Page 42 of Defend Me

“Yes, I do,” I say, with more vehemence than I was anticipating. But what was once a gut instinct is fast becoming a cold certainty.

“Everything all right, Miss Von?” Alex says.

“We’ve got another stop to make,” I tell him.

We arrive at the address Dale gave me—it is, in fact, an old colonial in Riverview—and I time how long the drive takes. Just under ten minutes. Putting Noah here at around 6:10. Mom was shot at 6:24. I’ll have to see if it’s possible for Noah to get to the estate in time. But first, I need to talk to Patrick.

Unfortunately, I quickly discover that Patrick Forrester no longer lives there.

The woman who answers the door says she has no forwarding address for him. I get back into the car and call Noah.

“What did Patrick say?” he asks in a rush.

“Nothing because I haven’t found him yet.” I relay the conversation I had with Dale. “We really need Patrick to confirm your alibi. Dale isn’t going to cut it. But we can’t get him to confirm it if we can’t find him. He could be anywhere. He could have left Long Island.”

There’s a brief pause.

“Patrick got sober?” Noah says quietly. That doesn’t seem pertinent at the moment, but the next second, I hear the clack of a keyboard in the background. “Hold on,” he says.

I frown. “You aren’t doing anything illegal, are you? You know you don’t work for the MBSD anymore.”

“I don’t?” Noah says sarcastically. “Gosh, I hadn’t noticed.”

“Ha ha.”

“I’m checking his social media,” Noah says.

“Seriously?”

“I was the tech guy at the department. Which really meant I was the only one who knew how to navigate Instagram. But you can learn a lot about someone based on what they post—more than they realize.”

“Is that why you have no social media presence?”

His chuckle tickles my ear through the phone. “One of many reasons. Okay. Here are some pictures of him and his family…wife, two little girls…let’s see…it’s tagged in a town called Maplewood. Looks to be on a nice street. Quiet. Big stone house with a massive front porch. Probably will have some toys on the lawn.”

“I need a bit more than that,” I say.

“There’s a church nearby,” Noah says. “I can just make out the steeple over the tops of the trees in one of the pics. Hold on…” There’s more clacking. “It looks like it’s St. Michael’s Episcopal Church. Start near there. I’ll send you the photo of the house.”

A few seconds later, my phone pings.

“Wow,” I say, unable to help myself.

“Impressed?” I can hear his confident grin and roll my eyes.

“I’ll talk to you later,” I say and hang up.

Alex finds the church and we drive through the nearby streets until we find the house in the picture. There are, in fact, kids’ toys on the front lawn. I walk past a tricycle and a miniature trampoline, up the front steps, and ring the bell.

A woman opens the door with a toddler on her hip. “Can I help you?” she asks.

“I’m looking for Patrick Forrester,” I say.

She sizes me up, then calls back into the house. “Pat! Someone here to see you!”

The man who comes down the hall is in his mid-fifties, wearing khakis, a red T-shirt with some logo on it, and loafers. A little girl who looks to be about seven is close behind him.

“Hi,” he says genially. “How can I help you?”

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