Page 5 of She Didn’t See It Coming

The woman lets Jayne into the foyer and closes the door behind her. She turns to face Jayne, crossing her arms in front of her chest, and says, “What now?”

The woman goes very still. “I haven’t seen her.” She adds, becoming more animated, “I know what she looks like, we say hi, but that’s about it. I don’t remember exactly the last time I saw her.”

Jayne glances toward the living room. “Can we sit down?”

“Why?” The edge is back in the woman’s voice.

“I just have a few questions.”

She reluctantly leads Jayne into the living room, where they sit.

“Your name?” Jayne asks.

“Tracy Kemp.”

She jots it down. The other woman looks at her nervously.

“How long have you lived here?” Jayne asks.

“Almost three years.”

“Do you live alone?”

“No. With my husband.”

“And what is his name?”

“Henry Kemp.”

The name is familiar. “Does your husband know Bryden at all?”

“No.” The answer is firm, almost angry.

Jayne presses the sore spot. “I understand your husband, Henry, had some difficulties a couple of years ago.”

Now the other woman looks at her with open hostility. “That’s why you’re really here, isn’t it? I know what you people are like.”

Jayne waits, lets the silence do the work.

“He was completely innocent. He wasn’t even charged. But even so, it’s pretty much ruined our lives. So pardon me if I seem bitter.”

“Can you tell me about it?” Jayne asks.

Tracy Kemp sits rigidly, caught in a situation she can’t get out of.

Finally, she says, “A woman made a false claim against him. He was arrested, but as I said, he was never charged, and they released him. There was no evidence whatsoever. She made it all up. And we’ve been paying for it ever since. ”

“What did she accuse him of?” Jayne asks, although she remembers perfectly well.

At that moment, the door opens, and they turn to look at the man entering the foyer, dressed in a business suit. He drops his keys with a clatter onto the side table, then turns and seems startled to see a stranger sitting with his wife in his living room.

“Why don’t you ask him?” Tracy says coldly.

Henry Kemp walks into the living room, slowly loosening his tie. “What’s going on?” he asks, looking at Jayne, and then at his wife.

Jayne stands up and introduces herself, holding up her badge.

“What the fuck is this?” Henry says.

Tracy stands up too. Jayne sees her swallow as she addresses her husband, her eyes fixed on his. “A woman down the hall, Bryden Frost, has gone missing.”

There’s a strange, electric vibe between them, Jayne notices. Tracy is protective of her husband, but is she afraid he has something to do with Bryden’s disappearance?

“Oh, I see,” Henry says, with heavy sarcasm, turning to Jayne. “And you think I’ve got something to do with it.”

···

Tracy watches her husband’s face darken as he stares at the detective. She feels a knot in her throat; she can’t seem to swallow. There’s a churning in her stomach. She thought all this was behind them. How quickly the panic returns, how familiar it is.

Now Henry says to the detective, “I don’t know her, other than to see her in the hall. When did she go missing?”

“Sometime today,” the detective answers.

Her husband looks nervous, but speaks offhandedly. “I was at work all day. People can vouch for me. Ask them.”

“Where do you work?” the detective asks.

“I own a car dealership.” He pulls out his wallet and offers her a card. “As you people know perfectly well.”

“We’ll check that out,” the detective says, taking the card.

“You do that,” he says acidly.

“I’ll need a list of all your employees and their contact information,” the detective says.

Tracy feels something pressing on her windpipe.

It’s fear. Fear that it’s happening all over again.

The accusations. She remembers the questions, the denials, the doubt.

She got through it once; she doesn’t think she can do it again.

The detective glances at her and Tracy turns away, afraid the other woman can see right through her, smell her fear.

The detective waits while Henry fires up his laptop and emails her his employee list and their contact details.

Tracy can’t look at the detective, and she can’t look at her husband either.

The silence in the room only emphasizes the tension.

She can hear the loud ticking of the clock on the sideboard, a ticking bomb counting down to something.

When she has received the emailed list, the detective thanks them for their time and stands up. Then she asks, “Mind if I have a look around?”

“Not at all,” Henry says smoothly. Tracy can’t even speak.

The detective walks down the hall toward the bedrooms, and Tracy’s husband follows. Tracy remains standing in the living room. She knows there’s no one here. Does the detective honestly think her husband would abduct a woman and keep her in the apartment? That she would let him?

Finally, the detective leaves. Tracy watches the door close behind her and begins to shake involuntarily.

Her husband observes her in dismay, and she sees his anger blossoming.

“Why are you shaking like that?” His voice is quiet; they are both aware of the detective outside in the corridor.

He steps closer to her. “You know I had nothing to do with that woman going missing!”

“I know,” she answers.

“For fuck’s sake, Tracy, I was at work all day.”

“I know. It’s—I think it’s just reaction.

After what happened last time, everything we went through, because of that woman’s lies.

” It’s been two years. They have almost no friends left; funny how people don’t stand by you, how they fall away, make excuses.

Family too. All they have left is each other.

It’s put such a strain on their relationship.

“Look, I don’t like it either,” he says quietly, “but we have nothing to worry about. They’ll soon realize that and leave us alone.

It won’t be like last time.” He strokes her hair.

“They’re just going door-to-door, like they have to.

It’s just our shitty luck that a woman on our floor has gone missing. ”

“We have all the luck, don’t we?” Tracy says bitterly.