“I choose to remember this day.”
“That’s probably for the best,” the detective said, missing Cynthia’s tone. She missed a lot of nuances, this girl. “I was touched you agreed to share this visit with me this year.”
Actually, Cynthia had done no such thing. She had mentioned her plans in the context of an excuse, a reason not to meet with Nancy at all. Again, a more intuitive person would have picked up on the insincerity of the invitation and turned it down.
“You have done a lot for our family, I suppose. I know my daughter is safe, that those girls were not trying to harm her or get to us. And I needed to know that for my peace of mind.”
Nancy nodded. “I can see that. I also can see you usually get what you need, one way or another. Don’t you, Mrs. Barnes?”
Perhaps the girl understood more than she let on.
“What are you trying to suggest, Ms. Porter?” Cynthia never called the young woman anything as formal as “detective.” It wasn’t a real title, like her father’s, or something a person earned with a degree.
“Nothing, nothing at all. I’ve just been thinking about the fact that what appeared to be a coincidence-the missing girl’s resemblance to your daughter-turned out to be anything but.”
“That wasn’t my fault.” Said sharply, swiftly, with the defensiveness of a child. “Helen Manning did that, when she appropriated my child’s likeness for the grandbaby she never knew, never wanted to know, if you ask me.”
“True,” Nancy said. “I don’t think Helen Manning had much desire to be a mother, much less a grandmother.”
“It was a good thing I called, if you think about it.”
“Oh, you’re very good with a telephone.”
There was nothing to say to that.
“Let’s see-” Nancy began ticking off a list on the fingers of her left hand. “You called my sergeant and then you called me, even though I wasn’t even the primary on the case. I figure you called the reporter, too, got her stirred up. Because you didn’t really care if we found the missing child. You just wanted to make sure that everyone knew who Alice and Ronnie were, what they had done. Brittany Little’s disappearance gave you an opportunity you were already looking for.”
Cynthia shrugged, as if the matter was of such insignificance that it didn’t merit comment.
“You even called me.”
“So you said.”
“No, I mean earlier. Those messages on my cell phone, right after Alice was released-those were your handiwork, right?”
“How would I even know your cell phone number?”
“I don’t know. I do know my mom got a call last spring, from a woman organizing a class reunion for Kenwood High School. Potrcurzski, now that’s a name you can find in a phone book-and it’s the name you knew me by, back in the day. My mom gave the caller my cell and my home phone, but I never did get that invite.”
“I was right. In the end, I was right.”
“Half right,” Nancy said, in a bone-dry tone that Cynthia had to admire.
“I’m really sorry about Ronnie Fuller,” she said, and the sentiment was as true as she could make it. She did pity the girl’s mother, who looked so wrecked on the evening news, the very embodiment of whatever the opposite of closure was. Even Helen Manning had seemed genuinely grief-stricken by the news of Ronnie’s death, belying a level of feeling that surprised Cynthia. She hadn’t thought the woman was capable of caring for anyone but herself.
Still, Ronnie Fuller would forever be the person who had killed Olivia, and Cynthia just could not be unhappy that the girl had taken leave of this planet.
“If you ask me, what’s galling is that the other girl’s not even in that much trouble. But the justice system is imperfect. Or so they kept telling me, when it failed me.”
“Alice was in a good position to make a deal,” Nancy said on a sigh. “Her accomplice is gone, probably out of the country, so he becomes the perfect fall guy. All of a sudden, this guy she was touting as the love of her life is a predator who raped her in the tool shed while she was supposed to be gardening. I can’t criticize the state’s attorney for not wanting to take it before a jury. A jury might have acquitted. At least she’s on probation this way.”
“Sharon Kerpelman rides again. She must be very proud of herself.”
Nancy allowed herself a wisp of a smile. “She might be, if she hadn’t sold her soul to Rosario Bustamante. I just saw her at the courthouse this morning. She’s working her ass off, representing real scum now.”
“Are you saying Alice Manning wasn’t scum?”
“She is to you. In the big picture, she’s an amateur. I’ve been in interview rooms with some truly scary characters. Alice Manning wasn’t one of them.” Nancy paused, distracted by her own thoughts.
“What about Helen Manning? If she hadn’t told her daughter that stupid story to excuse her own actions…” Cynthia might not mourn Ronnie Fuller, but she still had a hard time speaking of the girl’s suicide. “She’s the one who set everything in motion, with her lies. How does she go on?”
“She goes on because she doesn’t see it that way, because she truly believes she was always well intentioned. Helen Manning is a woman inclined to think well of herself.”
“Aren’t most of us?”
“Not to that extent.”
Cynthia noticed that Nancy had placed one hand on her belly, round and full beneath her straight navy blue skirt, a summery polished cotton that was wrong for the season.
“Are you-?” she asked.
Nancy followed Cynthia’s gaze. “Oh. No, just indigestion from the pizza I ate for lunch. I’m not pregnant.” She smiled. “Not yet.”
“Trying?”
“Sort of. No longer not trying at any rate.”
“Isn’t it hard?”
Nancy laughed. “Actually, I like my husband, so I’m enjoying it.”
“No, I mean-won’t it be difficult to be a homicide detective with a child?”
“Impossible, probably.”
“Even if you could work out the day care and the hours-well, I think it would drive you crazy, knowing the things you know about people, then bringing a child into this world. I don’t know how you could do it.”
“How did you do it,” Nancy asked, “knowing what you knew?”
Cynthia wanted to assume that Nancy was alluding to Olivia’s death, the precarious state of happiness, the folly of bringing another child into this world after losing the first. But the detective could just as well have been referring to what Cynthia knew about herself.