Harlan Coben - Fool Me Once

“Or he’s messing with you.”

Maya mulled that over for a few moments. “Or,” she said, “someone is.”

Soccer Day was like something out of a nostalgic American movie that was just a little too perfect, too Norman Rockwell, to be authentic. There were tents and booths and games and rides. There were laughs and cheers and referee whistles and music. Food trucks offered up burgers and sausages and ice cream and tacos. You could buy pretty much anything in the town’s green-and-white colors — T-shirts, caps, hoodies, polos, decals, water bottles, coffee mugs, key chains, fold-out chairs. Even the bounce house and inflatable slides were green and white.

Every grade had set up their own activity booth. The seventh grade girls applied temporary tattoos. The eighth grade boys had a radar gun and goalie net so you could see the speed of your kicks. The girls’ sixth grade had set up a face-painting booth.

That was where Maya and Lily found Alexa.

When Alexa spotted them, she dropped her paintbrush and ran toward them yelling, “Lily! Hey!”

Lily, who had been holding her mother’s hand, let go now. She giggled and covered her mouth with her tiny hands and quivered with that level of anticipation and joy that only little children can reach. The quivering and giggles grew as Lily’s cousin barreled toward them. The giggles grew into shrieking laughs when Alexa scooped Lily off the ground.

Maya stood there, a definite spectator in this greeting, and smiled.

“Lily! Aunt Maya!”

It was Daniel now hurrying toward them. Eddie trailed behind his son, a smile on his face too. The scene felt so unreal to Maya, almost obscene in the middle of the personal chaos, but that was okay. The world has lines and fences. More than anything, Maya wanted to keep these three children on the right side of them.

Daniel gave his aunt a quick kiss on the cheek on his way to Lily. He took her from his sister and hoisted her high in the air. The sound of Lily’s laugh, a sound of pure undiluted innocence, made Maya pull up. When, she wondered, was the last time she had heard her daughter make a sound like that?

“Can we take her on the rides, Aunt Maya?” Alexa asked.

“We’ll be careful,” Daniel added.

Eddie moved up next to Maya.

“Sure,” Maya said. “You need some money?”

“We got it,” Daniel said, and they were off.

Maya gave Eddie a quick smile. Her former brother-in-law looked better today, clean-shaven and clear-eyed. He kissed her cheek. No smell of booze. Maya turned her gaze back on the three kids walking away. Daniel had put Lily down between Alexa and himself. Lily held on to Daniel with her right hand, Alexa with her left.

“Beautiful day,” Eddie said.

Maya nodded. It was indeed. The sun was shining as though on a director’s cue. Here was the American dream, spread out before Maya like a warm blanket, and the overwhelming feeling for her was that she didn’t belong here, that her very presence was a dark cloud blocking that glowing light.

“Eddie?”

His hand cupped his eyes to keep the sun out. He turned toward her.

“Claire wasn’t cheating on you.”

His eyes welled up so fast he had to look away. He hunched over, and for a second, Maya worried that he might be crying. She reached out, wanting to put a hand on his shoulder, but she stopped short and let the hand fall to her side.

“You’re sure?” he said.

“Yes.”

“And that phone?”

“Do you remember my, uh, troubles with that combat tape that got released?”

“Yes, of course.”

“There was more to them.”

“What do you mean?”

“The guy who leaked it—”

“Corey the Whistle,” Eddie said.

“Right. He didn’t release the audio.”

Eddie looked confused.

“I think Claire talked him out of it.”

“That audio,” Eddie said. “It would have made it worse for you?”

“Yes.”

Eddie nodded, but he didn’t ask what was on it. “Claire was so upset when that scandal broke. We all were. We were worried about you.”

“Claire took it a step further.”

“How?”

“She contacted Corey. She hooked up with his organization.”

There was no reason to go into Claire’s possible motives with Eddie. Maybe Claire worked with Corey as quid pro quo for leaving Maya alone. Maybe Corey, who could be persuasive and charming, had convinced her that helping him take down the Burkett family was the moral and just thing to do. Didn’t matter in the end.

“Claire started to gather dirt on the Burketts,” she said. “To help Corey’s organization take them down.”

“Do you think that’s what got her killed?”

Maya looked over at her daughter. Alexa’s whole team had gathered around Lily to ooh and aah. They were taking turns putting green-and-white face paint on her, and even at this distance, Maya could feel her daughter’s joy.

“Yes.”

“I don’t understand,” Eddie said. “Why didn’t Claire tell me?”

Maya kept her eyes on the children, playing her part as the silent sentinel. She could feel Eddie’s gaze, but she kept silent. Claire hadn’t told him because she wanted to keep him safe. In doing so, in keeping Eddie completely ignorant, Claire had in all likelihood saved his life. She had loved her husband. She had loved him very much. Jean-Pierre was a stupid fantasy that would have curdled in the light of reality like turned milk. Claire, the loving pragmatist, had seen that, even if Maya, so impetuous with her own love life, couldn’t. Claire had loved Eddie. She had loved Daniel and Alexa. She had loved this life with its Soccer Days and face painting under the bright sun.

“Do you remember anything unusual, Eddie? Anything that might fit into this?”

“Like I told you before, she started working later. She was distracted. I would ask her what was wrong, but she didn’t want to tell me.” His voice grew soft. “She told me not to worry.”

The kids finished the face painting and started toward the carousel.

“Did she ever mention a man named Tom Douglass?”

Eddie thought about it. “No. Who is he?”

“He’s a private detective.”

“Why would she go to him?”

“Because the Burketts have been paying him off. Did you ever hear her talk about Andrew Burkett?”

He frowned. “Joe’s brother who drowned?”

“Yes.”

“No. What does he have to do with it?”

“I don’t know yet. But I need you to do something.”

“Name it.”

“Look at everything again with fresh eyes. Her travel records, her personal files, anyplace she may have hid things. Whatever. She was trying to take down the Burketts. She found out that they were paying off this Tom Douglass, and I think that was the catalyst for something bigger.”

Eddie nodded. “I will.”

They both stood there and watched Daniel hoist Lily onto a carousel horse. Daniel stayed on one side, Alexa on the other. Lily beamed.

“Look at them,” Eddie said. “Just...”

Maya nodded, afraid to speak. Eddie had said that death followed her, but it probably wasn’t that simple. All around her, children and families played and laughed and reveled in the glory of this seemingly ordinary day. They did so without fear or care because they didn’t get it. They all played and they all laughed and they felt so damn safe. They didn’t see how fragile it all was. War was far away from them, they thought. Not just another continent but another realm. It couldn’t touch them.

But they were wrong about that.

It had touched one of them already, more specifically Claire, and Maya was to blame. What she had done in a combat helicopter over Al Qa’im, like those sounds that wouldn’t ever leave her, started an echo, a reverberation, and eventually that echo found its way to her sister.