The Baker's Wife by Erin Healy Page B

didn’t go to work, obviously.
    She grabbed coffee with a girlfriend, forgot about the meeting she was supposed to attend before school . Or took a detour to put cheap gas in the car .
    That was another habit she needed to change: Why on earth waste gas money by driving great distances to save a nickel? The math didn’t work. She of all people should know that.
    When was the last time he’d spoken to his wife? He mentally reviewed. Usually she called him when she needed something. When he was deep in a case, checking in with her rarely occurred to him. Had she called him at all yesterday? Now that he thought of it, no. She’s angry with me about the long shift. Ignoring my calls now because she feels ignored . Julie did that once in a while. Not frequently enough for him to pay much attention to it. Still, that she was doing it now annoyed him. The circumstances were urgent. This was no time for games.
    An affair. A plot to run away, start a new life. Casanova drives the scooter, she follows him out of town. Divine justice intervenes and reduces the interloper to a grease spot. She hauls his broken body into her car and—
    Though such an offensive scenario might have been supported by Julie’s recently chilly behavior, her doctor had suggested she might withdraw for a time after her hysterectomy. Some hormonal side effect. Also, he didn’t need a psychiatrist to tell him that Miralee’s abandonment had devastated his wife, even though Julie refused to discuss it with him. She was having a rough time, not an affair. There was also the matter of her surgery, which would throw a wet blanket on any sexual flings, and the not-so-small matter of her not being able to lift more than ten pounds for another four weeks.
    The Bofingers had been adamant that there were no other parties at the scene, though they had plenty of motivation to lie to him. Well, that wasn’t his fault, was it?
    On the side of the shed, the key was hidden above the window on its protruding frame. He removed the padlock, swung the white wood door open on its tired hinges, and reached for the string that turned on the light.
    Nothing had been disturbed, not even the scents of potting soils for summer window boxes, or gasoline for the mower. Organic mixed with synthetic, damp air and dry earth. Rusting metal tools on a spongy wood floor, untouched dust and spider–webs, and the clean-swept spot near the door where the blue-and-white Vespa should have been.
    There was nothing wrong with this scene at all.
    New theory: More than one thief, careful people who know my wife’s habits, like where she keeps this key. Stalkers? They stole both vehicles, because—
    A new possibility for why Julie wasn’t answering the phone struck him, so obvious that it should have been the first to occur to him and not the last. He left the shed wide open and cursed himself as he ran back to the house, through the garage, and—the house door was locked. Julie never locked this door, though he admonished her to. His keys snagged on a thread in his pocket and tangled with each other before he got the right one into the keyhole.
    His entrance into the kitchen was confused: rush to find Julie or treat the house like a crime scene?
    â€œJulie!”
    The refrigerator hummed.
    â€œJulie, are you here?”
    Three options: Julie was gone. Julie was here, clinging to life. Julie was here, dead.
    The scooter accident had taken place more than three hours ago. If she was still here, she was probably not clinging to life any longer.
    Procedure. Method. Don’t do anything that will make a loophole for whoever did this .
    It was Jack’s house. There was no need for him to cover his hands or his shoes. Prints from both would be everywhere, and he could be easily excluded from the evidence.
    The kitchen was like the shed, as it always was: the eat-in table empty except for a bowl of fruit and two placemats, though they never ate in