“I think our strategy should be exhausted new mom, doesn’t know anything,” Izzy said, as if she were about to pitch a reality show to a Hollywood network. She smoothed a hair out of Brynn’s face. They stood on the police station steps together. “What do you think?”
“Well, that is the truth,” Brynn said. “I really don’t know anything, Izzy. This is all a mistake, like I told you. There’s no way Ross did this.” She had decided she wouldn’t tell Izzy everything she’d learned from Ginny, or the clue Ross had told her to find.
“Uh-huh,” Izzy said. It was clear to Brynn that Izzy didn’t believe her. “Well, the priority right now is you, not Ross.”
“Right, but I want to defend my husband. I mean, he’s not perfect, but I know he’s not a murderer.”
“Do you remember when Ross got home that night?” Izzy asked. “I just know they’re going to ask you that right away. So, we should prepare.”
Brynn had been going over it in her mind all morning. When she’d hired a sleep coach a week ago, the coach had advised her to write down when Lucas fell asleep and when he woke for night feedings, so that she could keep track of his progress. That night, she’d written in the Notes app on her phone: 10pm. Dream feed 4 ounces, spat up and had to change onesie, changed diaper, back asleep by 10:25. She remembered that after that feeding, she’d gone to the kitchen to wash the bottle and run the dishwasher for the night. Ross still wasn’t home. Then, she went to sleep.
Ross had told her that he’d come home, and they’d talked in bed. But she couldn’t remember. It sounded familiar, but in the way a dream sounds familiar. She wasn’t sure if it had really happened or if she just had the sense of it happening.
The next note she’d written was a couple of hours later. 12:30am. BF ten minutes right side. At that feed, she remembered for sure, Ross was home and asleep next to her. She’d gone back down to the kitchen again to pump her left breast and store the milk away. Even in her nocturnal daze, she’d noticed with resentment the empty water glass that Ross had left on the counter for her to clean up.
“I know he was home that night, asleep in bed with me,” Brynn said.
“Okay, that’s good. You have nothing to hide, Brynn. But still, say nothing. Okay? Let me do the talking.”
Brynn could feel her insides shifting around. She’d made the bad choice of wearing the one pair of jeans that fit her and a gray T-shirt, but now she felt claustrophobic and sweaty, and she wished that she’d worn something flowy and loose.
She reminded herself, as they walked in, that Izzy was right: she had nothing to hide. Even the knowledge she had about the Nelsons didn’t implicate her in anything, and it didn’t yet implicate Ross, either. Still, she felt like all the eyes were on her when she opened the door. She felt like she was the prime suspect.
Inside the station, the air was mercifully cold, and it smelled of day-old, microwaved coffee—the same as yesterday.
“Come on,” Izzy said.
Pete emerged instantly from a hallway, and greeted Brynn again as if she were a wife in mourning. As if everyone knew that Ross was guilty, and that he’d never see the light of day again. As if Brynn were just the dumb wife who never saw it coming.
“Chief, hello. I’m Izzy Melville,” Izzy said before Pete or Brynn could say anything. She extended her hand. “I’m Brynn’s attorney. I don’t think we’ve ever met.”
“Nice to meet you,” Pete said, with what Brynn detected as a stifled laugh. “Nice to see you again, Brynn. Why don’t you ladies come with me? This won’t take long. We just have a few questions we need to ask and then you’ll be on your way. Promise.”
They followed him into a gray conference room with metal chairs and a white plastic table.
“Well,” Pete said as they sat down, “I don’t usually get in the weeds like this anymore. But in this case, to respect the family, I felt I owed it to you all to personally see this through, and to handle it with the most delicate of gloves, and the most discretion.”
“Thank you,” Brynn said, though his words sounded slippery and made her feel queasy. She wished she’d had some water before this. She felt dizzy and tired; her exhaustion from weeks of sleepless nights suddenly hitting her.
Pete cleared his throat. “Now, there’s a couple puzzle pieces I’m trying to put together that I’m hoping you can help me with. But it’s nothing to worry about. Basic stuff, to just clear it off the decks, so that you can go on your way, and we don’t have to do this again. Okay?” Just get to it, Brynn thought to herself.
Brynn nodded. Pete cleared his throat.
“Would you say that you and Ross were happy together? Or had you been struggling, you know, as a couple?” Pete’s forearms were crossed and resting on the table, and he looked at her as if he knew the answer to the question already: that they weren’t entirely happy.
