Chapter 8
Jack
NORA FALLS ASLEEP halfway back to my house. I keep my gaze firmly fixed on the road, not wanting to get even a glimpse of her sleeping form. She looks so beautiful when she’s asleep. She used to fall asleep a lot when we were dating. Halfway through a movie I’d look down to catch her drooling on my shoulder, eyes closed, eyelashes fanned out across her cheeks. Anytime we drove after 10pm, she’d fall asleep in my car, her head slowly drooping across the console to rest on my shoulder. Once she fell asleep waiting for me to take my turn while we were playing a game of Chinese Checkers; although, to this day I’m not sure whether or not she was faking it. She used to tease me about how long I spent deliberating while playing board games, making me wonder if she was pretending to sleep as a way to emphasize her point.
Only when I pull into my garage, do I finally let myself look at her. She’s slumped against the window, hands curled up between her shoulder and chin. Her dark hair has fallen out of its ponytail, the wavy strands now loose around her face. In a word, she looks peaceful.
It kills me to think I have to destroy that peace by waking her up, but we still have things to do. Don’t we? She sighs softly, snuggling herself further into the door.
I mean, maybe some of it can wait until the morning.
Are we really going to track down the missing body tonight?
I sort of doubt it.
Maybe a good night’s rest is exactly what we both need.
Or at least what she needs. Perhaps I’ll drive her back to her place instead, then just do some searching for the body by myself. Not that I even have much of a plan on that front. I don’t usually have to go searching for dead bodies; as a homicide detective, dead bodies typically come to me. Case in point: earlier tonight a dead body showed up in my driveway.
Nora lets out another soft sigh, and that’s that. I’m not going to wake her up. I reverse out of my driveway and head toward her condo.
Familiar bright red and blue lights greet me as I turn into her condo complex, making dread pool in my stomach. Surely not. The police can't have already come for Nora. Somebody would have called me— and nobody called me. I check my phone again to be sure, confirming that I have no missed calls or texts. Sure, I’m not on duty, or even on call tonight, but my friends should all know this is Nora’s complex. If she’s involved, they’d have definitely called me. This is just a coincidence. Some other crime must’ve taken place here tonight.
As if responding to my thoughts, my phone starts to ring. A glance at the screen tells me it’s Stafford, one of my coworkers, and the dread pooling in my stomach grows into an ocean. That’s right, I’ve got a whole ocean of dread churning around inside me.
I ignore the call, praying he’ll leave me a voicemail with more information, then move my car abruptly into reverse, ready to get the heck out of there. The sudden movement makes Nora’s eyes pop open.
“What’s going on?” she murmurs sleepily. “Where am I?” She turns to look my way and gasps in surprise. “Jack!” I see the moment she remembers everything that’s happened tonight. The sleep vanishes from her eyes as her face turns ashen and her hand rises to clutch her chest. The police lights catch her eye and she rotates to face them, eyes widening to saucers.
“The police,” she whispers, “are at my condo?”
I don’t answer. Instead, I continue reversing out of the condo complex until I finally have space to pull forward and loop around.
“Jack,” Nora says, “why are the police there? How could they already know what I did? Who even told them Ian was dead?”
“I don’t know,” I say brusquely. My mind is racing, trying to catch up to this turn of events. I pick up my phone and see Stafford left me a voicemail. “Stafford called,” I tell her. “Maybe his voicemail will give us some info.” I go to press it to my ear, not wanting her to overhear the message in case it’s as bad as I’m imagining, but she snatches it from me with lightning fast reflexes that I was not prepared for.
“I’ll play it on speaker,” she says, holding the phone out of my reach and pressing play. Stafford’s voice fills the car sounding more anxious than I think I’ve ever heard him sound outside of the time his wife’s nephew almost got arrested for vandalism.
“Reynolds, you need to call me,” he says. “This is bad. Really bad. I’m outside Nora’s condo. Man, they found a dead body in her complex. Someone in the complex reported finding it on a late night walk with their dog...Reynolds, the body is on Nora’s front lawn. Stabbed in the throat with a knitting needle…I’m here now. There’s no sign of Nora. Geez. This is bad…I knew you’d want to know. Knew you’d be worried about her. Heck, I’m worried about her. Call me, okay?”
The voicemail ends. Somehow the silence in the car is louder than when Stafford’s baritone voice filled the air.
“That’s that, then,” Nora finally says, a tremor in her voice despite the fact that I can tell she’s trying to appear brave. “I’m going to jail.”
“You’re not going to jail,” I growl. “We can still fix this.”
