Criminal

out of her bag. “Do you know what happened to Amanda?”
    “She fell on her wrist. She’ll be in a cast for a while, but she’s fine.” Sara laid Emma down on the bed. Faith probably assumed Sara was working a shift. This was one of the problems with Will’s myriad secrets—Sara found herself keeping them on his behalf. There was no way to tell Faith what had happened to Amanda without revealing why Sara had been there.
    “Right on schedule.” Faith indicated a group of older women who were clustered at the nurses’ station. Except for a striking African American woman wearing a pink scarf around her neck, they were all dressed in monochromatic pantsuits and sporting the same short haircuts and ramrod-straight spines. “The good old gals,” Faith explained. “Mom and Roz are already in with Amanda. I’m sure they’ll be spinning war stories until the crack of dawn.”
    Sara wiped down Emma. The baby squirmed. Sara tickled her stomach. “How’s it going with your mom in the house?”
    “You mean do I want to strangle her yet?” Faith sat down on the stool. “I get maybe ten minutes, tops, every morning before Emma wakes up and I have to get her fed and ready and then get myself fed and ready and then my whole day starts and I’m at work and the phone is ringing and I’m talking to idiots who are lying to me and it’s not until the next morning when I get that ten minutes to myself again.”
    Faith paused, giving Sara a meaningful look. “Mom’s up at five o’clock every morning. I hear her poking around downstairs and I smell coffee and eggs and then I go down to the kitchen and she’s all cheery and chatty and wants to talk about what she’s got planned for the day and what she saw on the news last night and do I want her to cook me something for breakfast and what do I want for supper and I swear to God, Sara, I’m going to end up killing her. I really am.”
    “I have a mother, too. I completely understand.” Sara slid a new diaper under the baby. Emma’s feet kicked up as she tried to turn over. “What are you doing while Will’s working at the airport?”
    “I thought you knew.”
    “Knew what?”
    “Amanda assigned him to toilet duty so my days are free to take Mom to her physical therapy appointments.” Faith shrugged. “You know it’s not the first time Mom or Amanda’s bent the rules for each other.”
    “Amanda’s not punishing Will because of his hair?”
    “What’s wrong with his hair? It looks great.”
    Yet again, Will’s ability to read women was pitch-perfect. “I don’t understand that relationship.”
    “Amanda and Will? Or Will and the world?”
    “Either. Both.” Sara buttoned up the onesie. She stroked her fingers along Emma’s face. The baby smiled, showing two tiny white specks where her first pair of teeth were breaking through the bottom gum. Emma’s eyes tracked Sara’s fingers as they waved back and forth. “She’s starting to be a real person.”
    “She’s been laughing at me a lot lately. I’m trying not to take it personally.”
    Sara put Emma on her shoulder. The baby’s arm looped around her neck. “How long has Will been working for Amanda?”
    “As far as I know, he’s followed her around his whole career. Hostage negotiation. Narcotics. Special crimes.”
    “Is that normal to stay with one boss your entire career?”
    “Not really. Cops are like cats. They’d rather change owners than change houses.”
    Sara couldn’t imagine Will asking to be transferred along with Amanda. He seldom sang her praises, and for Amanda’s part, she seemed to delight in torturing him. Then again, if Will had one overriding characteristic, it was his resistance to change. Which fact Sara should probably take as a warning.
    “Okay, my turn for questions.” Faith crossed her arms. “Here’s the big one: when are you going to grab him by the short hairs and tell him to get a fucking divorce?”
    Sara managed a smile. “It’s very tempting.”
    “Then why don’t you?”
    “Because ultimatums never work. And I don’t want to be the reason he leaves his wife.”
    “He wants to leave her.”
    Sara didn’t state the obvious. If Will really wanted to be divorced, then he would be divorced.
    Faith hissed air through her teeth. “You probably shouldn’t take advice from a woman who’s never been married and has one kid in college and another in diapers.”
    Sara laughed. “Don’t sell yourself short.”
    “Well, it’s not like