“Brynn doesn’t have to answer that,” Izzy snapped. “Furthermore, it’s irrelevant.”
“I know that might seem like a personal question,” Pete said. “We’re just trying to figure everything out, and, well, sorry to be so blunt, but we have reason to believe that your husband, Ross, and the victim, Cecelia, had some kind of relationship. Were you aware of this?”
Izzy chimed in again. “She doesn’t need to answer that, either.”
This time, though, Brynn spoke up.
“No,” she said. “They did not have any kind of relationship other than knowing one another through the club. Ross and Cecelia were not close. Your son was her boyfriend, as I’m sure you know. Henry, however, was particularly close with Cecelia, but not in an inappropriate way.” Brynn swallowed. Maybe she shouldn’t have said Henry’s name like that. It might turn Pete on her. But it was the truth. Ross wasn’t close with Cecelia. Henry was. And everyone knew that. “I mean, all of us in the family knew Cecelia and cared about her,” she added, “but not in an abnormal way.”
“What do you mean, you all were close with her?” Pete asked.
“Brynn,” Izzy said, turning toward her, “you don’t have to say anything else.”
Brynn knew that she should take Izzy’s advice and just zip it, but she had to say the truth, which was that no one in the Nelson family had an inappropriate relationship with Cecelia. Or, at least Ross didn’t. She couldn’t just sit there and not defend what she knew to be true. What if she didn’t have this opportunity again? “I just mean, we all thought Cecelia was great. We all liked her very much. All the members at the club did. But Ross was not sleeping with her, if that’s what you’re getting at. Ross and I are happy.” She regretted her last sentence the moment she said it; she knew she sounded like she was overcompensating. Because she was. She and Ross weren’t happy. Not really.
“I never said that,” Pete said, leaning back in his chair. “I just said they had a relationship. Why would you suggest that they were sleeping together?” He wrote something down on a legal pad.
“I’m not suggesting it,” Brynn stammered. “You said they were having an affair, I just…”
“I didn’t say affair, Brynn,” Pete responded. He was too calm, too serene. He seemed to be enjoying this too much.
“Please,” Izzy interrupted. “Let’s focus on whatever you need to ask Brynn outside of her personal life.”
“Okay,” he said. “Okay. Do you remember what time Ross came home the night of June twenty-fourth? Anything unusual happen that night, or the next morning?”
Brynn took a breath. Pete knew very well that she had already told him yesterday that Ross had been home with her. She was going to stick to that story, even if she wasn’t entirely sure. She had to. “He was home with me that night, asleep in bed. And the next morning, he went to work like normal. Everything was like it always was.”
“But what time did he get home? Do you remember? I know this is hard.”
Izzy nodded at her, confident.
“He came home around eleven, which is very typical on a night when he’s gone for dinner and drinks with clients. I know this for sure because I write notes on my phone to keep track of our son’s schedule and feedings.” She showed Pete the notes on her phone that she’d shown Izzy just before. “He was home and sound asleep by the second night feed, so he probably got back around eleven.”
“Got it,” Pete said, writing something else down. “This is really helpful, thanks Brynn.”
Brynn nodded. Surely, this would be a key in clearing everything up. There’s no way that Ross would have had time to leave the club after dinner and drinks, drive all the way out to the end of Norton Point on the beach, and then come all the way back home. There simply wouldn’t be enough time, especially considering that he’d have to stop to deflate his tires to go out onto the beach and then fill them back up again on the way home.
“So, does that clear everything up?” Izzy asked.
“It does, yes,” Pete said. “But … maybe not how you think. I’m sorry to tell you this, Brynn, but … you see, the security footage from the club that I mentioned to you, well, it shows Ross during that window of time when he wasn’t home yet. It shows Ross with Cecelia.” Brynn felt nauseous and dizzy. She’d only tried to help by telling Pete that Ross got home around eleven. “Your timetable actually secures our evidence.”
“What?” Brynn felt her voice begin to growl. She took a breath. “I need to see that footage.” She knew she sounded defensive. But she had to see it. She wouldn’t believe it until she did.
“I thought you’d say that,” Pete said, tapping an iPad that he’d had on the table. “Let me just pull it up here.” He fiddled with the screen. “I’m an old guy. Never quite know how to work this stuff.” He smiled at them. “Here you go. See for yourselves.”
