After ten minutes without a response, Scarlet texted again.
why won’t u talk 2 me?
Five minutes later, Owen replied.
You have to stop, Scarlet. It’s over.
Scarlet felt a rush of adrenaline. He’d finally replied. She had to see him.
She had to give him a reason to see her.
October 10, 2019
The desks in the bullpen were set up in pairs—formidable steel squares headbutting each other. It was the end of the day on Thursday. Detectives Burns and Goldman had worked twelve-to-fourteen-hour days since they’d been assigned the Boucher murder. Burns watched Goldman’s entertaining but fruitless interview with Amy Johnson, while Noah screened Margot’s far more compelling interrogation of Leo Whitman. When she glanced up from her screen, Margot caught Noah smirking.
“What?” she said.
“If I watched this without sound, I could tell the exact moment you turned on him. And the other way around,” Noah said.
Margot lifted up her earphones. “He went out of his way to throw Mann under the bus. You notice?”
“Yes,” Noah said. “It was an inelegant transition.”
For a cop, Margot had an unusual response to snitching behavior. She preferred pulling evidence out of a witness. When it came too easily, like they were enjoying it, trying to point a spotlight on someone else, that got under her skin.
“He’s not the shooter,” Goldman said.
“Why?” Burns asked.
“Did you notice his hand tremor?”
Burns shook her head. Noah beckoned her over, queued up the right part of the video, and hit PLAY. Margot’s hair brushed against his neck as she watched. He didn’t ask her to move.
Onscreen, Leo’s right hand shook slightly. He would occasionally open and close his fist and the tremor would calm.
“Tremor is in the right hand,” Goldman said. “That’s what he used to hold his coffee. Not impossible, but unlikely he could make the shot.”
“Jesus,” Margot said, squinting at the screen.
“What?” Noah said, trying to spot what Margot was seeing.
“Why didn’t you tell me about my roots? Do they look that bad in real life?” Margot said.
Noah palmed his laptop shut. “I need a drink. You?” he said.
Margot checked the time. Her daughter was out until nine or ten and her son had a sleepover.
“Yes,” Noah said. “You need a drink.”
* * *
—
Burns and Goldman had been partners for two years. At first Noah found Margot terrifying. Well, first he found her attractive. Then terrifying. He wasn’t sure he wanted a female partner. He’d had a woman training officer right out of the academy. Granite-hard, eyes that could slice you down the middle. Trooper Sally Wright. She’d come up when female cops were still a novelty, when they had to be Teflon to survive. Noah was afraid Margot would be the same. He wasn’t Teflon; closer to particleboard. He soaked up everything, letting it warp him, become part of him. The days with Wright had worn him down. He figured out fast that Margot was different. He’d anticipated a dark side, but it never showed. Margot even had a family, and they all seemed pretty solid. Although the husband was gone now. Divorced, not dead, she had to explain when she first mentioned his absence. Her children were already teenagers. The girl sixteen, the boy fourteen. Noah had been over to their house now too many times to count. Noah used to talk about Burns to his psychiatrist. He was using his shrink as an expert witness, trying to gain understanding of Margot’s character. She’s sane but not boring. She’s a good cop, without any demons. How is that possible? When the shrink suggested they discuss his feelings toward his partner, Noah stopped mentioning Margot’s name in his sessions.
Noah was holding the door to Don’s Oasis when Margot got a call.
“It’s Bloom,” she said. “I’ll meet you inside.”
Bloom, Irene’s attorney, had been on vacation in the Bahamas when Irene was murdered. It had taken three days to get in touch with him.
Noah ordered two pints and found a table in back. Ten minutes later, Margot entered the bar. After her eyes adjusted to the dim light, she joined Noah at the table, quickly jotting down a few notes before she indulged in drink.
“Did you ask him why he went to the Bahamas during hurricane season?” Noah said.
“I didn’t ask. But he told me. His brother-in-law, Arthur, a notorious skinflint, booked the travel. Big family vacation. I think he would have preferred a hurricane to the nightly meals.”
“Any surprises in the will?” Noah asked.
“His office will messenger a copy,” Burns said, glancing down at her notes. “He did say that the estate would be hard to estimate because half of it was art that hadn’t been appraised in recent years. The gist is that about two-thirds of her estate, most of her art, goes to charity. The rest is divvied up among family members—including two distant cousins.”
“The house?” Noah asked.
“She left him enough to pay off the house,” Burns said.
“They had a mortgage?” Goldman asked.
“The house is in Owen’s name and he paid the mortgage.”
“That’s odd. Why?”
“Maybe she didn’t want him to get too comfortable. Bloom said he won’t know until everything is liquidated. Rough estimate, the total estate was worth ten million. Owen would get less than a million after taxes….”
“And if they divorced?” Goldman asked.
“Owen signed a prenup. He’d get the house and whatever was left on the mortgage. It’s about a five-hundred-thousand-dollar motive for murder.”
“He had access to more money with Irene alive,” Noah said. “When was the will drawn up? Maybe he didn’t know about it?”
Burns shook her head. “No, Bloom said he knew. Irene took care of it right after they married.”
“Life insurance?” Goldman asked.
“Nope,” Burns said, shaking her head again. “But people have killed for far less.”