“I asked Marisol directly.” I ignore the tiny grumble that warns me I’ve just lied to my husband. Not omitted, not withheld. Lied. Bold faced. Intentional. “I assume Claire’s with Summer today.”
The grumbling intensifies, our iron-strong bond bending with the pressure, threatening to snap.
“You two will work it out,” Gabe says so confidently I almost believe him. “Let me walk you to your car.”
Gabe opens the driver’s side door for me and helps me in.
“Don’t forget to tell the police about Regina,” I say as he shuts the door, his expression hidden behind its frame.
I drive robotically toward the pier, trying to make sense of this confluence of events. Regina drunkenly drowned. Aram overdosed. If someone did kill them, their deaths were designed to look like accidents, something the police would discount, something you’d be crazy to think was plotted. Barb isn’t crazy. Lara isn’t crazy. I’m not either.
I pull over and call Officer Gonzales, whose card I’ve kept in my wallet, though I was hoping I wouldn’t need to use it.
After I say my name, there’s a long pause. “What can I do for you, Mrs. Irons?”
“Someone who works for my husband, his embryologist, Aram Yassin, was just found dead outside their office. Supposed overdose.”
“Oh.” I hear him typing. “Where was this?” I give him the address. The typing stops. “Mrs. Irons, that’s in Santa Monica. You need to call the Santa Monica Police Department.”
“They’re already there.”
“Then I’m not sure what you want from me.”
“First Regina, now Aram. That’s two deaths in one week. At our home, now at my husband’s office.”
“Were Miss Geller and Mr. Yassin acquainted?”
“Not that I know of.”
“Help me understand. You think their deaths are connected?”
“Regina died outside our home, and Aram died in the parking lot outside my husband’s clinic.”
“Look.” Why do men saylookwhen they’re trying to appease women? I don’t know what I was thinking. If my husband can’t see the connection, there’s no way Officer Gonzales will. “I’m making a note of this. And I’ll call one of my buddies in the SMPD. If there’s anything suspicious with Aram Yassin’s death, we’ll find it.”
“Okay. Thanks.” As I hang up, I hate myself a little for thanking him. I can’t force Officer Gonzales to believe me. I can’t force my husband to either. I don’t get why Gabe doesn’t make the obvious assumption that their deaths are related to us, that this might have something to do with him. But he doesn’t know that Regina was obsessed with me. He’s still not convinced our son knew her. It’s easier, more comforting to assume their deaths were random tragedies. They weren’t random, not their causes nor their locations, in our canal and Gabe’s parking lot. I can’t make sense of this, which only serves to terrify me more.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Barb
Jasper and I are at a small playground along the beach when Tessa finds us.Playgroundis a generous term for the sculptures that line the sand. Jasper doesn’t mind. He asserts his independence on the boat, scrambling up the stones to the bow and barreling down to the stern. When Jasper spots Tessa, he gallops toward her. She squats and lifts him into the air, the conflict vanishing from her face. For a moment, there’s only her son, until she sets him on the ground and finds me and the pained expression returns.
I don’t know what an embryologist does, but I don’t interrupt Tessa as she shakily tells me the news. Her fingers twist, her body rocks, every part of her in subtle motion. This embryologist’s overdose reads as unlikely to her as Regina’s intoxication sounded to me.
We stand at the edge of the grass as Jasper explores the dragon head, tiptoeing into its maw before jumping back, delighted that it didn’t animate and devour him. “I told Officer Gonzales I think they’re connected. You can guess how he responded.”
“You think someone’s targeting your husband?” It gives me whiplash. Gabe Irons. Dan Huntsman. Gabe Irons again. The moment Maisy told me, I knew it was Tessa’s husband. I let myselfbe distracted by their neighbor and his anger. That kind of anger is too obvious. Although I still don’t entirely understand what transpired last night when Tessa called the cops, I get her impulse, the desire to protect that came out wrong. It cost Tessa her best friend. Fortunately, the same wasn’t true for me, only because Linda doesn’t know what I was searching for in Jessica’s emails, if she knows the particulars of my firing at all.
Tessa bites the corner of her mouth so hard she winces. “First our house, now his office. You see how this doesn’t seem random?”
“Is there anywhere you and Jasper can stay until it’s clear what’s going on? Go visit family?”
Tessa’s eyes well, and I don’t know how I didn’t notice it before. There is no family. Nowhere to go. There’s only Gabe and their house along the canals.
“We’ll be fine.” She forces a grin. “There’re always people watching. Besides, Gabe would never leave.”
Maybe you should leave him.I don’t say this. I can’t say this.
