Page 48 of Such a Good Wife

“Were you with Luke Ellison that evening?” he asks.

I think of Luke. It was such a short time ago that he was here, looking at me longingly, whispering lovers’ words in my ear. A career and happiness, a holiday in Italy spread out in front of him.

“No.” I don’t say more because I hear that my voice is husky with the strain of holding back tears.

“No?” he repeats. I don’t repeat my response. I wait to see where he’s going with this.

“We have a witness who says he saw you get into Luke’s truck in the parking lot of the bookstore several weeks ago.”

Nausea, something like seasickness, washes over me. The only person who saw me sitting in Luke’s truck that night was Lacy. Or so I thought. Could he be using the male pronoun to throw me off? I feel sure that Lacy has gone back to Joe even after saying she was done with him, but I can’t believe she’d involve herself in this. Maybe there was someone else passing through the lot.

“Yes, I sat in his truck for a second,” I admit.

“But you said you weren’t with him.” Joe writes something down in a tiny spiral notebook, then looks up and fills the pregnant silence.

“I told you. We spoke about writing, maybe lessons. He was giving me one of his books. I sat in his car for a second, to reach in the back and take a book off the stack—get his card and info. I already told you that.”

I want desperately to say that he could corroborate that story with Lacy, because I’d told her the same thing. But I already lied to him in the diner about how I knew her, that I’d met her only once before. I can’t change that now—too much rests on my consistency. I suppose, if it becomes necessary for my survival, I’ll have to bring Lacy into it, but not now.

“I didn’t know he gave private coaching lessons,” Joe says, an unyielding look in his eyes.

“How would you?”

“Well, he doesn’t have any indication on his website or business card, and no family members have mentioned a side coaching business. He makes plenty of money from his books. Why would he need to?”

“I wouldn’t know.”

“You wouldn’t know.”

“No,” I say, trying to keep my voice light.

“I met the guy a few times. Didn’t strike me as the charitable type, just offering private lessons,” he says, and I pause, absorbing that Joe had met Luke before.

“All I know is that he made the offer. I thought about it. And I decided against it.”

“Decided against it.” He says this like a simple echo, no meaning to be gained from it. Was it a question?

“Is there anything else?” I ask curtly.

“So your statement is that you never met him outside the bookstore.” I realize in the moment, when he uses the word statement that I don’t have to answer any of these questions if I don’t want to, and maybe I shouldn’t because I can’t be absolutely sure that I wasn’t seen. Whoever is texting me knows something, but it would likely be my word against theirs if it came down to it. I could always tell the truth about that cap if it were found. Well, part of the truth: that I must have set it down on the seat of his truck the day I sat in it to get his information and grab a book. It correlates with what I just said. The more I act guilty of something or refuse to cooperate, the more attention I’ll draw to myself. So I answer.

“Yes, that’s right.” I hold firm. If he knows more than he’s saying, I think he’d tell me, he’d press me for more information. All he knows is Luke looked me up on his computer. That’s nothing. I met one of the other moms in Ben’s class recently, and I thought she was quite funny and engaging, so I casually googled her name, just to see who she was. It led to Facebook, Twitter, site after site. That’s not abnormal. I wasn’t stalking the woman. He has nothing.

“Is that all?” I stand as if to escort him off the porch. He puts down his cup and stands too, countering me, but he doesn’t make a move to leave.

“You understand I’m not trying to give you a hard time here, Mel. It’s just that the guy seemed very interested in you. Obsessed might be the wrong word, but preoccupied, perhaps. And then we hear that you were seen with him, in his truck. That doesn’t exactly look like nothing.”

“Well, it is nothing.” I swallow hard. I can hear the sound it makes in the quiet morning air. I clear my throat to try and mask the guilty sound.

“I’m just telling you how it looks. The guy seemed like a jerk. If he was harassing you or anything, and you’re just trying to remove yourself from this whole thing, that’s understandable, but if there is something you’re holding back, I’m sure you know that it’s important you let me know now—” he pauses “—rather than later.”

“I appreciate that. There’s nothing to tell,” I say. I don’t know if playing the “old pal” card back to him and feigning friendliness will help, but I know what he is, and I can’t bring myself to pretend with him. I may have done something wrong, but only one of us standing here is a criminal.

“Well.” Joe tips his hat, smiling. “Thanks for your time, Melanie.” He carries with him none of the Southern charm promised by the singsong way he shapes his words, and I hate the way his lips form around my name. I give a quick, sharp nod back and watch him open his patrol car door. Before he sits, he pauses, holding the top of the door with both hands, looking as if he’s going to say something else, but then he looks up at me at the top of the porch stairs. I have my arms crossed, defensively, and I don’t welcome any other questions, so he closes the car door and drives off.

When the car is out of sight, I exhale and collapse onto the stairs beneath me. I want to scream. My fingernails have made moon-shaped impressions in my palms from unknowingly clenching my fists. I look to Claire, who leans over the side of her chair and spits. A translucent thread of saliva clings to her lip and stretches near the wooden slats of the porch floor. I like to think it’s because she knows the kind of man Joe Brooks is and is disgusted, but I know she can’t possibly know that. I’m grateful, anyway, that she can’t tell anyone he was here. Collin can’t know. This fire I’ve created grows with each lie I throw on the flame. I am a liar.

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