Now
Holly left the Woodson home with a spark in her stomach. She’d known there was more going on. She needed corroboration about the fighting, and the fear, and the next stop was Ivy Brookes. The woman who was by all appearances the Montclairs’ real best friend.
She decided to let the conversation move organically, like it had with Phyllis Woodson.
In comparison to the sumptuous Woodson home, Ivy Brookes’s condo was spartan, practically empty. Not at all homey or welcoming. It almost looked like a sterile hotel room. It was also diagonally down the street from the Montclairs as the crow flies, though the entrance was on Fourth Avenue.
Brookes waved her in, saw her taking in the living room. “I know, isn’t it awful? I travel so much I’ve never seen the need to decorate. Coffee?”
“Water is fine, thanks.”
Ivy handed over a bottle of Fiji water, took a thick white mug half-full of murky brown liquid for herself, and gestured to the sterile couch. Holly took a seat.
“So, Officer Graham. What can I help you with?”
“I’m going to cut to the chase, Ms. Brookes. What do you think has happened to Sutton Montclair?”
“Honestly? As much as I hate to say this, I think it all got to be too much for her and she probably took her own life. I expect you’ll find her body in a hotel room somewhere. She was on the knife’s edge lately.”
“How so?”
She sipped the coffee, her look faraway, as if she were remembering something awful. “Seriously? The woman lost her baby, her career, and was precariously close to losing her husband, all in a short year time frame. Things weren’t going according to plan.”
“How did you and Sutton meet?”
Ivy’s face broke into a smile. “She bought me a coffee. It was pouring rain, one of those drenching downpours. I dashed from the parking lot into Starbucks, but when I got in there, realized I’d left my wallet in my car. I plopped down at a table to wait for the rain to let up, and I happened to sit next to her. She asked me what was wrong, bought me a latte, and we started to chat. I was surprised when she said she was thirty-five. She looked so much younger than that. I thought she was my age. For a while, at least. Then all hell broke loose and her world fell apart. Not that you can blame her.”
“Phyllis Woodson seems to think Sutton is exceptionally strong and self-reliant.”
Ivy scoffed. “A hamster would seem strong and self-reliant to Filly. I’ve never met someone so utterly without a backbone.”
“Wow. You’re actually friends?”
Ivy shut her eyes and touched a hand to her mouth. When she spoke again, her tone was apologetic. “I know, that came out terribly. Yes, we’re all friends. You know how it is with a group of women. Not everyone loves everyone else to the nth degree. We all tolerate Filly because Sutton seems to have a real connection to her. Filly isn’t the sharpest tool in the shed. I never really understood why Sutton let her hang around. That’s not true. It was the baby.
“But once Dashiell died, they really had nothing in common anymore. The rest of us don’t have small kids—though Rachel and Susannah are trying to get pregnant, but they wouldn’t tell Sutton that. Why hurt her? Ellen’s kids are older, in college. Filly was the one with the step-by-step instructions. That woman is a walking What to Expect When You’re Expecting encyclopedia.” She gave a delicate little shudder. “The things they’d talk about, put you right off your coffee. Sorry. You have children?”
“No. Talk to me about the baby for a minute.”
Ivy closed her eyes again, as if remembering. “He was such a cute kid. Of course they blamed each other. The finding was SIDS, but what is that, really? The baby stopped breathing, for some unknown reason. They found him on his stomach, that I do know.”
“They found him? They were together?”
“No. Sutton...Sutton found him. Ethan, well, he blamed her. She wasn’t supposed to put the baby down on his stomach.”
“He was old enough to roll over, right?”
“I guess. I don’t really know the milestones. No, Sutton put him down, and a few hours later he was dead. Ethan will never not blame her. Even if it was an accident.”
“You don’t think it was intentional, do you?”
Ivy’s eyes were clear chips of ice blue. “Did Ethan tell you the story? About how they got pregnant?”
“No. Did they have difficulties?”
“You could say that. Sutton didn’t want to have children. Ever. She wasn’t the mother type.”
“It was an accident?”
“I guess you could call it that. Ethan switched out her birth control pills. He didn’t tell her until after she had the baby. And she hated him for it.”
“Seriously?”
“Yes. She felt raped. Completely violated. You know, in the beginning, she wanted to abort, but I talked her out of it.”
“Why?”
Ivy sighed. “She didn’t want to be a mother. Didn’t want to have a child. Everyone supported her in that, except for me. I was the only one who thought she should keep the baby. Everyone else wanted her to get rid of it. But I knew that would put a fork in their marriage, once and for all. They belong together, Ethan and Sutton. They complete each other. They just don’t always know it.”
“So they fought?”
“Oh, yeah. They fought. You’re the police, did you not see the list of domestic calls in the past year?”
“I did. Sutton never pressed charges.”
“Of course she didn’t. She never would. She and Ethan are explosive.”
“She also claimed she never made the calls.”
“Well, how’s that possible? How else would the police find out they were arguing?”
“I’m inclined to agree. Abused women often regret their calls for help, especially if their aggressor is still nearby.”
“Very true. Back to the baby. In the end, Sutton waited too long, and then the choice was made for her. I don’t know that she ever truly bonded with Dashiell, though. Ethan, on the other hand, was overjoyed. He loved that child.”
“And she didn’t?”
“No, she did, don’t get me wrong. But you have to wonder, sometimes, if she was in a self-destructive mode, whether she wasn’t as careful as she could have been. I mean, everyone knows not to put babies on their stomachs. And she was drunk when she came home that night. Ethan told me, after.”
Holly chose to ignore that last statement for the time being. “Sutton was often self-destructive?”
“At times. That’s why I’m so worried about her.”
“So for the record, you don’t think Ethan had anything to do with Sutton’s disappearance?”
Brookes chewed on her lower lip. “I don’t know if I’d phrase it that way. Sutton may have gone off to punish him, but if she did, it’s because Ethan drove her to it. His standards were impossible to keep up with. And he’s not been writing, which makes him utterly insufferable. He may not have pulled the trigger, but if she’s dead, he’s certainly responsible.”