Chapter 25
Pullman’s mouth was set into a tight line as he looked between me and Bradley. He gave me a dirty look, and I gave him one back. Why the hell was he here?
“I’m going to need you to come by the station to answer some questions,” Pullman said, shoving his card unceremoniously into Bradley’s chest. “Tomorrow.”
Bradley didn’t ask any questions. His gaze just darted from Pullman to me, trying to read the situation. His eyes were tight and beady with stress.
“Fine.” Bradley nodded.
“Great,” Pullman said darkly.
He looked at Bradley with disgust, and I instantly realized that for all of his faults, Pullman must have deduced exactly who and what Bradley was. I had to give him credit for that at least, even as he grasped my upper arm and pulled me unceremoniously from the apartment.
I waited until the door had fully slammed closed before I spoke. “Listen,” I started, but Pullman was already shaking his head.
“No,” he said. He nodded toward Bradley’s apartment door, his eyebrows raised suspiciously. “Not here.”
His eyes swept the second floor of the complex and lingered on the parking lot below and the neon sign illuminating the Chili’s situated behind.
“You feel like a drink?” he asked, pointing in its direction.
“Are you asking me if I want to go to a fucking Chili’s right now?”
Pullman looked annoyed. “You and I need to talk. So it’s either there or in my cruiser. Your choice.”
I sighed, knowing that he had the upper hand here. I needed to explain myself, and I didn’t relish the idea of doing it in the back seat of a police car.
“Fine,” I said, the irritation spreading over me. “Lead the way, Officer,”
The restaurant was decently busy for a Friday night, too full for our conversation to be overheard.
Pullman had flashed his badge to the hostess, whispering something in her ear that made her smirk back at him.
She had led us to a booth in the far corner of the bar, backing up to the kitchens.
The TV screens were all blaring various sports channels.
The one closest to our heads announced the Buffalo Bills’ newest draft pick, and that seemed to enrage the people nearby.
Pullman kept quiet while we sat down, speaking only to give the perky waitress our drink orders.
“Just a Diet Coke for me,” he said, flashing her a more genuine smile than I’d ever seen him wear around me or my family. The waitress blushed. Out of the context of an interrogation room, I guessed he was a little cute.
“And you?” she asked, turning to me.
“Tequila and soda,” I told her, flashing Pullman a dirty look. If he expected me to talk about this, in a chain restaurant of all places, I would need alcohol, and lots of it.
When she returned with the drinks, I grabbed mine, taking a grateful sip. The cheap alcohol burned, but it was comforting and the glass gave me something to do with my hands.
Pullman watched me, a dazed expression on his face, lips parted, eyes focused. For half a second, I caught his eyes drifting down to my chest. The tank top I was wearing was tight and low cut, meant to entrap Bradley.
It was at that moment that I knew Detective Pullman wanted to sleep with me.
He wouldn’t, of course. It was a conflict of interest, and he half thought I was clinically insane, but the desire was there.
If we had met randomly in a bar, he would have been all over me, and we both knew it.
I wondered what he would be like in bed.
I’d never been with a cop, but one of the women in my writing circle had.
“Copaganda romance,” as she called it, sold well.
Cop characters were firm and strong and knew what they were doing.
She’d slept with a few NYPD officers over the years, “all in the guise of research,” she’d said coyly, but also confided that she’d found herself disappointed.
Most of them had small dicks and only ever wanted to do it doggy-style.
I stared back at Detective Pullman and wondered if that was how he would be.
He was waiting for me to speak. I didn’t take the bait.
“Do you want to tell me why you were at Bradley Myers’s house?” he finally asked.
“I want to know why you were there,” I said, genuinely curious at how Bradley had gotten on his radar.
“I received a call from Victoria Hopely this evening,” he said, as my lips wrapped around my straw again.
He focused on them momentarily before continuing.
“She told me that she was concerned about a potential connection between Hazel’s disappearance and Alex’s murder.
She informed me that Bradley Myers and Alex were sleeping together before she was killed and that I should investigate him. As a suspect in Alex’s murder.”
