The Stranger
Page 27
Chapter 15
Adam sat in his office, going over everything for the thousandth time in his head, when a simple question came to him: If Corinne had indeed decided to run away from life, where would she go?
Truth? He had no idea.
He and Corinne were such a couple, such a unit, that the idea of her running away someplace without him or their family was completely anathema to him. There were friends Corinne might call, he guessed. Some women she knew in college. There were a few family members too. But he couldn’t see her confiding in or staying with any of them under this sort of circumstance. She just wasn’t that open with anyone other than . . . well, other than Adam.
So maybe Corinne was alone.
That seemed most likely. She would be staying in a hotel. But either way—and this was the key here—whatever she was doing would require means, aka the use of a credit card or cash. That meant somewhere there were credit card charges or ATM withdrawals.
So look them up, dummy.
He and Corinne had two accounts, both held jointly. They used a debit card out of one and a Visa charge card from the other. Corinne wasn’t good with the finances. Adam handled all that as part of their domestic division of labor. He also knew all the user names and passwords.
In short, he could see her every charge or withdrawal.
For the next twenty minutes, Adam went through her charge cards and bank accounts. He started by searching from the most recent backward—any activity from today and yesterday. But there was nothing. He started traveling back a few days, just to see if there were any patterns. Corinne wasn’t big on using cash. Credit cards were both easier and offered points on every purchase. She liked that.
Everything—her entire financial life or, well, spending life—was there and unsurprising. She had gone to the A&P supermarket, Starbucks, the Lax Shop. She had lunch at Baumgart’s and picked up takeout at Ho-Ho-Kus Sushi. There were the automatic gym payments taken off the card and something she had ordered online from Banana Republic. Normal-life stuff. There was also pretty much at least one charge every single day.
But not today. And not yesterday.
No charges at all.
So what should he make of that?
For one thing, Corinne might be naïve in the ways of bill paying, but she wasn’t dumb. If she wanted to stay hidden, Corinne might have realized that he could check the credit card statements online and track her down that way.
Right. So what would she do instead? She’d use cash.
He checked the ATM withdrawals. The last one she made had been two weeks ago for $200.
Was that enough to run away on?
Doubtful. He thought about it.
If she were driving for any length of time, she would need to buy gas. So how much cash did she have on her now? It wasn’t as though she planned to run. She couldn’t have known that he would confront her about the fake pregnancy or that the stranger would visit. . . .
Or had she?
He stopped. Could Corinne have put money away, knowing that something like this would happen? He tried to think back. Had she been surprised when he confronted her? Or had she been more like . . . resigned?
Had she somehow suspected that one day her deception would come to light?
He didn’t know. When he sat back and tried to think it through, he realized that he didn’t know a damn thing for anything close to certain. In her text, Corinne had asked him—no, the text equivalent of begged him, what with her “JUST GIVE ME A FEW DAYS. PLEASE.”—to let her be. Maybe that was best. Maybe he should just let her blow off steam or do whatever it was she was doing and be patient and wait. That was what she had specifically asked for in that text, right?
But then again, for all he knew, Corinne had driven away from the school and met some horrible fate. Maybe she knew the stranger. Maybe she drove to the stranger and confronted him and he got angry and kidnapped her, or worse. Except the stranger didn’t seem the type. And those texts had come in, telling him that she needed time and to give her a few days. But then again—this was how his head was reeling back and forth right now—anyone could have sent those texts.
A killer even.
Maybe someone had killed Corinne and taken her phone and . . .
Whoa, slow down a sec. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
He could actually feel his heart pounding against his chest. Now that this worry had entered his head—check that, it had been in his head, but now he had all but voiced it—the fear stayed there, unmoving, like some unwelcome relative who wouldn’t leave. He looked at her text again:
MAYBE WE NEED SOME TIME APART. YOU TAKE CARE OF THE KIDS. DON’T TRY TO CONTACT ME. IT WILL BE OKAY.
And then:
JUST GIVE ME A FEW DAYS. PLEASE.
Something about the texts was off, but he couldn’t figure out what. Suppose Corinne was in real danger. He again wondered whether he should go to the police. Kristin Hoy had asked him about that right away, hadn’t she? She asked him whether he had called the police if his wife was missing. Only she wasn’t missing. She had sent that text. Unless she didn’t send that text.
His head started spinning.
Okay, let’s say he went to the police. Then what? He would have to go to the town cops. And what would he say exactly? They’d take one look at the text and say to give it time, wouldn’t they? And in town, as much as he hated to admit it mattered, the cops would talk. He knew most of them. Len Gilman was the top cop in Cedarfield. He’d take his complaint, most likely. He had a son Ryan’s age. They were in the same homeroom. Gossip and rumors about Corinne would spread like, well, gossip and rumors. Did he care? Easy to say no, but he knew that Corinne would. This was her town. She had battled to make it her own again and make a life.
“Hey, bro.”
Andy Gribbel entered the office with a big smile on his bearded face. He wore sunglasses inside today, not because he wanted to look cool so much as to cover the red from either a late night or something more herbal.
“Hey,” Adam said. “How did the gig go the other night?”
“The band totally kicked ass,” Gribbel said. “Kicked ass and took names.”
Adam leaned back, welcoming the interruption. “What did you open with?”
“‘Dust in the Wind.’ Kansas.”
“Hmm,” Adam said.
“What?”
“Opening with a slow ballad?”
“Right, but it totally worked. Dark bar, low lights, atmospheric, and then we directly segued, no break, into ‘Paradise by the Dashboard Light.’ Blew the roof off the place.”
