at the hotel’s front desk for a recommendation.
And I would look for Mac. I had to.
What if it had been him I’d seen at the airport? What if he was right here in Miami? What were the odds of that? I propped myself up on my elbows and gazed back and forth across the teeming beach. If Mac was here, he’d be wearing a T-shirt to cover his scars—at first glance I saw half a dozen men wearing T-shirts with their bathing suits. What if one of them was my husband? What if he was here in this city, right now? What if everywhere I went for a full year, I saw him? Haunted, insane, every sighting an unrequitable yearning to have him back. I lay down on my lumpy towel, closed my eyes, and let the heat of the sun soak into my skin.
I waited until almost midnight for Jasmine to fall asleep. And then, when I was sure, I brought my clothes into the bathroom and changed out of my nightgown. I took a room key and my purse and quietly let myself out.
There was a business center off the hotel lobby, a windowless room with six cubicles stocked with computers, faxes, scanners, whatever you’d need to conduct business away from home base. The center was empty except for me. I chose a cubicle in the farthest corner of the room and went online.
Finding a local private investigator turned out to be incredibly easy. In fact, the area had an embarrassment of riches when it came to resources for nailing cheating husbands, bolstering your case in a custody battle, finding out if your business partner was embezzling, or whatever else you wanted to know but couldn’t find out yourself. One elaborate Web site after another offered an array of electronic and hands-on surveillance, and all you had to do was initiate a case and offer up your credit card number. It was that simple. As a former detective, I found the whole enterprise dubious; but on the other hand, I wanted someone to help me without letting Jasmine or anyone else know what I was doing. If she or my mother or Billy Staples or anyone knew that I wanted to make sure it wasn’t Mac who had evaded me at the Miami airport, they would invoke magical thinking, outright delusion, or worse. Too much crazy; but that didn’t mean I couldn’t satisfy my own curiosity.
I dialed the 800 number on the screen and in moments my call was answered by a man with an Indian accent.
“Hello! My name is Peter! You have reached Miami Investigation Services! How may I help you?”
He pronounced it Meeami , confirming my guess that I was talking to someone in a call center in India. No matter. In the morning, when an investigator picked up his roster of late night calls, he’d find my request.
I shared only the essentials with Peter, skipping the complications about Aileen and Hugh’s murders, Danny’s arrest, and Mac’s disappearance and presumed death. All he needed to know was that my husband had gone AWOL and I thought he might be in Miami.
“Do you have a photograph of your husband, ma’am? Of course it would much aid in the investigation.”
“I think I have some in my phone.”
I put the call on hold and scrolled through the pictures I’d snapped on impulse and forgotten about, each one inciting a poignant memory: Mac sitting on our couch, gazing down at Ben who slept in his arms; Ben gleefully throwing banana slices from his high chair to the floor while Mac grinned at me (at my phone, that every-ready surreptitious camera); Mac in front of our brownstone last winter, looking thoughtful and relaxed and very much like himself, less than a year before his life had come crashing down. That was the one. Peter gave me his e-mail address, I zapped the picture into the ether, and within moments Peter confirmed he’d received it. Next he asked for my credit card and a contact phone number, and Project Find Mac Alive was under way. Before I let Peter go, I made sure someone would call me tomorrow, someone from Miami , I specified. His answer, “Yes indeed, ma’am,” wasn’t all that
And I would look for Mac. I had to.
What if it had been him I’d seen at the airport? What if he was right here in Miami? What were the odds of that? I propped myself up on my elbows and gazed back and forth across the teeming beach. If Mac was here, he’d be wearing a T-shirt to cover his scars—at first glance I saw half a dozen men wearing T-shirts with their bathing suits. What if one of them was my husband? What if he was here in this city, right now? What if everywhere I went for a full year, I saw him? Haunted, insane, every sighting an unrequitable yearning to have him back. I lay down on my lumpy towel, closed my eyes, and let the heat of the sun soak into my skin.
I waited until almost midnight for Jasmine to fall asleep. And then, when I was sure, I brought my clothes into the bathroom and changed out of my nightgown. I took a room key and my purse and quietly let myself out.
There was a business center off the hotel lobby, a windowless room with six cubicles stocked with computers, faxes, scanners, whatever you’d need to conduct business away from home base. The center was empty except for me. I chose a cubicle in the farthest corner of the room and went online.
Finding a local private investigator turned out to be incredibly easy. In fact, the area had an embarrassment of riches when it came to resources for nailing cheating husbands, bolstering your case in a custody battle, finding out if your business partner was embezzling, or whatever else you wanted to know but couldn’t find out yourself. One elaborate Web site after another offered an array of electronic and hands-on surveillance, and all you had to do was initiate a case and offer up your credit card number. It was that simple. As a former detective, I found the whole enterprise dubious; but on the other hand, I wanted someone to help me without letting Jasmine or anyone else know what I was doing. If she or my mother or Billy Staples or anyone knew that I wanted to make sure it wasn’t Mac who had evaded me at the Miami airport, they would invoke magical thinking, outright delusion, or worse. Too much crazy; but that didn’t mean I couldn’t satisfy my own curiosity.
I dialed the 800 number on the screen and in moments my call was answered by a man with an Indian accent.
“Hello! My name is Peter! You have reached Miami Investigation Services! How may I help you?”
He pronounced it Meeami , confirming my guess that I was talking to someone in a call center in India. No matter. In the morning, when an investigator picked up his roster of late night calls, he’d find my request.
I shared only the essentials with Peter, skipping the complications about Aileen and Hugh’s murders, Danny’s arrest, and Mac’s disappearance and presumed death. All he needed to know was that my husband had gone AWOL and I thought he might be in Miami.
“Do you have a photograph of your husband, ma’am? Of course it would much aid in the investigation.”
“I think I have some in my phone.”
I put the call on hold and scrolled through the pictures I’d snapped on impulse and forgotten about, each one inciting a poignant memory: Mac sitting on our couch, gazing down at Ben who slept in his arms; Ben gleefully throwing banana slices from his high chair to the floor while Mac grinned at me (at my phone, that every-ready surreptitious camera); Mac in front of our brownstone last winter, looking thoughtful and relaxed and very much like himself, less than a year before his life had come crashing down. That was the one. Peter gave me his e-mail address, I zapped the picture into the ether, and within moments Peter confirmed he’d received it. Next he asked for my credit card and a contact phone number, and Project Find Mac Alive was under way. Before I let Peter go, I made sure someone would call me tomorrow, someone from Miami , I specified. His answer, “Yes indeed, ma’am,” wasn’t all that
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