Claire

My hands shook.

No matter how hard I tried to mentally order them to still, they refused to cooperate.

Tightening my robe, I sniffled back the mucus running down my nose. My poor lips were so chapped from all the crying and nose running and more crying. Not to mention, my skanky robe could have run out of here on its own.

All the while, I kept trying to stifle a small cough. I was a pitiful sight, yet the flu attacking my body felt like nothing in comparison to the cold, harsh reality of the person who stood in front of me.

A police detective.

A newer one, a younger guy, one I’d never met.

The first blow came when I answered the door. “Can I help you?”

“Dr. Richards? Claire Richards? Is that you?”

With only the mention of my name, a wave of nausea swirled up my esophagus, burning my throat. Something awful must’ve happened to Aiken. That was where he’d been. He hadn’t changed his mind about me.

“Oh God.” I held myself up on the doorjamb. “What’s happened?”

I’d already lost everyone else important in my life—it had to be Aiken. He’d been missing, but I thought he’d taken some space.

Unless this was about Mary, which sent another wave of nausea up my throat.

But they’d go see Pat first, right? Not me?

“Ma’am, are you okay? Dr. Richards?”

I nodded. “Yes, that’s me. Sorry, I’m fighting a wicked virus and not feeling so hot.” My throat croaked and cracked with my words.

Smitty eyed the strange man cautiously, a small rumble bubbling from his throat.

“I’m Detective Land. Maybe we should sit down? I have some things to discuss with you. You’re not in trouble.”

“Um, okay. Come in.” I motioned toward the living area.

Whatever it was, it couldn’t be good. That much I knew. Nothing ever good happened at my front door. Or over the phone in the middle of the night.

I watched the foreigner in my house walk toward the small sofa, thinking of when Aiken sat there, engulfing the pale pink piece of furniture. How he hated it. How he liked me on his black leather couch.

Closing my eyes, I counted backward from ten. My flu was long forgotten, and the burning in my throat was turning into a full-blown panic attack. I had no clue why this guy was sitting in my home, but my emotions were already frayed, my heart broken in several thousand pieces. Anxiety swirled in my belly, taking my breath and bravado, my hands beyond clammy, my heart rate skyrocketing, my chest hurting.

Pretending I was fully collected, a master at putting on a mask, I sat across from the detective.

“I’m sure this is out of left field, my showing up. And I’m sorry to disturb you at your residence, but I went by your office, and the student greeter said you were at home. I didn’t realize you were sick.”

“It’s fine.”

I really wasn’t—toast was fine. Abby used to say that to me when I’d say “fine” to her. She hated the words fine and nice. They didn’t fit in with her colorful, vibrant nature. She despised those words. To Abby, everything and everyone should’ve been awesome.

“About ten months ago, a local farmer came to us. He explained that he recently met a young guy in town who was looking for his mom.”

“Aiken,” I whispered, a million memories flashing in front of my eyes.

“Yes, Mr. Fordham.”

“Go on,” I instructed him, wiping my nose on the sleeve of my ratty robe. All pride had escaped me moments earlier when he’d said young guy. My young guy, Aiken, whom I’d been pining away over for the last two weeks.

“The farmer said that speaking with Mr. Fordham ended up reminding him of an old friend, who happened to be Mr. Aiken’s mother. She’d gone missing years before, and his friends, who were her parents, died shortly after. He began wondering where the young, or not-so-young woman now, was. So he came to us. He asked if anyone else had wondered or come by.”

“Forgive me, but I’m confused about why you’re telling me all this. That’s nice he looked out for Aiken and all, but Aiken’s gone. Left town, or whatever, without an explanation about three weeks ago. Haven’t heard from him since. I assume his house will go up for sale soon.”

“There’s no easy way to say this, so I’ll just come right out. We believe that Mr. Fordham’s mother, Jeannie George Fordham, was involved in the blast the night your daughter was killed.”

It felt as if a thousand sticks of dynamite exploded inside my heart, ricocheting through my spine, bone and blood splattering inside me. I had no rational thoughts, my brain turned to mush.

“Our first clue was when new information came forth regarding the death of Mrs. Fordham’s parents. A local mechanic who was selling some of the parts from their car came across a clipped wire. It’s crazy, I admit. Because of the untimely deaths, that car sat rotting on the end of his lot. Nobody wanted it. Not that it was worth much, but he decided he’d scrap it. When he found the wire, he said it was too clean of a cut to be due to age. They never looked at the wires after the accident. It was an older car, and everyone assumed either brake malfunction or user error.”

I didn’t respond, only nodded and encouraged him to get on with it. Better to rip the Band-Aid off quickly. The sooner he got his story out, the sooner I could be rid of him.

“The mechanic brought the wire to us. We looked for fingerprints, and right there was Jeannie’s print. We looked a little deeper and found she’s in the system for some altercation during a protest in college. There was a screening of a documentary about a rapper’s life and the challenges he faced growing up destitute amid a drug war. He apparently used drug money seeded in violence to get out of the ghetto. The protest was outlandish, considering they were protesting with violence. In the end, it looks like it was based on a black/white thing. Do you need a minute?”

He stopped dead in his monologue and stared at my shaking hands, which also happened to be dripping with sweat. I wiped them on my robe and shook my head. I needed him to hurry up and finish, leave, get out of my life for good.

I felt psychotic. I felt as if I needed to do something rash, and I didn’t really care. I wanted to act on the crazy that I’d felt for so long. Impulsivity coursed through my veins, and I fucking loved it. I’d wanted to let go for so long. It was long overdue.

