“Oh, I could’ve given him a hand,” Pam said, waving to Marcus, who shut the trunk.
“Thanks. He’s got it, and you’re carrying enough.”
“When are we ever not carrying enough? Did you see my new bag, by the way? My daughter gave it to me.” Pam held out her largest tote bag, a floral Vera Bradley pattern, which was the real version of Christine’s knockoff purse.
“Gorgeous. Teacher porn.”
“Hey ladies!” Marcus called out, striding toward them, his hand in his pocket. “Pam, you sure know how to throw a party, thanks again.”
“Happy to do it.”
“Honey?” Marcus took Christine’s arm and they walked as a threesome toward his car, which was in the same direction as the parking lot. They said good-bye to Pam again, and Marcus opened the door for Christine, then went to the driver’s side of the car and got inside. “Why did you get out of the car?” he asked, putting the car in gear.
“To see the video.”
“You’re being silly.” Marcus pulled out of the drive and headed for the exit.
“Maybe, probably. Let’s just head home. In three blocks I’ll be able to get better reception, on Glastonbury Road.”
“Silly.” Marcus reached on the console for the wraparound Maui Jims that he used for golf, and slipped them on his face. “Honey, he’s not our donor.”
“He could be. I mean, it’s possible.”
“No, it’s not possible. It’s out of the question. I can’t even believe you’re serious. They screen these donors.”
“I’m sure they do some, but how much? And what?” Christine thought about it. She had never asked anyone the question about what kind of screening they did for donors. She remembered reading some boilerplate on the site and wished she had paid more attention.
“These are reputable banks. We were referred to them by Dr. Davidow. It’s not like some fly-by-night operation.”
“But still, it’s not impossible. Someone committing a murder, or really any kind of crime, how do you screen for that?”
“Our donor must be a medical student by now. That guy they arrested wasn’t a medical student.”
“Maybe he was, we didn’t hear the story.” Christine thought that sounded improbable, even to herself, which made her feel a little better. They drove down the winding road toward the stone bridge. She checked her phone but there was still no reception. They’d be at Glastonbury Road in minutes. Sunlight dappled the asphalt from tall oaks lining the street, and the cornfield was a solid block of leafy green, fairly high for mid-June.
“Anyway, you only have one day left of school. Amazing, huh?”
“Yes, but I want to get this video up. Then I want you to look at it and see if I’m crazy.”
“You’re crazy.” Marcus chuckled, his eyes hidden behind his sunglasses. He steered the car onto Shire Road, and Christine logged onto Safari, then navigated to the CNN site, tapping the heading of the news story on her iPhone screen, then enlarged it with her fingers to read it better.
“It says, ‘Zachary Jeffcoat, a Pennsylvania man, was arrested today-’”
“See, already. It’s not our guy. Our guy’s from Nevada.”
“Right, good, but let me read the story.” Christine tried to focus in the jostling car. “‘… was arrested today for the murder of Gail Robinbrecht, a thirty-one-year-old nurse from West Chester, PA. The murder is the third of three murders of nurses in Newport News, Virginia, and Bethesda, Maryland. Nurse Lynn McLeane, a pediatric nurse, was stabbed to death on January 12, and Susan Allen-Bogen, an operating-room nurse, was also stabbed to death using the same MO, on April 13-’”
Marcus clucked. “The guy kills nurses? What’s the matter with people? Nurses are great.”
“Right, but it’s weird that Donor 3319 was a medical student and the victims were nurses.”
“The guy they arrested isn’t a medical student.”
“Right, I know.” Christine was confusing herself. Her face still burned, despite the air-conditioning. She returned her attention to the iPhone screen. “It says, ‘The murders gained national attention as the Nurse Murders.’”
“Does it say the killer is a medical student?”
“No, it doesn’t.” Christine skimmed the last two lines of the story. “‘The police commissioner is gratified that the suspect is in custody and thanks federal and state law enforcement for their hard work.’ Hmmm. It doesn’t say any more about him, like where he went to school. Even his age.”
“There. It’s not him. If he was a medical student, it would say so. That’s a relevant detail.”
“True,” Christine said, but her heart was still racing. She scrolled down to the end of the story and tapped a camera icon for the video. A freeze-frame showing the group of police officers came onto the screen, and she hit PLAY. The video showed the police walking and behind them, a thatch of blond hair bobbing up and down. She couldn’t see the prisoner’s face because the police blocked the view, and sunlight coming through the car window made it hard to see her screen. She hit PAUSE. “Can we pull over so I can see this?”
“Do we have to? We’ll be home in twenty minutes.” Marcus kept driving, his expression opaque behind the sport sunglasses.
“I don’t want to wait. Just pull over, it’ll take a minute. We can watch it together.”
“Fine.” Marcus peeled off the road onto a gravel service road that traveled uphill into the woods, ending in a tall mound of discarded logs and tree limbs, then he put the car in PARK and shifted over toward her in the seat. “Let me see what you’re talking about.”
“Thanks.” Christine hit PLAY, and they both watched the video, which showed the police walking below the frame and then in the next instant, the tall blond prisoner walking with them, his hands behind his back.
“It doesn’t look like him. Our guy’s taller.”
Christine pressed STOP. “You can’t tell how tall he is from this.”
“Yes, you can. Look at him in relation to the cops.”
“But you don’t know how tall the cops are.”
“The cops look like they’re just under six feet, which makes sense. They’re not staties. Staties tend to be taller. Besides, you know I have eagle eyes.”
Christine knew that was true. A lifetime of playing golf had made Marcus almost preternaturally skilled at guessing distances, and he had an engineer’s sense of spatial relationships, which she lacked completely.
“Besides, he looks older than our donor. Our guy should be about twenty-five, I think. That guy looks over thirty.”
“I can’t tell how old the guy is from this picture. Anyway, a twenty-five-year-old doesn’t look a lot different from a thirty-year-old.” Christine squinted at the video image, which was still hard to see in the car.
“Yes they do. Our guy is young. A kid, a med student. This prisoner is not young.”
“But we don’t know when our donor entered med school. We only know that he was accepted.” Christine gestured at the video. “Think about it. He’s tired, not old. He’s been on the run from the police.”
“It doesn’t say that.”
“I’m assuming.” Christine hit PLAY, and the video continued, the cops coming forward and the prisoner coming into view, from the waist up. He had on a rumpled navy Windbreaker and a white T-shirt underneath, but she couldn’t see his face because his head was tilted down. His blond hair caught the sunlight at the crown, showing its darker caramel tones. Christine pressed PAUSE. “That looks like our donor’s hair color, doesn’t it?”
“I don’t know, I don’t remember.”
“I do.” Christine scrutinized the man’s hair, thinking that she remembered his hair color, only because she always spent time noticing variations of blonde, so she could tell her colorist what she wanted. She’d been highlighting her hair for a long time, but she was always looking in magazines to get new color ideas, so she had the blond vocabulary. “His hair color was tawny. Not ashy like you, but a warm golden, like caramel, not cool Scandinavian-”