“Oh my God!”
“I know! So I was wondering if you could run through this morning’s security video of the lobby so I can see who he is.”
Monica clapped her hands excitedly and rolled her faux zebra-skin task chair over to a gleaming white monitor. This was the kind of project that gave her job meaning. She picked up a matching remote, and the black-and-white image on the screen began to jump back in time. They watched for a few minutes as people walked backward into elevators, until the lobby was quiet, the newspapers in their little stack below the mailboxes. Then a man walked backward into the building and bent down over the newspapers.
“There,” said Susan.
They rewound the tape a bit more and watched as a woman carrying a travel mug walked out of the elevator, through the lobby, and out the front door. As she exited, a man in a dark suit walked into the building, over to the newspapers, rooted through them, and clearly deposited something inside. He’d been waiting out front and caught the door as the woman had gone out.
“He’s cute!” squealed Monica.
“How can you tell?” asked Susan, disappointed. “You can’t see his face.”
“He’s got a nice suit on. I bet he’s a lawyer. A rich one.”
“Can you print this image for me?”
“Totally,” Monica gushed. She hit a button and rolled over to the white printer and waited while the image spit out, then handed the printout to Susan. Susan examined it. Totally unidentifiable. Still, she’d show it to Justin Johnson and see if it sparked a discussion. She folded it up and slipped it into her purse.
“Thanks,” Susan said, already half-turned to go.
“You know,” Monica said, her face a picture of helpfulness, “you should dye your hair blond. You would look so much prettier.”
Susan looked at Monica for a minute. Monica looked back obliviously. “I was thinking about it,” Susan said. “But then I heard that story on the news about platinum hair dye causing cancer in lab kittens.”
“Lab kittens?” Monica said, eyes wide.
Susan shrugged. “Gotta run.”
CHAPTER
22
D ebbie Sheridan lived in a stucco ranch-style house in Hillsboro, a few minutes off the highway. Susan had lived in Portland most of her life, and she could count on both hands the number of times she had been to Hillsboro. It was a suburb Susan drove through on the way to the coast; she didn’t think of it as a destination. Just being in the suburbs made Susan nervous. Debbie Sheridan’s house was typical for its neighborhood. The lawn was green and well groomed, with the sharp edges and dearth of weeds that screamed professional maintenance. There was a box hedge, a Japanese maple tree, some blue spruce, and several beds of ornamental grasses. A two-car garage was attached to the house. It was the picture of domestic bliss, and a home in which Susan could not even conceive of ever living.
She locked her car, walked to the medieval-looking front door, and rang the bell.
Debbie Sheridan opened the door and thrust out a hand in greeting. Susan took it. Debbie was not what Susan had imagined. In her late thirties, she had stylish very short dark hair and a trim, athletic body. She was wearing black leggings and a T-shirt and sneakers. She was attractive and chic and not at all suburban-looking. Susan followed her into the house. It was filled with art. Large abstract oil paintings on stretched canvas lined the white walls. The floors were layered with Oriental rugs. Books were stacked on every flat surface. It was all very cosmopolitan. Very world traveler. And very much not what Susan had expected.
“I like your art,” Susan commented. She always felt a little uneasy around women who were more sophisticated than she was.
“Thanks,” said Debbie amiably. “I’m a designer out at Nike. This is what I do when I want to feel like an artist again.”
It was only then that Susan noticed the “D. Sheridan” scrawled in the corners of the canvases. “They’re amazing.”
“They keep me busy. Sometimes I think my kids are more talented.”
Debbie led Susan down a hallway, past framed black-and-white photographs of two attractive dark-haired children. Some of the photographs featured just the children; some were of Archie and Debbie and the children. They all looked deliriously happy and delighted with one another.
They reached a bright modern kitchen with French doors that overlooked a backyard with a big English cottage garden. “Do you want some coffee?” Debbie asked.
“Sure,” Susan said, accepting a cup Debbie poured from a French press and then taking a seat on one of the tall chairs at the kitchen bar. She noticed a completed New York Times crossword sitting out on the counter.