Erik had taken the kids to school and she was alone with Brown in the apartment. When the door closed and all their voices-usually raised, laughing or yelling or horsing around, but today quiet, muted, somber-faded with the closing of the elevator door, she released the breath she’d been holding. She always felt like that when they left, like her energy could expand and she could think. She wasn’t wife and mother, monitoring needs, cleaning faces, packing lunches, answering questions, reprimanding, instructing, nagging, kissing, hugging. She was just herself, free to pour a cup of coffee, maybe even go to the bathroom without someone calling after her. This was the space where she was most creative-in the aftermath. When she knew the kids were cared for and off to start their day, she could finally see the world with the clear vision she needed to do her work.
It wasn’t that motherhood made her less creative; it was just that it created a maze that she must navigate to get to that still, center space within her. And the twists and turns were guarded by hobgoblins-guilt and worry and sometimes just exhaustion-which could take her down and smother her. But somehow the gauntlet she had to run to find that energetic well made the time she spent there so much richer. It focused her attention, forced her to maximize every moment. She knew she was a better artist for the emotional wealth of her life, that she was richer for the depth and breadth of her love for her children. But a better life didn’t mean an easier one.
But she wouldn’t be working today. Today she needed to take care of Izzy help her through whatever was happening. And what if Marcus was gone for good? Well, she shouldn’t even think like that.
With the thought of her brother-in-law, she remembered Izzy’s description of the call she’d received, and started to feel a little flutter in her belly. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to leave her sister to it. What if the threat to her safety hadn’t passed? She decided to shower and go after her sister, whether Izzy wanted her around or not. She glanced at her cell phone, which rested on the bar. No messages. She was relieved and disappointed in equal measure. She didn’t have time for that particular mess.
She took her coffee into the bathroom and placed it on the marble countertop, avoiding her reflection in the mirror. She ran the water scalding hot so the bathroom filled with steam, was about to strip her pajamas and step in when the buzzer from the street door rang and Brown started barking.
Linda walked over to the intercom, expecting to see Erik and the kids on the small black-and-white screen, having forgotten homework or cell phone or lunch box, too lazy to come back up. But it wasn’t her family. She drew in a deep breath at the sight of the man who stood there, snapped up the phone from its cradle.
“What are you doing here?” she hissed.
“I’m sorry,” he said, peering up at the lens. “I watched them get on the train.”
She raced through calculations in her mind-twenty minutes to school, fifteen to get them settled and dropped off, a stop at the bank and the grocery store. Erik would be another hour and a half at least. He’d asked that she be there when he returned, had something he needed to discuss. She told him she needed to focus on Isabel and could it wait? No, he said. It couldn’t.
“You have to leave. Right now,” she said. Even in her anger, in her fear, there was a snaking pleasure, a guilty desire. She shot Brown a look and he stopped barking and walked away, went back to the couch. She didn’t bother reprimanding him.
“Please, Linda. I need to see you.”
She thought about having him up, making love to him hard and fast in the shower. She thought about releasing all her tension with an earthquake of an orgasm. But no, she wasn’t that low, that stupid.
“I’ll meet you,” she said. “There’s a coffee shop on the corner. Go there. Ten minutes.”
“Let me up,” he said, moving close to the lens. She could feel her whole body go hot.
“No,” she said. “You’re crazy.”
“I told you. I’m desperate.”
She leaned her head against the wall, fought the awful waves of temptation. The thought of him walking through the door, those hands roaming her body, his desperation like a rocket through her, made her weak and ashamed. How could she be having an affair, her of all people? The good girl, the woman with the perfect marriage, the perfect life. It was disgusting. She hated herself. But she couldn’t give him up.
“I’ll be there in ten minutes.”
“Linda.”
“Go.”
He groaned and disappeared from the screen.
“Shit, shit, shit,” she said, moving toward the shower. She tied her hair up so that it wouldn’t get wet, showered, and dressed quickly. She grabbed her coat and her bag and headed out the door. She’d stop and see him quickly, then go straight to Izzy’s. Erik would have to wait.
“Be a good boy,” she called to the dog who was fast asleep.
9
It felt oddly right that the apartment I shared with Marcus was in tatters. As I walked through the detritus of our life together-an oil painting we bought in Paris slashed and knocked to the floor, a crystal vase we’d received as a wedding gift in big jagged pieces, our bedding cut with scissors-I wasn’t outraged in the way one would expect. I recognized the poetry of it. We’d built a life, collected memories, had things to show for that journey. As I walked through the rooms crowded by my memories, somehow it seemed appropriate in this moment that those things should be in pieces. The air hummed with malice. It didn’t even seem like the place where I’d lived for the last five years of my life.
Detective Crowe was my shadow. He was kind enough to offer his silence as he followed me from room to room, but I could feel his energy-anxious, agitated by the million questions buzzing around his brain. Grit and bits of glass crunched beneath my feet as I made my way, lifting a photo of my sister, touching a spot of red nail polish someone had poured on the bathroom countertop. It had taken on the shape of a heart.
Finally, in the small office off our bedroom where I did most of my writing, I sank into the chair in front of my desk and stared at the large blank monitor. It was huge, like a wall. When I wrote, my words were giant, swimming in a bright white sea. It helped me to see them so large, as though they had more meaning, the power to keep my attention, my focus if it threatened to wander. The dark screen seemed like a hole I could fall into.
I had all my files backed up and stored at Jacks office; I wasn’t worried about lost work. That was the least of my worries, and it would be hours yet before I started thinking about personal files, journals, calendars, account numbers, e-mail correspondence. Just two days before I had been sitting in this chair, Googling myself on the Internet, answering fan e-mail, visiting the Web sites of other authors-doing everything but what I should have been doing, working on my pages. I was annoyed at myself then, frustrated by my lack of focus and productivity. Today it seemed like a state of bliss. I’d have paid any sum to be back there.
“Mrs. Raine, did your husband have a history of violence or mental illness?”
I swiveled around to see that a petite woman had followed us into the room, stood behind and to the left of Detective Crowe.
“My partner, Detective Jesamyn Breslow,” he said with a nod.
“No,” I answered her, surprised by the question. “You think my husband did this?”