Brynn and Izzy looked, wide-eyed. The video started. It was grainy, but clearly showed the back door of the club basement, which led out to the staff parking lot. It was date- and time-stamped: June 24, 10:05 P.M.
At first, Brynn thought the tape was frozen. All it showed was the still image of the dark entryway. Nothing was happening. But then Cecelia burst out into the frame, running, sprinting away. And seconds later, Ross ran out behind her. They both disappeared from the frame, and the stillness continued on as before.
“Can I see it again?” Brynn asked.
Pete nodded and played it again. Brynn looked closer this time.
The video showed them both from behind. She could only see a sliver of the side of his face, but not fully.
“But you can’t see his face,” Brynn said. “This could be anyone. This doesn’t prove anything.”
“Well, not really,” Pete said. “It is a private club, after all. There are only so many people that could be in this video.”
It was true. Even though she couldn’t see Ross’s face, it looked just like him. It certainly wasn’t Sawyer, or Henry. She tried to picture Mauricio; it could be him, maybe. It might even be Jacob, if he had only about five extra layers of clothing. Brynn felt sick; whoever was in the video was either Ross or his clone.
“Still, you can’t be one hundred percent sure that it’s him,” Brynn persisted.
Pete lifted a paper bag from his lap and put it on the table. He reached inside and pulled out a baseball hat.
“Is this not Ross’s hat?” Pete asked, holding the hat out for Brynn to examine.
Brynn knew the hat instantly: it was Ross’s lucky fishing derby hat from the year he won first place for the bonito he caught from shore. It was indisputably his: on the side of it was his derby pin with his lucky number 16, turned upside down to indicate that he’d caught a weighable fish.
“We found it on the ground outside the club. Right where he would have been chasing after her.” Pete paused to look at Brynn more closely. “Do you recognize it?”
“This doesn’t prove anything,” Izzy said before Brynn could respond. But Izzy’s voice practically croaked. Brynn could tell that Izzy wanted to get herself out of here almost more than she did. “Are we done here?”
“Look,” Pete said, “I’m not trying to paint you as the enemy here, Brynn. I want to help you. I don’t think you had anything to do with this. So, you need to think about how to help yourself. And how to help your baby.”
Brynn wanted to scream. She suddenly wished she were younger, a child, before the weight of adulthood and parenthood had come crashing down on her. She wished she were back at her parents’ old home on Lobsterville Beach. She could smell the woodstove, hear the crackling of logs burning on a cold winter day, feel the bristle of their old rug on the living room floor, taste the sugary sweetness of her mother’s blueberry scones. She had felt so trapped there, so suffocated by her parents’ simple lifestyle and by the four walls of that small house, but now she’d give anything to be back there in the warmth of her mother’s quiet strength and her father’s reliable routines. She didn’t belong here in Edgartown. She was in over her head.
Someone had told her once that when two people get married, they make a silent decision to choose one person’s family as their touchstone, but never both. Brynn and Ross had chosen his family. It was never a conversation. But it was also never an option, Brynn thought, to do otherwise. Her parents didn’t create the opportunity for her to choose them. They didn’t go out for family meals, they didn’t travel on family vacations, they didn’t throw neighborhood parties. And then they left the island altogether. Maybe Brynn should have tried harder with them. Maybe she should have at least asked them to be more involved. Or asked Ross to help her reconnect. Or maybe she and Ross should have discussed choosing neither of their families, and just starting their own life together, somewhere else entirely. Would Ross have joined her, though, or had he picked Brynn because he knew that she would always adapt to his life, and not the other way around? Would he have chosen her over his family? Would he now?
Brynn mustered a goodbye to the chief. “Thank you,” she said. It was all she could manage.
The station went silent once more as Brynn and Izzy walked through the main room.
Outside, Izzy grabbed Brynn by the shoulders.
“Brynn,” she said. “You need to smarten up.”
“Excuse me?”
“I’m sorry, I know that sounds tough. But this is way more serious than I thought. You need to protect yourself, like he said. And protect Lucas. I’ll text you some names of other lawyers. You don’t want to get implicated in this in any way. Trust me.” Brynn had never seen Izzy look so serious.
“Yeah,” Brynn said. “Thank you, Izzy. I really owe you for being here.”
“Don’t mention it. I’ll see you on the mat soon.” Izzy gave her a weak hug, patting her on the back.
