Chapter 1 #3
Richard and Gretchen might never have spoken again had it not been for Brooks, who, it turned out, rowed crew with Richard (technically, Brooks was just the coxswain) and whom Richard asked to advocate on his behalf.
Brooks assured her that Richard was a stand-up guy—a scholarship student who came from a small town near New Haven.
Plus, he was genuinely smitten with Gretchen.
So Gretchen gave Richard a chance. After all, Brooks was a good person, bookish and a little nerdy, sure, socially awkward even, at times.
(The Dartmouth boys didn’t call him “Encyclopedia Brown” for nothing.) But he was kind, and he knew Gretchen in a way that few people did.
Maybe in a way that no one did. They’d been friends since kindergarten, and she trusted him.
But no one seemed more surprised than Brooks when she and Richard actually stuck.
Within weeks Richard and Gretchen were spending all their time together.
With his longish hair, beat-up car, and thrift store clothes, combined with a pristine room and diligent study habits, Richard was different from the other boys.
Even his handwriting was a work of art. He had things “to make up for,” he’d said earnestly when Gretchen teased him about it, and it was true.
He needed to be ready to work harder than all the private-school kids.
But he also gave the best hugs and had a contagious laugh.
Gretchen couldn’t always match Richard in warmth, but she loved that he was nothing like her parents.
Within a month of dating, Gretchen had known Richard was the one. No, that was a lie. She’d known it that first day in class, hadn’t she? She’d known it the second she laid eyes on him.
* * *
“I’m sure this is all upsetting,” Detective Reyes went on—and it was either kind or patronizing, Gretchen wasn’t sure which. Everything felt slippery. But she needed to focus. She needed a foothold.
“Richard has health problems,” she said. “They can become dangerous very quickly.”
This was not true. Richard was very healthy and fit.
“Your husband has health problems?” Detective Reyes asked, gesturing behind him toward the hallway where Richard had disappeared. “He seems in a lot better shape than me. And I’m, no offense, a lot younger.”
“He has dangerously high blood pressure and an irregular heartbeat,” Gretchen said. “He takes two different kinds of medications.”
“Didn’t he just climb Mount Kilimanjaro?” the detective asked, pronouncing the name of the mountain with what seemed like deliberate awkwardness. Kee-lee. “Isn’t that how he knew Frankie Callahan? I thought they did the climb together.”
Gretchen laughed tightly and regretted it immediately. A woman was dead. “They didn’t know each other, Detective. It was a ten-day trip. They were acquaintances, at best.”
The detective eyed Gretchen silently for a long, uncomfortable moment. “There’s a lot we don’t know about this situation yet, Mrs. Falk. That’s why we asked you to come down here so you could answer some questions.”
Gretchen crossed her arms. “Well, I don’t know what we can possibly tell you.”
He flipped open a notebook. “How about we start with why you didn’t go on this trip.”
She wasn’t going to answer any actual questions without Bruce there, but she would entertain this chitchat if it got her closer to getting Richard out.
“Climb Kilimanjaro?” Gretchen laughed again, breezily this time. She could regain the upper hand in the conversation. It was so obvious that Reyes was fishing for problems in their marriage when there was nothing there to find. “Do I look like someone who would do that?”
He made a point of assessing her physically, though somehow respectfully. “I think so. Yes. Very much so, in fact.”
Gretchen felt pleased despite herself. She knew firsthand there was a certain novelty to the well-maintained older woman—even with very attractive, much younger men.
And it was nice to be reminded that she was still beautiful.
She often passed for far younger, too. Some people even said forty (an exaggeration), but on a good day forty-five was a possibility.
“Well, thank you,” Gretchen replied, adjusting herself in her seat and crossing her hands in her lap—better.
“But, no, I don’t climb. I prefer to do other things with my free time.
” And that was enough with the flirting.
“I do need to speak with Richard now, to see that he’s taken his medication.
I’m always the one to remind him. Every day.
With this kind of stress, he could have a heart attack. ”
“What about when he was on that mountain?” Reyes asked.
“What?”
“His medication. You just said you remind him every day. Who reminded him while he was hiking?” Reyes had locked eyes with her. He knew full well that Gretchen was using the medication as an excuse.
“He’s not a child, Detective. He can manage, obviously.” Gretchen did sometimes care for Richard like he was her fourth child, and she found it very satisfying most of the time. “I’m just saying, under these circumstances, he might forget. Anyone might.”
Reyes stared at Gretchen, eyes narrowing. “You’re a very good wife.” This did not feel like a compliment.
It wasn’t going to be easy to maneuver her way around this detective. He wasn’t the hostess at Le Bernardin, or the receptionist at the Racquet he’d waited until last night, when they were waiting for the bill at Daniel.
Gretchen appreciated the gesture even if she could have done without the ridiculous item itself—not only diamond-encrusted but in the shape of a panther!
Richard wasn’t usually one for obviously expensive things, and Gretchen didn’t much care for the design, but she was grateful that he’d acknowledged that she had, in the end, given him her blessing.
Of course, it turned out she’d been right. He never should have gone on that trip.
At least Richard could admit when he was wrong. Most men were far too fragile to ever cede even an inch of their power.
“Well, I am sorry about the cold,” Reyes said. “The AC in here is ridiculous. We don’t have access in the station to adjust it.”
“And our granddaughter has a school performance in the—well, this morning. Both of us need to be there…It’s past six. We came here voluntarily, Detective. And now, it seems, we’re being punished for trying to be helpful.”
Detective Reyes shrugged, as though the situation had nothing to do with him. “Why don’t I mention the performance to Richard when I go back in? And he can text you. He still has his phone.”
Still. As though he might not have it for much longer.
“Gretchen!”
When she turned, Bruce Barone was hurtling toward her, briefcase in hand, a blue-striped button-down half tucked in, tufts of gray hair sticking up all over.
He looked addled and old and like he had indeed bolted out of bed and run right over without even looking in a mirror.
Well, at least he’d done as she’d asked.
As soon as he saw the detective, he slowed to a walk, smoothed a hand over his messy hair, and lifted his chin.
Gretchen smiled slightly, smugly. “Richard’s attorney,” she said to Reyes. “He can help us sort through this.”
They waited in silence until Bruce was a few strides away.
“They won’t let me see Richard, and he’s been in there for three hours, Bruce,” Gretchen said.
“Mr. Falk knows he’s free to go,” Reyes interjected evenly. “He’s been told several times.” He reached out to shake Bruce’s hand. “Detective Raul Reyes.”
It felt like a betrayal when Bruce shook it back.
“But you know how Richard is, Bruce…” Gretchen began.
In point of fact, Bruce probably did not think of Richard as charming at all.
“He gets to chatting with people he’s just met and—he’s probably forgotten all about a performance we need to be at for Oppy.
” Gretchen was aware this all sounded ridiculous under the circumstances, but much better to talk about their granddaughter’s opening assembly than to mention that she was afraid Richard had forgotten he was in a police station.
Bruce put a hand on Gretchen’s arm in a way that felt both patronizing and comforting. Quiet, dear. Let the men sort this out.
“I need to see my client. Right now,” Bruce said. “You and I both know that we left ‘voluntary’ behind a long time ago, Detective. That’s a custodial interrogation, plain and simple. Anything you’ve gotten out of him is going to get tossed out anyway.”
Gretchen felt such a rush of gratitude. Bruce Barone to the rescue! Who would have thought?
Detective Reyes narrowed his eyes at Bruce for a moment. Finally, he nodded. “Right this way.”
“Have a seat, Gretchen,” Bruce said. “This won’t take long.”