Chapter 11 #2
Kate continued. “A part of me wishes these guys could be happy for ten minutes. That they cared about the mind that went along with the body of these women.”
Rodney turned to her, raising one eyebrow.
She shrugged. “It always sounds great until you’re in it. Then it’s just hollow.”
“For some people, absolutely. They’re built for that but not for all of us,” Rodney clarified.
“And yet a lot of people, once they get it, they don’t want it anymore,” she murmured.
“What about you?” Rodney asked.
“I’m happy. I didn’t go looking, and Simon just …
fell into my lap,” she admitted, “but I’m not stupid.
” She faced him. “I truly realize the wonderful relationship I have, but I still have days where I think it’ll never work,” she muttered, “especially the days when we have his woo-woo stuff going on. That’s often a complete killer in a relationship, but I’m still hanging in there. ”
“I think he needs you for that too,” Rodney suggested, staring at her. “He needs that acceptance.”
“Yes, he does,” she agreed, “and I’m at a place where I’m fully accepting. Yet we definitely have times when I wake up and just shake my head, wondering what the hell I’ve gotten myself into.”
He laughed. “I think Simon would probably say the same thing about you.”
She grinned and nodded. “You could be right.” With that, she dialed the number at the top of her list and went on down the line.
Her questions didn’t take very long to bring these women to tears, some crying out in shock, others not very forthcoming at all.
Some asked what it had to do with them. All in all, Kate was gathering quite a mix of reactions.
When she got to the next woman, Sherry, Kate went through her initial spiel, asking Sherry if she knew Kurt Conner, John Smith, or Robert Blake.
As soon as Sherry heard the name Robert Blake, she broke up.
“Excuse me. I’m—I’ll have to call you back.”
Kate heard the dial tone as Sherry hung up on her.
About twenty minutes later, in between other phone calls, Sherry called back. “Sorry, my husband was at home.”
“Ah,” Kate replied. “I totally get that. It’s definitely awkward.” After a long silence, Kate began again. “Look. I’m not here to preach to other people about how to live their lives. They can do what they want, and that works for me, until someone dies. I just need some information.”
Sherry replied stiffly, “Good, then we’re in agreement. You don’t tell anyone what I’m telling you, and we’ll get along just fine.”
“What can you tell me about your relationship with Robert Blake?”
“Friends, … with benefits.”
Kate wasn’t expecting her to be so upfront. “Okay. And when did you last see him?”
“Um”—she pondered that—“last Friday night. My husband didn’t want to go anywhere. He just wanted to stay home, gaming with his friends. So, I told him that I was going out. I checked in with Robert, and he’d had a cancellation. So I popped over to spend some time with him.”
“And when did you leave?”
“It was still early.”
“How long were you there?”
“Probably about an hour and a half.”
“Would he have, … I know this sounds a little crude, but would he have had somebody else in after you?”
After a moment of silence, Sherry snorted.
“Honest to God, I have no idea. He might have. Don’t get me wrong.
I thoroughly enjoyed every moment we spent together, but it was literally a physical release with somebody whose company I enjoyed and whose body I adored.
He kept himself in really great shape. He was a hottie, and I don’t have any shame in saying that. ”
“I’m not here to call you out for anything,” Kate reminded her. “I am concerned as to the nature of his relationships and whether anybody may have had something to do with his death.”
“Are you telling me that he was murdered?” Sherry asked. Shock filled her tone, yet maybe not as much as Kate would have expected.
“I haven’t heard from the coroner yet,” Kate explained. “Plus, I have another case with certain similarities. However, that case is in a different department than mine.”
“Similarities?” Sherry repeated. “Like, … what similarities?”
“I can’t divulge any details of an active investigation,” Kate told her. “These are ongoing cases, so obviously we have to keep the details private.”
“Right.” She snorted again. “So I can tell you that he was fit, extremely physical, with a high need for sex. I’m not sure that it would be a normal amount, but I think it was him just being him.”
“And when you say, not normal?”
“I just mean that I knew I was one of many, and I didn’t care. He was not one of many in my world. Robert knew, and he understood the role he played, and we didn’t argue or have any problems with it.”
“How long had you been seeing him?”