Despite myself, I was shocked that Victoria had felt strongly enough about Will’s potential innocence that she would formally suggest the cops look into someone else.
“Good,” I said, not clueing Pullman in on this. “You finally decided to do your job.”
Pullman ignored my jibe. “She also told me that she told you the same thing and was concerned you might enact some vigilante justice on him if I didn’t get there first.” I pursed my lips and he cracked a slight smile, knowing he was right.
“After what you told me about Hazel looking into all of this, I figured she was probably right.”
I tried very hard not to give anything away with my face.
“I read your book cover to cover,” Pullam continued. “I could read between the lines. Myers was the teacher, right? And he was inappropriate with you too?”
I said nothing. I didn’t have to. Pullman understood. His expression softened. “I’m sorry,” he said slowly. It was the most compassionate I’d seen him since I met him.
“I wasn’t there about that,” I continued. “I needed to know if he killed Alex.”
“So you went alone to the house of a man you suspected of murder?”
“I needed to talk to him,” I said, reeling from how stupid it sounded. Not that I’d give Pullman the satisfaction of admitting it.
Pullman rolled his eyes. “I gathered that.”
“Then why did you ask?”
“Because I don’t understand, Rose,” he said, putting his hands down on the table. “A couple hours ago you were screaming at me, telling me that you wanted to help your sister—only to immediately put yourself in harm’s way. It’s reckless and unhelpful.”
His outrage was understandable, but also infuriating.
“I’m an adult,” I reminded him. “I don’t have to explain myself to you, Pullman. I have my reasons.”
“Except you do. Because I’m the police.” Pullman fixed a firm gaze on me. “It’s my job to look into these things,” he said finally. “Not yours. You’re a writer, Rose, not a detective.”
I took another sip of my drink to keep from rolling my eyes. “I couldn’t risk telling you and waiting to see if you would act on it,” I snapped, aware that nearly half my drink was gone already. “I don’t trust the police after what happened to Will.”
“That isn’t fair,” Pullman said, giving me a look that bordered on hurt.
Suddenly I could see him as he was outside of work.
Someone’s brother. Someone’s boyfriend. It was unnerving.
I didn’t want Pullman to be a real person.
I preferred to hate him like every other inept cop I’d ever dealt with.
“I have been completely devoted to your sister’s case.
I’ve followed every lead, including all of the insane ones you’ve suggested. ”
I scoffed and Pullman sighed, leaning back against the booth, his arms crossed in frustration. “Well, turns out Bradley wasn’t involved,” I said, deciding not to wait for him to continue his lecture. “He has a solid alibi. For both Hazel’s disappearance and Alex’s murder.”
“Yeah, well, I’ll be confirming both of those.” He took a handful of tortilla chips from a basket that had just appeared and pushed it toward me begrudgingly. “You know this whole investigation would move a lot faster if you trusted me with information.”
I cocked my eyebrow. “Right. Because your department is so receptive to my suggestions?”
Pullman shook his head. He looked frustrated with me, and I guess I couldn’t really blame him.
“I want to ask you a question,” he said. “And I’d like it if you were honest with me.”
I snorted. “Is this an interrogation, Detective?”
He rolled his eyes. “Hardly. This would never hold up in court. We’re in a restaurant for one, which is inappropriate. Combine that with you being under the influence, and nothing you say would be admissible in any way.”
“I don’t think one drink qualifies as ‘being under the influence.’”
“It does in a courtroom, and besides, that’s not the point,” Pullman said. “What I meant is that this isn’t an official meeting. I could already be sanctioned just for being here with you. It’s a conflict of interest.”
This intrigued me. “So why did you suggest it?”
Pullman chewed on his lower lip. “Because you’re not exactly a regular witness, are you, Rose? So I’m not going to treat you like one. I’m hoping we can be more upfront with each other about the case. Okay?”
“I’m listening.”
“I’ve been thinking about what you said earlier.”