“Fix it? How can we fix it? The man I murdered earlier just showed up on my front lawn with my knitting needle stuck in his throat! I’d say the evidence is stacked pretty high against me. Plus,” she waves a hand at me, “you’re probably either going to be put on the case or asked if you know anything, and what then? Are you really going to perjure yourself for me? I don’t think so, Jack. And I would never ask you to.”
My hands grip the steering wheel like it’s the only thing keeping me from being sucked into a black hole. Like a black hole, this situation certainly has a very hopeless/there’s no way out vibe to it.
Well, except for the one way.
And I’m still not totally sold on the idea that’s been percolating in my mind for a couple of hours now.
We reach a red light and I look over at Nora, expecting to see her crying or at the very least on the verge of tears. But instead she’s just sitting there, eyes straight ahead, a dull, vacant expression on her pretty face.
She’s given up.
And that is something I cannot allow.
“I may not have to perjure myself,” I say carefully.
“What are you going to do— feign muteness?” she says dryly, still staring listlessly ahead.
I try to swallow but my throat is too dry. Memories of how poorly this went last time assault me.
“We could get married,” I say, injecting as much casualness into my voice as I can. I’m cool.
Casual. Chhiilll. Chiller than Chili’s baby back ribs.
Nora doesn’t say anything for a long time.
“Nora?” I finally prompt.
“I’m sorry, I think I just hallucinated. I thought you said we should get married.” She lets out a high-pitch laugh.
“I didn’t say we should,” I reply. “I said we could. Like it’s an option on the table.”
“You want to get married?”
“Again, I didn’t say that I want to get married. I said we could.”
“But why? Do detectives’ wives have some sort of immunity I don’t know about?”
“Yeah, Nor, didn’t you hear? If you’re married to a cop you can kill anyone you want,” I answer, my voice dripping with sarcasm.
“Well,” she cries defensively, “what was I supposed to think? I don’t see how getting married helps us here unless it’s conjugal visits you’re after.”
My cheeks burn with anger. “Conjugal visits? Are you freaking kidding me, Nora? That’s why you think I made the suggestion. Nice to know you think so highly of me.”
She’s quiet. I’ve chastened her.
“I’m sorry, Jack. You’re right. That was horrible of me to accuse you of that.”
How does she always disarm me like this? Seconds ago I was spitting mad, now I want to wrap her in a hug.
“I suggested marriage because of spousal immunity,” I tell her, eyes focused on the road, heart focused on her. “If we’re married I can’t be forced to testify against you. In fact, even if I wanted to, legally I can’t testify against you without your consent.”
“Wait, that’s real?” Nora shifts in her seat, angling her body toward mine. “I thought that was just on cop shows and stuff.”
“It’s real. See section 600.2162 of Michigan Legislature if you don’t believe me.”
Nora fiddles with the sleeve of her sweatshirt. “I don’t need to look it up. Of course I believe you, it’s just…marriage?” She drops the sleeve and folds her hands in her lap. “That’s a big ask.”
Irritation flares in my chest, closely followed by a fresh wave of the feelings of inadequacy her original rejection left me with. “Silly me, I didn’t realize that a life spent in prison was better than one spent with me.”
She sucks in a breath. “I didn’t mean a big ask for me, Jack,” she says softly. “I meant that it’s a big ask for me to make of you.”
There she goes again, stripping me of all my weapons.
“It’s not that big of an ask,” I downplay the offer. “Just think of it as me asking you to be my roommate.”
She laughs humorlessly. “Yeah, your roommate to whom you’re legally bound.”
Moment of truth: I do not actually hate the thought of being legally bound to Nora.
“Legally bound? Don’t make this weird, Nor,” I joke, using humor to hide my true feelings.
“Ha. Ha.” She blows out a puff of air. “How would we even pull this off? I mean, the police found the body on my front lawn. They’re looking for me. It’s not as if we can find someone to marry us in the middle of the night. This isn’t Vegas.”
“Wait, so you’re actually considering doing this?” I ask.
Second moment of truth: It makes me feel extremely pathetic that three years ago I proposed and she said no, but now she might say yes because it could save her from going to jail…and yet I’m still excited about the prospect of marrying her. Yep. Extremely pathetic. And yet, it’s true: I am excited to be Nora’s husband.
Not that I’m going to tell her that. No need for her to know I’m probably still in love with her.
“Maybe,” she hedges. “But only if you’re really sure. Anyway, I’m just gathering intel. What’s the point of deciding yes or no before I even know if we could pull it off.”
