Free The Other Widow by Susan Crawford Page A

Honduras. “My mother is very ill, Karen,” he’d told her on a lush, green day two years before, sitting on a bench in the Public Garden. Spring hung like perfume in the air.
    â€œOh,” she’d said. “My God! How long will you be gone?” But he shook his head.
    â€œI don’t know.”
    She could have loved Tomas. But Karen’s always known passion isn’t everything. She understood that, watching her parents wrestle through their lives in their cardboard house with hard blue rugs, where their daughters learned to live on their toes, dancing, edgy, like birds on a hot wire, always ready to break and run. No. For love. For passion. For Tomas, Karen would not leave her husband.
    She parks. She checks her makeup in the rearview mirror and looks around before unlocking her car door. Is she getting paranoid, living all alone the way she is now? Maybe she should sell the house and get a place in Boston, an apartment downtown, somewhere close to Alice.
    Is that all this is? Nerves? But there were the footprints, the figure in the trees at the cemetery. Maybe she’ll confide in Edward. She opens her car door and turns to lock it before walking quickly toward the restaurant. The wind howls off the water and she pulls her scarf over her head, tucks her chin down, against the icy gusts. And then Edward is there, puffing up behind her; steam flies from his mouth and lingers in the air.
    He hugs her. A lengthy hug, she thinks, but they’re both grieving, after all. Edward’s bulk lends some protection, but still the wind flings her hair across her cheeks, steals their words, their breath. After a few short stabs at conversation, they walk in silence, pushing through the door into the welcome warmth of Legal’s.
    Edward raises two fingers and they are immediately escorted to a table near a window, where a waiter takes their orders, leaning down to straighten a coaster before he hurries to the kitchen, pad in hand.
    â€œAre you all right?” Edward is himself again—solicitous and attentive. He leans back and looks hard at her face. A rock, she thinks. Edward is a rock, but then she notices his bloodshot eyes, remembers that he’s ordered a martini, extra dry, and that it’s barely noon.
    â€œYes,” she says. “I’m okay.” She looks at Edward’s face and decides not to mention the footprints after all. He might feel duty-bound to stay there at the house. For her. For Joe. He’d want me to , he might tell her, and then she’d be stuck with Edward draped across her grief. Worse yet, across her living room. “Actually.” She sticks her napkin on her lap. “I’m not fine at all. I miss Joe. I keep expecting him to come through the front door. He was gone so much, it seems as if he’s only away on business, that he’ll be coming back.”
    Edward clears his throat. “I get that,” he says. “Same at the office.” His voice is tired, brittle; it cracks on the last word. “Quiet as a tomb down there without him,” which Karen thinks is a poor choice of words, all things considered.
    The waiter brings their food, but neither of them seems to notice. The waiter smiles, nearly bows before he trots back to the kitchen.
    â€œAn insurance investigator came by the office earlier this week.” Edward takes a swallow of his drink. “A woman. Brennan, I think she said. Maggie Brennan. Used to be a cop. She’ll probably be calling you at some point. Asking you some questions.”
    â€œWhat kind of questions?” Karen feels her anxiety level ratchet up a notch.
    Edward shrugs. “My guess is they’ll try to pass Joe’s death off as a suicide. That way they don’t have to pay out on your claim. I could be wrong.” Edward is already halfway through his second drink. He’s barely touched his food. “Just wanted to give you a heads-up.”
    Karen picks at her