Whitney ran to wake Jules, who entered the living room in rumpled silk pajamas. He was a tall British man with a shoulder-length mane that made him seem distinguished. “OK, OK,” he said, trying to force himself awake.
As they’d built their real estate empire, Jules had begun referring to himself as “The Lion,” as in “Call Whitney and the Lion—for all your real estate needs!” I think he wanted clients to think it was an old prep school nickname, when in reality he’d come home one day and said, “Honey, how about I go by The Lion from now on?” Whitney had called me and we had laughed for ten minutes. What a dork! But he was a savvy businessman—the name had stuck.
“What’s happened?” he said. He looked disheveled, his face showing panic despite the Botox Whitney had confided that they had both received the week before during a realtor open house that featured “Botox and Bubbles.”
“The kids found…somebody on the greenbelt,” I said. For a moment, I felt a flash of fear—this night, this event, would be my downfall. Somehow the horror—the kids found somebody on the greenbelt—would discolor our friendship, making me unwelcome in Whitney’s beautiful home.
“Where’s Roma?” said Jules.
“In her room? I don’t know!” cried Whitney.
“Did you touch the body?” asked Jules.
The boys were silent, looking at each other, deciding something, it seemed.
“Answer me,” said Jules.
His son lifted his chin. “We gave her mouth-to-mouth,” said Xavier. “We tried to save her. That’s what we’ve been trained to do.”
“We tried chest compressions, too,” said Charlie. “But they didn’t work!”
“It’s not our fault,” said Bobcat. His tone was low and pained.
“Oh my God,” said Jules.
“I’m calling 911,” said Annette. “Did you call 911?”
Again, the boys seemed uneasy. “We didn’t know what to do,” said Charlie.
“Our phones didn’t work down there!” said Bobcat, shaking his hands anxiously.
“We didn’t call anyone,” said Xavier, his voice breathless, bordering on hysterical. “We just came home!”
“Come out back. All of you. Leave your phones,” said Jules.
Something in his tone made us obey. I was relieved to follow his lead. Even as an adult, I sometimes wondered, “Who’s in charge of this situation?” before realizing it might have to be me.
In the far corner of the Brownsons’ yard, fireflies flaring against a black sky, the boys talked and we listened. The Texas heat pressed on us, a living thing.
What choice did we have? We promised we believed them.
-1-
Salvatore
AT APPROXIMATELY 6:45 A.M., Allie informed her father, Austin Police Detective Salvatore Revello, that she did not, in fact, want to be a cat for Dress Up Day but, instead, Dora the Explorer. “Or,” she said, crossing her arms across her skinny chest, “I’ll be the Incredible Hulk. But definitely not a cat.”
Where had a seven-year-old learned to speak with such contempt? And what the hell was wrong with Allie’s cat costume, which Salvatore had ordered on Amazon Prime the night before, the cost totaling thirty-eight dollars after paying for the two-hour delivery fee and tipping the hapless millennial who’d shown up at his door at 11:00 p.m.? His goddamn wife, Jacquie, had always made their costumes. By hand.
“Allie, you’re being immature,” noted Allie’s brother, Joe. Joe was twelve. He’d wanted to be his favorite basketball player, Steph Curry, for Dress Up Day at summer camp, because Joe was a crafty little demon and knew he could request the Chinese New Year Warriors jersey, call it a “costume,” and get some cred at middle school, even among the preppy little cretins who wore Vineyard Vines and Supreme T-shirts that cost seventy-five dollars apiece.
Joe trolled eBay, Craigslist, and the thrift stores near their ranch house in a sprawling development of identical beige homes called Whisper Valley. He was on an endless quest for shoes and clothing that could make him seem rich. When he’d won an Alexa smart speaker at the school Wellness Fair and Salvatore had told him he could not plug in the spying device （oh my God, the things he’d learned about people from their Alexa smart speakers）， Joe had sold it on eBay within hours and bought a pair of gently used Adidas Human Race NMDs just a few sizes too big for him.
Salvatore was proud of his kid.
“That’s true,” said Salvatore, smiling at Allie. “You are being immature.”
Allie’s defiant expression crumpled, and Salvatore hated himself. She was so fragile now—they all were. He had to remember that.
“What about Taylor Swift?” said Joe.
“How would I be Taylor Swift?” said Allie, glaring at the Cuteshower Girl Cat costume, which had come in a plastic case and included chintzy-looking ears on a headband and a sad strip of “tail.”
“Can she use Mom’s makeup?” said Joe. Allie’s face lit up.
* * *
—
IT HAD BEEN A long night securing a crime scene on East Riverside. Salvatore could have handed off the investigation, but he was careful not to use the “single father” card unless he absolutely needed to. His boss had been pushing him to take time off ever since Jacquie’s death, but Salvatore knew that he couldn’t slow for an instant. The sheer adrenaline his work provided—the blood, the bodies, the hysteria, the interrogations, the late nights compiling evidence, the stories only he could untangle—his job was a hypodermic needle of the purest relief. As long as he could work, could keep from sinking into the anguish that yawned under him, pulling at him, seeping into his weird, swampy dreams…if he could focus on nailing perps, he would be OK.
Thanks to his next-door neighbor, Peach, an elderly woman always happy enough （or lonely enough） to come sleep in the guest room when he needed to burn the midnight oil, Salvatore was able to arrive at the crime scene at the same time as Katrina, the medical examiner.
When he arrived, he tried to slide into the place where he could silence all the noise around him and really see. He tried to get into this tunnel before even entering a crime scene, standing very still, his mind laser-focused, asking himself, What is wrong here?
Clothes too hastily strewn, a necklace in a kitchen, bloodstain patterns, a child’s stuffed toy where it should not be, a broken window. Each item out of place was an essential clue, a way to unlock the mystery of what had happened to bring Salvatore and his team to the scene. In the tunnel, Salvatore could try to interpret how a night had gone wrong, how an ordinary evening had led to one less soul alive.
His team surveyed and photographed the street where the body was found and Katrina determined the time of death, signing off so she could arrange transport to the morgue for autopsy. Near dawn, Salvatore collapsed into bed, only to be woken up an hour or two later by Allie shrieking about Dress Up Day.
Salvatore rubbed his face. He knew that opening his wife’s makeup drawer was something he’d get reprimanded for at family therapy on Wednesday. Ditto for saying nothing （even getting choked up） when Joe went into Jacquie’s closet and pulled out the neon-pink T-shirt she’d used for yoga class, slipping it over Allie’s head and cinching it at the waist with the gold belt Jacquie had worn to ’80s Night at the kids’ elementary school.