Page 67 of What the Wife Knew

“She actually isn’t.” He studied the bag. “I’ll turn this over to the investigator and see what he can figure out.”

That felt anticlimactic. “I’m stuck in my house with my mother. It feels like we’re not getting anywhere. For the record, I’m not enjoying these early newlywed-widow days.”

“This might help. My investigator found our missing doctor, August Christopher.”

That time a gentle wave of relief rolled over me. Not huge and not all-encompassing. More of a trickle. “You love to hold back information then drop it for dramatic effect.”

Elias smiled but otherwise ignored the shot. “The man is in town. I spent an hour with him last night. He didn’t say much except that he ran because he was afraid of Richmond. With Richmond dead, now he’s afraid he’ll be accused of murder. But he wants to talk with you. He’s willing to answer questions about Ben Cullen’s surgery but only to you.”

Just like that the bit of relief I’d enjoyed vanished. If I trusted Detective Sessions I would have suggested August go to him, but that wasn’t an option unless I wanted the doctor to run scared again. “When?”

“Now. He’s at the gate behind the greenhouse.”

“Remember what I said about you and drama? You thrive on it. Is that a lawyer thing?”

“I was giving him time to walk around to the gate. He’s waiting with my investigator.” Elias shrugged. “I worried August would get nervous and run, so I dragged him here and brought armed reinforcements.”

The idea of meeting this guy and potentially hearing about anew, horrid thing Richmond had done should have had me jogging to meet him. Instead, excuses and reasons to stall jammed up in my head. “That entrance doesn’t open.”

“No, but there’s a window in the door that we can unlatch from this side and talk through it. The barricade of sorts is safer for you anyway.” Without warning, Elias stood up. “Ready?”

Abrupt. Serious. Quick. A restless agitation moved through me. Finding August had happened both too fast and too slow, but the reality of seeing him face-to-face hit me in a way that started alarm bells ringing in my head. I’d lived long enough and close enough to the edge—spent too many years ducking and hiding from Mom—not to listen to that incessant chiming.

Elias took off, and I was tired of waiting around for news, so fine. After a change from bunny slippers to sneakers, I followed Elias out the back door. We walked across the lawn in silence. There were a thousand questions I should have asked about this runaway-doctor guy and the investigator, about whatever topics Elias and August had discussed and why, but I couldn’t call up the right words to spit out any of them.

After last night’s brisk rain, the recently seeded grass sunk beneath my shoes. A slight wind blew across the yard, snapping off those last tenacious leaves and sending them dancing to the ground. We got within a few feet of the gate before I heard the low rumble of voices. Two men talking. Neither sounded familiar.

I inhaled, steeling my nerves for incoming news while Elias reached for the small window and cracked it open.

No!I put my hand over his and slammed the opening shut again. I backed away as the scent of tobacco hit me. Another sharp note seeped into my consciousness. One I couldn’t identify but remembered.

Elias rushed to my side, keeping his voice to a low whisper. “What’s wrong?”

“That smell.” The memory of it haunted me.

“What are you talking about?” Elias glanced around. “The cologne? I think its’s from—”

“August Christopher.” That scent. The attack. “I smelled it right before I got thrown into the tree.”

Chapter Forty-Four

Her

Present Day

Detective Sessions showed up when Elias called to report August and have him hauled away. The doctor yelled and flailed and insisted he’d been set up. None of it stopped the detective from loading him into a police car.

Now, six hours later, the detective had returned. I sat in my library, watching him pace back and forth in front of the big fireplace. Elias stood next to the couch and Mom claimed to be making dinner in the kitchen, but the woman hadn’t cooked dinner... ever? More likely, she was hanging outside the room, trying to listen in while she pretended to let me handle this.

The detective started talking without any warning or preamble. “August Christopher insists he’s never been near you before today and definitely never touched you. He admits he’s driven by the house, as the GPS shows, but says he never left his car. Claims he was curious about you, which is not a convincing reason. At the least, it’s clear he’s been in the area and was parked nearby around the time of the attack out front. That gives us a place to start.”

I liked a nice wrapped-up story as much as the next gal butthis one hadtoo easywritten all over it. “Why me? I don’t know the guy.”

“There’s no question he and Richmond had serious issues.” The detective hesitated. “It sounds as if your husband was playing a dangerous game.”

Not the usual mix of accusations and snide remarks that made everything my fault. It wasn’t clear what that meant. “What exactly did August tell you?”

“I know about Ben Cullen, if that’s what you mean. About his father’s accusations.”

---