stonily, making no move toward the house. “I’m not selling,” she said. “I toyed briefly with the idea and I did mention it to Inspector Green, but I’ve changed my mind.”
“Well, we’re not in a rush,” Sue said, careful to avoid Bob’s eye. He’d been listening to her increasingly frustrated rants for months. “We’ve been looking so long, if it’s a few more months till —”
“I’m not selling, period.”
Sue cast a longing look at the sorry little house, with its overgrown roses and magnificent view. She felt a tug of kinship. “If we’ve come at a bad time …”
“No.”
Belatedly, Bob came to life. “Thank you for your honesty, Mrs. Carmichael. Sue, let’s check out that other place.”
“What other place?”
He gave her another look. The time-for-a-sock-in-it-Sue look. In the ten months since their wedding, she had become much better at reading him. Just because he stammered and became all flustered under stress, it didn’t mean he was a pushover. In his own quiet way, Bob could be as immovable as a tank. A trait she would have to learn to manage. But not now. Not with the outraged homeowner about to erupt.
Marilyn Carmichael softened as they retreated toward their car. “I’m sorry. It’s a bad time at the moment. The place is a mess. I’m still sorting through things and I can’t think beyond that.” She pressed her hand to her mouth as if she were struggling for control.
As Bob babbled apologies, Sue climbed into the car, puzzled. Green had said the woman was anxious to sell, anxious to move on. Grief takes many forms and travels many paths, as Sue knew only too well. The road to recovery from a catastrophic loss was not smooth or straight. It was full of setbacks, shocks, and disappointments.
As they bumped back down the muddy lane toward the main road, she looked back at the little house, where Marilyn still stood in the drive, her arms crossed and her body rigid. Watching them.
“You shouldn’t have told them!”
Green was surprised by the vehemence in Marilyn’s voice when he phoned to apologize. Meeting Gibbs and Peters in the cafeteria that morning, he’d found them strangely evasive. Since Gibbs usually became red and tongue-tied in his presence, Green would have given it little thought if bulldozer Peters hadn’t had difficulty meeting his eyes.
A simple question had elicited a mumbled confession from Gibbs that their impromptu visit to Navan had not gone well. Not well, Peters burst out. The woman had refused to let them in the door and had virtually kicked them off the property.
Twenty years ago, Green had met this ferocious side of Marilyn Carmichael. When her emotions were fired up, she was a formidable force, but Green was surprised that a simple visit to the house, no matter how unexpected, would have roused her to the point of rudeness. She might be feisty, but her British courtesy was deeply ingrained.
That emotion was all the more puzzling because barely two weeks earlier she had been looking ahead to the sale of her house and the chance to start afresh. Now she seemed back in the mire.
On the phone now, he tried for a reassuring tone. “I’m sorry, Marilyn. You’re right. I was trying to be helpful.” He didn’t add that although he had told the newlyweds about the house, he’d stopped short of suggesting a visit, particularly unannounced. He should have known Peters would seize the opportunity and charge ahead under full steam.
“It was an invasion of my privacy.”
He was chastened for a moment as he finally grasped the subtext. The Carmichaels had endured twenty years of prying eyes and invasive questions, both from media and community. Their life had been laid bare and dissected. If Marilyn had become hardened and less forgiving, she could hardly be blamed. The sight of a strange car in her drive must have flooded her with old fears.
Nonetheless, he sensed another emotion lingering beneath the surface of her indignation. “Marilyn, is there something —”
“I’ve decided not to sell, that’s all.”
“Fair enough.” He trod carefully. “As you said, you have friends there now. The book club and the arts fair …”
His voice trailed off when she left him dangling awkwardly in silence. Mumbling reassurances into the empty air, he hung up and sat looking at the phone. Worry piqued him. Marilyn sounded brittle and on the edge again. On his last visit, she had appeared to be looking forward to her new life, so he had been lulled into complacency. But Marilyn could act with the best. She could hide her deepest pain. Living with her broken husband and navigating the complex feelings of her children, she had had plenty of practice.
And then there was the gin …
“I’ve seen her crash before, when the trial was over,” he said to Sharon later that evening. He had waited until she had a rare moment of peace, nursing their daughter who had fallen asleep at her breast on the living room sofa. He had lit a fire and placed a cup of herbal tea at her elbow. Modo, their hundred-pound rescued mutt, was in her favourite spot, stretched beneath Sharon’s feet. Snoring gently.
Sharon hadn’t been part of his life back then. He had been on his own, his first wife having stormed out of his life in the middle of the case, taking their infant daughter with her. Ashley had been in way over her head as the young wife of a brand new detective. While Green waded hip-deep in human depravity and despair, she had been overwhelmed and self-absorbed, leaving Green without the support and safe haven he hadn’t even known he needed.
Until Sharon. Now she was sprawled amid pillows, with her head resting on his shoulder and her tiny feet propped on the coffee table. Her diminutive frame had more curves now and her rich dark curls were shot through with silver, but she still stirred him. Although her eyes were shut, he knew she was listening, and he felt a twinge of guilt for burdening her. But no one had better insight into the contortions of the human mind than Sharon. No one listened better, and no one knew him better.
She nodded drowsily. “The trial was probably her only reason for getting up in the morning. Once the killer was convicted, her work was done.”
He took a sip of wine, his mind replaying the memories. “Not quite. The jury took four days to reach a verdict. Arguments must have been fierce, because they finally brought down a compromise verdict of second-degree murder. The Crown was going for first.”
“That wouldn’t be punishment enough for her,” Sharon said. It was a statement, not a question. Opening her eyes, she ran her finger down her daughter’s plump, pink cheek.
For a moment he found it difficult to speak. His inexpertly laid fire sputtered and he disentangled himself to prod it back to life. “The jury split over the notion of premeditation. The Crown argued that Rosten had strangled her in the course of a sexual assault gone wrong. Murder committed in the course of another crime is automatically first degree. But the evidence for sexual assault was pretty flimsy. The post-mortem found signs of sexual activity, but no lacerations or semen. It was enough for the defence to drive a small wedge of reasonable doubt into that argument.”
“Evidence of sexual activity wasn’t enough?”
“A condom was used. Rapists don’t usually bother with such niceties.”
“They might if they’re a biology professor familiar with DNA.”
“The
