Chapter 1 #2
“Bruce said not to answer any questions,” Gretchen said finally, “so why are we going down there?”
“Because I have questions. I want to know why they’re at our house.” Richard sounded more angry than upset, luckily. “Besides, I don’t care what Bruce says. It would seem suspicious to say no. Would you have preferred that?”
“Of course not,” Gretchen said, but she felt a little attacked, which hardly seemed fair under the circumstances.
They were quiet for a moment. Then Richard exhaled heavily and reached for her hand. “It can’t hurt to be cooperative,” he said. “To keep things…calm.”
“But why are they searching our house?” she asked again. Just the thought—those police officers with their hands all over her things, their things. Their family. It was a violation.
He turned to look at Gretchen, his eyes searching pointedly. “I don’t know, Gretchen.” A pause. “Do you?”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Gretchen snapped, freeing her hand to tuck her hair behind her ear.
“They must have a reason, though. A decent one, because a judge gave them a warrant. That’s why I want to talk to them—poke around a bit and find out.”
And so here they were, still down at the police station at nearly six in the morning.
They’d casually separated them right away.
Mr. Falk, you can come right this way. Mrs. Falk, someone will be right out for you in a minute.
As though this were all a routine matter.
“A minute” had turned into hours; Gretchen had been sitting there for what felt like a lifetime, shivering in her Natori pajamas.
It didn’t seem right for them to be purposely making her uncomfortable while she waited.
She’d already mentioned how cold she was to at least three different officers, one of them a woman.
And yet even that female officer hadn’t done anything but frown and shake her head as if the solution weren’t as simple as adjusting the thermostat or offering Gretchen a blanket or an extra jacket.
Gretchen had also asked to see Richard at least a half dozen times and been ignored.
Or, rather, assured: Any minute, any minute—they’re just wrapping up. They were stalling, obviously.
Gretchen could also picture Richard in the interrogation room, doing his part, charming the pants off the officers, trotting out his man-of-the-people credentials.
Taking his sweet time, his wife forgotten on a rock-hard bench in a frigid lobby, along with Bruce’s warnings about not talking to the police.
She glanced at the clock on the wall. Three hours and eleven minutes now!
Enough was enough. This had gone on too long.
They needed a lawyer, and Gretchen still hadn’t been able to reach Scotty—her calls kept rolling straight to voicemail. She called Bruce again.
“What are you doing down at the police station? I expressly told Richard not to answer questions!” Bruce shouted.
He was a very good attorney but a very unpleasant man who was particularly condescending to women.
Not surprising, given that he and her father had gotten on famously.
He’d even drafted their prenup, the one she’d been mortified her parents had insisted on.
“What the hell is wrong with him? Richard should know better.” That was exactly how her father had talked about Richard.
“I mean, there is stupid and then there is—”
“Oh, shut up, Bruce!” It was one thing for her to be upset with her husband, but she wasn’t about to listen to Bruce criticize him.
She suppressed a smile as she registered Bruce’s gasp on the other end of the line. Men always underestimated Gretchen, but she’d learned long ago to use their low expectations to her advantage. When to play demure, and when to bite back.
“Richard and I pay you, remember?” she went on.
“A lot over the years, as a matter of fact. And not for your personal opinions.” Shame and love collided in Gretchen’s chest. It was hard to get adequate purchase on the moral high ground while sitting in a police station in your pajamas.
“Just get down here. Now, Bruce. And do your job.”
Gretchen hung up and stared at the phone in her trembling hand.
“Mrs. Falk?” Detective Reyes approached, looking even more attractive in the light and not at all short.
(At six-five, Richard had a way of shrinking other men.) Reyes took a seat next to her, a sympathetic but authoritative expression on his handsome face.
Like a doctor there to deliver bad news—regrettable, no one to blame but the fates.
“I’m so sorry to have kept you waiting, and for the middle-of-the-night disruption. ”
“ ‘Disruption’? That’s certainly an understatement, Detective.
