Total pages in book: 127
Estimated words: 127715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 639(@200wpm)___ 511(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127715 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 639(@200wpm)___ 511(@250wpm)___ 426(@300wpm)
They stopped to wait to cross the street, and once they were over, she mumbled. “I wonder.”
“You wonder what?”
She looked up at him. “If this wicked stepmother might have been another reason you didn’t try to find someone sooner after Winnie.”
Harry had never thought of that, but it made sense.
“It’s not the only reason, sweetheart,” he said. “But yeah. Mom was a hard act to follow. Winnie definitely was too.” He pulled her tighter to his side. “Though, I found her eventually.”
She shot him another smile.
And it was then, Harry realized, the night before, she told no lies.
She wasn’t skipping to the coffee joint and singing Taylor Swift songs, but she seemed lighter, quicker to smile, and the smiles were genuine.
He’d only known her with the cloud hanging over her.
He was looking forward to what he’d get when he got her out from under it.
What he knew was, he was going to like it.
And that was all in their messed-up world that Harry, down to his bones, knew.
However Lillian Rainier came to him, he was going to like it.
THIRTY
The Pain Was Real
Harry
Late that same morning, after listening to some relief when Harry shared his news about meeting Lillian, Harry then got the kind of talking to he hadn’t received since he was about eleven from his father. This talking to was about Harry calling to share he was seeing someone he wanted his father to meet the day before her murdered parents’ memorial.
Onward from that, happiness from his brother, until Josh learned what was going to happen the next day, which meant Josh said, “Fuckin’ hell, Harry. Give a man at least forty-eight hours to find a babysitter.”
To which Harry told his brother they didn’t have to come, and they could meet Lillian later, maybe at Christmas.
And now Harry was again in the observation room at the station.
Rus was in interrogation along with Special Agents Patterson and Bakshi, Dern and Dern’s attorney.
“Now, weird thing is,” Agent Patterson was saying, “we’ve been on this,”—he looked to his partner—“what we got logged on this case, Fatima? Twenty-six whole hours?”
“Around there,” Bakshi replied casually.
Patterson went back to Dern. “Twenty-six hours. And in those twenty-six hours, we uncovered the fact that Gerald Dietrich made a bad investment, and to cover those losses, he made another one. It was the Great Recession. Shit like that was happening to a whole bunch of folks. But this put his boxers in a bunch, and they were squeezing his balls tight, especially considering he and his wife didn’t think that maybe, money was scarce all of a sudden, they might want to cut back on the Chanel and fresh-flown-in Maine lobster. I mean, you all got lobster right here in the Puget Sound. That’s a diss to the locals for sure.”
Dern sat there, working hard at keeping his face a mask of nothing.
Then again, Harry understood it would be difficult since he’d spent the night in a cell it used to be him who provided that accommodation, so he didn’t wake up in a good mood. And now he was being spoken down to by a special agent from the Federal Bureau of Investigations.
“This put them in a lot of debt. A lot,” Patterson stressed. “Though, the hefty insurance payment helped them out with that. Thing is, they seemed to get out from under it before they got that check.”
Dern said nothing.
“So, we’re looking at their finances,” Patterson continued, “and imagine our surprise, after that robbery but before they got their insurance payout, they suddenly have much less overhead. Now, this isn’t unheard of if you’re in financial straits, but a man and a woman gotta eat, and get their highlights touched up, and there were no longer any credit or debit transactions for things like groceries, gas, hair stylists and barbers, or meals out.”
“Maybe they went on a diet,” Bakshi suggested.
“Maybe,” Patterson said, his attention not leaving Dern. “Or maybe they were paying in cash.”
Dern looked to the table.
“Then, doing some more poking around,” Patterson kept at him, “we got a hit on a domestic dispute. Happened years ago. Years. Man brandishing a gun at his girlfriend in Olympia. Strange thing was, when they ran that gun, it wasn’t registered to him. It was registered to a Gerald Dietrich and reported stolen. When asked where he got it, he said he bought it from an online site. That site has since closed down. But we sent some agents to talk to this gentleman, and he changed his tune when the FBI knocked on his door. Suddenly, he remembered where he got that gun, and several others. And damned if the man didn’t describe the guy he bought the guns from as a man who looks exactly like Gerald Dietrich.”
Dern continued to look at the table.
“Now, you were here, working that case, my question is, how we got all this in a little over a day, and in that day, we also had a sleep, took a long drive, and personally, I accomplished a very gratifying shit, so how on earth did all of this slip right by you?” Patterson asked.