Authors: Andrew Grant
I staggered to the bathroom and once the urge to throw up had subsided, I dosed myself with Advil then headed downstairs in search of caffeine. But when I reached the hallway, all thoughts of coffee were put on hold. I stopped dead in my tracks. Because the front door was standing wide open.
My first thought was that Carolyn had come home. My heart raced, and the pain and sickness were forgotten as I called her name and ran to the kitchen. I pictured her standing at the stove, humming as she cooked something delicious for breakfast. Sitting by the French doors, reading one of the historical novels she loves so much. Even striding around the room, brandishing a random utensil and looking to reignite the fight over the memory sticks. Anything would be better than her not being there at all …
There was no answer to my call. When I reached the room, it was as empty as it had been the night before. I shouted again, louder, and went to check the dining room. It was deserted. As was the living room. And the den. I even looked for her in my study. Then I wondered
if she could be upstairs, in one of the spare bedrooms. I started back along the hallway, and two other thoughts crossed my mind: If she was back, her car would be in the driveway. And if she was in the house, why had she left the door open?
Maybe she’d gone outside to get something from her trunk? She hadn’t taken any luggage with her, but she could have bought clothes or overnight things after she left. I diverted to the doorway and looked out. My Jaguar was where I’d parked it yesterday. But there was no sign of Carolyn’s Beemer. Only the tracks it had left in the gravel when she’d sped off.
What about a taxi? Maybe she’d continued drinking, and had taken a cab home? She’d always been responsible that way. And because the trip was unplanned, she may not have had much cash with her. She could have come inside to get enough to pay the driver. I went all the way to the street to see, but again, there was nothing.
I stood at the end of my driveway, deflated, suddenly aware of the pain in my head, the cold pavement beneath my bare feet, and the wind tugging at my pajama top. I saw that I’d misaligned two of the buttons, causing it to gape open around my stomach. And then a question popped into my mind, far more hurtful than the embarrassment or the physical discomfort. The last time Carolyn had left the front door open, she was leaving me. Temporarily. What if this time she’d only been here to collect her things before leaving again, permanently? How deeply had I been asleep? Could she have sneaked in and dismantled our marriage without me hearing her?
I hurried back to the house and shut the door behind me. Then I took the stairs two at a time, ignoring the throbbing between my temples. All our suitcases were still in the spare-room closet, so I moved on to Carolyn’s dressing room. I couldn’t be sure nothing was missing, because who could memorize every single outfit his wife owns—especially one as devoted to shopping as Carolyn—but there were no obvious gaps. What else would a woman need if she was going away for a while? Underwear? I checked her drawer, and it was full to overflowing with tiny scraps of colorful lace. Bathroom stuff? I looked, and the cabinet was crammed with all kinds of feminine things, the way it usually was.
I had to face facts. Carolyn’s things were here, but she was still gone. I moved over to the bed, fighting the temptation to crawl back under the covers and wait for the disappointment to pass me by. But before I could lie down I realized that an ember of doubt was still smoldering away at the back of my mind like a warning beacon, barely visible through the mist.
Something else was wrong.
It had to do with something I’d seen. When I was looking for Carolyn. Something had been disturbed, or out of place. Not up here, though. And not in the kitchen. Not in the dining room. Or the den. In my study! Suddenly the picture in my head was as clear as day and I was out of the bedroom before I even realized I was moving, heading back downstairs.
I hurried to my desk, sat in front of my computer, and stared at the screen. It was dark and lifeless. For most people, this wouldn’t be a problem. But it was a major red flag for me. Because the first thing I always did when I set up a new computer was to disable its ability to sleep. It’s an old quirk of mine. When I’m working I often have to pause to figure out a problem—often for thirty or forty minutes straight—and it drives me crazy if I have to wait for the machine to wake up when I’m finally ready to continue. So, there was no way the computer should have been dormant like this. It should have still been running my tests from yesterday, or waiting for me to review the results, patiently filling the screen with a succession of digitized Lichtensteins. Unless—could there have been a power outage when I was lost in the tequila haze?
