fantasy.
As he walked back up the drive, looking at their house, he thought of all of the upgrades that had been done by his own hand; the addition built with the help of his friends; the painting done on weekends by him and Julia. Some of his best memories were of the time spent together building their home, laughing at the mistakes and imperfections, the paint fights and hammered fingers. It was the simple things, as cliched as it sounded, the peaceful times of being alone with no distractions, eating pizza on the floor, that he cherished most.
Nick walked through the garage and glanced at his dirty car. He was not one for car washes; he preferred his Audi to be a bit on the dirty side in the hope that as it sat on the streets of the city, it would not be noticed amongst the shiny BMWs and Mercedes, blending in and being avoided by the car thieves of the world. It was a practice he had adhered to, much to Julia’s annoyance, but it had proven successful to date, so he wasn’t about to change. With the accumulation of dust and pollen atop the dark blue metal surface, the handprint was clearly visible on the car’s trunk lid, and there was no question it was not his, not Julia’s. It was larger, meatier, and out of place.
Nick pulled his key fob from his pocket and hit the button, remotely releasing the hatch. As the trunk lid rose he could see the usual mess: his black duster purchased in Wyoming, the best raincoat he had ever had; jumper cables, a med kit, two coils of rope, all in the event of emergency. There were his hockey skates and pads from the adult league that he and Marcus played in, two boxes of golf balls, an umbrella, and the one object he had not placed there. He’d seen it back in the interrogation room at the Byram Hills police station. Dance had pulled it out, questioned him about it.
Nick was looking at the murder weapon, the exotically styled 134-year-old Peacemaker, the collector’s weapon that had taken Julia’s life.
There was no question now. He had known it before, but had had no confirmation: He was being set up.
As he looked at the gun he knew there was nothing he could do about it. He could hide it, but it would surely be found. He didn’t want to pick it up. The cops had said his fingerprints were on the gun, though he thought it to be a detective’s ruse to get him to confess, as there had not been time or personnel to examine the prints, but he would not give them the satisfaction of putting the prints there himself now.
He took a cloth and, wrapping his hand, closed the trunk. Whether the gun was found was irrelevant. If he found a way to save Julia, there would be no accusation, no murder investigation, it would be a moot point. And if he didn’t save her, he didn’t care what happened to himself.
Nick braced himself for the next five minutes. He knew that what he was about to do would haunt his dreams for all eternity. He was going to look at Julia’s body willingly and dreaded what he would see.
MARCUS SAT ON his front steps, his heart breaking, as he stared over at Nick’s home. He watched his friend walk up and down his driveway after spending over a half hour in the house. Seeming to wander aimlessly, looking about the neighborhood as if he would happen upon Julia’s killer, Nick looked to be chasing ghosts.
There had been an odd look to Nick’s eyes when he had rejoined him on the front steps after calling the police. While they looked sad and troubled, they were not filled with the agony he had first seen when he found him sitting with her. There was such heart-rending grief in his face, such an inhuman cry of pain in his voice when he found Nick huddled with Julia’s body. It was a sight that Marcus would never shake, a sight that would invade his thoughts till he passed from this earth.
But as Nick walked away from Marcus, heading toward his house, insisting on investigating a murder he could not possibly solve, Marcus’s concern for his friend shifted.
There was something in Nick’s eyes, something he couldn’t identify, it almost appeared to be hope, an emotion completely contrary to a moment in which one’s future had been lost, in which the woman one loved had been so violently snatched from among the living.
To Marcus there was only one explanation, only one thing that would cause all the agony to vanish from his eyes.
As he watched Nick step through his garage, on a course to see Julia’s shattered body, he knew Nick was no longer in possession of his judgment.
Nick’s mind had retreated to a false reality,
Nick’s sanity had slipped away.
