Natalie is watching Bennett carefully, too.
Natalie seems to feel Marissa’s gaze. She turns and meets Marissa’s eyes.
Someday soon, Marissa vows, she will call Natalie and suggest they get together for a cup of coffee, or a glass of wine. But for now, she settles for mouthing, Thank you.
When Bennett finally arrives at the car, he is smiling.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
AVERY
YOU MIGHT THINK, WATCHING THEM, that they’re an ordinary mother, son, and grandfather enjoying a beautiful spring afternoon at the park. But the Bishops, like the rest of us, are far more complicated than they appear.
I slowly walk toward them, along the trail that winds through the Candy Cane City park, pausing every now and then to let Romeo sniff a dandelion or—and this bit of his progress delights me—wag his stubby tail at another dog.
Romeo is healing from his traumas, but he still bears scars.
We all do. Some of ours are just more visible than others.
Marissa puts an arm around her son’s shoulders and bends down to kiss the top of his head. I wonder if Bennett is recounting the story of his rocket getting stuck in the tree, and his dad lifting him up to retrieve it.
Bennett chose this spot when Marissa asked where he wanted to go to remember his father. Matthew hadn’t spent much time with his son, but at least Bennett has a few good memories.
Bennett doesn’t seem to be grieving much, Marissa had said to me last night at Skip’s town house, when I’d seen her for our ninth session: Reconciliation.
For Marissa, like most of my clients, this means reconciling her new reality with the loss of her former life. Because if I’ve done my job right, my clients are in a completely different place—emotionally, and often physically—by this point in the process.
I told her what I tell all of my clients who are struggling with loss: Grief is a shape-shifter. It defies logic, sneaking up on you when you least expect it and leaving you empty-handed and hollowed out when you go searching for it.
Bennett knows you’re here for him, and that’s the most important thing, I’d advised Marissa. Answer any question he has, but don’t feel the need to make sense of it all for him now.
She’d nodded and reached for a tissue. Do you know what some people used to call us?… The Golden Couple.
I do know, I’d thought as I pictured Marissa and Matthew gliding into my office for their first session. They’d almost convinced me, too. Then I’d put a hand on her shoulder while she’d cried.
Her tears were mostly for her son, but they were also for herself, because even though Matthew wasn’t ever the man Marissa tried to pretend he was, grief breaks all the rules.
Marissa and I still have one final session left: Promises. The tenth meeting is when my clients embrace their new futures. I suggested we schedule it whenever she is ready. I also told her there was no expiration date. But I have the feeling Marissa will reach out to me before the end of the year. I also have a pretty good idea of who will be in her future, but Marissa needs to find her own way to him.
“C’mon, Romeo,” I say now, giving his leash a little tug.
Marissa hadn’t wanted to hold a memorial service for Matthew. Given that detectives are now investigating whether Matthew was responsible for Tina’s murder in addition to trying to kill Marissa and Skip, any public event would have turned into a media spectacle.
So she planned this little private one at the park.
Marissa knows I’m coming, but her father-in-law, Chris, does not.
I’m counting on the element of surprise to continue to serve me well.
On Bennett’s other side, Chris leans over to say something to his grandson. Chris looks like a doting grandpa. He appears to be the kind of guy who would stop and help if you got a flat tire or would stuff a pillow under his shirt to play Santa for a holiday party.
Until you see his eyes.
Matthew inherited his icy-blue eyes from his father.
I’ve put together a timeline since Matthew died, casting back in my memory in between my questions to Skip, fitting in the pieces until the narrative finally flows.
It began with Finley, of course.
But the next person who entered my life was Chris. Not Skip, and not Marissa and Matthew.
I just hadn’t seen him coming.
Like his son, Chris is an invisible architect of destruction. He has been behind the curtain all along, wreaking havoc.
I now know that Chris works in the shadows. Many of his clients seek him out for the kind of services they can’t dirty their own hands with. Men like Chris have always been around: They protect the interests of the biggest players in the most powerful cities in the world. They’re the jury fixers, the eyes in the sky at billion-dollar casinos, the dirty political operatives who take down national candidates.
Chris’s name doesn’t appear on Acelia’s list of employees, but he’s one of their most valued assets.
Shortly after I called in my tip to the FDA, I burst onto Chris’s radar. Chris began looking into my life, searching out potential entry points.
He found out I was single, then he asked Skip to befriend me.
That meeting at the Matisse bar was no accident.
Skip didn’t know many details then. He just thought he was doing a favor for the man he’d known since he was a teenager, the man who’d helped him get a scholarship to Dartmouth and had given him a start in business.
But after a few dates, Skip explained to me, he defied Chris. I liked and respected you too much to try and trick you into giving me information about your clients.
The rest of what Skip had already told me was true: He’d begun to suspect Matthew could be dangerous, so he sent Marissa the Post article about me. He hoped I could help her see who her husband really was and break free from her marriage. At least one part of Skip’s desperate plan worked: Marissa did make an appointment to see me. He just hadn’t counted on her bringing Matthew along.
Skip had no idea that Chris was increasing the pressure on me on behalf of Acelia, sending his henchmen to move my Synthroid medication onto my bureau, follow me to my doctor’s office, and even pose as a new client.
I was looking at your appointment calendar that night when you caught me coming out of your office, Skip confessed. But it was only to see if you were meeting with Marissa. I swear I had nothing else to do with what Chris did to you.
When I got over being pissed off at Skip, I told him I was flattered by the faith he’d placed in me.
Now I walk a little farther down the path at Candy Cane City, enjoying the feel of the sun warming my face and the laughter of a group of kids tossing around a Frisbee.
Marissa catches sight of me and waves me over. “Avery, you made it.”
Her father-in-law whips around at the sound of my name.
Chris’s poker face is impressive. He must need one, in his line of work. His only other reaction to me is a tightening around his lips.
I’ve taken precautions to prepare for whatever he might do next—I did kill his son, after all, and now I know exactly who Chris is, whom he works for, and how he’s connected to my life in ways that have nothing at all to do with his family.
But Chris merely nods at me. I exhale and slide my hand out of my coat pocket.
Marissa turns to Bennett. “Sweetie, this is my friend Ms. Chambers.”