Left alone, Finn hesitates before leaving. To the right, a small desk in the mudroom serves as a landing spot. The surface is cluttered in an attractive way. Small dishes hold change and keys, while a large wicker basket holds the mail. He doesn’t dare go through it right now or open any drawers, not when she might pop back in at any moment. He doesn’t know what he is looking for anyway. Some sign, some hint.
He pulls out his tarot card, the familiar image of the Star bringing a bittersweet pang to his chest. Autumn gave it to him the day before his surgery.For hope and renewal, she’d written on a sticky note attached to it.
He doesn’t believe in ghosts or communicating with the dead. He doesn’t foster any hope that the universe might deliver some message to him if he only opens his mind. When he used to tell his mom that she needed to be more open-minded, she would laugh and say, “If you’re too open-minded, your brain’s gonna fall out.” Yet he asks the question he’s asked for the past year whenever he steps inside a house in the Eastbrook neighborhood.
Did someone who lives in this house kill Autumn?
EIGHT
I sit on a counter stool, watching as Miguel gets a glass of water for one of the two officers now crowded into our kitchen.
“Anything for you?” Miguel asks, glancing my way.
“A cup of tea, thanks.” I wipe my hands on my pants, feeling the nervous sweat starting to gather. The younger of the two officers, a woman with a tight bun and a stony expression, is standing just out of sight next to the refrigerator, but it feels like judgment emanates from her. I can hear the low hum of her police radio. I see myself through her eyes: old, hysterical, calling the police over nothing. In one word—aKaren. At the far end of the island stands the other officer, a barrel-chested man in his thirties whose fleshy face and large ears remind me of the rubber Richard Nixon mask my father wore every Halloween when handing out candy.
“I’m Officer Jankowski. That’s Officer Lee.” He glances at his partner before opening a small notepad. “You called nine-one-one about an assault. Let’s start at the beginning, Mrs. Costa.”
“We don’t know that it was an assault,” Miguel says, handing him the water glass and placing a steaming mug in front of me. “We called you because we wanted to cover our bases.”
“And the doctor at the ER said it would be a good idea,” I add in a shaky voice.
Officer Jankowski looks confused. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand. You’re not sure if you were assaulted?”
“I may have been.”
“Why don’t we start at the beginning?”
“All right. I was at a party last evening. I remember leaving around eight, but then the next thing I remember it was this morning, and I was blocks away from my house, outside someone else’s house—”
“You had fallen, honey,” Miguel says in a soft tone.
I stiffen. “Yes, that’s true. I slipped in some mud. I don’t remember anything between last night and this morning. I don’t even know where I slept.” The dull, relentless throb of a headache pulses at the base of my skull. I wince as I touch the bruise there, tender and real, proof that something happened last night. “When I woke up this morning, there was dried blood, and we went to the hospital.”
“What did the doctor say?”
“He told us there had been blunt force trauma,” Miguel answers for me. “A concussion. And that Caren was suffering from post-traumatic amnesia.”
Jankowski’s eyes flicker toward me. “Mrs. Costa, did you have anything to drink at this party?”
“Two glasses of wine. That’s it.”
“And a shot,” Miguel adds. “You said you had a shot.”
Jankowski nods appreciatively toward Miguel. “Three drinks, huh? That’s enough for some people to black out.”
“No, I was fine when I left the party.”
“Drugs?”
“The doctor is running a tox screen. To check and see if my drink was spiked.”
The officer shakes his head. “I meant you. Any prescription drugs? Lots of medicines you can’t take alcohol with.”
“No. I’m not on anything.” I press my hand to my temple to try and stop the dull ache blooming there.
“Caren, c’mon. Tell him.”
Out of the corners of my eyes, I glare at Miguel. “What are you talking about?”