Brynn nodded, even though yoga class existed in another galaxy now for her.
Ginny was digging into a family-size bag of peanut M&M’s when Brynn climbed back into the car.
“Go,” Brynn said. “Drive.”
Ginny put down the candy and backed the car out of the lot.
“Actually, can you go out to Katama?” Brynn asked. “Right fork. I need to do something. I need to clear my head.”
“Sure,” Ginny said.
“Ginny, it’s bad. They showed me the security camera footage,” Brynn said after a few minutes. “It shows Ross running after Cecelia. Like they’re in a fucking horror movie.” She sighed. “And they found his hat outside. His lucky hat. It’s bad, Ginny. It’s so bad. I think I’ve been blind this whole time. There’s no other explanation for it.”
Ginny didn’t say anything. There was nothing to say. She pulled the car into the bumpy dirty parking lot of South Beach’s right fork. The car bounced through mud puddles and then came to a stop facing the dunes, which hid the roaring waves just beyond. The lot wasn’t too crowded for a summer day. Normally, it was packed, cars stuffed into the lot like sardines in a can, and beachgoers jockeying for the best spot to set up their tents, their volleyball nets, their grills.
When Ginny turned the car off, Brynn jumped out and took her jeans off right there in the parking lot. Underneath, she had on black, full-coverage underwear. She needed to go for a swim, somewhere where the waters were rough, dangerous, and loud. Somewhere close to where Cecelia was found. Somewhere that might drown her, too, if she swam out far enough.
She walked out to the beach, Ginny following behind silently. Brynn could feel the eyes of sunbathers on her as she marched into the sea with her T-shirt and underpants on. She didn’t care. She dove under a crashing wave and swam, swam, swam out to sea. When she couldn’t swim any farther, she took a big inhale and ducked under the surface. Her ears filled with water, and the sound of the ocean consumed her.
Underwater, Brynn opened her mouth and screamed. She screamed for Cecelia, she screamed for Lucas, she screamed for Ross, but most of all she screamed for herself. She screamed for the self she used to have, the one she was scared she’d never get back, the one she’d let disappear, the one she’d given up on, the one she needed now more than ever. She screamed and screamed until she had to push herself back up for more air. But as much as she breathed, it didn’t feel like enough.
Her life was collapsing, she thought, and now she had to figure out what to do. She and Ross had to be over. There was too much evidence against him. She wasn’t going to bother looking for his fucking clue, the orange sun. Whatever that was! He’d been fooling her all along, but she was done.
She hated that she knew how much easier her future would be if Lucas didn’t exist. She felt guilty for thinking about it. But if she and Ross only shared memories and a marriage license, then she could just extract herself from his family and never look back. But with Lucas, she and Ross were forever connected. Forever intertwined.
How could Ross have done this to her? How could she have been so stupid? Why hadn’t she picked Sawyer? Or, why hadn’t she picked neither of them, and instead thought about what she wanted in life?
She considered what one of her heroines would do. While she didn’t live in a world of the romance genre, she still tried to make her female protagonists strong, capable, modern women. Surely, none of them would stand by their husband in a situation like this. They’d go off on their own. They’d raise their child alone. They’d stand up for the victim, not the accused. They’d leave this island and never look back, not for a second. The right decision seemed so easy when she was only writing it, not doing it.
But Brynn wasn’t one of her protagonists. She wished she were but she knew she wasn’t. She was real, and flawed, and complicated, and this was her actual life, not one that she was making up for herself. As much as she wanted to walk away from Ross—from all the Nelsons, from her own life—she couldn’t just yet. Even if Ross had killed Cecelia, it didn’t make Henry innocent. Brynn had to find a way to help Margaux and Sawyer now, too. She couldn’t turn her back on them.
And yet … she still wanted to find the clue. She needed to. Whatever the orange sun was, she knew that she wouldn’t be able to put anything behind her until she found it.
She was so furious with Ross for not telling her what he knew. And she was furious with him for telling her what he did know, too, just before he was taken away. She was furious because as much as she couldn’t argue against the evidence the police had on him, she still, deep down, believed him. She fucking believed him, and she hated him for that.
Brynn floated on her back. The sky was cloudless, and the water so clear that she couldn’t quite tell where the ocean ended and the air began.
She wondered if this was how Cecelia felt in the last moments of her life.