Chapter 36
Kat stood frozen in the backyard of this ordinary house in Montauk and felt the earth open up and swallow her whole. Eighteen years after saying that he no longer wanted to marry her, Jeff was a scant ten feet away. For a few moments, neither one of them spoke. She saw the look of loss and hurt and confusion on his face and wondered whether he was seeing the same on hers.
When Jeff finally spoke, it was to the old man, not Kat. “We could use a little privacy, Sam.”
“Yeah, sure thing.”
In her peripheral vision, Kat saw the old man close the book and go in the house. She and Jeff didn’t take their eyes off each other. They had either become two wary gunfighters waiting for someone to draw or, more likely, two disbelieving souls who feared that if one of them turned away, if one of them so much as blinked, the other would vanish into the eighteen-year-old dust.
Jeff had tears in his eyes. “God, it’s so good to see you.”
“You too,” she said.
Silence.
Then Kat said, “Did I really just say ‘you too’?”
“You used to be better with the comebacks.”
“I used to be better with a lot of things.”
He shook his head. “You look fantastic.”
She smiled at him. “You too.” Then: “Hey, that’s becoming my new go-to line.”
Jeff started toward her, arms spread. She wanted to collapse into them. She wanted him to take her in his arms and press her against his chest and maybe pull back and kiss her tenderly and then just wait for the eighteen years to melt away like the morning frost. But—and maybe this was more a protective maneuver—Kat took a step back and held up her palm to him. He pulled up, surprised, but only for a moment, and then he nodded.
“Why are you here, Kat?”
“I’m looking for two missing women.”
She felt on firmer ground when she said this. She hadn’t gone through all this to rekindle a flame her old fiancé had long ago extinguished. She was here to solve a case.
“I don’t understand,” he said.
“Their names are Dana Phelps and Martha Paquet.”
“I’ve never heard of them.”
She had expected this answer. Once Kat put together that she was the one who said, “It’s Kat” first, the rest had fallen into place.
“Do you have a laptop?” she asked.
“Uh, sure, why?”
“Could you get it, please?”
“I still don’t—”
“Just get it, Jeff. Okay?”
He nodded. When he went inside, Kat actually dropped to her knees and felt her entire body give out. She wanted to sink to the ground and forget about these women, just lie on the earth and let go and cry and wonder about all the what-ifs that this stupid life brings us.
She managed to get back up a few seconds before he returned. He turned on the laptop and handed it to her. She sat at a picnic table. Jeff sat across from her.
“Kat?”
She could hear the pain in his voice too. “Not now. Please. Let me just get through this, okay?”
She got to the YouAreJustMyType page and brought up his profile.
It was gone.
Someone was closing ranks. She quickly opened up her old e-mail and found the link Brandon had sent her with Jeff’s inactive Facebook page. She brought it up and spun the laptop toward him.
“You were on Facebook?”
Jeff squinted at the page. “That’s how you found me?”
“It helped.”
“I deleted the account as soon as I found out about it.”
“Nothing online is ever deleted.”
“You saw my daughter this morning. When she was going to school.”
Kat nodded. So the daughter had called him after she made contact. Kat had figured as much.
“A few years ago, Melinda—that’s her name—she thought I was lonely. Her mother died years ago. I don’t date or anything, so she figured that the least I could do was have a Facebook page. To find old friends or meet someone. You know how it is.”
“So your daughter set up the page?”
“Yes. As a surprise to me.”
“Did she know you used to be Jeff Raynes?”
“She didn’t then, no. As soon as I saw it, I deleted it. That’s when I explained to her that I used to be someone else.”
Kat met his gaze. His eyes still pierced. “Why did you change your name?”
He shook his head. “You said something about missing women.”
“Yes.”
“And that’s why you’re here.”
“Right. Someone used you in a catfish scheme.”
“Catfish?”
“Yeah. I mean, that’s what they call it. Have you seen the movie or TV show?”
“No.”
“A catfish is a person who pretends to be someone they’re not online, especially in romantic relationships.” Her voice was flat, matter-of-fact. She needed that now. She needed to just spout facts and figures and definitions and not feel a damn thing. “Someone took your pictures and created an online profile for you and put it on a singles site. Two women who fell for the catfish-you are missing.”
“I had nothing to do with it,” Jeff said.
“Yeah, I know that now.”
“How did you get involved in all this?”
“I’m a cop.”
“So was this your case?” he asked. “Did someone else recognize me?”
“No. I joined YouAreJustMyType. Or a friend did for me. It doesn’t matter. I saw your profile and I contacted you.” She almost smiled. “I sent you that ‘Missing You’ video.”
He smiled. “John Waite.”
“Yeah.”
“I loved that video.” Something like hope lit up his eyes. “So you’re, uh, you’re single?”
“Yeah.”
“You never got—”
“No.”
Jeff’s eyes started to well up again. “I got Melinda’s mother pregnant in a drunken haze during a really self-destructive period for both of us. I managed to get out of the self-destruction. She didn’t. That’s my former father-in-law inside. The three of us have lived together since she died, when Melinda was eighteen months old.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. I just wanted you to know.”
Kat tried to swallow. “It isn’t my business.”
“I guess not,” Jeff said. He looked to the left and blinked. “I wish I could help you with your missing women, but I don’t know anything.”
“I know that.”
“And yet you still came all this way to find me,” he said.
“It wasn’t all that far. And I had to make sure.”
Jeff turned back so that he was facing her. God, he was still so damn handsome. “Did you?” he asked.
The world was crashing around her. She felt dizzy. Seeing his face again, hearing his voice—Kat hadn’t really believed it would happen. The pain was more acute than she would have imagined. The rawness of how it all ended, the suddenness, was made all the worse by seeing his beautiful, troubled, haunting face.
She still loved him.
Goddamn it to hell. Goddamn it all and she hated herself for it and she felt weak and stupid and like a sucker.
She still loved him.
“Jeff?”
“Yes?”
“Why did you leave me?”
? ? ?
The first bullet hit the tree six inches from Dana’s head.