Again.
Trina was dead, Joyce told him. A young woman—one of Trina’s students—had found Trina this morning in her apartment. Joyce said the student’s name was Addy. Did he know anyone named Addy? Joyce had asked.
“Did they question you too?” he asked Joyce. He didn’t know why the police had shared so much with her.
Joyce shook her head. “No, they want to talk to you.” She seemed to understand his confusion. “The reporters are here already.” They must have asked the same question of Joyce when she let the police in. Do you know the woman who found Trina? Do you know Addy?
Simon had never heard that name before in his life.
Maybe he would have if he’d followed Trina even more, kept better tabs on her. Then she would have never been with Dermot on the night he died and none of this would have happened. She’d still be alive, which meant there’d still be a chance for Simon to make things right.
“I was the victim of kidnapping and armed robbery,” Simon answered Det. Kirkpatrick’s question. Simon rubbed his hands over his face. The weariness of his life sank in between his shoulder blades like a knife. “I was at the hospital, there were several witnesses.”
“Yes, we’ve read the statements.” The other detective, Bechdel, nodded and held her pen poised over a fat little notebook. Simon thought law enforcement must be the only career that still encouraged the use of actual written notes. Even the journalists who had hounded Simon and Joyce after the accident last year used their phones to tap out notes rather than be hindered by paper.
Which reminded Simon that they would surely be getting visitors camped outside their door again soon once the connection between their shared past and Trina’s death was made. Joyce wouldn’t tolerate much more, he thought. Last year nearly broke them.
“You were attacked at a store not far from Trina Dell’s apartment.”
“I had stopped to buy wine for dinner that evening.”
“Why were you in Ms. Dell’s neighborhood?”
“What does it matter?” Simon was losing his self-control. His hands shook despite him trying to hold them folded in his lap. He needed a drink, or a nap, or another life. Maybe all three.
“Because the robbery took place at 6:10pm, according to the security videos at the store.” The sprinkle fell from Kirkpatrick’s mouth, and Bechdel flicked it off the table with a small moue of distaste. Kirkpatrick didn’t notice, instead picking up the line of questioning.
“And based on what the coroner can initially tell us, Trina Dell died anywhere between 4:30 and 8:30pm.”
“Ah, I see.” Simon couldn’t seem to swallow. He coughed in a series of raspy blows after some of his own spit caught in his throat. “You want to know if I killed her.”
“We’d like to know where you were during that window of time.”
“I’ve already told you. I was at the police station—this police station—then I was at the park to clear my head, followed by Trina’s meeting with the lawyer I’d arranged. Afterwards I headed home and decided to stop at the R&S and get some wine for my dinner that evening.”
“You don’t have any wine at home?” Kirkpatrick looked back at Simon innocently. “Most people usually have a bottle or two on hand?”
“And it’s not like the R&S is a place anyone would go to get a special bottle, you know what I mean?” Bechdel offered a conspiratorial smile. “I mean, you seem to be a man of some taste.”
Simon sighed. What was the point? Trina was dead. Someone murdered her. What did it matter for him to keep up appearances? “I planned to buy some whiskey and drink it back at my office.”
“Why?” Kirkpatrick asked.
“I’d come from the police station, where my wife accused Trina Dell of being responsible for that young man’s murder. My connection to Trina Dell is complicated—”
“You contributed to the death of her fiancé as a result of your drunken attempts to save him—” Bechdel offered.
“Yes, thank you for the clarification.” A fist gripped the inside of Simon’s chest and squeezed tight. He flinched as Kirkpatrick leaned forward in his chair, his survival instincts triggered. Simon’s brain sensed danger, not realizing that it was the threat of his life changing irrevocably rather than merely ending.
“So you’re a drinker,” Bechdel stated.
“Yes, I am.”
“Had you been drinking that afternoon already?”
Simon thought about the snifter he kept in his office. “Yes, I had.” He stopped himself from saying he wished he had some right now.
“When did it start?”
“The drinking?”
“Yes, the drinking.” Kirkpatrick was being droll.
“It got worse after the accident.”
“But that wasn’t when it started,” Bechdel amended.
“What do you want me to say? Yes, I’ve been a drinker for a long time.”
“We’re just trying to get a sense of what happened last night.”
“I spent the night in the hospital, covered in another man’s blood. I saw him shot, just moments after he held me close to him as his prisoner. All this, and then when I am finally able to go home, I’m accosted again by the police because a woman whose life I ruined is dead. Murdered. Just a week after her supposed lover was found dead. Do I have that right?”
Bechdel and Kirkpatrick remained still. In the brief silence, Simon realized he was doing exactly what they wanted him to do. Talking and talking, streaming out anger and, with it, information.
“Were you in love with Trina Dell?” Bechdel’s voice sounded kind. She gave Simon a knowing look. Simon wanted to smack it right off Bechdel’s face.
“What does it matter?” Simon was cold in the thin T-shirt he slipped on from the shower. His hair was still wet in places.
