IT WAS JUST after 4:00 in the morning when Test got home. She and North had worked on Brad, then gone over their notes. North was a good detective. Thorough. No surprise. And, fortunately, with both of them in the weeds of the minutia of the case, and worn out, North hadn’t brought up what had happened at King’s place, when Test had drawn her weapon.
In the mudroom, Test shed her coat and let it fall to the floor, then slumped against the wall with exhaustion. She dreaded even the climb up the stairs. She could have fallen asleep if she laid down there on the slate floor.
She kicked her boots toward the neat row of the kids’ and Claude’s boots. Yawning, she shambled into the kitchen, pressing her balled fists into her sore lower back. Realizing she was as hungry as she was beat, she flipped on the kitchen light and winced at the glare as she opened the refrigerator door to find something to satisfy her empty stomach.
A shuffling came behind her. She turned.
Claude leaned against the doorjamb to the kitchen and stared at her.
“Sorry, didn’t mean to wake you,” she said.
“You didn’t.” He looked bushed too and she wondered if the kids had behaved for him. Sometimes he was a softy, and if the kids were in a spirited, mischievous mood, they’d take advantage of that and grind him down.
Test was happy to see Claude, but she needed to eat and get a drink of water before she collapsed.
“Sonja,” Claude said.
“Let me grab a bite first,” she said and removed her holster and set it down on the counter with a clunk, peered into the refrigerator. She wanted to eat something nutritious. But the long day, the stress, along with the darkness and cold, was triggering a craving for carbs. She stared at a shepherd’s pie Claude had made three nights earlier. There were containers of yogurt and cottage cheese and pudding. A chunk of cheddar cheese wrapped in cellophane, sweating. A head of iceberg lettuce rusting at the edges, tomatoes gone soft, a knob of ginger, a cluster of garlic cloves. Nothing appealed, except a piece of chocolate cake Claude had brought home from his showing at the gallery in Cambridge several days before. It had to be pretty dry. Still. The frosting tempted her. She wished Claude had thrown out the cake like she’d asked. If it weren’t around, she wouldn’t be tempted.
“I’m going to eat the cake, damn it,” she said and grabbed it.
“Sonja,” Claude said.
She shut the refrigerator door and lifted the cellophane off the plate.
She broke a piece of cake off with her fingers and ate it.
It was dry. But the frosting remained sublime.
Claude was staring at her. His eyes compassionate. But also. Sad.
“Sonja,” he said again. The look on his face was more than exhaustion. It was anguish.
Her appetite left her and she set the piece of cake on the counter. “What is it? What’s happened?” His face was grim. “Please tell me,” she said.
Her heart was skipping. “Is it one of the kids?” she said. And then. She knew. The silence of the house. She’d been so exhausted coming into the house she’d missed it. Charlie had not come to the door to greet her.
“It’s Charlie,” Claude said.
“Oh,” she said and wilted against the counter. “I knew he was slowing down but I—”
“No,” Claude said.
“What?” Test straightened, panicked. Claude was scaring her now.
“He ate poison.”
Test felt dizzy.
“Poison? What do you mean?” she said. “What did he get into?” Suddenly she was furious, her ire up. How many times had she told Claude to dispense with his paints and thinners responsibly. “I told you to keep your stupid paints sealed up or—”
Claude hung his head. Not with guilt, but with an emotion Test could not quite gauge.
“You don’t understand,” he said. “Someone poisoned him. I found hamburger outside, near his daytime pen. He—”
This was too much. It was all too much. And it couldn’t be. How could it be?
“Where is he?” she said. “Where’s Charlie? I want to see him.”
“He’s in the garage, under a blanket.”
“Did the kids—”
“No.”
“Why the hell didn’t you call me?” she snapped, her ire up, though she regretted instantly her misplaced anger. Her moods were swinging wildly. She was too tired to stem impulsive reactions.
“If I’d called or texted to let you know, it would have only distracted you while you were doing important work,” Claude said. “And I knew you would want to come straight home but wouldn’t be able to.”
He was right. But it grieved her to know Charlie had died and been left all alone on the cold garage floor.
Her heart heaved and she began to sob.
Claude let her. He’d learned not to try to comfort her in such moments, but to grant her the space she needed to collect herself. Then, he could take her in his arms.
She calmed herself and Claude put a hand on her shoulder.
“You’re sure he was poisoned?” she said.
“You decide.”
TEST KNELT BESIDE her old Charlie, gently pulled back the blanket covering him. He was stiff now, whether it was rigor mortis or from the cold in the old barn, she wasn’t sure. Maybe both. It wasn’t clear straight away that he’d been poisoned.
“He was frothing at the mouth,” Claude said and cleared his throat. “And. I found this.”
He picked up a half pack of hamburger and handed it to her.
“He must have eaten the rest, I found the Styrofoam trays,” Claude said.
Test examined the meat. Anger reared up in her again. “Drano?” she said, her voice hoarse. “Fucking Drano?” A sob started to come, but she let her anger rise above her sorrow and crush it. She would need her anger now. Use it to help her focus.
“I’m going for a run,” she said and stood.
“Now? No,” Claude said. “You need to sleep.”
“You think I’ll be able to sleep?”
“It’s dangerous running in the dark on these roads.”
“Not at four A.M.”
“What if—”
She knew what he was going to say and cut him off before he could say it.
“Whoever did this is a coward,” she said. “They’re long gone. We’re not in harm’s way. The kids aren’t. I wouldn’t—”
“I stayed up all night,” Claude said. He was scared. She’d never seen him scared. “Every little sound. I took out my father’s old twenty-two pistol.”
“You can’t be walking around the house with a handgun, Claude. You don’t even know how to shoot. Or if it shoots.”
“I’m not taking chances. If this is linked to—”
“Trust me,” Test said, though she didn’t trust her own words. “If it’s linked it’s only linked by some cruel asshole gay basher who wants to scare off anyone who pursues the case. Not the person who killed Jessica. We have a suspect in custody.”
“You have him already?”
“That’s where I’ve been all night.”
Claude seemed to relax. It felt odd, Test putting her husband at ease.
“Trust me, no one is out there.” She believed whoever had poisoned Charlie was long gone. But she could not know it.
“Go on to bed,” she said.
“I must look pretty bad,” Claude said, with a dim smile.
“No worse than me.” Test smiled too.
Claude relented. He knew when trying to change her mind was futile. He gave her a kiss on the cheek and lumbered off toward the house.
Test remained kneeling at Charlie’s body for a long time, stroking his side and talking to him and giving him the love she’d promised she would the other night when she’d shoved him away.
Then she pulled the blanket back over him to keep him warm and went for her run.