Turner alternated between wrenching at his beard and cracking his knuckles, still moving like a metronome. “This restaurant called Sandman’s. It’s?—”
“I know where it is,” Josie cut him off. “Why were you meeting with her?”
“We were on a date.”
“A date?” Josie tried very hard to keep her mouth from gaping. Obviously Dani was into him. They’d been married. It was just hard to imagine Douchebag on a date with, well, anyone. Was he as smug and annoying on dates as he was generally? Was he as distracted as he usually seemed?
“Yeah. A date. I’m dating my wife again. Trying to, anyway.”
“You’re still married?”
He exhaled. “Yeah. Still married. Despite…everything.”
“What’s everything?” Josie couldn’t help but ask. She’d never seen him wear his wedding band.
Turner’s hand drummed against the sides of his thighs. “All the fighting, I guess. The on again and off again.”
“How long have you been separated?” Josie asked.
He huffed a bitter laugh. “This time? Or the time before that? Or the one before that?”
“How long have you lived in separate residences?” she asked. “How long has Dani been using her maiden name?”
“She started using her maiden name when we still lived in Alden. We had some big blowout and the next day she went back to Schwarber.”
“Did she change Cassidy’s last name, too?”
“What? No. Cassidy’s mine. She’s got my last name. Dani would never go there.”
Clearly, Dani’s neighbor had made an assumption about Cassidy’s surname. “Okay,” Josie said. “Let’s go back to Dani. She went back to her maiden name when you lived in Alden.”
“Yeah. She was trying to make a point. Punish me, I guess. Never mind we were already sleeping in separate bedrooms. Trying not to be home at the same time. When I was at home, she’d be at the gym or getting her nails done. Whatever got her out of the house.” Back and forth he went. “When I took this job, it was supposed to be a breakup. The end. That’s what Dani wanted. I wanted her to follow me. I wanted to keep workingon things even though she dropped my name. She wasn’t into it at first but then she changed her mind. She agreed to move to Denton, but she would only come if we lived separate lives. Start from scratch again although there’s really no starting from scratch with the mother of your kid, but whatever.”
“Okay, so two weeks ago. Dinner at the Sandman’s. What did you fight about after?”
“I had enrolled Cassidy in a youth art program at the university that meets on weekends starting in September. I didn’t consult Dani. She said if we were going to co-parent then that meant both of us got a say. I told her we wouldn’t need to co-parent if she’d just take me the hell back.”
Again, Josie tried to imagine Turner as a husband. She could kind of see him as a father, especially after the speech he’d laid on Charles Barnes the other day. Maybe not a great father, especially to a girl, but she imagined at some point, before his daughter grew old enough to realize what a douchecanoe he was, that she probably enjoyed his snark and irreverence. Yet Cassidy’s bedroom told a different story—one of closeness with her father, a father she clearly missed even though he was in the same city.
It was the thought of Cassidy missing her dad—whether Josie liked him or not—that snapped her back to the task at hand. “Cassidy. When’s the last time you saw her?”
“A few days before the festival. We were supposed to—” His voice got raspy and he had to swallow twice before resuming. “I told her I’d take her there for the day. She wanted to check out some yoga thing and go up in a hot air balloon.”
“What day?” Josie asked.
“Sunday.”
“The day we caught the Barnes murders. You were working.”
Finally, he stopped pacing, but his fingers kept twitching at his sides. “Yes, I was working. We’ve been swamped, Quinn. You know that. I just?—”
“You worked. Instead of taking her to the festival.”
His eyes narrowed. “Don’t get all judgy on me, Quinn. You’re not an expert just because someone dumped a teenager at your front door. I’ve had my kid a lot longer than you’ve had yours.”
There hadn’t been any judgment in her tone because her mind hadn’t even gone there. He was projecting that onto her which meant that Cassidy hadn’t taken his absence well. “Not judging,” she said.
He could lash out at her all he wanted. Right now, she didn’t give a damn about his emotional ineptitude. She had a mother and daughter to find. “What did Cassidy say when you told her you couldn’t take her to the festival?”
