After
Gretchen
Gretchen strode toward the watches along the wall—she was in head-to-toe Chanel, even her clutch.
Overkill, perhaps, but if ever there was a day.
The man behind the counter had the smooth face of a child, along with perfectly manicured hands.
She smiled at him warmly, then laid her arm casually on the counter.
“Could you help me with something?”
“My husband bought a watch for me at your store in Paris, and I need to know how much it cost,” she said.
“I just don’t feel comfortable wearing it, with the city being what it is these days.
He keeps telling me that it’s not as expensive as it looks, but I don’t believe him.
He tends to be too extravagant.” She rolled her eyes—a woman accustomed to the burdens of great wealth. Which she was.
Gretchen had checked the Cartier website—she wasn’t an idiot—but there were several different versions of the same watch that varied wildly in price.
This was typical, so the company could produce lower-priced alternatives to the most expensive pieces, with fewer stones or more affordable metal.
If she was going to sell the watch, she needed to know precisely how much Richard had paid for it.
She might be in a bind, but she had no intention of being fleeced.
“I understand completely,” the young man said. “Do you have the item with you?”
Gretchen pulled back her sleeve. “Yes, I’m wearing it right now.”
“Oh,” he said, and it came out somewhere between a word and a gasp. “Would it be okay if…Maybe you could take it off?” He placed a small velvet tray on top of the display case. “I can run the serial number on the inside. That’s really the best way to know for sure.”
“Of course,” Gretchen said, slipping it off her wrist and setting it down in the tray.
“I’ll be right back.”
He retreated to a computer two glass cases away.
Gretchen watched him inspecting the back of the watch as an older colleague came over.
The two exchanged words, then the older man returned with the younger.
Gretchen wondered for a moment if Richard had purchased a counterfeit in Paris and they were bracing to tell her the bad news.
She was very glad she’d opted for the Chanel.
“Okay,” the younger man said, his face tight. “Let’s have you put it back on.”
“Is there a problem?” she asked.
“No, no,” the younger man said. “I just want to be sure you have it secured on your person, given the watch’s value.”
“Which is what?”
“One hundred and sixty-seven thousand dollars.”
She felt queasy and relieved all at once.
Such an absurd sum of money! But lucky for her, it was more than enough to recoup the fifty thousand dollars she needed—hopefully.
She was pretty sure they paid a steeply discounted rate on the resale market.
Gretchen knew nothing about how such things worked, but it was common sense. The item was used.
“I just wanted to introduce myself,” the older man said. “Doug Miles. I sold the watch to your husband.” He extended his hand.
“Oh, no, he bought it in Paris.” Of course, now that she thought about it, Richard had only just given the watch to her a few days ago.
He’d been waiting for the right moment, he said, considering Van’s death, but she realized that he’d probably invented the part about Paris because he didn’t want her to think he’d forgotten about her while he was away.
After all, what would he have done to secure a watch like that while climbing?
“Well, I do know that he wanted it to be a surprise,” the older man went on. “It was all adorable, really. He was beaming when he spoke about you. Said that you were quite the artist.”
—
Gretchen made it two blocks down Fifth Avenue before she stopped to heave into a revoltingly filthy trash can. Right there on the sidewalk, for all of New York City to see.
She had known. Of course she had. Not about the watch, but about her husband’s adoration. The dangerous depths of it. She’d known it as soon as Richard had called her from the side of that mountain. She’d seen it in his eyes.
But now she didn’t just know it, she felt it.
Really felt it. Like acid in her veins, flowing into every part of her body.
She had been so foolish. All these years, all this time.
It was like someone had suddenly flipped on all the lights—cold, fluorescent, merciless.
And there she stood, chin-deep in rapidly rising water, well on her way to drowning.
No, no, no. That was enough of that. She needed to focus on the task at hand.
Smoothing her skirt and wiping a hand across the damp back of her neck, Gretchen walked over to a nearby hot dog vendor and bought a small bottle of water.