“Anyway, when we found the print and the info about the past altercation, we snooped some more, and as it turns out, another mechanic said Jeannie hung around his shop one day while getting an oil change and asked a lot of questions. It appears as if she played a role in the untimely deaths of her parents. At the time, we didn’t share this with the farmer informant. He later came back to us to see if we had discovered anything more on Jeannie. He’d finished his business with Mr. Fordham, but said he knew the young gentleman still wanted to find his mother. Then, a few weeks ago—two, to be exact—police thwarted a second explosion at a concert—a concert by the same rapper your daughter went to see.”

“What?” My voice was weak, almost not audible.

Two weeks. When Aiken left. After we woke in each other’s arms, he’d gone out to get the paper and was gone later. His house sat empty and dormant, like my heart.

Of course, Mary had started acting weird about the same time and began giving me a million research papers to look over, keeping me busy with work over spring break, and burdening me with her lackluster personal life.

She’d intentionally buried me in work, and I had been able to barely come up for a breath.

I had literally run myself ragged with work and emotions until I physically took sick.

“Yes, another explosion. Thankfully, the blast was intercepted and the real suspect apprehended, who happened to be none other than Jeannie Fordham. It was in the national papers, no memorial services though, since no one was injured.”

“I didn’t hear anything about it,” was all I said.

“It was hot news for a few days. We thought you’d see something and come to see us, but when you didn’t…we waited to be sure we had all the facts. Ms. Fordham recently admitted to arranging the explosion at the arena here too. More of her racist hatred. I assume that’s why she targeted the rapper.”

“My paper hasn’t been out there in the morning. I keep calling—I like a real paper newspaper. The smell, the feel. Anyway, they keep saying my subscription was suspended and asking for payment. I know I paid them in full, but they refuse to honor it. I’ve been so busy with work, I haven’t had the energy to fight it or care. I’ve been too tired to get on the Internet. I don’t know, I haven’t been myself.”

Why the hell am I explaining myself to this guy?

Who stopped my newspaper?

“Christ.” I stood, suffocating myself with the tie to my robe, squeezing it tighter and tighter against my abdomen, until I felt as if I was going to throw up.

“Ma’am, I didn’t mean to upset you. We thought you should know.”

“Don’t be so meek.” I turned on my heel and stared the cop down. “My daughter died. I didn’t even know you’d reopened the case. Have you told the other parents?”

“Well, they came to us when the story broke on the Internet. But you didn’t.”

I’d been busy acting like a heartbroken baby when the younger guy I fell for skipped town. Now I knew the truth. His mother killed my baby.

“Did they say if they were going to contact me?” My voice was shrill, my nose leaking.

“They said it was in your best interest not to know, that you were going through a rough time and we should be sure before we told you anything.”

“Jesus,” I swore. “Why does everyone act like I’m an emotional wreck?”

“I didn’t mean to get in the middle of this…”

“No! You’ve been fabulous,” I yelled. “You just made it abundantly clear how everyone…and I mean everyone…has basically been in on my not knowing this. Keeping it from me. Why? Because I’ve basically been sleeping with the enemy. And for God’s sake, where the hell is Mr. Fordham? You must know, because he must be the one sabotaging my newspaper.”

“He’s been cooperating with us for a while now. He’s been showing us what he found while trying to find his mom. Most of it is irrelevant, except for a dark political blog she frequented and left comments on. He’s pointed us toward another key witness. Ms. Fordham had another child. Here in central Pennsylvania.”

“So he knew? Mr. Fordham? And who the hell is this second child? Where does he or she come into the picture?”

“I don’t know all the specifics, ma’am. I know Aiken’s partly behind us locking his mother up. His own mother. He tipped us off. I shouldn’t tell you that, but you sound upset, so…and this new witness helped him unearth a lot of the clues.”

“Why have I not heard any of this until now?” I shrieked, wringing my hands together.

“We’ve been trying to keep most of it quiet. There were a lot of students at the concert a few years back. We don’t want to worry parents any more than we have to, especially the new ones who are sending their kids here to school. We didn’t want this school to look like a target.”

“Get out.” I turned on my heel. I’d had enough of the police and the school. All the red tape and incestuous collusion to preserve the university’s positive image hadn’t changed a bit since the day Abby died. I was sick of putting up with it. It was like the sexual-assault cases that were swept under the rug… No, no, our campus is safe, send us your kids and your money.

“I’m going to leave my card here. Right here on the table, if you need anything, Dr. Richards.”

“Just get out.”

I stood up, slammed the door behind Detective Land, locked it, and slumped into my chair, staring into space until the tears came so hard I had to shut my eyes.

The man I loved…his mother killed my daughter…and the last few months played on a continuous loop in my head. Aiken moving in, wearing me down, convincing me to let go of memories.

Then there was us running, us fucking, Abbie…and Allison…making a mess of everything.

Abbie? Was she the other witness? Or Allison?

I stood so quickly my head felt hazy. Waiting a second to regain my balance, I ran upstairs to the shower. I needed to go to the police station, find out where the hell Aiken was, and ask him who Abbie really was to him and all of this.

My cell phone rang. The screen said it was Mary. Ignoring the call, I went to my bathroom, dropped my robe to the floor, and turned on the shower. She could wait. After all, she’d been lying for weeks.

Fuck her.

And Aiken.

And the damn horse he rode in on.

It was time for me to take control of my life.