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With Lenore out of the way, it gave me the opportunity to have a more intimate conversation with Dominic, one I hoped would provide me with a possible direction to go in. But first ... I had a burning question, one that would persist until I asked it, so I did.

“Does Lenore stop by often, or was today the first time she came by?” I asked.

“She’s checked in here and there.”

“The two of you don’t know each other well, do you?” I asked.

“Not at all. Why?”

I crossed my arms, thinking how to best phrase my next comment. “Given my line of work, it’s easy for me to be suspicious of people’s motives.”

“You think she has a motive other than offering to help me out?”

I spread my arms and glanced around the room. “You have a nice place, expensive taste from what I can see, and you’re a widower. Maybe Lenore is genuine in her offer to help, or maybe she’s trying to get her foot in the door and start something between the two of you.”

Voice shaking, he said, “If she thinks there will ever be something between us, she’s mistaken. Noelle is the only woman I’ll ever love. I will never, ever be with anyone else.”

It was a bold statement, raising more questions.

“When did you and Noelle first meet?” I asked.

“She was my high school sweetheart.”

“I know it’s tough to talk about your wife so soon after her death. If you think you could find it in yourself to do it, even for a short time, I would appreciate it. Any information you can give me sooner than later ...”

“Isn’t there a way you can conduct your investigation and leave me out of it? I’ve already spoken to the police, and I answered their questions. Can’t you just talk to them?”

“I can, and I have, but having a separate conversation with you gives me a better picture of who your wife was and why someone murdered her.” I paused, then added, “What if we don’t discuss the night she died for now? What if we talk about her instead?”

After a long pause, he said, “I’ll consider it. What do you want to know?”

“What was Noelle like in her day-to-day life? How did she spend her time? Did she have a lot of friends? Was she involved in the community in any way?”

Slow down, Georgiana.

Don’t overwhelm the guy.

“You’ve hit me with a lot of questions,” he said. “I’m not sure where to begin.”

“Why don’t we start at the beginning? How did the two of you meet?”

“I’d like to skip over that part of our lives for now, if you don’t mind.”

I wondered why, but I didn’t press the issue.

“All right,” I said. “How about you tell me whatever you feel comfortable sharing about her.”

He took a deep breath in. “When my grandfather died, I inherited a large sum of money. I was young, in college at the time. Growing up, my grandfather had taught me a lot about how to make money with money, so I put a fair amount of what I’d inherited into the stock market and various other places.”

I wasn’t sure what his money habits had to do with Noelle, or where he was going with the conversation, but I kept quiet, hoping if he kept talking, it would all make sense.

“By the time I married Noelle, we were set for life,” he continued. “I didn’t even have to work, but I like working. It gives me purpose, so I became a partner and an investor in various startups I believed in. Noelle didn’t come from money, and it meant a great deal to me to give her the life she deserved. We were happy here. So happy.”

“Did Noelle work?”

“Not in a formal way. I wanted her to focus on herself, on her hopes and dreams. We both loved to travel, and we did a lot of it together, first by ourselves, and then with our daughter. Noelle also enjoyed her volunteer work. Giving back to the community meant a lot to her.”

“Where did she volunteer?”

“A few different places, but most of her free time was spent at the women’s center. It’s a place for abused women looking for a fresh start in life.”

“How long did she volunteer?”

“Up to her dying day. She felt the center was the one place she could contribute the most. She connected to the women on a personal level, and they trusted her.”

He’d just told me a lot more than he realized.

He’d said the women connected to Noelle on a personal level.

They trusted her, which told me she empathized with their situations.

Empathy was different than sympathy.

Sympathy came from a place of feeling sorry for another’s misfortune.

Empathy was rooted in understanding what the other person was going through, often because the person had experienced some version of the same thing themselves.

I needed to know more.

“Did something happen in Noelle’s past that helped her bond with the women at the center?” I asked.

Dominic leaned back in the chair, crossing one leg over the other, going silent. If I were to coax an answer from him, I needed to try harder.

“I get the feeling you don’t want to talk to me about some things in Noelle’s past, and I understand,” I said. “She was everything to you, and from listening to what you’ve said about her today, it’s clear to me that protecting her, in the past and present, is a major priority to you.”

“You’re right. Protecting Noelle and Kiera means everything to me.”

“I understand your hesitation in sharing private things with me,” I said. “Whatever it is, if you trust me enough with it, I won’t share it with anyone else unless I have to do so. You have my word.”

He cleared his throat, once, then a second time. Then he began fidgeting, drumming his fingers on the table, sighing, shaking his head, no doubt thinking about what he wanted to say and what he didn’t. Or maybe not saying anything at all.

