Just Between Us

I inched my way toward the open steel drawer and the waxy-looking figure lying upon it. It was a woman of about my own age and weight, who’d been stabbed and had her throat slit by her boyfriend because, or so he was insisting, she’d attacked him. She was lying there on the slab naked, her pale, fragile body completely exposed. I could see the wounds clearly, though they were no longer bloody, just gashes, as if she weren’t human, but some stuffed upholstery that had split open, an impression reinforced by the rows of even stitches made postautopsy. There was a line across her forehead, and it took a moment for me to realize that they’d sawed open her skull.

I can remember that there didn’t seem to be enough air in the room, that I struggled to breathe. I can remember looking away from the body, gazing frantically at the medical examiner’s dispassionate expression, before glancing up at the lights. The next thing I knew I was sitting in a hallway being told to breathe into a paper bag. Hyperventilating from stress, the medical examiner said. “Tell your boss to come himself next time,” he said when I’d recovered enough strength to leave.

At the visitation, more than ten days after his death, Viktor’s head didn’t show this line. It had been covered by heavy makeup, all evidence of the postmortem carefully concealed, just like the gaping wounds the bullet had left in the front and back of his skull. But I knew they were there, and at first, as I stared down at him in his coffin, I felt that same panicky struggle to breathe.

The visitation was in an old brick building in Ambridge, the choice becoming clear when I saw the name, Beresko Funeral Home, embossed in gold on the outside. It was Ukrainian. The narrow building had old rooms made up in heavily patterned, jewel-toned wallpaper, as if they were pysanky.

Viktor didn’t look like he had in real life, despite the comments so many people were making as they passed his coffin, a heavily polished dark wood with large brass handles and lined with puffy cream-colored satin. “He looks so handsome,” I heard one older woman murmur to Anna Lysenko. “Just like he always did.”

But to me, there was nothing natural-looking about him. Viktor hadn’t worn makeup when he was alive, and no amount of foundation or blush can simulate the glow that blood flow brings to the skin. There were visible comb marks in his short brown hair, which I’d never noticed before. He wore a dark suit and a white shirt with a collar so sharp it seemed to be cutting into his throat. His tie was bright blue and he had a small pin affixed to his lapel—apparently a symbol of membership in some medical organization. The medal that Terry Holloway had picked off the kitchen floor had been attached to a silver chain and was weirdly centered on Viktor’s tie. Someone had folded his fine-boned surgeon’s hands neatly across his chest. Looking closely, I could see that makeup had been added to this skin, too. He looked so different, and after a minute I realized what it was: He looked vulnerable.

“You’d never guess that he choked her with those hands,” Alison murmured after I’d sufficiently paid my respects and joined her standing at the rear of the room among the huge flower arrangements flanking the walls. The cloying and competing scents of dozens of varieties of cut flowers filled the tight space.

“You’d never guess it looking at Heather either,” I whispered, glancing across the room where the grieving widow sat in a receiving line, tearfully greeting people, flanked on either side by Viktor’s mother and aunt.

“Did you spot the police?” Alison murmured. “They’re here.”

Alarmed, I tried to look around the room without attracting any attention. I saw mourners, a huge crowd, many of them Viktor’s colleagues from the hospital, a few still dressed in scrubs and lab coats. “Where?” I said. “I can’t spot anyone out of place.”

“The man in the blue suit at ten o’clock,” Alison said, “but don’t look now. Wait a minute.” I kept my eyes down for a moment before moving my gaze up and slowly in that direction. The man was standing by a doorway, not in the line waiting to pass by the coffin, and not in any of the small clusters of mourners.

“He’s a detective? How can you tell?” He didn’t fit my vision of the police at all, this short, stout man with a bald head and fuzzy fringe of graying hair. I’d met with various members of the police force when I was a lawyer, but none of them had looked quite as, well, nerdy as this guy. He looked like he worked for Charles Schwab, or, given that cheap suit and those orthopedic shoes, I also could have pegged him as a high school teacher. That’s who he really reminded me of, one of my high school history teachers, Mr. Fussel, who all the kids had called Mr. Fossil because he was about as lively as one, droning on about supposedly vitally important moments in history without capturing anyone’s interest.

“He just looks like one. I’d lay money on it,” Alison said, speaking so softly that I had to strain to hear her. “And I’ll bet his partner is the guy standing next to the table with the guest book.” She didn’t have to tell me again not to look; I waited a second and then let my gaze move casually across the space. The other guy was less of a surprise. Young, fit, with a crew cut and an intense look on his face, he definitely looked like cops I’d known. He reminded me of a neighbor’s Doberman pinscher—a watchdog on high alert. His eyes met mine and I quickly looked away, afraid he’d read the panic in my face.

I hoped they were here because they thought the carjacker might feel guilty and come pay his respects and not because they were watching us. I was going to ask Alison her opinion, but just then Eric left the conversation he was having and crossed the room to my side. “Almost ready to go?”

Alison smiled at him and moved off into the crowd. I glanced at my watch, surprised to see that we’d been there for almost two hours; we didn’t want to pay for too much time with the babysitter. “Sure, I guess. Let me just say good-bye to Heather.”

Julie was also there, across the room talking to various people. I’d waved at her earlier, but we’d agreed in advance that it was a bad idea for us to be seen hanging out as a group. That had been Alison’s suggestion and I’d been initially skeptical, but not anymore. I was aware of the nerdy detective watching as I cut the line to say a quick good-bye to Heather, and I felt his gaze on me again as I joined Eric in the hall and we maneuvered our way through the crowd toward the exit.

“You okay?” Eric put his arm around me and gave me a squeeze. “How’s Heather holding up?”

“As well as can be expected, I guess. I haven’t been able to talk to her much.”

“She’s going to need you after this is all over, you and Julie and Alison are her biggest support network.”

“She’s got other friends,” I said quickly, concerned that the Doberman pinscher standing at the exit might have overheard us.

“Yeah, but it’s not tight like the bond you four share.”

Tighter than he knew. I flushed. One of the hardest parts was not being able to tell Eric what had happened. We didn’t keep secrets from each other. Not along the lines of what had transpired at Heather’s house and what we’d done. What I’d done. Of course, before this there’d never been anything of this magnitude to keep from him. It was hard to believe it had been barely two weeks since that horrible night.

“I can’t believe he’s actually dead,” Eric said as we walked out to our car. “One minute you’re driving along, living your life, and the next minute—bam!”

I jumped, but he didn’t notice. “What kind of person would do a thing like that?” he said, shaking his head. “Jesus.”

We drove home in a silence that was becoming increasingly common between us. Eric reached over at one point and squeezed my hand. I knew he thought that I was grieving for my friend. He couldn’t know that for the last few nights, after turning off the lights and drifting off to sleep, I’d relive that decision, all of us standing around in that garage, staring into the dark cavity at the back of Viktor’s head. Sometimes I’d jerk awake to the sound of plastic snapping as Alison shook it out to drape over his body.





chapter twenty





ALISON

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