I hit the space bar, and the computer came back to life. That was the last thing I was hoping for, but it did actually make sense. A hiccup in the electrical supply wouldn’t have restored the computer’s ability to sleep. Only a manual reset could do that. And more alarmingly still, there were no test results for me to view, and no indication my new program was running in the background. I was lost for an explanation. But as I sat and stared at the inert Home screen, my confusion began to unravel itself into something much more straightforward. Worry.
I pulled the keyboard closer to me and checked the computer’s directory. There was no sign of my new program at all. It had completely
vanished. As had the data I’d imported. The memory stick had disappeared, too, from the port on the side of the machine. To lose the program was bad enough, but my only copy of the data as well? That would be a disaster.
Then, a moment’s reprieve. All the data wasn’t missing. I hadn’t used the files on the second memory stick, had I? But what had I done with it? My sluggish mind was blank. It took a real effort to recall details of the previous night. And out of the murk I dredged up—nothing.
That was the answer. Nothing. I hadn’t done anything with the memory stick. I’d left it on my key ring. The key ring I’d put on my desk when I checked that the tests were still running. And now there was no sign of it, either. There was just my keyboard, and the monitor. Other than those, the glass surface—and the wooden floor that was visible through it—was completely bare.
Hopes for Carolyn’s return were suddenly replaced by another, altogether more sinister explanation for the door being open when I came downstairs earlier. My stomach turned over. I looked up at the wall above my desk, neurotically checking that my Lichtenstein was still there.
Then I reached for the phone and dialed 911.
I
N A FEW MINUTES’ TIME, THERE’D BE ARMED MEN IN MY HOUSE
.
I’d never imagined myself having to call the police. In fact, like most people, I’d never given the police much conscious thought at all. Ever since I could remember they’d just been a hypothetical, intangible presence. Sometimes unwelcome—like when a guy breaks out a joint at a college party, or when your speedometer creeps a few miles-an-hour north of the limit on the freeway—but usually reassuring. Like a safety net. Only there’s a big difference between being vaguely aware of something that’s there to catch you
if
you fall, and finding out how it feels to crash face-first into the mesh.
MAYBE ARMED MEN HAD ALREADY
been in my house that morning? If I was right, and someone had stolen my prototype, they’d have had to break in to get to my computer. And what kind of burglar breaks into a house, knowing the owner is inside, without being armed? I couldn’t believe I’d been there all along, asleep, and oblivious. It reminded me of my favorite TV show from a while back.
Deadwood
. Set at the height of the gold rush. In those days, if someone stole your stuff you were free to cut their throats and have their bodies eaten by pigs. Today, I had to wait for a couple of government clock-punchers to show up and take care of business for me. It made me feel irrelevant, like a redundant spectator on the sidelines of life, and I didn’t like it one little bit. I began to wonder if I’d been too hasty, refusing point-blank when Carolyn
suggested we should keep a gun in the house after a spate of break-ins in the neighborhood the Christmas before last.
MAYBE ARMED MEN WERE
still in my house? The thought hit me as I finished making the coffee I’d neglected earlier. The front door had been left open, after all. Could that have been deliberate? Could the intruders have left it that way in case they needed to make a quick exit? They could have heard me moving around, and taken cover to avoid a confrontation. Like cornered animals. I never did check the spare bedrooms upstairs. Or the closet in the hallway. Or the laundry room, or …
I heard a noise behind me. Someone was trying a door handle. Trying to get in? Or out? I spun around and saw two people outside, on the rear deck. Both were women. Both were younger than me—maybe in their early thirties—and both were wearing nondescript pant suits and flat shoes. I stepped back, momentarily panicked, then the obvious realization hit me. It was the police. These women were detectives. For some reason I’d been expecting uniformed cops. I relaxed, and one of them motioned for me to open the door. That was a whole other problem, though, due to the missing keys.
“Well,” the taller detective said when I finally managed to retrieve the spare set of keys and wrestle the door open. “That was quite an adventure.”