If he’d noticed the retching, he did not seem to care.
Such was city life—full of brutal mercies.
That was really her only option now, too, wasn’t it?
To not care. There would be plenty of time later to tend to her shattered heart.
Gretchen gripped the icy water bottle, condensation dripping from her hand, and took a few large swallows.
I am not a fool, she reminded herself. She had made calculated choices, deliberate decisions, with the information she had.
Now she would simply make different ones.
She crossed the street, tossing the water bottle in the empty trash can on the far corner, where it landed with a satisfying thud.
Gretchen was not a victim. She never would be.
—
The small man with a grumpy demeanor turned his back to Gretchen as he inspected the watch with a magnifying glass in his dusty second-floor shop.
With some quick googling and a mention of the watch’s specifications, Gretchen had found a dealer in the Diamond District who said he could meet her immediately.
Now she just needed him to transform the watch into a fistful of cash.
Finally, he turned to his computer, presumably to check the serial number.
“Name?” he asked.
“Gretchen Falk,” she said. “My husband, Richard Falk, bought the watch at the Midtown Cartier. I know that it’s very valuable. And I assure you that it’s real. You can look it up.”
“Let me see your ID.” The man held out a hand for her driver’s license, his eyes still on the watch as Gretchen silently handed it over.
“Mmm,” he said noncommittally, rolling on his stool to the computer. He skeptically compared Gretchen’s details with those on his computer screen.
To think how Richard had presented the watch to Gretchen with such emotion, complete with a little speech about how much he loved her. How grateful he was for her—especially after what had happened to Van—how every minute they had was precious.
Gretchen wondered what kind of speech he would have given Frankie.
And why had he changed his mind about gifting it to her?
Unless—what if he’d tried to give it to Frankie and had been rebuffed?
Such an absurdly expensive present—there was a chance that Frankie had refused to accept it.
Gretchen momentarily considered snatching the watch back from this grumpy man and crushing it under the heel of her shoe.
But no, she needed money right now, regardless of how upset she felt. And upset was just a small fraction of it. Murderous. Rageful. That was far closer to the mark. But she already knew from experience that letting her feelings take over would lead nowhere good.
Cash in hand.
“I can pay you fifty thousand, certified check,” the man said when he at last rolled his stool back to her. He eyed her dispassionately over the top of his reading glasses.
“I need cash.” She realized she sounded like a degenerate, but what difference did it make what this unfriendly little man thought of her?
He frowned but did not seem surprised. “Forty thousand then, cash.”
“It’s a deal.”
—
It was nearly five by the time Gretchen was on her way in an anonymous yellow cab.
It had taken so long to hail one around the corner from her building.
Gretchen almost always used Sam, far more than Richard; when she didn’t, she called an Uber.
She was out of practice with actual taxis, which were apparently now an endangered species.
But Gretchen knew better than to leave a trail.
She wasn’t going to have this nothing of a situation turned into a something by police officers monitoring her credit cards.
She was delayed further when she miscalculated the exact location of Bethesda Fountain in the park.
Dead in the center but also farther south than she realized.
Not the easiest place to get to from either the East or the West Side.
And so she ended up having to run like a lunatic, which honestly might have been the worst part of the entire miserable day.
But at least she arrived at the top of the tall staircase only three minutes late.
I’m here, she texted before descending.
Sit on the first bench to the right and wait. Put money on bench next to you.
She did as she was told, moving as quickly as she could down the steps, careful not to trip. The last thing she needed was that kind of attention.
Once she was finally seated, she tried to compose herself, watching the water spill lazily over the fountain’s edge.
She’d had to get the additional ten thousand dollars from the safe, wrapping the full amount in a plastic deli bag secured with rubber bands before tucking it into the Metropolitan Opera tote that was now resting under her hand.
She wanted that bag back, though it probably wasn’t worth dying for, even as a matter of principle.