Page 20 of She Didn’t See It Coming

Lizzie sits with Sam at the little table in his hotel room, the lights dim.

Neither of them can sleep, although they are both drained and exhausted and it’s long after midnight.

Sam has plundered the mini bar, and Lizzie has joined him.

He’s drinking scotch, and she’s drinking little bottles of vodka, mixed with Coke.

She needs its warmth and comfort, needs its numbing properties.

Clearly Sam does too, because this is his third.

She studies him anxiously. Fortunately, Clara has not woken up, not yet anyway.

Lizzie is worried because Sam is all Clara has now.

But then she reminds herself that that is not true.

Clara has her, and her grandparents. She is loved, and she will be okay.

They’ll make sure she’s okay. She tells herself that children are resilient.

But she recognizes that Sam himself may never recover from this.

She wants to know what happened when he was with the police, but she’s afraid to ask again. Instead, she says, “Sam, you should probably get some sleep.”

“I know, but I tried that. I can’t. I just keep imagining…what happened to her.” His voice has sunk to a strangled whisper.

She nods. “I know. I keep thinking about it too, even though I try not to.” She adds, her voice catching, “We don’t even know how she was killed yet. I hope she didn’t suffer too much…” She watches Sam finish his drink. She hesitates, then finally asks, “How did it go with the detectives?”

He doesn’t look so defensive now, like he did when she asked him earlier. Maybe it’s the scotch.

“They think I did it,” he says abruptly.

She feels a surge of fear. “No, they can’t actually believe that,” she says, her mouth dry.

“It was my suitcase.”

“ Your suitcase,” she says.

He nods. “And I don’t have an alibi. They really grilled me about that. Detective Salter hates me, I can tell.”

“She doesn’t hate you,” Lizzie protests.

“She has to investigate you, that’s all.

” She says it, but she’s afraid Sam might be right about them thinking he did it.

Her voice rises. “It could have been anyone. Anyone could have come to the door and knocked. And she would have answered it—why wouldn’t she?

And whoever it was killed her and looked around the apartment and found your suitcase.

It could have been anyone!” She puts her hand out and lays it on his forearm.

“And we have to find out who. Because the police are useless.”

He looks back at her, visibly surprised. “We don’t know that they’re useless. They found her. And they’ve only just begun.” He adds wearily, “I have keys to the storage room.”

“Anyone in the building has keys to the storage room!” Lizzie exclaims.

“That’s what I told them.” He downs the rest of his drink. “Maybe they’ll find out things.” He seems a little drunk.

“What things?”

“I don’t know.” He looks down at the table.

“You don’t know something you’re not telling me, do you?” Lizzie asks.

“No, of course not.” But then he abruptly staggers to his feet. “I’m going to bed.”

Lizzie watches him, uneasy, then returns to her own room. She spends more time on her phone before she finally goes to sleep.

···

Donna lies rigidly on her back in bed, unable to close her eyes, while her husband tosses and turns beside her in a restless, tortured sleep.

Her eldest daughter is dead, her beloved Bryden.

Someone murdered her and left her in a basement to rot.

She doesn’t think she can survive it. Donna hasn’t been able to keep even the smallest amounts of food down since she heard her daughter was missing.

It’s as if her body is trying to heave up the ugliness and horror in the world and expel it.

But nothing she does can change anything.

She thinks she understands now why some people go mad.

Maybe it’s a choice. To go somewhere else in your mind because reality is just too hard to bear.

She had a great-aunt who went mad, although the family never talked about how or why, and now everyone who knew her is gone.

Maybe Donna will go mad too and end up in an institution like her great-aunt, living in her own, inaccessible world.

Right now, that doesn’t seem too farfetched.

Her thoughts run on, won’t let her sleep.

Who would kill her beautiful daughter, who would discard her body that way?

Whoever did it is a monster. It might be someone Bryden knew.

Possibly even someone close to her. It usually is, isn’t it?

So—a monster with a friendly, familiar face.

