MARY CLARK - Every Breath You Take

“Don’t laugh,” Alex said, even though he was chuckling, too. “He was playing soothing spa sounds on the car ride down here, saying he was worried that the trip to D.C. had been too stressful for me.”

“It’s sweet. He loves you like family.”

“I certainly feel the same way. In fact, I have to fill out these forms disclosing the names of anyone who plays a substantial role in my life, even if they’re not formally family. My only biological family is Andrew, of course, but there was no question about listing Ramon.”

Something about the way he was looking at her made it clear that there was someone else who belonged on that list, too, but then the waiter arrived with their entrees, and Alex switched the topic to a budding scandal coming out of the Mayor’s Office. As the night continued, they talked about everything—some new restaurants they had tried, the books they were reading, the worst youthful dates they’d ever had. By the time the waiter asked once again if they needed anything else, Laurie noticed for the first time that they were the last couple in the restaurant. She looked at her watch. They had been there for nearly four hours, and those four hours had gone by too quickly, she thought.

Alex signaled for the check. The waiter looked relieved, but when he brought it over, Laurie beat Alex to it. “I invited you, remember?”

“Very well, then,” Alex said. “But that means next time is on me.”

“I’m looking forward to it.”

“Is tomorrow too soon?”

“I feel like it’s not soon enough.” She could not stop smiling.

She accepted his offer of a ride back to her apartment, where Leo was watching Timmy. Ramon was clearly happy to see her and turned down the spa music multiple times to ask for updates about her and Timmy. When they were almost at Laurie’s, Alex put his arm around her. The entire night had been “effortless,” to use Alex’s word. She was no longer studying their relationship like a project to be managed. She hadn’t paused every few minutes to ask herself where this was all going.

Alex had pressed her to decide what he was to her. She finally had her answer. He wasn’t simply a co-worker or a friend, a pal to her father, or a buddy to Timmy. He wasn’t even just a boyfriend.

It had been Ivan Gray, of all people, who had helped her make sense of it all when he had read his proposal to Virginia: You told me I was your second chance at happiness, and I knew that you had opened your heart to me, where I want to stay with you always, for every breath you and I can take together .

Alex was the next chapter in her life. She was certain it was what Greg wanted for her. And now there was no doubt that it was what she wanted and needed.

53

Peter Browning opened his eyes, momentarily confused about where he was. Then he remembered that he and Anna had decided to stay overnight at the house in Greenwich after the filming yesterday. Marie was taking care of the children in the city. He knew that Anna needed some quiet time in what had been her parents’ primary home. Here they could collect their thoughts about yesterday’s Under Suspicion interview.

Now Peter could see from the light of the nightstand’s clock that his wife’s eyes were wide open. She was staring at the ceiling. The clock read 4:32 A.M.

He turned to face her and draped one arm across her waist.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “Did I wake you up with all my tossing and turning?”

“No,” he said, even though he was certain that he had opened his eyes because of her. Sometimes he thought they shared a telepathic connection. Even in sleep, he knew when his wife was anxious. “How long have you been up?”

“Hours. I had that terrible nightmare again.” He knew which one she was talking about. She’d had it countless times since Virginia was killed, but she walked him through the familiar sequence anyway. “I saw her up on that roof, in her beautiful gown. She was looking out at the skyline over Central Park South, and snow was falling. And then she turned and looked over her shoulder, and said ‘Ivan?’ just the way I always picture it. But this time, it wasn’t Ivan standing behind her.”

She brushed a tear from her face and Peter pulled her closer. “Shhh, it was just a dream, sweetie.” He didn’t force her to finish her description of the nightmare. They had spent most of the previous night discussing her worries about her brother, Carter.

“What if it wasn’t just a dream? I pictured the entire scene. He followed her upstairs to harangue her about the will. You saw how obsessed he was. He wouldn’t let up on the subject, even at the gala. And in my dream, she was just as defiant to him as she was with me when I raised the subject the day before. But where I let the matter drop, Carter kept pushing and pushing and pushing until she told him that he hadn’t earned any right to that money the way his father had. And then Carter—he just snapped. In my dream, he was standing at the ledge, looking down at her on the ground below, and he fell to his knees and sobbed.”

“Except that was all your imagination, Anna. You didn’t really see it.”

“But I can picture it now. Should I call him before his interview?”

Carter was going to be filmed by the Under Suspicion crew at the Wakeling Development offices at noon.

“Let your brother take care of himself for once,” Peter said. “Three years ago, your mother told him he needed to grow up, and he hasn’t changed a bit. Look at how much Tom has matured in that time, while Carter continues to act like a child.”

“You’re absolutely right,” Anna said, sounding determined. “If he did hurt our mother, maybe this show will get to the bottom of it. And then at least I’ll finally know.”

54

Laurie looked at her watch. It was a quarter after noon, and the conference room at Wakeling Development was filled with lighting and cameras, ready for the arrival of their star witness.

Ryan stood when the door opened, but it was Jerry, returning from his venture to search for Carter Wakeling.

“Any sign of him?” Laurie asked.

They had spent the early hours of the morning gathering footage of the Long Island City neighborhood that originally put Robert Wakeling on the map as one of New York City’s most successful real estate developers. They had arrived at the Wakeling offices nearly two hours earlier to set up for the interview in this room with sweeping views of Manhattan and the East River. Carter’s secretary, Emma, had shown them into the conference room, but they hadn’t spotted any of the Wakeling family as of yet, and now Carter was ten minutes late for what Laurie had come to believe was the most important interview of the production. He was supposed to have arrived twenty minutes early for makeup.

Jerry shook his head. “I made a new friend in Emma, though. She says Carter was here earlier, when we first arrived, but then left to go into Manhattan to try to find his sister and Peter. Apparently Anna and Peter both called in, first thing this morning, to cancel their office meetings for the entire day. They hadn’t been answering their phones when Carter had tried calling.”

Laurie wasn’t at all surprised that Jerry had found a way to learn the inside details of Carter’s whereabouts. He had a knack for becoming gossip partners with perfect strangers.

“So he went all the way to their apartment to look for them?” Laurie asked. “That seems unusual.”

“Emma thought so, too,” Jerry said. “Apparently she tried reassuring him that their secretaries had just spoken to Anna and Peter personally a few hours ago, but she said she’d never seen Carter so concerned.”

“Concerned for himself ,” Ryan said, swinging his chair to prop his feet at the edge of the conference table. “He’s probably eager to find out what Anna and Peter said yesterday during their interview in Greenwich.”