Chapter 38
THIRTY-EIGHT
MINA
“Mina?”
A light tap on my shoulder pulled me out of the dream. I’d been running through fog, trying to get to the source of faint light but never reaching it.
“Mina?”
I nearly rolled off the couch. Ashley stood over me, worry lining her young face.
“What time is it?” I asked, vaulting to my feet. I had no concept of whether it was day or night.
“Just after eight,” she said. “I just got here.”
“No one else is in the office?”
Ashley surveyed the room. I’d pulled the blinds, but forgotten to lock the door. I set an alarm on my smartwatch but must have slept through it.
“Look,” she said. “I know it’s none of my business. But I know this is the third night you’ve slept here. Is something going on? Something I can do?”
Lord, I thought. Sweet as she was, if I’d gotten to the point I needed help from the likes of Ashley, I was in bigger trouble than I thought.
“No,” I said. “I’ve just been immersed in trial prep. I guess I lost track of time.”
An absurd lie that even Ashley could see right through. I had my overnight bag tucked in the corner. When I checked into the Bayview, I’d packed enough for four days, which would get me through until tomorrow.
“Well,” she said. “Mark says he’s been trying to get ahold of you since last night.
He wants you to meet at his office at eight thirty.
He said he’s on his way and that I’m supposed to tell him the second you get in.
Again, don’t wanna pry into your business, but I get the impression you don’t want him to know you’ve been sleeping here. ”
“What? I don’t… I’m not asking you to lie for me.”
“No. I know. It’s just… Mina… something’s wrong. We all see it.”
“There’s nothing to worry about,” I lied.
I walked over to the other side of the room.
I had a small mirror on the wall next to my coat rack.
I looked awful. My hair was matted in the back.
Smudged mascara made me look like a raccoon.
If Mark was on his way, I didn’t have much time to pull myself together.
“There’s a leak in the women’s restroom,” Ashley said. “That’s actually why I came in a little early. The maintenance guy, Connor, told me he’d be here any minute. Not ashamed to admit I’m kinda hoping to catch his attention.”
I noticed Ashley’s outfit. She wore a tight leather skirt and a fitted red knit shirt with a plunging neckline.
“Don’t worry,” she inserted just before my panic set in. “Why don’t you use the men’s room? I’ll stand guard. If Mark walks in before you’re out of there, I can distract him.”
“I don’t know if all that’s necessary,” I said.
“Just go.” She picked up my overnight bag and handed it to me. I had a strong urge to hug her. Instead, I hurried to the private men’s room and did the best I could to pull myself together.
Five minutes later, with my hair neatly pulled back and wearing a fresh linen dress, I was presentable.
As I opened the bathroom door, I could hear Ashley overexaggerating her words, making sure to alert me that Mark had arrived.
I had just enough time to toss my overnight bag into my office before he spotted me.
“Oh,” he said. “You’re already here. That’s good. Can you give me five minutes, then meet me in my office?”
He punched a number into his phone and turned his back on me. Ashley shrugged, indicating she had no new insight as to Mark’s agenda. She rushed over, carrying a steaming cup of coffee, and put it into my hand.
“Thank you,” I said. “You didn’t have to do any of this.”
“Mina,” she said. “Yes, I did. I get you don’t want to tell me why, and that’s cool. But you’re hanging on by a thread. Look, it happens to the best of us. I’ve got you.” I thanked her and walked down the hall to Mark’s office.
He stood at his window, overlooking downtown. “Have a seat,” Mark said, his tone grave. He gestured to the couch against the wall rather than one of his desk chairs. Whatever was going on, it meant this wasn’t going to be a short meeting.
“Am I going to need to take notes for this?” I asked.
He didn’t answer. Instead, Roy showed up. His expression was just as dour as Mark’s. They exchanged a knowing look.
“Palicki,” I said. “Please don’t tell me something fell apart. If I—”
“This isn’t about Palicki,” Mark said. He perched himself on the edge of his desk. Roy took one of the desk chairs and turned it so he was facing me on the couch.
Mark jerked his chin at Roy, urging him to start. Roy rubbed his temple. It didn’t look like he’d gotten much more sleep than I had.
“Mina,” he said. “I’m going to get right into this.”
“Roy called me last night,” Mark interrupted. “I thought it would be best if we talked to you together. I tried to get a hold of you beforehand; you weren’t picking up.”
“I turned my phone off,” I said. “I generally do when I’m trying to sleep.”
He waved me off. “Go ahead, Roy.”
Roy cleared his throat. “I know you’ve been under some stress. None of this is easy for me. And I’ve tried to do my due diligence. I wanted to talk to you by myself. I would have, but Mark reached out to me and between the two of us—”
“What is going on?” I asked. “I know the two of you well enough to read the looks on your faces. What happened?”
“Mina, did you go to Corrine Egan’s house the night before last?”
Mark’s face was hard as he stared at me.
“Did she call you?” I asked. “What did she say?”
“I’d rather you told me your side of it first,” Roy said.
“I’d like to hear it too,” Mark said.
It dawned on me then that Roy had probably told Mark what I’d shared with him the other night on his doorstep. Had he also shown him the pictures of Lock’s indiscretions?
“I don’t know what this is. But, yes. I went to see her. Roy, you know exactly why.”
“And I told you specifically not to do that,” he barked. “I thought I made that pretty clear. And I thought you had enough common sense to do what I said.”
“Excuse me?” I said, rising. “Whatever she told you—”
“You know,” Roy said. “It almost doesn’t matter what she said. What matters is what you did. And what she has proof of.”
