Death Before Facebook

block, just to the corner and back, and they made it to the office before the others had found parking places. Joe met Skip at the door with his arms open wide. “Baby, don’t you ever scare me like that again.”
    Joe was Mr. Professional. He never called her pet names and never hugged the detectives. She guessed she must be suffering from shock—everyone seemed a good deal more upset than she was. She was more or less flying.
    She had put together most of the remaining pieces on the ride back, but what she didn’t know, she thought she could get from Kit, who’d arrived to give her statement before she and Cappello had. She called Kit into a room.
    “Are you doing okay?”
    “I feel like I’ve been up about seventy-two hours.”
    “Yeah, me too.”
    “I thought you might still be at the hospital.”
    Kit grinned. “Fortunately, the asshole gave me capsules. They dissolve slowly enough that all I had to do was throw up. Since I was in a hospital, they knew just what to do.”
    “I’m glad you’re okay.”
    “You want to know about the hypnosis, don’t you?” She shook her head. “I really thought I could help him. A lot of good work is being done with hypnosis these days.”
    “For heaven’s sake.Kit! Why in hell didn’t you mention it?”
    “Because I’m not licensed—or certified. Whatever you have to be.”
    “You don’t even know?”
    “It’s got to be something. I didn’t want to end up in some kind of legal trouble.”
    Skip sighed. Similar fears probably caused more witnesses to clam up than lawyers did.
    “And because ethics prevented my talking about a client.”
    “Your client was dead.”
    “And because I didn’t learn anything that could possibly help.”
    “No?”
    “No. Not even in retrospect. Not one single thing.”
    Skip considered. “Okay, thanks.” She stood up.
    “I can go?”
    “Sure.” Skip smiled at her, aware that it was the first time she’d smiled in hours, days maybe. “I’m sorry if I was hard on you. I’m feeling a little… wired, I guess.”
    “Oh, forget it. You’ve been through a lot.” She looked down at her folded hands. “We all have.” She paused. “It’s all so crummy. Something good has to come out of this. It just has to.”
    “Yeah.” Skip thought it was just like a person who believed in witchcraft to say something like that.
    * * *
     
    It was only after she got home that she could really think about what had happened, and the thing that chilled her, the thing that absolutely paralyzed her, was not how close she had come to death but how close she’d come to killing Cole.
    Jesus. I would have dumped him off that roof if I could have.
    No, I wouldn’t have. I’m not that kind of person.
    Don’t do that. You would have. You went crazy up there.
You’d better talk to Cindy Lou.
    Steve was who she really wanted to talk to. Thinking of Steve made her think of Darryl—could she talk to Darryl about it? She didn’t know, didn’t know him well enough. If Cindy Lou was right, she couldn’t—a butterfly man wouldn’t stand still for it.
    And anyway, he hadn’t called.
    Let’s get real, Skip—you’ve had lunch with him once and then when he didn’t call, you called him. He hasn’t called since then. Is that a man you can rely on?
    He hasn’t had time.
    He isn’t interested.
    It didn’t matter; she knew perfectly well it didn’t matter.
    She wanted Steve.
    Where was he?
    He must be staying with Cookie Lamoureaux, the friend they had in common. She called Cookie and Steve answered. “It’s Skip.”
    “Yes.”
    “I need to talk to you.”
    “My flight leaves in two hours.”
    “I’ll come get you. I’ll take you to the airport.”
    “Cookie’s taking me.”
    “Stay there. I’m on my way.”
    He was waiting in the living room, his coat already on, and he didn’t smile when he saw her.
    He had always been so quick to smile, so accommodating, so easygoing. This was a new Steve, this sullen, quiet one.
    One that I made.
    When they were in the car, she said, “Listen, I think I made a big mistake.”
    “No. I’m the one who did.”
    “Look, I’m really sorry I couldn’t talk to you at lunch. You surprised me, that’s all. It’s been an awful day and—”
    “All we ever talked about is your work. Do you realize that?”
    “Steve, that’s not fair!” It certainly wasn’t. She knew him—no subject on earth was more fascinating to him.
    “Oh, great. That’s not fair either. Nothing I do is