“Years,” Sherry replied. “My husband is not … physical. He has a very low libido, and he doesn’t know that I have an outside relationship.”
“Would he be upset?”
“I don’t know that he would be,” she admitted. “He’s often told me that, if he can’t satisfy me, then I should look elsewhere. I’ve just never brought it up and told him that I had gone ahead and done it. And I really don’t want to have to bring it up … at all.”
“So, it works for you?”
“So far, the status quo holds, and it’s worked for us,” she shared, followed by a dry laugh.
“I don’t know what I’ll do now,” she muttered.
“Robert was special. You don’t just replace that easily.
And I’m starting to realize that maybe I was a little more emotionally involved in that relationship than I thought.
He was a good man. So, if somebody did kill him, it’s not anything he deserved. ”
“You say that, but don’t you think that some upset husbands were out there who didn’t agree with that?”
More silence came. “Yeah, probably a lot of them. Robert didn’t care whether you were married or not.
Even though he religiously used condoms, he still wanted someone clean—meaning you kept yourself free of STDs and got checked on a regular basis.
Plus, you had to be up front about what you were doing and where you were going with this.
Then it was all fun and games, … until it wasn’t. ”
Kate sighed. “Right, … until it wasn’t.”
“Right,” Sherry repeated, her sadness permeating her tone.
“Until it wasn’t. And that is where the challenge comes in because Robert really was the guy who was not after anything except sex.
And I know a lot of guys are out there who are probably very similar, and I have met many of them.
However, at the end of the day, while most of them wanted strictly sex, they were still looking for that perfect relationship.
Robert wasn’t, not at all, and he didn’t have any intention of ever having a perfect relationship. ”
“And he really didn’t care how you felt about it?”
“We talked about it, and, to him, it was just another hookup. As long as you understood what the game was, he was willing to have fun. And it was fun,” she confirmed. “We were enjoying our time together, without hurting anybody else.”
Until maybe your husband found out. Kate shook her head and talked further with this woman, getting an even better understanding of what Sherry’s relationship with Robert had been like. Then Kate finally asked her, “Do you know any other people with whom he was in a relationship?”
Sherry hesitated.
Kate sighed. “Look. I know you probably don’t want to tell on somebody else.
However, we have a massive amount of phone numbers to go through here,” she shared.
“So, if you could ease up some of that calling we need to do to solve Robert’s murder, it would help a lot.
Particularly if you think anybody may have had something against him.
Do you know of any breakups that were difficult or violent or anything along that line? ”
“I don’t know about any breakups. However, he told me something,” she began, “and I think it was probably on that same Friday night, but he didn’t mention a name.
He told me how he appreciated our relationship because it was drama-free.
I laughed and said, But that’s the only way we do this.
And he agreed, but he said not everybody does it that way.
He shared something about believing he did everything right, but somebody believed very differently. ”
Kate’s eyebrows shot up at the word believe. So she asked, “And do you have any idea who this was about?”
“No, I don’t have a clue. He gave me the impression that it was somebody he decided to have a relationship with and then regretted it.”
“Interesting,” Kate muttered. “Now, changing the subject, you never told me if you knew either of the other two guys.” Then she repeated the names for her.
“That John Smith name is common, and I did see one man with that name. It wasn’t for very long. And I don’t know any Kurt in that context either. Why? Are they involved?”
“I just wondered if your relationships or friendships,” she clarified, “included these people.”
“No, not at all or not for long, but again there are a lot of John Smiths out there,” she stated. “So I probably don’t know these guys.”
Kate frowned at that, since Sherry’s phone number was found in Kurt’s record of phone calls made. “And where do you work?” Kate asked.
“Do you really need to know that?” Sherry sighed and added, “Sorry, I’m a bit worried.”
“Yes, we do need to know, but I’m not planning on going to your job and telling everybody about your past relationship.”
“Right. And it is a past relationship now,” Sherry muttered, and the tears almost instantly turned back on again.
Kate hurriedly moved through her remaining set of questions and then added, “Look. If you can think of anybody who may have been problematic or wanted more than Robert could give or didn’t accept goodbye when he told her that it was time to be done, please let me know.”
“I will,” Sherry replied, “but I can’t have you calling me at this number again.”