“Yeah, your prosecutor won’t think much of it.”
“Nope, he won’t think anything of it at all because he’ll be locked on Barry, the ex-husband.”
“And you seem to have knocked him off the suspect list?”
“No,” she replied, studying Simon. “I definitely haven’t knocked him off, but I have knocked him down on the list.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t think he wants anybody to know what happened to him.”
“So, saving face is a bigger thing than stopping the abuse?”
“Absolutely. Everybody would have preferred to just completely ignore it. And then the fact that he was getting divorced means that the abuse was coming to an end– but according to what he’d said earlier, she was the one who wanted the divorce, so maybe he didn’t want to get out of it.”
*
Simon watched asKate kicked off her shoes and socks and raced into the water, her tank top flowing behind her as she ran. When the water was midthigh, she dove into the water. He wasn’t far behind, but watching her brought such joy to his heart that he couldn’t tear his gaze away. She was so calm, so confident, so natural—and, in this moment—so full of joy. He knew that thereality of this case, the other cases to come, and the ones that still weighed on her from the past would always be there, but she was doing so well in handling them.
He admired her and didn’t think he could do the same work, not without being pulled down to levels he didn’t want to even begin to go. And, of course, some of it was more interesting because it did bring up these other issues, like the men being abused by the women.
He knew it was a sensitive topic. He had heard rumblings about such things, but nobody he knew personally had ever been abused to that extent—that he knew of. Yes, he’d been hit, but, as he told Kate, it wasn’t something that had continued, and he would never allow that. Either the relationship itself needed to be terminated or something different had to happen.
But he couldn’t imagine a case where he would kill somebody in order to get out of that situation. It would bring up all the cops and all the questions, and he could imagine how any man would immediately not want anything to do with that because it would then become public, and keeping this private was the whole goal.
Simon sighed and dove in beside her, and, when he popped up, she was there, laughing at him, splashing him in the face. He grinned, caught her in his arms, then pulled her up tight and kissed her, the heat flashing between them, even though they were in the icy cold water.
She wrapped her legs around his hips, climbed up higher, then leaned down and kissed him tenderly. “This was a wonderful idea,” she murmured.
“Definitely,” he agreed, holding her close.
They turned to see the sun starting to set.
She cried out in joy. “Look at that,” she whispered. “Is there any prettier place in the world?”
“I’m sure lots of people around the world think the same thing,” he noted, with a chuckle.
“Maybe,” she said, “but they’d be wrong because we are right.”
He burst out laughing at that, and she just grinned down at him.
“We’re blessed,” he added, with a smile. “That’s for sure.”
She nodded. “What a stupendous evening.”
He smiled, held her close, and whispered, “I’m so glad you came by.”
“Me too,” she whispered back. “I didn’t even have a real reason to.”
“Do you need a reason?” he asked, tilting his head back to look up at her.
She smiled, gently pulling his wet hair off his face. “Sometimes I feel like I do.”
“We’ll have to work on that,” he noted.
“Maybe,” she replied, “but not tonight.”
They stayed in the water, just floating, talking, holding hands, enjoying the company and the downtime. Then finally, she started to shiver.