is gone,’ he had written. She knew that he was telling her this for her own good. It was time to face it. In her reply, she had sorrowfully, reluctantly agreed to end the search.
Perry unfolded his hands and wrote a note on a pad on his desk. ‘G-I-?’
‘R-O-U-X.’ Shelby finished the spelling. ‘Anything else?’
Perry hesitated. ‘I have to ask. Does your daughter’s husband know that you wish to reopen this investigation?’ Shelby avoided his gaze. ‘I haven’t mentioned it to him,’ she said.
Perry nodded, a knowing expression in his eyes. ‘Are you aware of whether your son-in-law took a polygraph test in St Thomas?’
Shelby’s eyes widened. ‘No, I don’t know.’
Perry nodded. ‘I will ask Chief Giroux when I speak to him.’
Part of Shelby wanted to pursue his question. Part of her did not want to hear what he was thinking. ‘Is there any hope at all of finding out what really happened to Chloe?’
Perry nodded. ‘Of course there’s hope. That’s why you got in touch with me, right? Now, try not to worry.’ He stood up. ‘I will let you know as soon as I know anything.’
Shelby reached into her purse and fished out her checkbook. ‘All right. That’s good enough for me. Let me just give you a check now and then, at the end, you can make me out a bill . . .’
Perry raised a hand. ‘No, no,’ he said. He shook his head. ‘No payment necessary. I’m going to treat this as company business. You’re a valued employee here at Markson’s. It’s what Mr Markson would have wanted.’
Albert Markson, Shelby thought. She wasn’t sure at all that Elliott would feel the same way. ‘Are you sure? I’d be glad to pay you, Perry.’
Perry shook his head. ‘I don’t want it to seem like I’m moonlighting,’ he said. ‘Let’s just keep this between us, shall we?’
Shelby stood up. They shook hands.
‘You’ll hear from me, soon,’ he said.
‘I can’t thank you enough,’ said Shelby.
‘You lost your only child,’ Perry said. ‘It’s the least I can do.’
THIRTEEN
The balance of her day passed in a blur. She left Markson’s and did a multitude of errands in Center City. Her last stop of the day was at the office of Dr Cliburn, where Chloe had worked. Shelby had been avoiding the task of picking up Chloe’s belongings and having to come face to face with Chloe’s co-workers. But all of the young women who had worked with Chloe treated Shelby gently, fully aware of the difficulty of her errand. One of them had placed Chloe’s belongings in a shiny, sky-blue shopping bag. Shelby glanced in at the contents and saw a pair of clogs, a coffee mug, a cardigan sweater, and a framed photo all neatly packed. Dr Cliburn, a big, gruff man in his fifties, came out of his office and offered his condolences. Shelby felt claustrophobic under their sympathetic scrutiny. She couldn’t wait to flee the cheery office full of parenting magazines and baby photos on the wall. She felt a headache beginning to form over her eye, and all she wanted was to escape their kind wishes and solicitous glances. A text from Talia arrived just as she was getting back into her car. ‘GLEN HOME,’ it read. ‘CALL.’
Glen, she thought wearily. Was he in trouble again, she wondered? Glen was the youngest of the three Winter siblings, and the only one of the three who, despite his keen intelligence, had never seemed to have any goal in life other than to get high and avoid responsibility. He worked sporadically, stayed with friends and acquaintances, and eschewed all entangling emotional alliances. He had frequent skirmishes with the law, which usually resulted in an indignant rant against the police. His visits home were infrequent. Mother must be worse, Shelby thought. Glen wasn’t visiting for a social call. Shelby wished she could block the whole problem out, but there was no avoiding it. No use pretending that she hadn’t seen the text.
The only thing more unsatisfactory than a face-to-face conversation with Talia was texting her or trying to talk to her on the phone. Shelby was in her car and already near the college. She decided to go directly to Talia’s lab and get an update directly from her sister.
The parking lot at Franklin University was full of cars and Shelby had to park far from the computer lab. The façade of the lab building was mostly glass. The staircases and hallways were industrial pipe and pressed metal walkways