Chương 9
I stared at her.
"Someone measured it."
"We don't know how precisely."
"Someone stood in my kitchen and decided how much to give me."
Ruiz did not correct me.
That was worse than correction.
I swallowed.
"What about Freya?"
"Her fingerprints are on the tin."
"Of course they are."
"Exactly."
She leaned forward.
"That's not the important part."
"What is?"
"When officers searched the trash bins behind your house, they found a burned cardboard package."
My pulse quickened.
"From the chemical supplier?"
"Possibly."
"Leo burned it?"
"We don't know."
"Freya?"
"We don't know."
I laughed without humor.
"More maybe."
"Yes."
She let that sit.
"But the package wasn't completely destroyed."
I looked at her.
"There's a shipping label."
"Whose name?"
"Not Leo's."
My chest tightened.
"Whose?"
Ruiz watched me for a second before answering.
"Yours."
I stared at Ruiz until the room seemed to lose its edges.
"My name?"
"Yes."
"I didn't order anything."
"I know what you've told me."
"No, I mean I didn't."
My voice sharpened.
"I have never ordered chemicals in my life."
Ruiz did not flinch.
"The shipping label uses your full name and your home address."
"Then he used my name."
"Possibly."
"Stop saying possibly."
"I can't."
I turned my face toward the window.
The morning traffic below crawled through the intersection in small red and silver lines.
Someone had left a paper cup on the roof of a parked car.
It stayed there through one green light, then disappeared when the car moved.
"What happens now?"
"We establish who placed the order."
"How?"
"Payment records, account access, device history, delivery records."
"You said someone deleted the purchase history."
"Deleted isn't always gone."
"Was it paid from our account?"
"We're working on that."
I looked back at her.
"If it was in my name, does that make me a suspect?"
Ruiz paused too long.
My stomach dropped.
"Judith, right now you're the victim of a serious medical event and a possible poisoning."
"That's not what I asked."
"No."
She folded her hands between her knees.
"Your name on a shipment means investigators have to verify whether you were involved in ordering it."
"Involved in poisoning myself?"
"In ordering it."
"Why would I do that?"
"I don't know."
I laughed once.
"Great."
"I didn't say I believe you did."
"But you have to prove I didn't."
"That's not how this works."
"It feels exactly like how this works."
Ruiz rubbed the bridge of her nose.
"You may have to answer uncomfortable questions."
"More uncomfortable than whether my husband poisoned me?"
"Different."
I looked at the phone on my bedside table.
Leo had access to our desktop.
Leo knew my email passwords once because I reused them until Mara bullied me into using a password manager.
Leo knew my date of birth.
My Social Security number had been on tax forms in the filing cabinet for years.
He knew every answer people treat like proof of identity.
"What email address was on the order?"
Ruiz hesitated.
"One we haven't been able to access yet."
"Mine?"
"No."
"His?"
"No."
"Whose?"
"It appears to have been created specifically for the purchase."
The cold feeling in my chest deepened.
"What was the username?"
"I can't give you that right now."
"Why?"
"Because if you recognize it, I need your reaction to be clean."
I stared at her.
"That's a very detective sentence."
"Occupational hazard."
A knock sounded.
Mara came in carrying a breakfast sandwich and stopped when she saw Ruiz.
"What now?"
Ruiz stood.
Mara looked at me.
I hated the expression on her face.
It was the face people make when they are waiting for the next bad thing.
"Apparently I ordered the poison."
Her sandwich slipped halfway out of the paper wrapper.
"What?"
"I didn't."
"I know you didn't."
"You don't know that."
"Yes, I do."
Ruiz glanced at her.
Mara noticed.
"Don't give me that look."
"What look?"
"The cop look."
"I don't have a cop look."
"You absolutely have a cop look."
Ruiz almost smiled.
"Judith's name is on a shipping label."
Mara set the sandwich down.
"Leo used her name."
"That's one possibility."
"That's the possibility."
Ruiz remained quiet.
Mara's shoulders tightened.
"You seriously think she poisoned herself for five months, forged loan documents against her own house, and then collapsed at her husband's birthday party?"
"I didn't say that."
"Then don't stand there like—"
"Mara."
She stopped.
I was suddenly exhausted.
"Please."
Her anger went out of her posture, but not her face.
Ruiz nodded to me and left.
Mara closed the door behind her.
Then she turned around.
"Sorry."
"I don't need you fighting everyone."
"Someone should."
"I can fight."
She looked at my legs before she could stop herself.
I saw the guilt immediately.
"So that came out wrong."
"Very."
"I meant verbally."
"I know."
She pulled the visitor chair closer.
"I brought you breakfast."
"I'm not hungry."
"It's terrible anyway."
"What is it?"
"Egg."
"That descriptive?"
"There may be cheese."
I laughed despite myself.
She peeled the wrapper open and inspected it.
"Definitely cheese."
"Eat it."
"You sure?"
"Yes."
She took a bite and grimaced.
"This is punishment."
For several minutes she ate while I watched a maintenance worker outside the room change a ceiling tile in the hallway.
He balanced on a ladder while another worker held a plastic bag open underneath.
Dust fell.
Nobody looked at me.
I was grateful.
"Do you still have the old laptop?" I asked.
Mara swallowed.
"Which one?"
"The silver one I gave you."
"The one with the cracked hinge?"
"Yes."
"I think so."
"Do you remember if I ever signed into email on it?"
"Probably."
"Could there be old messages?"
"Maybe."
"Or passwords?"
She set the sandwich down.
"Why?"
"Because Leo might have used something of mine."
"Okay."
"I need to know what accounts existed before all this."
"Okay."
"Can you check?"
"Today?"
"Yes."
She studied my face.
"You're in a hospital."
"I know where I am."
May you like
"You also haven't slept."
"I slept."
