Shivering Mind

Chapter 59

‘Got it,’ Matilda says, appearing. ‘Hey, Dad, this is my wife, Amy. Remember Amy? We moved back home so we could see you more. This is our new house.’

Matilda glares at me: I was the one who insisted we invite his dad.

‘All I’m saying, Matilda,’ Bill Dunne says, pointing now, jabbing an index finger toward my face, the party going hushed, several men moving slowly, cautiously, in from the other room, their hands twitching, ready to move, ‘is she doesn’t belong here. Little b***h thinks she can do whatever she wants.’

Mama Mo swoops in then, her arm around her ex-husband, always, always rising to the occasion. ‘Of course she belongs here, Bill. It’s her house. She’s your son’s wife. Remember?’

‘I want her out of here, do you understand me, Maureen?’ He shrugs her off and starts moving toward me again. ‘Dumb b***h. Dumb bitch.’

It’s unclear if he means me or Maureen, but then he looks at me and tightens his lips. ‘She doesn’t belong here.’

‘I’ll go,’ I say, and turn away, walk straight out the door, into the rain. From the mouths of Alzheimer’s patients, I think, trying to make light. I walk a loop around the neighborhood, waiting for Matilda to appear, to guide me back to our house. The rain spackles me gently, dampening me. I really believe Matilda will come after me. I turn toward the house and see only a closed door.

Matilda DUNNE

FOUR DAYS GONE

Max and I sat in the vacant Find Amy Dunne headquarters at five in the morning, drinking coffee while we waited for the cops to check out Lonnie. Amy stared at us from her poster perch on the wall. Her photo looked distressed.

‘I just don’t understand why she wouldn’t say something to you if she was afraid,’ Max said. ‘Why wouldn’t she tell you?’

Amy had come to the mall to buy a gun on Valentine’s Day, of all days, that’s what our friend Lonnie had said. She was a little abashed, a little nervous: Maybe I’m being silly, but … I just really think I need a gun. Mostly, though, she was scared. Someone was unnerving her, she told Lonnie. She gave no more details, but when he asked her what kind of gun she wanted, she said: One that stops someone fast. He told her to come back in a few days, and she did. He hadn’t been able to get her one (‘It’s not really my bag, man’), but now he wished he had. He remembered her well; over the months, he’d wondered how she was now and then, this sweet blonde with the fearful face, trying to get a gun on Valentine’s Day.

‘Who would she be afraid of?’ Max asked.

‘Tell me about Desi again, Max,’ I said. ‘Did you ever meet him?’

‘He came to the house a few times.’ Max frowned, remembering. ‘He was a nice-looking kid, very solicitous of Amy – treated her like a princess. But I just never liked him. Even when things were good with them – young love, Amy’s first love – even then I disliked him. He was very rude to me, inexplicably so. Very possessive of Amy, arms around her at all times. I found it strange, very strange, that he wouldn’t try to be nice to us. Most young men want to get in good with the parents.’

‘I wanted to.’

‘And you did!’ He smiled. ‘You were just the right amount of nervous, it was very sweet. Desi wasn’t anything but nasty.’

‘Desi’s less than an hour out of town.’

‘True. And Hilary Handy?’ Max said, rubbing his eyes. ‘I don’t want to be sexist here – she was scarier than Desi. Because that Lonnie guy at the mall, he didn’t say Amy was afraid of a man.’

‘No, he just said she was afraid,’ I said. ‘There is that Noelle Hawthorne girl – the one who lives near us. She told the police she was best friends with Amy when I know she wasn’t. They weren’t even friends. Her husband says she’s been in hysterics. That she was looking at pictures of

Amy, crying. At the time I thought they were Internet photos, but … what if they were actual photos she had of Amy? What if she was stalking Amy?’

‘She tried to talk with me when I was a little busy yesterday,’ Max said. ‘She quoted some Amazing Amy stuff at me. Amazing Amy and the Best Friend War, actually. “Best friends are the people who know us best.”’

‘Sounds like Hilary,’ I said. ‘All grown up.’

We met Derek and Gilpin just after seven a.m. at an IHOP out along the highway for a showdown: It was ridiculous that we were doing their job for them. It was insane that we were the ones discovering leads. It was time to call in the FBI if the local cops couldn’t handle it.

A plump, amber-eyed waitress took our orders, poured us coffee, and, clearly recognizing me, lingered within eavesdropping distance until Gilpin scatted her away. She was like a determined housefly, though. Between drink refills and dispensing of utensils and the magically quick arrival of our food, our entire harangue came in limp bursts. This is unacceptable … no more coffee, thanks … it’s unbelievable that … uh, sure, rye is fine …

Before we were done, Derek interrupted. ‘I understand, guys, it’s natural to want to feel involved. But what you did was dangerous. You have got to let us handle this kind of thing.’

‘That’s just it, though, you aren’t handling it,’ I said. ‘You’d never have gotten this information, about the gun, if we didn’t go out there last night. What did Lonnie say when you talked to him?’

‘Same thing you said he said,’ Gilpin said. ‘Amy wanted to buy a gun, she was scared.’

‘You don’t seem that impressed by this information,’ I snapped. ‘Do you think he was lying?’

‘We don’t think he was lying,’ Derek said. ‘There’s no reason for the guy to invite police attention to himself. He seemed very struck by your wife. Very … I don’t know, rattled that this had happened to her. He remembered specific details. Matilda, he said she was wearing a green scarf that day. You know, not a winter scarf but a fashion-statement scarf.’ She made fluttery moves with her fingers to show she thought fashion to be childish, unworthy of her attention. ‘Emerald green. Ring a bell?’

I nodded. ‘She has one she wears with blue jeans a lot.’

‘And a pin on her jacket – a gold cursive A?’

‘Yes.’

Derek shrugged: Well, that settles it.

‘You don’t think he might have been so struck by her that he … kidnapped her?’ I asked.

‘He has an alibi. Rock-solid,’ Derek said, giving me a pointed look. ‘To tell the truth, we’ve begun to look for … a different kind of motive.’