I don’t believe Cora would ever hurt the kids, not even by accident, but I’ll also never be able to erase the sight of her smashing the Scorpion into a concrete column out of my head. If she wasn’t wearing her seat belt, or if she’d had a little more runway, she could’ve died. I lost ten years of my life in those few seconds.
I truly don’t know what to do. Whenever I broach what happened, Cora changes the subject. The last time I brought it up, she sucked my cock. I didn’t say no, and I reciprocated, but it didn’t sit right, either, knowing she was doing it to distract me. All to the good, then, that Logan is finally coming through.
I call him from the library. I’m too nervous to sit, so I pace while the phone rings.
“Hey,” he answers sharply.
“Hey. What do you have?”
He doesn’t reply right away, and my stomach sinks. “Are you sitting down?” he asks.
“Tell me.”
He sighs. “Listen, man, I need you to promise me that you’ll think first, okay? Before you doanything, you need to stop, breathe, and take time to really think through what you want to do.”
My sinking stomach slithers into a knot. I know where he’s coming from. He lost a woman he loved in college because he listened to someone out to break them up, and he’s been searching for her ever since. I never used to understand how a person could nurse regret like a bottle of booze, but I’ve recently learned it’s not a choice.
“Just spit it out,” I say.
He sighs again. “It’s not a short story.”
“Well, it’s not getting shorter with all this dicking around.”
“All right. Well, you know the six missing months? Before Cora showed up in New York?”
“Yeah. Where was she?”
“Dead.”
I freeze in my tracks. “What the hell?”
“The real Cora Jenkins; no father on record; mother Marie, deceased; grandmother Pam, also deceased—she’s been dead for six years. Cora died in a car accident at age seventeen. Multi-car pile-up on I-95.”
“What are you saying?”
“Your wife is not Cora Jenkins. She’sCara Perkins.”
I sink onto the sofa. “I don’t understand.”
“It’s wild, and honestly, if my guy wasn’t the best, he wouldn’t have been able to untangle this one. Your wife, Cara, had a guardian angel. She ever mention a woman named Pearl Flowers?”
Pearl? Like our Pearl? “No. Never.”
“Mrs. Flowers was a social worker. CoraandCara’s social worker. I imagine it was the similarity in names that gave her the idea.”
“What idea?” Foreboding trickles up my spine.
“Cora Jenkinsended up in foster care for a few years after her grandmother passed, butCara Perkinswas in the system much longer, in many more placements. Cara’s mother only died five years ago, by the way. An overdose.”
“I don’t understand. How is this possible?” It’s the information age. People can’t disappear or switch identities at will anymore.
“When the real Cora died, Mrs. Flowers, the social worker, was called to identify the body. She identified her as Cara. We assume Mrs. Flowers passed Cora’s informationand at least some documentation to Cara, and Cara was able to get herself a driver’s license in Cora’s name. Cara Perkins was buried by the state, and the new Cora Jenkins showed up in New York City with a brand-new past.”
“Why? Why did she need a new past?” I’m gripped by the need to set eyes on her. As I listen to Logan, my guts coiling, I open Messenger and ask Martinez to report.
“This is where the story takes a turn. You still sitting?”
“Just spit it out.”