“I’m sorry about that. The keys … My regular ones are missing … I couldn’t remember …”
“Is that coffee I smell?” the second detective asked, cutting me off. “Pour me a big mug, no cream, no sugar, and we’ll call it even. Do that, then maybe go put on clothes, and we can get started.”
WHEN I RETURNED
, five or six minutes later, the detective who’d asked for the coffee was sitting at my kitchen table, leaning back comfortably like an old friend who’d popped round to shoot the breeze. Her gray jacket was draped across the back of her chair. She had dark hair—almost
black—that hung down below her shoulders, curling in slightly at the tips, and contrasting sharply with her crisp white blouse. Her colleague, the taller one, had cropped blond hair that stood up in sharp little spikes. Her suit was dark blue, and its cut was a little more flattering. She didn’t have a wedding band, but from the way she was leaning against the fridge, looking like she’d be happier somewhere else, she did seem to have an attitude.
“That’s better.” The sitting detective smiled. “It’s an old rule of mine. If I can’t be in pajamas, no one can. Now, let’s get this show on the road. Introductions. My name’s Detective Hayes. This is my partner, Detective Wagner. You’re Mr. Bowman, right? May we call you Marc?”
She didn’t wait for an answer.
“You called 911 this morning? Said there’d been a break-in? And property had been stolen?”
“Right. I did.”
“OK. Well, we’re very sorry about what’s happened to you, Marc. But the good news is, Detective Wagner and I are here to help. Why don’t you start at the beginning, and tell us exactly what happened? In your own words. Take your time. And don’t leave anything out.”
DETECTIVE HAYES TOOK A
notepad out of her purse when I began talking, but she didn’t write anything down. About halfway through my account she started tapping the paper with her pen, and by the time I’d finished I could see from her expression that her idea of sympathy was very different from mine.
“Thank you, Marc.” Hayes tipped her head back to take a final swig of coffee. “I’m getting the bare bones, no problem. But there are a couple of things you could help us straighten out. Like, the front door. You found it wide open, before, you said. Why’s it closed now?”
“Why’s it closed?” I repeated. “Because I closed it. Obviously.”
“You closed it? According to you, someone opened that door to gain illegal access to your home, but you went ahead and closed it? It never crossed your mind that we’d need to examine it?”
“Oh. No. It didn’t. Look, I’m sorry, I’m new to this.”
“New or not, you should be capable of using some common sense. Instead, you completely contaminated the scene. How are we going to recover any evidence? You destroyed all chance of that. And with no neighbors inside a hundred-yard radius, the canvass will be a fool’s errand, too.”
“I’m sorry. It just didn’t occur to me. And it wasn’t till later, after I closed the door, I realized anything was missing.”
“So what
did
you think? The door had been open all night, and that seemed
normal
?”
“No. I thought …” I stopped, not ready to admit what was going on with my marriage. “I didn’t really know. I didn’t think it was anything bad, though.”
“Is there a reason you might not have been thinking straight this morning?”
“No. Of course not.”
“Do you live here alone, Marc?” Wagner spoke for the first time. She had her hands in her pants pockets now, and her head was tipped to one side, making her look slightly menacing. “This feels like a big place for one person.”
“No. There are two of us. Me and my wife, Carolyn.”
“And where is Carolyn, Marc? Can we speak with her?”
“She’s away right now.” I felt my face begin to glow.
“Away?” Wagner echoed.
“Working. She’s an exec at AmeriTel. They’re bidding for a chunk of wireless bandwidth right now, from the government. It’s a huge deal for them—make or break, actually, billions are at stake—and they’re finding out the results today. That’s all they’ve been thinking about for months. Things have been crazy around here.”
“So, where
exactly
is she?” Wagner’s patience was clearly running low.
“D.C.” I hoped that sounded plausible. I didn’t want to get caught lying to the police. Not just to save face, anyway.
“When did she leave for D.C.?”
“Yesterday.”
“What time yesterday?”
“I don’t know exactly. Afternoon.”
“When will she be back?”