She knows that the detective suspects Sam; she could tell, they could all tell.

The husband is always the main suspect. Donna wants to think that the idea is absurd.

He’s always been so good to Bryden. She loved him.

She remembers how they were together at Christmastime. They were so happy. Weren’t they?

But honestly, how well do parents know what’s going on in their children’s lives, in their marriages?

They might have been pretending. It could have been awful, and Bryden might not have told her.

She might have been too embarrassed, or ashamed, or in denial.

She and her daughter weren’t as close as they used to be, since they’d moved away to Florida.

Maybe that was a mistake. Maybe she should have stayed put, been here for her daughter.

Maybe Bryden would have confided in her then.

Maybe Donna could have helped her. The guilt kicks in hard.

She should have been paying more attention.

She thinks about Sam, about his demeanor since they arrived. He’s been distressed, agitated, distraught—it’s impossible to tell if it’s from grief or guilt.

Donna had been deeply shaken when she learned Sam didn’t have an alibi. He should have been at work, and he wasn’t.

She’s always thought she loved Sam, but she could easily hate him.

···

On Thursday morning, Paige wanders tiredly around her apartment. She doesn’t think she fell asleep before four. How could she sleep?

She knows they found Bryden’s body last night, after she’d left the condo.

Sam had called her to let her know, but she had stayed away.

It was time for the family to be alone. She told him how sorry she was and tried to comfort him.

She’d watched the coverage on the news, followed it all online.

She couldn’t bring herself to do anything but sit at home by herself, her arms around her knees, thinking about Bryden.

Her best friend, murdered and stuffed in a suitcase.

Now, she hears a knock at her door and immediately tenses. She walks across the hardwood floor and answers it. The two detectives from yesterday stand on her doorstep.

Detective Salter says, “We’re sorry to bother you, but we have a few more questions, if that’s all right.”

Paige swallows and feels her eyes start to tear up. Salter says gently, “I’m so sorry, but I’m sure you’ve heard—this is now a homicide investigation. Can we come in?”

Paige lets them into her apartment. She takes a couple of deep breaths to steady herself while her back is turned.

···

Jayne regards the woman across from her and Kilgour, sitting on the green velvet sofa in the sunny living room. The apartment is the first floor of a charming older home close to downtown, with high ceilings and tall, narrow windows that look out onto the street.

Paige Mason looks as if she hasn’t slept.

She’s dressed in jeans and an old sweater.

Her hair is tied behind her in a careless ponytail, still damp, and she’s not wearing any makeup.

She’s clearly upset about Bryden, and seems apprehensive, uncomfortable at having the detectives in her home. Well, most people are.

Jayne says quietly, “Paige, we’re so sorry for your loss. We understand that this must be very painful for you.” Paige nods, looking down at the coffee table between them, fighting tears.

Kilgour says, “We want to get who did this.” Paige looks up at them then.

Jayne is hopeful they can get more out of her today, away from the condo, and the people in it. “Paige, when we spoke to you yesterday, you said that you had known Bryden since your college days.”

“Yes, that’s where we met.”

“Try to think. Is there anyone who might have had an interest in Bryden, from that time, or more recently? Any spurned boyfriends?”

Paige sits still, as if thinking deeply. Finally, she sighs and says, “No, not that I know of. Not that she ever mentioned.”

Kilgour says, “You told us yesterday that Bryden and Sam were happy, that they had a good marriage. Do you still stand by that?”

“Of course. They were very happy.”

He says, “You said that as far as you knew, neither one of them ever cheated.”

“That’s right.”

Kilgour says, “We think you were lying.”

“What? No I wasn’t.” She looks startled, caught out.

Jayne speaks up. “Your body language gave you away. You said, ‘Neither one of them would ever cheat,’ but that’s not true, is it?” Jayne asks. Beside her, Detective Kilgour stares intently at Paige. Jayne asks, “So which one was cheating, Paige? Sam or Bryden?”