Initially, she had come up empty. But then she noticed a pattern of monthly autodrafts paid to Star Properties LTD. The name didn’t ring any bells. For all she knew, Star Properties was one of the publicity firms Stephen used to book events and draft press releases. But there were also regular transfers to an account labeled TRAVEL—$4,000 drafted on the fifth of every month. Not that either was proof of an affair. It was entirely possible the payments were legitimate business expenses or that they were related to Stephen’s investments. But her intuition told her they were not.
In the end, it was a photograph that provided confirmation. She’d been sitting at Stephen’s desk, exhausted after her search, thinking, as she stared at a collection of photos on a nearby bookshelf, how little Stephen had aged over the years, when she noticed that in one of the shots his eyes were angled toward a small group of onlookers.
And there she was at the edge of the frame, wearing skintight jeans and four-inch heels, her heavily made-up eyes slanting boldly back at Stephen. It was the intimacy of the look that knocked the breath out of Christine, a private moment captured by chance, and for a moment, she found herself trying to remember if there had ever been a time when she and Stephen had looked at each other that way. If there was, she couldn’t remember it. Was that Stephen’s fault or hers? She couldn’t say, but she felt the thought lodge itself in some dark corner of her mind, like a pebble in a shoe that could be ignored for a while but would eventually have to be dealt with.
The case clock on the mantel chimed softly, reminding Christine that she had somewhere to be. But as she grabbed her purse from the kitchen counter, her eyes slid to the phone. She’d been checking her messages all week, hoping to hear back from Connelly, but so far there’d been nothing.
Eleven new messages awaited her when she pushed the button—reporters, colleagues, even offers of sympathy from neighbors who’d heard the news way down in Sarasota or wherever they went when the leaves began to fall. One by one, she deleted them, but paused when a familiar baritone filled the kitchen.
“Christine, it’s Gary. Call me when you get this.”
She hit “Save” and moved on, in no mood to deal with Stephen’s agent. To her dismay, the message that followed was also from Gary. His voice sounded oddly strained. “It’s me again. Please call me back so I know you’re all right.”
Was she all right?
Christine blew out a sigh. She appreciated him checking on her, but it was hard to say what constituted all right these days. She jabbed the button again. This time Gary’s tone bordered on urgent.
“Christine—Jesus. Where the hell are you? I’ve been trying to reach you for two days now, and all I get is this damn machine. Call me as soon as you get this. We need to talk.”
She rolled her eyes as she checked her watch. She had time for only one phone call before she had to leave, and it wasn’t going to be about book advances and movie rights. She needed—no, she deserved—to at least know the name of the woman who had died with her husband.
She dialed Connelly’s number from memory—after four failed attempts she knew it by heart. Not that she expected to catch him at his desk. He was always out on some investigation when she called, or in the middle of an interview. Today proved no different.
The woman who answered the phone informed her briskly that Detective Connelly was out of the office and promptly shunted her off to his voice mail. She left another message for what it was worth—the fifth by her count—and hung up. Maybe it was just coincidence that he was never available, but part of her wondered if he was purposely dodging her calls. Perhaps he’d learned more than he wanted to and was trying to spare her the truth. If so, he was wasting his time. That ship had sailed.
Christine checked the time once more and picked up her purse. She had a husband to memorialize. But first, she was going to have to navigate her way through the mob of reporters at the gate.
Her palms felt sticky as she backed the Rover out of the garage and down the driveway, then reached for the remote clipped to the driver’s side visor. She thought Stephen was just being paranoid when he’d insisted on installing a perimeter fence and security gates—to keep out crazed fans and curiosity seekers, he’d explained—but now she was grateful. Though she doubted he had foreseen a time when the curiosity seekers would turn out to be members of the press clamoring for a glimpse of his widow.
The furor began the moment the gates began to slide back, reporters with notepads and cell phone cameras held aloft squeezing through the opening like a colony of fire ants. Apparently they’d seen the memorial notice in the Herald and were hoping to grab a quote as she left the house. The Rover lurched backward as she goosed the accelerator. She held her breath as she continued down the drive, eyes focused straight ahead as she inched past the gaggle of leering faces. Just a few more yards and she’d be home free.
She was about to breathe a sigh of relief when a meaty fist pounded on the driver’s side window. She hit the brakes with a strangled yelp, glancing up in time to see a man in a red L.L. Bean parka plaster a newspaper against the glass. Suddenly, horribly, she understood. The reporters weren’t here for a quote about Stephen’s memorial. They were here to get her reaction to the grisly image staring back from the front page of the Examiner—the empty eyes of Stephen’s Jane Doe.
THE NAKED AND THE DEAD: MYSTERY BLONDE PULLED FROM STEPHEN LUDLOW’S CAR
The earth shifted as Christine stared at the headline, a slow, shuddering quake that only she seemed to notice. As if sensing her dismay, the reporters’ questions ratcheted up, swelling from hungry clamor to full-blown frenzy. Frantic, she cast about for some route of escape, only to find herself hopelessly cut off from both the road and the open garage door. She was going to have to make a run for it.
They rushed her the instant her foot touched the driveway, like a pack of gulls after a toddler with a french fry. There was no scurrying for the front door. No scurrying anywhere. Instead, she was forced to elbow her way through the crush, eyes fixed desperately on the front door. If she could just get inside and bolt herself in, she’d be safe. But the reporters knew it too and collectively wedged themselves between her and the front steps, so that her only choice was to brave the gauntlet.
Lowering her head, she plunged into the fray, muscling past faces that seemed to blur into a single, greedy entity bent on blocking her path. She was nearly sobbing by the time she reached the front door, so shaken she almost dropped her house key. She had lost her scarf somewhere in the press, and the top button on her jacket was hanging by a thread, but she didn’t care. All she cared about was reaching sanctuary.
“Mrs. Ludlow!” A woman’s voice suddenly rose above the din. “Do you know the woman they pulled from your husband’s car the night he died and were they involved sexually?”
A momentary hush fell as the mob waited for a response. When none came, the questions resumed.
“Can you comment on the fact that she wasn’t wearing any clothes when they pulled her from the car?”
“The police are still referring to the woman as Jane Doe. Can you tell us her name?”
“Do you know how long the relationship had been going on?”
“Have there been other women, or was she the first?”
Christine nearly wept as her house key slid home. By the time she pushed inside and shot the deadbolt, she was gulping back tears. She had no idea how long she stood there, too shaken to make her legs move, but suddenly she knew she was going to be sick. Panicked, she dropped her purse and scrambled for the kitchen where she retched over the sink until she was limp-limbed and quaking all over. She’d never been comfortable in crowds, but a mob of reporters hurling questions about her dead husband’s mistress was an entirely new level of discomfort.