of me.â He turned and put his arms around her and pressed his face into her neck. This horrible notion had been swimming around, sharklike, beneath the surface of his thoughts all day: that he was somehow responsible for his friendâs death in the wake of that hideous black silhouette of the every-killer.
âHush now, Uly, hush,â she whispered and held him.
Grove let his tears come then, until he couldnât see or hear or feel anymore.
EIGHT
The funeral came and went the next day in a solemn, melancholy blur. By mid-afternoon, trapped at the Geisel shiva, alone among a house full of grim-faced strangers, Maura Grove realized something was wrong. She realized this even before she saw her husband having an intense, clandestine conversation with the FBI director across the dining room of the crowded farmhouse.
The stately old home, which belonged to Lois Geiselâs brother, famed D.C. divorce attorney Danny Patton, had been seething all day with quiet undercurrents of nervous tension, most of which seemed to be radiating from Ulysses. He kept pulling various Bureau staffers into quiet alcoves to have hushed, tense conversations about some pressing matter that had nothing to do with mourning Tom Geisel. After four glasses of tepid chardonnay, Maura became convinced that her husband was being drawn into another dark labyrinth. She had seen it too many timesâthe mood swings, the cryptic dissembling.
Now, standing alone in the Patton kitchen, staring out the window blinds at the overcast afternoon, Maura could see her husband strolling the far reaches of the backyard with one of his students, both their faces looking dour and grave as they talked.
Maura felt a pang of jealousy, standing there with her glass of room-temperature wine, watching her husband confer with a voluptuous black girl named Drinkwater. Maura knew how much the students idolized Grove. Still, it was a ridiculous notion that Grove would have an affair with one of his pupils. It stemmed from Mauraâs own projections, her own insecurity about the current state of her marriage, and her uncertain future.
Standing there, nervously sipping her sour chardonnay, her thoughts drifted back to that bizarre moment last year when she herself had been the object of a young personâs desire.
The key incidentâMaura had come to think of it this way, an incident , like a fender bender or a sprained ankleâhad unraveled in such an innocuous series of events, it hardly seemed worth remembering. Ulysses had been out of town, consulting on a kidnapping in Indiana, when an unexpected visitor appeared on their doorstep. A young Bureau trainee named Benjamin Bard had come over ostensibly to hand-deliver, as was Bureau policy, a hard drive loaded with case files for upcoming expert-witness testimony. The kid had a lanky, rangy swimmerâs physique and a long blond ponytail, and when Maura offered him a cup of coffee, he smiled and pulled a joint from his pocket.
âYou realize youâre married to a freaking legend?â he had asked her at one point, sitting at the kitchen table across from her, puffing his blunt, tossing his long blond straggles out of his face.
Then came the touch.
It wasnât much as physical flirtations go, just a light squeeze of Mauraâs bare forearm, which was resting on the table. But the young manâs hand had lingered just a millisecond longer than the duration of a friendly pat. âMust get lonely around here, though, with the maestro gone all the time,â the kid had murmured then, just in case Maura had missed all the blatant signals.
âYeah, umâ¦.â She had immediately pulled away. Then she went over to the sink to regain her composure. She busied herself with the dishes, grasping for something to say, searching for just the right combination of rakish indifference, wry humor, and tart wisdom. But the perfect response remained out of reach, just beyond the limits of
âHush now, Uly, hush,â she whispered and held him.
Grove let his tears come then, until he couldnât see or hear or feel anymore.
EIGHT
The funeral came and went the next day in a solemn, melancholy blur. By mid-afternoon, trapped at the Geisel shiva, alone among a house full of grim-faced strangers, Maura Grove realized something was wrong. She realized this even before she saw her husband having an intense, clandestine conversation with the FBI director across the dining room of the crowded farmhouse.
The stately old home, which belonged to Lois Geiselâs brother, famed D.C. divorce attorney Danny Patton, had been seething all day with quiet undercurrents of nervous tension, most of which seemed to be radiating from Ulysses. He kept pulling various Bureau staffers into quiet alcoves to have hushed, tense conversations about some pressing matter that had nothing to do with mourning Tom Geisel. After four glasses of tepid chardonnay, Maura became convinced that her husband was being drawn into another dark labyrinth. She had seen it too many timesâthe mood swings, the cryptic dissembling.
Now, standing alone in the Patton kitchen, staring out the window blinds at the overcast afternoon, Maura could see her husband strolling the far reaches of the backyard with one of his students, both their faces looking dour and grave as they talked.
Maura felt a pang of jealousy, standing there with her glass of room-temperature wine, watching her husband confer with a voluptuous black girl named Drinkwater. Maura knew how much the students idolized Grove. Still, it was a ridiculous notion that Grove would have an affair with one of his pupils. It stemmed from Mauraâs own projections, her own insecurity about the current state of her marriage, and her uncertain future.
Standing there, nervously sipping her sour chardonnay, her thoughts drifted back to that bizarre moment last year when she herself had been the object of a young personâs desire.
The key incidentâMaura had come to think of it this way, an incident , like a fender bender or a sprained ankleâhad unraveled in such an innocuous series of events, it hardly seemed worth remembering. Ulysses had been out of town, consulting on a kidnapping in Indiana, when an unexpected visitor appeared on their doorstep. A young Bureau trainee named Benjamin Bard had come over ostensibly to hand-deliver, as was Bureau policy, a hard drive loaded with case files for upcoming expert-witness testimony. The kid had a lanky, rangy swimmerâs physique and a long blond ponytail, and when Maura offered him a cup of coffee, he smiled and pulled a joint from his pocket.
âYou realize youâre married to a freaking legend?â he had asked her at one point, sitting at the kitchen table across from her, puffing his blunt, tossing his long blond straggles out of his face.
Then came the touch.
It wasnât much as physical flirtations go, just a light squeeze of Mauraâs bare forearm, which was resting on the table. But the young manâs hand had lingered just a millisecond longer than the duration of a friendly pat. âMust get lonely around here, though, with the maestro gone all the time,â the kid had murmured then, just in case Maura had missed all the blatant signals.
âYeah, umâ¦.â She had immediately pulled away. Then she went over to the sink to regain her composure. She busied herself with the dishes, grasping for something to say, searching for just the right combination of rakish indifference, wry humor, and tart wisdom. But the perfect response remained out of reach, just beyond the limits of
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