Page 71 of Happy Wife

Mia is often more of an adult in any given situation than most adults I know.

“I just…needed a break. My mom’s house is so crowded. She keeps begging her friends to come over so they can drink wine and watch her cry about Dad. Like she hasn’t spent the last millennium badmouthing my dad to anyone who will listen. Everything’s always so dramatic with her.”

Something about Constance getting to own any piece of Will’s loss makes the ache of losing him feel heavier and chafe in all the wrong places. I curse his death for the thousandth time.

How am I supposed to carry all this?

I am about to tell Mia that she can come here whenever she wants, and that I really do want her to still consider me family, but Este comes through the sliding glass door, a bottle of Prosecco in her hand, shifting the mood.

“Hey, Mia. How’re you holding up?” Este sets the Prosecco down on the counter and goes to the butler’s pantry for glasses.

“I’m okay. But I better go. If my mom finds me here, she’ll kill me. I’ll, uh, see you guys later, I guess?”

“Of course.”

I pull Mia into a hug. It’s the kind of hug my mother has never been able to give to me. And for a brief moment, it’s exactly what I need. She lingers for a second, her body slumping into mine, but when she starts to shake a little, she pulls away. And so do I. We’re not ready to settle into the pain yet. She scoops up the clothes off the counter and shows herself out the front.

I look at Este, the glisten of a tear in the corner of her eye. I can see her fighting it off, being strong for me. Very on brand for Este and her “never let them see you bleed” motto. She hands me a glass of Prosecco and more of whatever stash of Xanax she seems to have an endless supply of. For a flash, I see my future as the subject of a cautionary tale, but I slam them both back. We walk to the living room and I climb into the corner of my couch, pulling a pillow across my lap and hugging it close.

“Has Ardell called?”

Este brings the bottle of Prosecco and her glass over and plops on the couch next to me. “I checked with him, and he said they still haven’t heard from the medical examiner. Fritz was going to go down to the office to talk to the guy himself as of about twenty minutes ago.”

“I want to talk to him. I want to know what evidence he’s been able to gather.” I’m wringing my hands with the anxiety of it all.

Este reaches out and stills my hands. “You’re about twenty minutes away from being a little drunk. And high. Maybe another day?”

“I have things to say.”

“Like what?”

I sink back into my seat. All I can fixate on is that Constance was drunk and angry about her social demise the night Will died. It’s the one card I have, so I need to be careful about how I play it. I’ve even withheld it from Este, because she runs so hot she’d be on Ardell’s doorstep in an hour with the information. I need more to back up my theories before I can say anything.

“Never mind,” I mumble.

Will is dead—murdered—and everything is upside down. I have so many questions running through my mind. How did we fast-forward from trying to find Will to this? It feels like as soon as his body was found, a switch flipped, and now everyone is in a hurry to bury him. I keep waiting for one of the mourners who’ve come to pay their respects to pull me aside with their conspiracy theory of how this is all a farce. If they’re talking about how this could have happened, they’re not talking to me. Everyone gives me a wide berth as I move through the house.

They’re all so somber and certain of their grief. Meanwhile, if I open my mouth, I might just scream.

Isn’t someone going to do something? Aren’t we looking for answers? What could’ve happened? Was he scared? Did he…suffer?

The last thought almost makes me want to puke. And I must look like I am going to because Este reaches over and rubs my knee. I can tell that she doesn’t really know what to do or say, and “at a loss for words” is a very weird look for Este. I don’t like it.

Este must sense my feelings because she picks up the remote and turns the TV on. She’s flipping through the guide, trying to find something mindless to watch when the current channel up in the little box is Lindy Bedford—the nationally syndicated newsmagazine host who makes Nancy Grace look like a kitten—talking about Winter Park. Este clicks on the box and I hear myself gasp when I see Will’s face front and center on the screen.

“The body of Will Somerset, a perfectly healthy forty-six-year-old man, was found in a lake in Winter Park, Florida. Officials still haven’t released the details, but their homicide unit is looking into the case. That sounds like murder to me. And get this, he’s one half of one of the most prolific personal injury firms in the state. For those of you who don’t know about Winter Park—this is an area that doesn’t try to attract attention the way West PalmBeach or Miami does, but there’s still plenty of money to go around in this zip code. For an area with a population of less than thirty thousand people, the median household income, according to our research, is over a hundred and fifty thousand dollars per year. That’s a lot of money for a relatively small city.”

“Este, why is this on my TV?” I croak out.

“I have no idea.”

“Remind me to send a thank-you card to Kristy with Channel2 News,” I mumble.

Lindy finds the next camera angle and leans forward. “Let’s be real honest here. In domestic homicide, they always look at the partner. And in this case, the wife is a beautiful twenty-eight-year-old who likely wouldn’t have married someone almost twenty years her senior if he hadn’t been standing on his wallet. If I’m the police, I’m thinking the cause of death is ‘suspicious,’ and she’s my number one suspect. Period.”

I don’t remember standing up, but I’m now in front of the TV with my own face staring back at me. “Este—”

“I’m already on it.”

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