The room started to spin. What did she have proof of?
“Mina,” Mark said. “I think maybe you should have your own lawyer for this.”
“What? Am I under suspicion of something?”
Roy had a small tablet. He opened the camera roll and turned it so I could see the screen.
He pressed play on a video. It was Corrine’s interior doorway at her apartment.
The playback only lasted about a minute.
The camera was placed behind me and slightly above my left shoulder.
I hadn’t even noticed it was there. There was no sound, but both my and Corrine’s body language was pretty easy to interpret.
I saw the moment she struck me in the chest. Then I pushed her back. Roy froze the recording.
“She says you assaulted her,” Roy said. “She said you stalked her first. Waited outside the bar where she works and followed her up after she clocked out. She says you threatened to kill her.”
I looked from Roy to Mark. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“You have the video,” I said. “She’s saying I threatened to kill her? I didn’t. I told her to stay away from me.”
In the back of my mind, the lawyer in me was shouting at me to shut up. Stop talking. Say nothing more. Mark was right. This was an interrogation, and I owed Roy no answers. At the same time, Roy was my friend. Mark was my boss. They knew me. Corrine’s lies were so blatant and obvious.
“You weren’t going to do anything,” I said. “I told you point blank that woman is trying to ruin my life. I think she’s in some sort of mental health crisis and she needs help. I told you what she did. The paint cans. The dove. I didn’t assault her. She hit me in the chest and I pushed her away.”
Roy played the video again. Reluctantly, I watched it.
The second time through, I realized the problem.
I knew what had happened on that doorstep.
I knew Corrine had actually assaulted me.
But the angle of the camera didn’t show it.
You could only see my back. Just before I pushed Corrine off me, my body obstructed hers.
I couldn’t believe it. She told Roy I had assaulted her.
Again, the lawyer part of my brain kicked in.
If I were showing this recording at a trial, I might have thought it was a slam dunk for the prosecution.
“This doesn’t tell the whole story,” I said, shoving the tablet back at him.
“I’m telling you, Corrine was the first aggressor.
She’s lying to you about what happened. Twisting it so it looks like I did something wrong.
I didn’t. Everything I’ve been telling you is true.
There’s something wrong with her. She’s trying to ruin my life.
The paint, killing the dove, the note she wrote, her breaking into my home. ”
“She denies all of it,” Roy said.
“You think I’m making it up? Imagining it? Roy? Mark? Does that sound like something I’d ever do?”
“Mina, look,” Mark said, sliding off the side of his desk. “You’ve been under a lot of strain. I know things have been difficult for you at home. I didn’t want to pry or put myself in the middle of your marriage. Believe me, I wouldn’t. But Lock reached out to me last night.”
My heart thumped behind my breastbone. “He what?”
“He expressed some concerns. He said you’ve been behaving erratically. He said the two of you have been having trouble. He said… I hate to even bring this up. But he said you’ve been taking some new medication that might affect your mood.”
Anger erupted inside me. “He said what? He called you? You talked to Lock?”
“He texted me,” Mark said.
“Show me,” I demanded. “I want to see exactly what he said.”
For three days, I’d had no communication with Lock.
“There’s no point,” Mark said. “It only matters that you understand where I’m coming from.
Mina, I’ve seen you. You barely got through your hearings last week.
It’s not like you. Showing up at Roy’s doorstep at night.
Then going after Corrine Egan? You had to have taken her personal information from a confidential file.
That’s a problem for me, Mina. You’re an agent of this office. ”
“The two of you are accusing me of what? Losing my mind?”
“You need to understand,” Roy said. “Corrine is within her rights to file for a personal protection order against you. This puts me in an untenable position. I can’t ethically try to talk her out of it.”
“And I can’t ethically refuse to act when I see an officer of the court, under my supervision, behaving the way you are.
So let me make this crystal clear. You need to take a leave of absence.
You need to get help. Sort out whatever you need to in your marriage.
That’s your business. But when it impacts your work for the county, then it’s my business,” Mark said.
“And when you do something that could be considered a crime, it becomes my business. If you’d had this altercation with Corrine in Lasalle Harbor, do you realize the position that would have put me in?” Roy asked.
I shook my head. Breaking into a cold sweat, I rose. “I can’t believe this. Of either of you. They’re lying to you. Both of them. It’s both of them. Corrine and Lock. They’re trying to destroy me.”
By the looks on their faces, I knew they didn’t believe me. I could barely breathe.
“Go home, Mina,” Roy said. “Take the time Mark’s giving you. Get some rest. Hit pause.”
I staggered toward the door. How could Lock do this to me? How could he hurt me so deeply? Try to destroy my career? And to communicate with Mark behind my back. Lock was a stranger to me. Or even worse.
I grabbed my bag from my office and raced down to the parking lot. I couldn’t go home. I couldn’t be at Lock’s house. Not when I knew Corrine had come and gone from there as she pleased. Not when I couldn’t trust Lock anymore.
My heart shattered into a thousand pieces. Somehow, I’d known this was coming. I’d been trying to run from it for almost four days now.
As I climbed into my car, I pulled out my phone. I needed to hear it from him. My call to Lock went straight to voicemail once again. I tried texting instead.
What are you doing? You talked to Mark behind my back? Call me. Now.
I watched as my text was delivered. A moment later, it showed read. I felt bile rise in my throat as three gray dots wavered beneath my message.
Almost a full minute went by. The dots disappeared.