Adam sat in his office, going over everything for the thousandth time in his head, when a simple question came to him: If Corinne had indeed decided to run away from life, where would she go?
Truth? He had no idea.
He and Corinne were such a couple, such a unit, that the idea of her running away someplace without him or their family was completely anathema to him. There were friends Corinne might call, he guessed. Some women she knew in college. There were a few family members too. But he couldn’t see her confiding in or staying with any of them under this sort of circumstance. She just wasn’t that open with anyone other than . . . well, other than Adam.
So maybe Corinne was alone.
That seemed most likely. She would be staying in a hotel. But either way—and this was the key here—whatever she was doing would require means, aka the use of a credit card or cash. That meant somewhere there were credit card charges or ATM withdrawals.
So look them up, dummy.
He and Corinne had two accounts, both held jointly. They used a debit card out of one and a Visa charge card from the other. Corinne wasn’t good with the finances. Adam handled all that as part of their domestic division of labor. He also knew all the user names and passwords.
In short, he could see her every charge or withdrawal.
For the next twenty minutes, Adam went through her charge cards and bank accounts. He started by searching from the most recent backward—any activity from today and yesterday. But there was nothing. He started traveling back a few days, just to see if there were any patterns. Corinne wasn’t big on using cash. Credit cards were both easier and offered points on every purchase. She liked that.
Everything—her entire financial life or, well, spending life—was there and unsurprising. She had gone to the A&P supermarket, Starbucks, the Lax Shop. She had lunch at Baumgart’s and picked up takeout at Ho-Ho-Kus Sushi. There were the automatic gym payments taken off the card and something she had ordered online from Banana Republic. Normal-life stuff. There was also pretty much at least one charge every single day.
But not today. And not yesterday.
No charges at all.
So what should he make of that?
For one thing, Corinne might be naïve in the ways of bill paying, but she wasn’t dumb. If she wanted to stay hidden, Corinne might have realized that he could check the credit card statements online and track her down that way.
Right. So what would she do instead? She’d use cash.
He checked the ATM withdrawals. The last one she made had been two weeks ago for $200.
Was that enough to run away on?
Doubtful. He thought about it.
If she were driving for any length of time, she would need to buy gas. So how much cash did she have on her now? It wasn’t as though she planned to run. She couldn’t have known that he would confront her about the fake pregnancy or that the stranger would visit. . . .
Or had she?
He stopped. Could Corinne have put money away, knowing that something like this would happen? He tried to think back. Had she been surprised when he confronted her? Or had she been more like . . . resigned?
Had she somehow suspected that one day her deception would come to light?
He didn’t know. When he sat back and tried to think it through, he realized that he didn’t know a damn thing for anything close to certain. In her text, Corinne had asked him—no, the text equivalent of begged him, what with her “JUST GIVE ME A FEW DAYS. PLEASE.”—to let her be. Maybe that was best. Maybe he should just let her blow off steam or do whatever it was she was doing and be patient and wait. That was what she had specifically asked for in that text, right?
But then again, for all he knew, Corinne had driven away from the school and met some horrible fate. Maybe she knew the stranger. Maybe she drove to the stranger and confronted him and he got angry and kidnapped her, or worse. Except the stranger didn’t seem the type. And those texts had come in, telling him that she needed time and to give her a few days. But then again—this was how his head was reeling back and forth right now—anyone could have sent those texts.
A killer even.
Maybe someone had killed Corinne and taken her phone and . . .
Whoa, slow down a sec. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
He could actually feel his heart pounding against his chest. Now that this worry had entered his head—check that, it had been in his head, but now he had all but voiced it—the fear stayed there, unmoving, like some unwelcome relative who wouldn’t leave. He looked at her text again:
MAYBE WE NEED SOME TIME APART. YOU TAKE CARE OF THE KIDS. DON’T TRY TO CONTACT ME. IT WILL BE OKAY.
And then:
JUST GIVE ME A FEW DAYS. PLEASE.
Something about the texts was off, but he couldn’t figure out what. Suppose Corinne was in real danger. He again wondered whether he should go to the police. Kristin Hoy had asked him about that right away, hadn’t she? She asked him whether he had called the police if his wife was missing. Only she wasn’t missing. She had sent that text. Unless she didn’t send that text.
His head started spinning.
Okay, let’s say he went to the police. Then what? He would have to go to the town cops. And what would he say exactly? They’d take one look at the text and say to give it time, wouldn’t they? And in town, as much as he hated to admit it mattered, the cops would talk. He knew most of them. Len Gilman was the top cop in Cedarfield. He’d take his complaint, most likely. He had a son Ryan’s age. They were in the same homeroom. Gossip and rumors about Corinne would spread like, well, gossip and rumors. Did he care? Easy to say no, but he knew that Corinne would. This was her town. She had battled to make it her own again and make a life.
“Hey, bro.”
Andy Gribbel entered the office with a big smile on his bearded face. He wore sunglasses inside today, not because he wanted to look cool so much as to cover the red from either a late night or something more herbal.
“Hey,” Adam said. “How did the gig go the other night?”
“The band totally kicked ass,” Gribbel said. “Kicked ass and took names.”
Adam leaned back, welcoming the interruption. “What did you open with?”
“‘Dust in the Wind.’ Kansas.”
“Hmm,” Adam said.
“What?”
“Opening with a slow ballad?”
“Right, but it totally worked. Dark bar, low lights, atmospheric, and then we directly segued, no break, into ‘Paradise by the Dashboard Light.’ Blew the roof off the place.”