“Sure, that makes sense.” I drum my fingers across the steering wheel. “But I guess I want to go on record as saying that, while I am willing to do this for you, I certainly don’t want you to feel stuck or as if this is your only option. You experienced something traumatic tonight. Something no person should ever have to experience. Offering to marry you is my attempt at helping to correct that injustice. I know nothing can ever fully correct it, but I want to do my part to help you come back from that trauma. That being said, if you don’t want to marry me, we'll find another way to keep you out of jail. We could always make a run for it. Start over somewhere warm and sunny. Antigua, maybe. Seems like that’s where lots of criminals like to flee to. Makes you wonder about the crime rate there, but hey—”
“Yes,” Nora cuts me off, bursting out the word.
“Yes?” I echo. “Yes, what?”
“Yes, I’ll marry you,” she elaborates, her eyes wide and jaw set.
Do not smile, I instruct my rebellious mouth. Do not even think about smiling.
“Right, um, okay.” I pretend to be really engrossed in the setting of my windshield wipers. A move that sadly backfires when I accidentally flip them to the highest speed, sending a screech through the car as the wipers rub against the dry glass. Smooth, Jack. Real smooth.
“So we’ll have to head to City Hall first thing in the morning. We can pay extra to expedite the marriage license. My cousin did that when she and her boyfriend decided to elope before he left for his deployment. If things go to plan, we'll be married by tomorrow afternoon. We’ll need witnesses, but that shouldn’t be too much of a problem. We can find two people off the street if we have to. You’ll need your birth certificate–which will pose a problem now that there are cops at your place. We’ll have to either sneak into your place somehow or make a request for one at the courthouse. I think those can be provided the same day. Of course, we’ll have to call in sick to work. I’d really like to avoid talking to anyone at my work until after we’re married, so I’ll send an email that I’m out for the day rather than calling. But for you it’s important that it doesn’t look suspicious for you to call in sick the same day that Ian doesn’t show up to work. Is there anyone in the office you can leak it to that you’re not actually sick, just playing hooky to get married? Ideally someone who loves to spread office gossip.”
“Wow,” Nora murmurs, “you’ve thought of everything.”
I run a hand over the back of my neck. “Uh, yeah. Guess I did.”
No need to tell her that this plan has been working itself out in my head all night.
“I can tell my friend Stella about the wedding. She’ll spread it around.”
“Perfect. Yes, in the morning, call Stella.”
Nora nods, then peers over at me. “So do you just think this fast on your feet? Or have you had this plan in mind all along?” she asks, an exaggeratedly light tone to her voice that lets me know she’s trying to appear as if she cares way less about the answer than she actually does.
“No…All along? Nah. I mean...” I clear my throat, rubbing my hands up and down around the steering wheel. “Did I consider that things might be heading this way…maybe a little. It was just a contingency plan. Always good to have one.”
There’s a beat of silence, then Nora whispers, “Thank you, Jack. You always take such good care of me.”
The words are bittersweet. It’s nice to know she thinks so, but I can’t help but wonder why that wasn’t enough to make her say yes three years ago? What did I not do or provide for her that would’ve swung her answer in my favor?
“It’s no big deal,” I say gruffly. We’ve reached my driveway now, and I turn into it. “We should also talk about Stafford’s voicemail…I think I’m going to have to lose my phone. That way we have a story for why I didn’t get it.” I ease the car into my garage, then put it in park before turning to face her. “And then maybe I’ll tell them, you spent the night at my house–in the guest room, of course. I’ll be sure to mention that. I don’t want to tarnish your reputation as a Christian woman.” My eyes flick to her hands where I know I’ll see the pearl promise ring her grandpa gave her on her 13th birthday. “I know how important that is to you.”
Something strange flickers across Nora’s eyes, there and gone so fast I don’t have time to identify it; but then, just as fast, she darts across the center console, plants a soft kiss on my cheek, then settles herself back in her seat, her cheeks flushing a pretty pink. The spot where her lips brushed the skin of my cheek tingles. I have to force my hand to stay at my side, rather than allowing it to rise to my cheek to feel the spot for itself.
“What was that for?” I ask testily, making her cheeks turn even pinker.
“S-sorry,” she stutters. “I just. Well, it was a thank you of sorts. So, thank you. Again.” She doesn’t say anything more, just fumbles with the handle on her door for a few seconds before finally managing to get it open. She flees into my house without so much as a backwards glance in my direction.
I sit there for a minute, staring after her. Then, when I’m sure she’s safely inside and not going to come back out, I give in and lift my hand to my face, letting my fingers trace over the imprint of her kiss.