“He didn’t make it.” She repeated the doctor’s phrasing.
Dead. Hank died.
“I think we have all we need for now,” Price said.
Sanchez clearly disagreed. She approached the bed. “Mrs. Jewel.” The detective took a deep breath and gave her a serious stare. “Sue, if your husband did something to you, you need to tell us. He can’t hurt you anymore.”
“My husband is dead.” Her voice was weak. More tears streamed down her face. The words felt foreign and thick on her tongue. “He died.”
The stuttered breath felt like a punch in the side. She doubled over and curled her body into a ball.
“Please leave,” Sue begged. “It was an accident. A horrible accident. I don’t know what you think you found in the trunk, but it’s not from tonight.”
“My card,” Sanchez said. “If you think of anything.”
Sue listened to them leave. She reached for a call button and hit it several times. When a nurse entered, she muttered, “Something for the pain. Please. Something for the pain.”
She didn’t want to feel anymore.
In. Out. In. Out.
Blessed numbness came through her IV, and she let it take her into oblivion.
Chapter Two
Three months later…
It started with the smell of Hank’s cologne, a mix of gun oil and cedar, lingering in the bedroom. Sue couldn’t shake the feeling of him standing behind her, watching, judging. In those moments, she forgot he was dead.
She donated his clothing and toiletries to charity, hoping that would erase the scent. Then she caught whiffs of it in the middle of the night, waking her from a troubled sleep. She thought it was the pillows, a haunting scent embedded in the polyester filling, so she threw out the pillows, bought new ones, and then shampooed the mattress with the carpet cleaner.
The smell returned.
It showed up in the kitchen and living room, so she cleaned the house ceiling to floor. Nothing helped. The cologne followed her like a cloud when she walked to the grocery store. Flowers emitted a hint of bourbon with their fragrant petals to cause a wave of sickening sweet nausea that forced her to hold her breath whenever she walked past them.
Sue hated going out. People wanted to hug her and tell her how sorry they were for her loss. Even when she could avoid people, every place she went, she was reminded of Hank—mainly because every place smelled like him.
She didn’t call the doctor to ask him about it. He’d only want to run more tests, and she’d had enough of the hospital to last a lifetime. Each time someone read her file, their expression would change, and they’d say something about her loss.
Using the homeschool medical degree that was the internet, she checked diagnostic sites for an answer. Olfactory hallucinations were called phantosmia, and head injuries could cause them. After the wreck, that made sense, and there was no big psychological mystery behind why Sue hallucinated Hank.
Sue decided to ignore the smells and hoped they would go away on their own. She rubbed menthol beneath her nose, relying on the overpowering salve to hide the hallucination. The strong scent made her hot tea taste a little funny, but it was better than the alternative.
The flat-screen television’s sound played low in the background, its blue-tinted light flashing from the wall as a talk show live-streamed. She sat alone on the couch. An ugly floral lamp she hated cast a soft glow behind her. Actually, she hated most of the decorations. They looked like a pastel flower monster invaded the home and threw up on the walls and furniture. It all reflected the style of Hank’s childhood home.
A dirty plate rested on the coffee table next to her purse in the otherwise pristine living room. The half-eaten sandwich had been for sustenance more than flavor. She hadn’t felt like cooking.
Seeing her cell phone light up with an incoming call, she didn’t pick up. There was only one person who’d be calling, and she didn’t want to talk to Hank’s mother. Kathy would go on about how wonderful her son was, “an angel, just an absolute angel,” and how lucky (with a subtext of undeserving) Sue was to have been married to him. Everyone liked Hank. He was a charming and likable guy. He was the life of the party.
The plastic bag Sue had been avoiding since her hospital discharge sat on the floor next to her feet. If not for the life insurance check that arrived to remind her of the hospital, she might not have thought to pull it out of the coat closet.
“Twenty thousand dollars,” she read before muttering, “wife severance pay.”
A wave of grief washed over her as she stared at the numbers so long that they blurred. She wasn’t foolish enough to think Hank had bought the policy to take care of her. His motivation would be more so that other people thought he was taking care of her. Appearances had been everything.
Sue pushed aside her teacup, lifted the hospital bag to the table, and reached inside to pull out Detective Sanchez’s card. The woman had tried to talk to Sue a couple of times. She had been unable to make a case out of her theories. About a week after the accident, the detective’s picture had been in the news in relation to a double homicide investigation.
Sue found a pair of jeans with cuts up the legs from when they’d removed them. Her shirt was missing, and there was blood on the one shoe included in the bag. Sadness and pain clung to them, these everyday objects. She had done her best not to think about the details of that night.
When she started to shove the clothing back into the bag, she noticed an unfamiliar jewelry box inside her shoe. The black-covered chipboard was worn along the edges. Someone at the emergency room had probably dropped it into the wrong bag. She shook the box lightly, hearing the clack of something inside, before opening it.
Sue didn’t recognize the tarnished silver ring with delicate engravings. Hank bought her jewelry to wear in front of his friends but nothing like this. Jewelry wasn’t her forte, and she wasn’t sure if it was an actual antique or just made to look that way. Regardless, whoever had owned it had worn it often. They would probably be missing it.
Sue’s attention went to her wedding band with the obnoxious diamond. Most women would have found the size romantic, but Sue knew it for what it was—a giant, shiny warning to other males that she was taken. She pulled the wedding ring off her finger and set it on top of the life insurance check. Her hand looked naked without it, but there was something freeing about knowing she didn’t have to slip it back on ever again.
Knowing she should call the hospital to report the mistake with the antique ring, Sue still slid it onto her right ring finger to see what it would look like. Strangely, once she had it on, the silver didn’t appear as tarnished. She held up her hand, admiring the simplistic beauty of the piece.
“Keeping you would be wrong,” she said to the jewelry. Her finger tingled where it touched her, and she flexed her hand, wondering if the band was a little too tight.
Leaving it on, she picked up her phone and searched for the hospital’s number.
“Put the phone down,” a voice demanded loudly.
The sudden burst of sound caused Sue to jump in surprise. Realizing it was only an exuberant commercial for an ambulance-chasing law firm boasting million-dollar payouts, she laughed and resumed her search. Finding the hospital, she tapped the screen to call.