‘Good one. You had me going for a minute there. Who put you up to this? Come on – who’s pranking me? Ah, I bet it’s Tony. I got him good last?—’
‘We’re not in the habit of pranking, Mr Harris,’ Kim said, fixing her gaze on his.
His brow furrowed, and he swallowed deeply. ‘You can’t be serious. Karen? Murdered?’
‘Very serious. Your ex-wife was stabbed to death yesterday afternoon at her home.’
‘Shiiiiit,’ he said, the colour dropping from his face.
‘I understand it’s a lot to take in, but may we ask you a couple of questions?’ Kim asked, diving straight in. Former spouses or partners didn’t receive the same sensitivity. The connection had already been severed. This news was not going to alter the landscape of his life. He might be saddened for a while, but ultimately he would continue as before.
‘This is real?’
Kim was done trying to justify her reason for being there. ‘You’ve been divorced how long?’
Rick Harris swallowed and nodded. ‘A couple of years now, but we were having problems way before that.’
‘What kind of problems?’
He sighed heavily. ‘Things change, you know,’ he said with what appeared to be genuine sadness.
‘She changed?’ Kim asked.
‘No, I did. The very reasons I fell in love with her were what ended our marriage.’
‘Go on.’
‘We met in our twenties. I’d never come across anyone like her. She was a free spirit, unconventional, always seeking her inner light. We’d make a date to go out and then she’d call me from Tanzania or Cape Town just because it had called to her.’
He shook his head as a smile formed on his lips. ‘I never knew what she was going to do from one day to the next. I was head over heels. I felt like the luckiest guy alive when she agreed to marry me.’
Kim could hear regret creeping into his tone. ‘So what changed?’
‘I did. I grew up. I got the steady job and waited for us to move on to the next stage. I assumed she’d settle down, keep a job for longer than a week, start a family, but she was always searching for something. She always felt there was something else she was meant to be doing, and it created a restlessness in her.’
‘So you divorced her?’ Kim asked.
He nodded.
‘You got that steady wife and kids now?’
He shook his head. ‘Not sure it was all I imagined it might be. I miss her. Life lost a little colour once we were no longer together.’ His eyes reddened. ‘She really gone?’
Kim nodded, realising the news was going to have more of an impact on him than she’d thought. She was beginning to understand why.
‘You still loved her?’
He hesitated before nodding. ‘Not one day passed without me wondering if I’d made the wrong decision. Conventional isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.’
And now any chance to do anything about it had been taken out of his hands.
‘May I ask a personal question?’ she asked. Maybe the homewrecking theory wasn’t dead in the water yet.
He nodded.
‘Were you married or attached when you met Karen?’
He shook his head. ‘No. I hadn’t been in a relationship for a couple of years.’
