The Quickie - James Patterson [31]
Nothing could quite top off a long day of covering up a murder like having to admit to your husband that you cheated on him.
I took a long lungful of oxygen, slowly let it out, and pushed the door open.
Paul was lying on the couch with a Yankees throw pulled up to his chin. He clicked off the set when he saw me standing there.
“Hey,” he said with a smile. He still had a nice smile, even at the most inappropriate times.
I stared at him. I don’t know what I was expecting, but a cheerful “hey” wasn’t it. “Hey, slut” maybe.
“Hey, yourself?” I said tentatively.
I didn’t know what the next dance step was supposed to be. Not even a wild guess. I’d never had Paul murder my lover before.
“How was work?” Paul asked me.
“Work was fine, Paul,” I said. “Um, don’t you think that maybe we should talk a little bit about last night?”
Paul lowered his eyes to the floor. Now maybe we were getting somewhere.
“I was pretty loaded, huh?” he said.
That’s what generally happens when you practically polish off a bottle of scotch by yourself, I wanted to say. But I guess I needed to be supportive. I definitely needed Paul to open up, unburden himself. Tell me exactly what happened. Hear his side of things.
It would make things so much easier. He could get it off his chest, and I could tell him that he didn’t have to worry, that I was already taking care of everything.
“What’s going on, Paul?” I whispered. “You can tell me.”
Paul glanced at me, his lower lip caught between his teeth.
“My God, Lauren,” he said. “My flight. It was a nightmare. There was this loud boom, and we started plum-meting. I was convinced it was another terrorist attack. That I was dead. Then it just stopped. The plane leveled out, but the pilot landed it in Groton. I never made it to Boston.
“It was like I’d been spared, you know? After we touched down, I rented a car and drove home. I guess I was still in shock when I got back in. I opened the bottle to have a drink to calm myself, and pretty soon, the bottle was my drink. Don’t ask me what happened to my clothes. Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
My face burned in the dark. Why was Paul lying to me now? Acting as if he wasn’t aware I knew what was going on? On the other hand, it wasn’t uncommon for murderers to enter a state of denial. Sometimes it was so impenetrable, it was like they themselves truly believed they didn’t commit the crime. Was that it? Was Paul in shock and so racked with guilt that he’d become delusional?
“Paul!” I finally said. “Please!”
Paul looked up at me, confused.
“Please what?” he said.
My God, I thought. As if this wasn’t hard enough. Was Paul playing some type of game with me? It was as if he didn’t know I’d been there, too. That he thought Scott had been alone and . . .
Holy shit! That was it! A hand went to my gaping mouth. I couldn’t believe it.
Paul didn’t know that I’d been there!
Paul hadn’t come to confront us, I realized. He must have seen an e-mail or two, suspected what was going on, and gone over to Scott’s to deliver an ass kicking in order to scare him away from me. That’s why he’d left without confronting me! And that was why he was acting oblivious now. He wasn’t acting. Paul was oblivious!
Paul didn’t know I’d cheated on him.
Chapter 46
NOW, THAT CHANGED THINGS, didn’t it? I stared across the room as Paul lifted up the throw.
“Get in here with me, Lauren,” he said. “You’ve been working too hard. Hell, we both have. C’mere.”
Seeing Paul lying there like that reminded me of the time when I’d thrown out my back, chasing a suspect down a Throgs Neck fire escape the year before. I was laid up for two weeks, and Paul had used his vacation to take care of me. Really take care of me. He’d cooked us three meals a day, and we’d eaten here together watching daytime TV, reading, Paul reading to me. The water heater gave up the ghost in the middle of the second week, and I’ll never forget how Paul had washed my hair in the kitchen sink with water heated from the stove.
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