Page 30 of Wrong Mail

He doesn't look at the house.

He stays by his open door and takes in the road, the tape, the ambulance, and the neighbors standing in their doorways. He does it unhurriedly, like someone reading a page.

Hanson goes over to him and starts talking. The man listens. Then he lifts his head and looks past the tape, past the cedars, past the whole shocked street.

He looks at my house.

Not at the Ericksons'.

At my gate. My drive. The lit kitchen window where the plate is still lying in the water.

He looks at it for three full seconds. Then he says something to Hanson, who turns and looks too.

Chapter Eleven

The same unmarked SUV is outside our gate at ten past eight the next morning. I’ve been awake since five waiting for it.

I watch them come up the drive from the landing window. Hanson, in uniform with his hat under his arm, walks beside the man from last night. He's wearing a jacket despite the heat. Tucked under one arm is a folder. He stops halfway up and scans the house.

Anyone else might think he's admiring it. The eaves, the corners, the porch. But I know what he's looking for.

Cameras.

We don't have any.

For a brief moment, our eyes meet.

Then he walks on.

"They're here," I call down.

My voice comes out wrong. David says something from the kitchen I don't catch.

"Mr. and Mrs. Grant. Officer Hanson, Medina PD." He's careful with our names, as if he hadn't stood on our road last night. "This is Detective Rodriguez, King County Sheriff's Office, Criminal Investigations. He's taken over. We're canvassing about last night."

"Of course," David says. "Come in. Please."

Rodriguez shakes David's hand and then mine. He holds mine exactly as long as is normal, no longer. Then he walks into the living room, stands in the middle of it, and looks around.

He isn't rude about it. That's what makes it unbearable. He looks at the room the way I'd look at it, which is the whole problem. Then he finds the sofa, and he waits to be asked.

"Sit, please," I say. "Can I get anybody anything to drink?”

"We're good."

We sit. David takes the arm of my chair rather than the seat beside me, which is a thing he does when he expects a conversation to end fast.

The basics come first. They're easy. Where were we? David was at the hospital until seven, home by half past. I was here. Did we hear anything, see anything, notice a car we didn't know? No, no, and no. I hear myself saying it, and I hear how thin it sounds.

"And your work, Mr. Grant?"

"Attending surgeon. I work at UW Medical Center in Seattle. I'm up for Division Chief, which means I'm at the hospital more than I'm here."

"Promotion?"

"It's not a done deal yet."

Rodriguez writes nothing down. Hanson is the one writing.