back against the seat. I have no reason to doubt Mulroney, but his revelations aren’t computing for me. What was I doing in that part of the city?
And more importantly, what had caused me to run from myself and everything that mattered to me?
20
Due to bad traffic, I don’t make it back to the city until close to seven. But that still means I have an hour to kill before Hugh arrives home. I peel off my dress, change into jeans and a sweater, and order dinner for the two of us from Pavone’s. That’s twice in seven days, but I lack the energy to devise a more original plan.
Next, I do as Mulroney suggested and search through my emails for any reference to Forty-Second Street. There’s nothing. But when I sit down to flesh out and update my timeline, I realize that with Mulroney’s help, I’m definitely making progress.
MONDAY
evening: dinner, TV, argument
TUESDAY
7:00: still in bed
9:00-ish: took call from Dr. Erling
9:00–9:17: sent emails
9:30: hung out at café
11:00-ish: left for 42nd Street
Before 3:00: possibly witnessed someone get injured???; lost phone
3:00 to 3:30-ish: called WorkSpace
WEDNESDAY
Noon-ish: bought food at Eastside Eats, East 7th St.
Afternoon: walked near Tompkins Square Park
THURSDAY
8:05: arrived at Greenbacks
Now I turn to my laptop and google rigor mortis again, doing a deeper dive than I’d been able to in the car with Roger. It turns out there are other variables besides air temperature that can stall its onset or hasten the process. Muscle mass or recent exercise, for instance. But the bottom line is that the stiffening of muscles begins a few hours after death, reaches its peak approximately twelve hours after death, remains that way for twelve more hours, and then subsides, completely dissipating by the thirty-six-hour mark.
Which makes one thing pretty clear: Since Jaycee’s body already seemed frozen when I accidentally kicked it on Wednesday at three thirty, she must have been killed much earlier, possibly Tuesday. By Friday, her body would have passed out of rigor.
I keep reading. Rigor isn’t the only factor a coroner relies on in determining time of death. There’s also body temperature, stomach contents, and something called lividity, the settling of blood in the lowest surface of the body postmortem, causing purplish-red discoloration of the skin. All those years ago, the Millerstown area coroner obviously took those factors into consideration when making his or her determination. But still, if I’d been completely forthright, it would have certainly been of help.
I take a long, deep breath and type “Jaycee Long” into the search bar. I probably should have done that six or seven weeks ago when I first started discussing my past with Dr. Erling, but I wasn’t able to summon the nerve.
To my surprise, there’s next to nothing online. It seems like the area newspaper that serves my hometown didn’t begin digitally archiving stories until about two years after the murder. I’m going to have to trek to the library out there and comb through microfilm to read news coverage of the crime.
Though maybe I won’t have to. If I’m lucky, Chief Nowak will be amenable to sharing details with Roger about the original investigation, including how seriously the mother and her boyfriend were viewed as suspects.
Mercifully, the intercom jars me from my thoughts, signaling that dinner has arrived. I pay at the door, set the food out on the counter, and pour myself a glass of wine. My whole body is vibrating with tension.
By the time Hugh arrives home, it’s after eight—8:25, actually. He gives me a quick hug and yanks off his tie.
“So sorry. The case is such a mess.”
He returns from the bedroom a few minutes later wearing jeans but still in his blue-collared shirt, the sleeves rolled to his elbows. The sight of him dressed like that fills me with tenderness. He’d worn his shirt that way on our second date—our third encounter—and the night when I began to feel the first spark of desire.
Desire. I realize that the last time we had sex was the Sunday before I fell apart.
While I microwave the chicken piccata, Hugh grabs a barstool at the island and I end up serving the dinner there. “Do you want wine?” I ask, before sliding onto a stool next to him.
“No, I still have work and I’ll need to focus.” He drops his gaze to my half-full wineglass. “You think it’s okay for you?”
“I’ve been having wine here and there, and it doesn’t seem to be a problem. . . . Hugh, I know this