His eyes widen. “You think Jo and Daniel slipped you a Mickey?”
“It’s not funny.” My voice hardens. “It is possible that my drink was spiked. And it could have been anyone.”
He exhales. “I hear you. And I’m not saying that didn’t happen, but…”
I drop my fork. The clang is louder than it should be. “But what?”
“Bonnie on the corner said she saw you walking the dog that night. After the party. She said you looked fine.”
“What?” My voice rises. Bonnie is our neighborhood chatterbox. More than once I’ve resorted to leaving my groceries in the car just to run inside and avoid conversation. In her late sixties, married, with no children but a cat she is always callingafter, she is in terrific shape and spends most of her time either gardening in her front yard or speed-walking with other women in the neighborhood. “How do you know that?”
“She brought it up. Said she saw you home the other day, and she asked me if you were sick. I told her you fell and hit your head and were taking some time off work.”
“You told her that?”
“What’s the big deal? It’s not a secret, is it?”
“Just—what exactly did she say?”
“That she saw you walking the dog Saturday night. Said you looked unsteady in your heels. ‘Those shoes are not for walking,’” he says, mimicking Bonnie with a grin that falls flat.
I don’t laugh. “So, Bonnie saw me. With the dog. In my dress. In heels.”
“That’s what she said.”
“Well maybe… maybe Kugel found his way home after I fell.”
“Caren. C’mon. How would he get inside? And did Kugel take your phone when he let himself in?” He chuckles. Like it’s funny. Like it’s all one big silly misunderstanding.
“I wish you would take this seriously.”
“I do. I take your injury very seriously. In fact, I took the liberty of calling about the support group this morning. They meet on Fridays, at one.”
“Without asking me?”
“Don’t be mad. Just give it a try—”
“I’m not crazy.”
“I don’t think you’re crazy, mi cariño.” His voice drops. “But you’re scared. And I get that. Rachel’s coming home tonight—we don’t want to scare her too.”
“I wasn’t going to scare Rachel.” It irks me that she is always his first priority, and I hate that I feel a little jealous of my own daughter.
“Good.”
“But hear me out. It does make a kind of sense—what if someone wanted me unconscious so they could get into the house? To steal the bracelet?”
He opens his mouth to speak, but I hold up a hand.
“Let me finish,” I say. “The bracelet was stolen before, from Holly. What if whoever took it, what if they saw it on the Facebook page and panicked? Thought it might be traced?”
Even as I say it, my theory collapses under its own weight. Although it somehow made sense in my head, my logic is falling apart as soon as I put my thoughts into words.
“Can I speak now?” he asks, a hint of a smile on his lips.
“Go ahead,” I mutter, bracing for his disbelief.
Instead, he leaves the room. The sound of his footsteps retreating across the floor is muffled by the rug. When he returns, he’s holding a ziplock bag. Inside is the bracelet.
