David Ellis - In the Company of Liars

He makes it to the front of the line and walks up to a postal agent.

“I’d like to speak to Raoul,” he says.

She sees Sam’s eyes, notices him because he was talking to some clients before his attention was suddenly diverted. His client’s perceptions of him are paramount, it is the whole reason for the cocktail party, but he is overtaken by her, by pure lust, his gaze running up and down her body, his imagination running wild. It is, she is sure, the most memorable expression she has ever seen on a man’s face.

“Mother, you’re blushing.” Jessica Pagone drops her backpack on the opposite side of the table in the restaurant where they have agreed to meet, on the northwest side, within the distance permitted by the terms of her bond.

And then Allison thinks of Sam’s fateful words.This isn’t going to work out. Mat-Mat’s a friend. You know this is crazy. It always was.

Jessica remains standing and watches her mother, almost accusingly.

“Jess, c’mon.” Allison lifts a bang off her forehead. “Sit.”

“You cut your hair,” Jessica says, taking the seat across from her mother and not elaborating on the observation.

And Allison will not ask for elaboration. She will not seek a compliment from her daughter. If pressed, Jess would probably comment favorably. But the whole thing would be so forced, so unlike them now, so awkward. As if things aren’t awkward enough.

There is a truce. They are not fighting. They have not so much as bickered since Sam’s murder. It is not as if things are openly hostile. Things are simply tense.

Allison divorced Jessica’s father and, not long afterward, began an affair with her father’s colleague in the lobbying business-a man for whom Jessica worked. That is all, apparently, that Jessica needs to know to choose sides. The murder of Sam Dillon has complicated things, makes it harder for Jessica to hold her grudge; she no doubt realizes that her mother has more urgent things on her mind right now. And so she has reacted with all the right words. She has shown concern. Given words of encouragement. But it is all still there, simmering beneath the surface, Jessica’s intense resentment, even if she tries to mask it with a comforting expression.

“You’re losing weight,” Jess says. “You have to eat.”

True enough. With the nerves keeping her stomach in knots and all of her exercise to still those nerves, Allison has lost close to fifteen pounds in a little over two months.

“The trial starts soon,” Allison says.

“I know.”

A waiter takes their order for drinks-just water for Allison, iced tea for Jessica. The server is cute, Allison thinks, probably a college boy, and she sizes him up as she has sized up every man of his approximate age-Jessica’s age-wondering, however improbably, whether this will be the man Jessica finds. She has envisioned the perfect man for her daughter. Caring, passionate, strong. She wants a man who makes Jessica feel loved, who challenges Jess to be a better person, supports her unequivocally. This, she supposes, is what every mother wants for her child.

“It’s okay to tell them,” Allison says.

“I don’t have a choice.”

No, Jessica doesn’t have a choice. She did once. She had a number of options the first time the police paid her a visit. She probably could have gotten away with it, too. The police probably wouldn’t have charged a young woman who failed to give incriminating information about her own mother. But Jessica didn’t know that, and it probably wouldn’t have mattered, anyway. By then, the police were pretty sure who they liked for the murder. And that is all history. The prosecution has subpoenaed Jessica Pagone and she will have to testify against her mother. However hard she may try to equivocate, they will make her answer the questions the same way she answered them in the police station.

“Mother?” Jessica asked, when Allison came home at close to two in the morning, her hands and face dirty. “What have you done?”

Allison wants to hold her daughter. She wants to caress her, kiss her, talk to her intimately again. She wants to ask her about boys, about school, about her hopes and ambitions.

But they don’t talk about such things anymore. They haven’t for some time. Because the marriage didn’t break up overnight. The descent began-oh, it’s so difficult to pick a starting point, but what Allison means by this is the first time that the problems were on the surface-about three solid years ago, their anniversary dinner, after a bit too much champagne, when Allison openly wondered what, exactly, they were celebrating. Or that same year, when Allison paid an unannounced visit to Mat’s firm and found Mat in his office with a young associate, a female associate, a very attractive young female associate with shiny brown hair and a cute figure. It was nothing inherently incriminating; they were not locked in an embrace or straddling each other on the desk. Mat was sitting in his chair, turned away from the desk, in a way that Allison could only describe as unusually informal, the young associate-Carla was her name-half-sitting, half-leaning on the desk on the same side as Mat. Only separated by about three feet, speaking in quiet but comfortable tones. No, nothing on its face incriminating per se, with the exception of their reactions, Mat leaping to his feet and stuttering out a greeting to Allison, the young associate Carla jumping off the desk so quickly that she almost hit the wall behind her. Mat’s suddenly reddened face, his struggle to collect himself, finally getting to the point where he could ask Allison what she was doing here. Allison had wanted to ask Mat the same question. But she didn’t. She even shook Carla’s hand, took it lightly but then solidified her grip, and she imagines-probably exaggerates this, she admits-that Carla squeezed back, as if for that single moment they were locked in a territorial battle that Carla, apparently, was winning. Yes, that is probably the point where Allison first let the feelings that had been boiling below for so long finally surface, when she finally questioned what the hell she was doing with this man. And Mat knew it, on some level.

And so Jessica did, too. What the two of them, Mat and Jess, said to each other, Allison will never know. She did not ever-would not ever-share this incident with her daughter. She will not be that kind of person. But after that, Jessica and Mat grew closer, spent more time together away from home, away from Allison, had lunches together, probably got together in places that Allison never knew.I don’t know what’s wrong with her, Mat probably told Jessica. I’m trying to keep this marriage together but your mother seems to want something else. I’m doing all I can, Jess. She’s shutting me out.And the vacation they took together, Mat and Jessica, after the divorce was finalizing, spending this past Christmas in Florida together while Allison spent the holiday alone. Just one quick phone call was all the notice Allison had. She had been preparing to make dinner and spend Christmas Eve with her daughter, even considered having Mat join them. Then the phone call, two days before:Mother, I’m going with Daddy to Sanibel for the holiday. Talk to you when I get back. Just one voice mail on her phone and she would spend Christmas alone.

Allison tried. Since the breakup, she tried to engage her daughter about school-Same old, same old, Jessica would say. About her friends-My friends are my friends. Some are fair-weather, some you can count on.About her love life, a topic from which Allison was now shut out.There’s a guy, she told Allison last December,but you probably wouldn’t approve. She remained mum, initially, wouldn’t elaborate, despite Allison’s claim of an open mind.