It was all extremely…dramatic,” Gretchen said, to her credit, very calmly.
Detective Raul Reyes was not a man who would be moved by anger.
That was obvious. “It would help to have some more information, at least—like why you’re searching our apartment in the first place.
This is all quite…upsetting, to be honest.”
She could be upset. Worry, fear, anxiety—these were female emotions men were willing to tolerate.
They shrunk women down to manageable size.
But Richard had never needed Gretchen to be anything other than exactly who she was, never needed her to pretend to feel any way that she did not.
And she’d fallen in love with him because of it.
* * *
There was something odd but also endearing about the guy in the faded Sonic Youth T-shirt who said hello as he took the seat next to her in Carpenter Hall on the first day of Introduction to the History of Art in the Ancient World.
Especially when combined with his very fastidious-looking notebooks and his perfectly organized pencil box. What college student had a pencil box?
“Can’t wait for this,” he said, not directly to Gretchen, but she was the only one in the vicinity.
“For art history?”
“I think art gives the world meaning.” He said this so emphatically, Gretchen thought for a minute he might be joking. But he didn’t seem to be.
“You’re an artist?” She didn’t bother to hide her skepticism. She would have guessed basketball player. Crew, it turned out.
He shrugged sheepishly. “No, but if I could do anything…I’ve always felt that way since I was a little kid.
I used to take art books out of the library and read them under the covers with a flashlight, like they were porn or something.
” He laughed. “Things like art weren’t exactly part of the place I grew up. ”
“You still can do anything. If you want. You’re in college. That’s the whole point.”
“We’ll see.” He searched her face for a moment. “Not sure the real world and art are especially compatible, no matter where you are.”
Gretchen couldn’t argue with that. Sure, art was fine.
Her parents were on the board of the Met, and she’d always enjoyed an afternoon there.
But studying art? Art giving the world meaning?
It seemed to her excessive and, well, dumb.
Gretchen wasn’t sure what she wanted to do yet, but law school had popped into her mind more than once.
She wanted to make a positive difference in the world. She wanted to help people.
“I think people give the world meaning,” she added, even though she wasn’t looking to further the conversation.
“Fair,” he said. “People first then, art second.”
Gretchen turned to focus on the professor, who had stepped onto the stage in the huge lecture hall. She could feel the guy still staring at her.
“Wow, you are really gorgeous,” he added. “You must know that, but still…”
She turned her head, ready to shut him down.
Some small talk in class was one thing. She didn’t appreciate being hit on, though, especially when it maybe came with a dig about her being arrogant.
But he was smiling now. And his expression was so open and hopeful, she was immediately disarmed.
The boys she knew dispatched compliments like heat-seeking missiles—all calculation and no heart.
But this was different. This odd boy with the shaggy hair and the sincere eyes was unlike anyone she had ever met.
“Oh, God, and smart, too. You can really see it, in your eyes.” He gave a low whistle. “That’s a dangerous combination.”
“Dangerous for whom?” Gretchen asked with remarkable poise, given how her heart was racing.
“Dangerous for me.” He laughed as his smile changed to something deeper and more serious. “Good for the world, probably.”
Gretchen decided she wasn’t going to fall for any of this. “Ah, yes, the threat of the smart woman,” she shot back. “Every man’s favorite backhanded compliment.”
“That sounded wrong, didn’t it?” He closed his eyes for a moment and lowered his head in mock defeat. “I’m Richard.” His eyes were much softer now. “Can we start again? I’ll try to get my foot out of my mouth.”
An uncomfortable flutter rose in Gretchen’s belly.
Richard didn’t seem the least bit put off by her chilly manner—“patrician,” her friend Brooks liked to say (or “bitchy,” when he was teasing her).
Still, as far as Gretchen was concerned, men were a threat until proven otherwise.
Besides, she wasn’t at Dartmouth for boyfriends.
She was there to plan her future. She was not going to end up subject to the whims of a man.
She shook her head and looked away, just as the professor began his lecture.