“Where’s Luna?” Mason asked.
“She had a thing,” Owen said.
“She doesn’t like people in her room when she’s not around,” Mason said.
“It’s okay. I got her permission,” said Owen.
“Mason, want a shot? I think I got another glass in here somewhere,” Ted said, fishing through his backpack.
“Nah. Alcohol is poison,” Mason said as he hovered in the doorway.
Owen wanted Mason to leave, but Ted invited Mason to take a load off. Mason decided to stay, figuring Luna would come back eventually. He also felt protective of the personal space that he knew Ted and Owen were breaching.
“So, you and Scarlet,” Ted said, joining their names as if they were a well-established couple.
“We’re just hanging out,” Owen said.
Ted had heard otherwise but was only interested in the subject as a gateway to another topic. “So there’s nothing going on with you and Luna?” Ted asked.
“We’re pals, that’s all.”
“Cool,” said Ted, pouring Owen another shot.
Owen drained the glass. Ted generously poured him another.
“You have a thing for Luna?” Owen asked Ted.
“I think she’s cool,” Ted said.
Owen wished Mason would leave. He was just sitting there, silently following the conversation.
“She is cool,” said Owen. “Don’t you agree, Mason?”
“She’s got her good side and her bad side,” Mason said. He adored Luna but couldn’t shake his noncommittal ways.
Ted ignored Mason and returned his attention to Owen. “Dude, you’re like her best friend. Give me something.”
“Huh?”
“What do I need to know?”
“She’s a girl,” Owen said. “Ask her questions. Ask her lots and lots of questions.”
Owen briefly caught Mason’s confused expression. Mason knew what Owen was saying was bullshit, and he let Owen know he knew, but he didn’t rat him out.
* * *
—
“Hey!” Luna shouted from the shadow of her door. “What the fuck?”
The three men scrambled to their feet. Mason took something out of his backpack and stashed it in the pocket of the army jacket Luna was wearing.
“I just came by to bring you that,” said Mason as he made a quick departure.
Ted foisted on Luna the half-empty bottle of whiskey. “For you,” he said as he slipped out of the room.
Luna dropped the bottle on her desk, then took Mason’s weed out of her pocket and stored it in her dresser drawer.
“So many admirers,” Owen said. “How can you possibly keep them all satisfied?”
“Keys,” Luna said, holding out her hand.
Owen fished in his pocket and handed them over. He tried not to look as guilty as he felt. Luna tried not to look as angry as she felt.
“They just came by. I didn’t invite them in,” Owen said.
Luna opened her door wide to encourage Owen’s departure. It took Owen a moment to get the hint.
“Ohhh. You want me to leave.”
“I need some me time,” Luna said.
October 8, 2019
Detective Burns gazed out the grimy window of the Deerkill police station and carefully observed Luna and Owen chatting on the front steps. Owen was smoking. Burns, who had a good nose, hadn’t detected the odor of even a casual smoker during the interview. Trauma often caused people to return to bad habits. So did fear. And guilt. Luna had to have bought the cigarettes for him. Luna was not smoking. So, Luna had anticipated his need. There was something intimate about that.
Detective Goldman approached his partner, carrying two fresh mugs of coffee. He followed Burns’s gaze out the window. “ME confirmed that Irene died yesterday. There’s no point in testing the husband’s pajamas.”
“Right,” Burns said. She took a sip of the piping hot coffee and winced.
“You going to tell me what you’re thinking?” Noah asked.
“I don’t think anything yet,” Margot said.
Margot’s first partner, now retired, had tunnel vision. He always trusted his gut and never let go. She came to realize that his gut was more about his psychological biases than anything else. If he wouldn’t like someone in day-to-day life, he was more prone to like them for murder. Margot’s takeaway from five years with the man was to keep her mind open until the weight of the evidence was too much to bear. At times it came off as absurd, like you had to beat her over the head with the truth. Still, she stood by her process. This annoyed the shit out of Noah because she would frequently ask for his early impressions. Just by answering the question, he was failing her test.
“What’s your read on those two?” Burns asked.
Sometimes Goldman would refuse to answer on principle, but then Margot would keep asking.
“I think that whatever those two are, it’s not normal,” Goldman said.
Burns nodded. She was thinking the same thing.
* * *
—
Luna’s phone buzzed relentlessly as she drove Owen away from the Deerkill police station. Owen retrieved Luna’s mobile from her purse and read the messages as if they were his own. Luna didn’t mind, these days. The only secrets she currently had were the thoughts in her head.
“You haven’t told Sam?” Owen asked, having noted the impatient tone of Sam’s texts.
“He was gone when I got home after—I didn’t want to tell him before a surgery. What if he fucked it up? I’d always wonder if it was my fault the patient walked with a limp the rest of their life.”
“I’m going to tell him you’re alive. That’s all. He heard a jogger was murdered, and I bet he thought it was you.”
“Shit, you’re right,” said Luna, glancing at her phone as she hit the brakes for a stop sign. She grabbed the phone from Owen and quickly knocked out a text.
Driving. Will call soon. I’m fine.
“We should be the ones to tell Leo,” she said, passing the phone back to Owen.
“Let’s get it over with now.”
“Don’t you want to go home first? Put on some normal clothes?”
“For a man who wears pajamas all day? No.”
* * *
—
Luna had promised Leo she’d drop by that morning to help him review résumés again.