If She Fled. Блейк Пирс

for DeMarco.

      “Agents DeMarco and Wise,” DeMarco said. “We’re on location in Frankfield, looking into the murder of your wife.”

      The man nodded and stepped away from the door. He swayed a bit when he did, making Kate wonder if that whiff of whiskey had been from a very recent drink—and here it was, not even two in the afternoon yet.

      “Well, yeah…I’m Joseph. And I could have saved you the trip. I can tell you who killed her. Come on in…I’ll help you out.” He grinned, apparently amusing himself, and headed back inside.

      “Whoa, hold on,” DeMarco said. “You can’t just make a statement like that. Do you for sure know who killed her?”

      “I have no proof, but I have a damned good idea.”

      “Maybe you let us be the judges of that,” Kate said. “What do you have?”

      “I’ll show you.”

      They followed him inside and Kate started to feel a bit uneasy. She wasn’t sure if Hix was in a perpetual state of grief and drunkenness or if he was a little off the rails—or both. But what she did know was men handled grief very differently. And the tired, I-don’t-give-a-shit look she had seen when he opened the door never led to anything good.

      The apartment was modestly furnished but was limited in space. Hix led them directly to the kitchen, where he didn’t even bother trying to seem like a well-adjusted guy. He grabbed a bottle of whiskey that had been sitting on the counter and poured himself a tumbler. He shrugged to the agents and downed it in one gulp.

      “It doesn’t bring her back,” he said with a grimace, “but it makes it hurt a hell of a lot less.”

      “This is your brother’s place, right?” Kate asked.

      “Yeah. It’s a shithole, but Kyle…he’s all I got now.”

      “Mr. Hix, would you be willing to answer some questions for us?”

      “Yeah. But like I said, I can tell you who killed her. I told the cops, too…but you see how far that got me.”

      Kate didn’t want to take his bait, not wanting to let a grief-stricken and drunk man lead them down a rabbit hole that would likely go nowhere. Apparently, DeMarco felt the same because when she asked her next question, she did her best to veer the conversation elsewhere.

      “You work as a proposal specialist, right?” DeMarco asked. “Something with telecom?”

      “Yes. They’ve given me two months…like it’s a favor. I work sixty hours almost every week and stay in France for them at least two months total out of every year.”

      “Did it strain your marriage?” Kate asked.

      Hix nodded and pulled the bottle back to him. He looked at it longingly, desperate for another shot. She could see him considering it.

      “Of course it did. She was unhappy most of the time, I guess. She acted like she was happy when I was actually around and never got too confrontational when I was away so much. At the risk of sounding like a bastard, she enjoyed the money. She always joked about it, but there was a whole lot of truth to it, you know? And there seemed to be a lot more joking after our son was gone.”

      “Gone?”

      “Yeah…as soon as he left for college, things seemed to get a little more tense.”

      “How long ago was that?”

      “Nine or ten years. Don’t get me wrong…we loved each other very much. I don’t know how that woman loved me as much as she did, but…”

      He decided to go ahead and take that other shot. He did it as if he were set on a mechanical spring, going through the actions like someone with far too much practice.

      “We always talked about taking trips after he was gone. Rome, Sydney, Madrid…those were the big ones. But I think she knew they’d never happen; it would take too much commitment on my part.”

      Listening to him talk, Kate was reminded of the call she had ignored from Melissa. It made her feel bad, as she wondered if the issues Melissa and Terry had been having were similar. Of course, neither of them made enough money to promise trips to one another, but an absentee spouse was an absentee spouse no matter how you cut it. Inexplicably, she felt the need to speak with Melissa quite badly in that moment.

      But DeMarco, getting very adept at questioning potential suspects, kept the ball rolling quickly and efficiently.

      “Were you at work when Marjorie was murdered?”

      “I was. I was actually on a flight back from Seattle. I’d been there on business for three days. I landed at O’Hare and got a barrage of missed calls and texts from the police before I even got off of the plane.”

      “You claim to know who did it,” DeMarco went on. “Did you think you knew even then?”

      “More or less, yes. But now, almost a week afterwards without a single suspect, I become more and more certain.”

      “And who might you have in mind as the suspect?”

      “A guy named Andrew Bauer.”

      “And why do you think he did it?”

      “Because he’s always had a thing for Marjorie…ever since they graduated college and found out they were living less than ten minutes away from one another. The guy is a sleazebag. I know it might sound pretentious and judgmental, but I don’t care—the guy is single and living in a neighborhood that is predominantly married couples with children. And he’s at home for days on end, sort of just stalking around the neighborhood and befriending all of the lonely women who have men that work long hours.”

      “And how do you know this?”

      “It’s pretty common knowledge. Andrew is a pilot. He works a few days, he’s home a few days. I’m not the only man in the neighborhood that had to have a word with him.”

      “What sort of word?” Kate asked

      “About a year ago, I came home and found him standing in my yard while Marjorie was pulling weeds in her flowerbed. He had this evil grin on his face. I don’t know how to explain it. He’s just slimy.”