“Before, when you asked how we met, I didn’t want to talk about it because of the story behind it,” he said. “How we came together ... well, it’s bittersweet. Even so, it was the start of us, a light in a very dark time. It led to us dating, and then getting married. But before all that, there was a heaviness hanging over both of us, an experience we endured together, one I wish wouldn’t have happened the way it had.”

I may not have understood everything he was trying to say, but one thing was clear. Noelle had endured something heavy and dark, and he had helped her through it, and kept her secret—if, in fact, she had one.

“Whatever happened in the past, you can tell me,” I said.

“If she was still alive, I wouldn’t tell you, or anyone. Now that she’s passed away ... well, I still wouldn’t mention it to most people. Given you’re investigating her murder, I suppose I feel all right about sharing it with you. Though I don’t know how talking about it will help you with your case.”

“Sometimes the smallest thing ends up meaning the most.”

He nodded, exhaling a heavy breath. “In our sophomore year of high school, I was walking through the park one night, and I saw Noelle sitting inside her car. She was alone, and she was crying. We’d had a couple of classes together at school, but we didn’t know each other well at the time. Still, the look on her face gave me cause for concern.”

“What did you do?”

“I walked over and knocked on the driver’s-side window. She looked up at me, and I noticed her bottom lip was bleeding. There was also a bruise on her cheek. I thought she might have been in an accident at first, but I didn’t notice anything wrong with the car when I walked up. I asked her if she was okay.”

“What did she say?”

“Nothing at first. She just stared at me, so I asked a second time. She told me she didn’t want to talk about it, and she asked me to go away. Something inside me knew I needed to stay, so I did. I leaned against the car and stood there for a while, listening to her cry. Some time passed, and she seemed to calm down a little, so I started talking to her about anything that came to mind. I’d say it was a good hour before she relaxed enough to roll the window down.”

“What happened then?” I asked.

“The first thing I noticed was the dress she was wearing. It was light blue with big, white polka dots. I’ll never forget it. One of the sleeves was ripped, and it was then I thought someone may have assaulted her.”

I crossed one leg over the other. “Did you ask her about it?”

“I did.”

“What did she say?”

“She said she’d gotten into a fight with her boyfriend a few hours earlier, a kid we went to school with named Gabe Romero. He’d always had a temper on him, but I was still surprised he’d gotten angry enough to take it out on her. She admitted he’d gotten a little rough, and that’s all she would say.”

“Did you believe her?”

“Not one bit. Like I said before, we didn’t know each other well, so I didn’t feel right about pressing her to talk about it. She didn’t seem in the right mental state to drive, so I offered to get her home, and she accepted. When we pulled into the driveway, and we both got out of the car, she ran over to me, pulled me close, and threw her arms around me. She turned to head into the house, and I reached out, grabbing her hand. I don’t know why I did it. I just did. She turned back, and in that moment, all I wanted to do was to protect her. It was then I knew she was the woman for me.”

Even though their relationship began in a horrible way, it still was a beautiful beginning to their love story.

“Did Noelle ever tell you more about what happened that night with Gabe?” I asked.

“Not right away, not until she felt safe enough to share it with me. Gabe didn’t just rough her up because he was angry. He did it because that night he forced himself on her, pushing her to have sex. She did what she could to fend him off, inciting his anger. He hit her, and then he raped her.”

He. Raped. Her.

Rape.

The word itself sent a shiver down my spine.

No wonder she’d spent her adult life trying to help others overcome their own misfortunes. In ways, I was sure it was therapeutic—a way for her to help herself, and others, to move on.

“It must have been hard for her to tell you what happened,” I said.

“It took about four months before she told me. Before then, she told everyone she’d fallen down some stairs in the hallway after school. Some believed her, some didn’t. When the truth came out, I’d like to think I was the one who convinced her to talk to the police.”

“You were in the right place at the right time,” I said.

“I’ve never seen it that way. If I’d been there before it happened, I could have stopped him, saving her from the nightmare that animal had put her through.”

Dominic stood, rubbing a hand along his face.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

“Of course I’m not all right. I don’t want to talk about this stuff anymore. It’s too ... it’s too hard.”

I was learning so much and wanted to continue. At the same time, I didn’t want to pressure him into overload when he was hurting. I’d arrived at the house with so many questions about the fact he was mere feet away from his wife when she was murdered. I’d even considered him a suspect. Now, getting to know him, my conscience told me he was innocent, that everything he was telling me was true.

I was just about to suggest we get together another day when he looked at me and said, “Can we take a break?”

A break was far different than asking me to leave.

“Sure,” I said. “Whatever you need.”

“Five or ten minutes?”

“You got it.”

He walked to the pantry, reaching up to the top shelf as he pulled out a bottle of rum. He gave me a nod and then exited the kitchen, bottle in hand, and I sat there, watching him turn the corner, tears streaming down his face as he disappeared down the hall.