Harlan Coben - The Innocent

Loren was thirty-four years old, a serial dater who, to quote her cigarette-toting mother who was currently on the couch, "never closed the sale." The cop-thing worked liked that. It initially attracted men and then sent them scurrying when the commitment-aka-expiration date approached. She was currently dating a guy named Pete whom her mother labeled a "total loser," and Loren had trouble arguing with that assessment.

Her two cats, Oscar and Felix, were nowhere in sight, but that was normal. Her mother, the lovely Carmen Valos Muse Brewster Whatever, lay sprawled on the couch watching Jeopardy! She watched the show nearly every day and had never gotten a question right.

"Hey," Loren said.

"This place is a pigsty," her mother said.

"Then clean it. Or better yet, move out."

Carmen had recently split with Husband Four. Her mother was a good-looking woman- far better looking than the plain daughter who'd taken after her suicidal father. Still sexy, though now it was in a sort of sloppy-seconds way. Her looks were starting to droop, but she still landed better dates than Loren. Men loved Carmen Valos Muse Etcetera.

Carmen turned back to the television and took another deep puff of the cigarette.

Loren said, "I told you a thousand times not to smoke in here."

"You smoke."

"No, Ma, I quit."

Carmen turned the big browns in her direction, blinking seductively out of habit. "You quit?"

"Yes."

"Oh, come on. Two months? That's not quitting."

"It's five months."

"Still. Didn't you smoke in here?"

"So?"

"So what's the big deal? It's not like the smell is gone or anything. It's not like this is one of those fancy no-smoking hotel rooms. Right?"

Her mother gave her the familiar judgmental eye, sizing Loren up the way she always did and finding her wanting the way she always did. Loren waited for the inevitable "just trying to help" beauty tip: Your hair could use some shape, you should wear something clingier, why do you have to look like a boy, have you seen the new push-up bras at Victoria's Secret, would a little makeup kill you, short girls should never go out without heels…

Carmen's mouth opened and the phone rang.

"Hold that thought," Loren said.

She picked up the receiver.

"Yo, Squirt, it's moi ."

"Moi" was Eldon Teak, a sixty-two-year-old Caucasian grandfather who only listened to rap music. Eldon was also the Essex County medical examiner.

"What's up, Eldon?"

"You catch the Stacked Nun case?"

"That's what you're calling it?"

"Until we come up with something funnier. I liked Our Lady with the Valley or Mount Saint Mountains, but no one else did."

She gently rubbed her eyes with an index finger and thumb. "You got something for me?"

"I do."

"Like?"

"Like the death wasn't accidental."

"She was murdered?"

"Yup. Pillow over the face."

"God, how the hell did they miss that?"

"How the hell did who miss that?"

"Wasn't she originally listed as death by natural causes?"

"Yes."

"Well, Eldon, see, that's what I mean when I say, how the hell did they miss that?"

"And I asked you who you meant."

"Whoever originally examined her."

"No one originally examined her. That's the point."

"Why not?"

"You're kidding, right?"

"No. I mean, shouldn't that have shown up right away?"

"You watch too much TV. Every day zillions of people die, right? Wife finds the husband dead on the floor. You think we do an autopsy? You think we check to see if it's murder? Most of the time cops don't even come in. My old man croaked, what, ten years ago. My mom called the funeral home, a doc declares him dead, they pick him up. That's how it normally works, you know that. So here a nun dies, looks like natural causes to anyone who doesn't know exactly what to look for. I would have never gotten her on the table if your Mother Superior doesn't say something."

"You sure it was a pillow?"

"Yup. Pillow in her room, matter of fact. Plenty of fibers in the throat."

"How about under her fingernails?"

"They're clean."

"Isn't that unusual?"

"Depends."

Loren shook her head, tried to put it together. "You have an ID?"

"An ID on what?"

"On the victim?"

"I thought she was Sister Silicon or something. What do we need an ID for?"

Loren checked her watch. "How much longer are you in the office?"

"Another two hours," Eldon Teak said.

"I'm on my way."

HERE IS HOW you find your soul mate.

It is spring break your freshman year of college. Most of your friends head down to Daytona Beach, but your high school bud Rick has a mother in the travel business. She gets you super-low rates to Vegas, so you and six friends go for a five-night stay at the Flamingo Hotel.

On the last night, you head to a nightclub at Caesars Palace because you hear it's supposed to be a great hangout for coeds on vacation. The nightclub, no surprise, is noisy and crowded. There is too much neon. It is not your scene. You are with your friends, trying to hear them over the loud crush of music, when you look across the bar.

That is when you see Olivia for the first time.

No, the music doesn't stop or segue to angelic harps. But something happens to you. You look at her and feel it in your chest, a warm twang, and you can see that she feels it too.

You are normally shy, not good with approaches, but tonight you can do no wrong. You make your way over to her and introduce yourself. We all have special nights like this, you think. You're at a party and you see a beautiful girl and she's looking at you and you start talking and you just click in a way that makes you think about lifetimes instead of one-nights.

You talk to her. You talk for hours. She looks at you as if you're the only person in the world. You go somewhere quieter. You kiss her. She responds. You start to make out. You make out all night and have no real desire to push it any further. You hold her. You talk some more. You love her laugh. You love her face. You love everything about her.

You fall asleep in each other's arms, fully clothed, and you wonder if you will ever be this happy again. Her hair smells like lilacs and berries. You will never forget that smell.

You'd do anything to make this last, but you know it won't. These sorts of interactions aren't built for the long term. You have a life, and Olivia has a "serious" boyfriend, a fiancé really, back home. This isn't about that. It is about the two of you, your own world, for just too brief a time. You pack a small life span into that night, a complete cycle of courtship, relationship, breakup into those few hours.

In the end, you will go back to your life and she'll go back to hers.

You don't bother trading phone numbers- neither one of you wants to pretend like that- but she takes you to the airport and you passionately kiss good-bye. Her eyes are wet when you release her. You return to school.

You go on, of course, but you never quite forget her or that night or the way it felt to kiss her or the smell of her hair. She stays with you. You think of her. Not every day, maybe not even every week. But she's there. The memory is something you take out every now and then, when you're feeling alone, and you don't know if it comforts or stings.

You wonder if she ever does the same.

Eleven years pass. You don't see her in all that time.

You are no longer the same person, of course. The death of Stephen McGrath had set you off the rails. You have spent time in prison. But you're free now. Your life has been given back to you, you guess. You work at the Carter Sturgis law firm.

One day you sign onto the computer and Google her name.

You know it is stupid and immature. You realize that she probably married the fiancé, has three or four kids by now, maybe taken her husband's name. But this is harmless. You will take it no further. You are simply curious.