“You’ll need to be more specific.”
“About Will’s potential innocence,” Pullman said. Was this a trick? Why would Pullman suddenly start listening to me? I stared at him, trying to figure out where he was going with this.
“You think Will is innocent?” I asked in disbelief.
“No,” Pullman said. “But I have some things I want to run by you. Some questions about back then. I think your perspective could be helpful.”
I felt a lump of discomfort form in my chest. “You’re going to ask me about my father again, aren’t you?” I couldn’t help but snap, still mad they had put him through that.
“He’s a person of interest, Rose. That’s all. One among many.”
“I’d love to know why,” I said, crossing my arms in annoyance.
“I can’t tell you that,” Pullman said. “It would be interfering with the investigation. Which I think you’ve done enough of already.”
“So why am I even here?”
Pullman sighed. “Because you want to find your sister. Just like I do. And in order to do that, I need you to let me in. Work with me instead of against me. Please.”
It wasn’t as if I had much of a choice. I was fresh out of leads, and Pullman did seem like he was trying to be genuine and helpful.
“Fine. I’ll try. Happy?”
“Ecstatic,” Pullman said, and he actually looked it.
“Let’s get into it—after I go to the bathroom,” he added, pushing his nearly empty soda cup away from him.
“Don’t go anywhere.” I watched him rise from the booth, giving me one last look before he slipped out of it and headed toward the men’s room.
I didn’t know how to feel. On the one hand, I had always hoped more people would listen to me, would consider the possibility that Will was innocent.
It was what I had spent the last eleven years of my life trying to accomplish.
But now, it just felt like a last-ditch attempt from Pullman to make sense of Hazel’s case. Which meant he had nothing.
I didn’t want to sit with the thought. I opened up my phone, searching for the local school superintendent’s email.
I found it in seconds and opened up a new message to him on my email then attached the recording I had taken at Bradley’s and typed out a quick message about who it featured.
I clicked the Send button before I could change my mind.
There, I thought as the word sent flashed across the top of my screen.
There was no way they’d sweep this under the rug.
There would be HR meetings and professional consequences.
Bradley would have to answer for sleeping with me and Alex, and whoever had come in between and after.
I might not be able to do anything for Hazel, but I could at least protect the girls that would come after her. It made me feel slightly less useless.
I was about to close out of my phone when I decided to open a new tab on my browser and typed “Dominick Pullman” into the search bar.
If Pullman wanted me to be open and honest with him, I was going to do a little digging on who he was first. The first few pages were all links to the sheriff’s department website and Palm Beach Post articles where he had been quoted about the job.
He didn’t have a large online presence, mostly work stuff.
I scrolled through some of the more boring pages until I found his Facebook profile.
It was set to public. I found his birthday: He was thirty, and a local.
He had gone to Palm Beach Gardens High School and then FAU.
I kept scrolling through his page until I stumbled upon a comment from another officer under a photo of Pullman.
He was smiling in front of a bag full of toy donations for the sheriff’s department toy drive.
The other officer had written, Thank you for the donation. Way to go, Nick!
Nick. I froze. I had been so focused on the “Nicholas” angle that I had never considered that the name might be a nickname for Dominick.
What were the fucking chances? Heart racing, I scrolled back up and checked his graduation year. Class of 2011. I scrambled back to my email, searching for the ten or so unopened yearbooks I’d requested from . I stopped when I found one buried between emails from Marta and my publisher.
I opened the link. By now, I had done this so many times that it felt useless, but my fingers were shaking anyway as I opened the search bar and typed in “Dominick.”
And then there he was. Nick from the mall.
My fingers hovered on the screen, zooming in on the photo of the floppy-haired, dimpled boy I remembered from that day.
My teenage memory had made him more attractive, the way we had always seen older boys.
Looking at him now, eleven years later, he looked more average.
But there was no question it was him. There was something about his face I couldn’t place.
And then I stopped cold, realizing the reason he looked so familiar.
Mall boy’s full name, written just under his picture, was Dominick Pullman.