“You want to chance it?” Griff asked.
Luna didn’t care about anything at that moment. She couldn’t muster enough energy to feel stunned, angry, or even mildly depressed. She had to wonder, again, if this was her fate. Whether it was punishment or just bad luck.
Griff also experienced a sense of history repeating itself. Once again, he was playing the adult, though all the children should have grown up by now. He blocked the door and extended his palm.
“Give me the keys. I’ll drive,” he said.
On the way to the station, Griff didn’t ask Luna what had happened, why the police needed to see her in that precise moment. They hadn’t spoken in fourteen years. He wasn’t comfortable asking anything about her life, though he could have killed an entire day with his questions.
Griff parked in the station lot and suggested that he come in with her. But Luna told him to go, to spend time with Owen. And to get his dog out of her house before her husband came home.
“Okay, but don’t—you know,” Griff said.
“Don’t confess to a crime I didn’t commit?” Luna said.
“For starters,” Griff said. “Just…speak as little as possible. Ask for an attorney if at any point they seem focused on you.”
“This isn’t my first rodeo,” Luna said.
“Don’t say that in there,” Griff said.
Luna took a deep breath. When she exhaled, Griff noted a distinct yeasty fragrance in the air. He spotted a pack of mints in the cup holder and placed it in Luna’s palm.
“Take these. All of them,” he said.
* * *
—
Twenty minutes later, Noah stepped out of the interview room and delivered the phone and a toothbrush to Margot.
“Wow,” Margot said. “She just brought in her husband’s toothbrush of her own accord?”
“She’s being cooperative,” Noah said. “I’m not getting the snitching vibe from her.”
“Okay,” Margot said skeptically. “What’s the over-under on their divorce?”
When the mystery number was answered, Burns and Goldman thought that was a win. Luna bringing in her husband’s DNA, that was too easy. Burns wasn’t quite as excited about the new development as Goldman was.
When Noah returned to the interview room, he found Luna resting her head on the table, her arm shielding her eyes. She didn’t lift her head when he entered. She didn’t move. He thought there was a chance she was asleep. Burns once told him that innocent people don’t fall asleep when being interrogated about murder. He wasn’t sure if it applied in this situation, since Luna was low on the list of possible shooters.
Luna was not, in fact, asleep. The fluorescent lights were making her eyes blurry. She felt the familiar knock on the inside of her temple. The feeling of not being fully present. She had taken her meds and hadn’t had a seizure in years. But she wanted to do whatever she could to avoid that possibility.
“Ms. Grey,” Goldman said, “are you awake?”
“Of course,” Luna said, keeping her head down. “Would it be weird if I asked you to turn off the lights?”
“Migraines?” he asked, flicking off the three light switches.
“Seizures. Rarely, these days,” Luna said, lifting her head and adjusting to the welcome darkness. “But there’s always a warning.”
There was just one small window in the interview room. Outside, the sky was dull and overcast. The dim light made the room feel oddly intimate.
“Better?” Goldman asked.
“Thank you,” Luna said.
Goldman took his seat. “We appreciate you bringing in the…uh—” Goldman began.
“Even if Sam’s DNA matches what you found on the body, it doesn’t mean he killed her,” Luna said.
“No. It doesn’t. But it helps. We could at least exclude your husband,” Detective Goldman said.
“Right,” Luna said.
“Where was your husband the morning of Monday, October 7?”
“He left for work before I woke up,” Luna said.
“Around what time was that?”
“He usually wakes up before six a.m.”
“Did he wake you?”
Luna paused before answering. “We don’t sleep in the same room.”
“Because of his early mornings?”
“That might be one of the reasons.”
“Was your marriage in trouble?” Goldman asked.
“Clearly it was,” Luna said. “But I’m not sure I would have said so before I answered that phone.”
“So, how would you have described your marriage yesterday morning?” Goldman asked.
“I don’t know,” Luna said.
She felt an oppressive exhaustion wash over her.
“Did you fight?”
“Not often,” Luna said.
“So, you didn’t sleep in the same bed and you didn’t fight,” Goldman said.
He was getting a decent picture of the union.
“It sounds passionless, I know,” Luna said.
Luna had to admit that their sex life had waned. Was that before or after Sam started up with Irene? She didn’t know when they started up, so she couldn’t say. The interview felt more like a therapy session than an interrogation.
“Was it?” he asked.
Luna wasn’t going to offer intimate details of her marriage. To a psychiatrist she might have admitted that she and Sam were like friends with benefits who resided under the same roof. Weird, but efficient.
“It was always easy with Sam. I never had to explain myself. I think we had similar dispositions. I couldn’t be around another person all the time. Neither could he. At least that’s what I believed. Maybe he was lonelier than I thought. Whatever happened with Irene has nothing to do with her death.”
“You sure about that?” Goldman asked.
“What’s his motive?” Luna asked. “I don’t see one.”
“Maybe the relationship with Irene was the only good thing he had. Maybe she wanted to end it and he couldn’t bear the thought of that.”
“That’s another man you’re talking about.”
“How do you mean?”
“You’re describing a man who’s out of control.”
“Sam likes to be in control?” Goldman said.