Officer Maerz had been asking Zoe's mom boring background questions about Zoe-where she went to school and if she had any hobbies. Zoe's mom had been stalling so Zoe could get dressed and think through what she wanted to say. Her mother had her laptop in front of her on the table. It was open, for all to see, to a page entitled, "The Rights of Minors During Police Questioning."
Zoe loved her mother's feistiness and felt proud that she'd inherited it. Her mom worked six days a week managing a dumpy spa called Piping Hot Springs ("Relax and rejuvenate in one of our healing pools!"). She also worked as a hostess at a great café called Loula's, in Whitefish, and directed traffic on a road crew whenever they repaved Route 93. Even so, Zoe knew her family was always short on cash. She knew her mom felt like she was running down a train track, just a couple of steps ahead of the train.
Zoe's mother told Officer Maerz that Zoe's hobby was collecting trophies, which seemed to impress him. The truth was that Zoe literally collected trophies-she thought they were ugly and ridiculous and awesome so she bought them at yard sales and thrift stores. If you went into her room and didn't know any better, you'd be amazed that one girl could be so good at swimming, public speaking, archery, macramé, ballooning, and raising livestock.
Zoe's mom began rambling magnificently now. She described hobbies of Zoe's that were entirely made-up. One of her supposed collections-32 of the 50 official state spoons-so piqued Maerz's interest that Zoe was afraid that he'd ask to see it.
Zoe sat down next to her mother.
"I am all about state spoons," she told Maerz. "I'm starting to worry that I'm too into them."
Zoe's mom bit her lip, and kicked Zoe gently under the table.
"Yeah, okay," Chief Baldino said gruffly. "I think we're done with the icebreakers."
He signaled to Maerz that he'd be taking over the interrogation since Maerz clearly wasn't up to it. (Zoe's mom shot her a familiar look-the look that said, Alphas are the worst.) Maerz shrank in his chair, looking hurt.
Baldino slid a piece of paper across the table to Zoe.
"Can you confirm that you sent this e-mail to us at nine fifteen last night?" he said.
Zoe glanced down. When she looked back up at Baldino, all she saw was the man who had abandoned her dad's body.
"Yes, I sent that e-mail," she said, "which is why it has my name on it."
Baldino put on reading glasses that seemed weirdly dainty for such a fat, overstuffed armchair of a man, and read the e-mail aloud. Zoe's mom grimaced when she heard the name Stan-if her dad had known him way back when, in Virginia, her mother must have, too-and again when Baldino got to the sarcastic final sentence, "You're welcome."
"I assume those are your words?" said Baldino. "Since they have your name on them?"
"Yes," said Zoe.
"So how about you tell us how you know all this?"
Zoe's mom made a show of scrolling down the webpage, then nodded to her. Zoe knew she couldn't tell the whole truth, but she could at least tell nothing but the truth.
"Jonah and I were trying to find the dogs," she said.
She glanced at Officer Maerz, who had been sullenly taking notes ever since he'd been removed from power, and then at Sergeant Vilkomerson, who gave her an encouraging you're-doing-good sort of nod. Baldino folded his arms tightly across his chest and puffed his stomach out so far that he looked seven or eight months pregnant.
"We got caught in the blizzard," Zoe said. "We went to Bert and Betty's place to warm up. We used to stay there all the time." The memory was so painful that she couldn't help but add, "After my father died-and you guys refused to go get his body."
Baldino was unfazed by the remark, but everybody else shifted unhappily in their chairs. Zoe's mom leaned over and whispered, "Don't, honey. That's not fair."
Zoe pulled away from her, surprised.
"How is that not fair?" she said.
Baldino interrupted before her mother could answer.
"So you encountered Stan Manggold at the Wallaces' former residence?"
"Yes-if that's his last name. He called himself Stan the Man."
"My god," said Zoe's mom.
She even recognized the nickname.
"And how exactly do you know that Mr. Manggold is responsible for the deaths of Bertram and Elizabeth Wallace?"
"I saw-" Zoe began, then broke off immediately. She'd been about to say, I saw him do it. That would have gone over well: I saw it in a movie on the back of a superhot guy.
"You saw what, exactly?" said Baldino.
"I saw how he bragged about it," she said. "And I saw the poker he killed them with. He thought Bert and Betty were rich. He was still trying to figure out where they hid their money. But they didn't have any money-and now their bodies are in the lake."
Her voice was shaking.
"Zoe," said Baldino, "did you and your brother see anyone other than Stan Manggold while you were out at the lake-anybody you knew, anybody you didn't know, anybody at all? I want you to think carefully about your answer. Because we're going to write it down."
At this, Officer Maerz looked up at his boss, as if to say, Are you talking about me? Baldino rolled his eyes and said, "Yes, Stuart, whatever she says, write it down."
Everyone looked at Zoe, waiting. X's face flashed into her head. She felt protective of him. He had carried them home.
Just then, there were noises from outside-it sounded like animals had gotten into the garage and toppled the garbage cans.
Zoe's mother stood.
"Raccoons," she said. "We're going to need a quick recess. No questions while I'm gone." She turned her laptop to face the policemen. "If you have a problem with that," she said, "you can take it up with legalbeagle."
"Would you like some help, Ms. Bissell?" asked Sergeant Vilkomerson.
"No, but thank you, Brian. The raccoons are just going to have to find a new place to play."
Zoe stood, her calves rippling with pain, and went to one of the duct-taped windows in the living room. Outside, the clouds had shifted. The moon was a bright, white eyeball in the sky. The mountains were just wavy lines receding into the distance.
She felt weary for the thousandth time. She thought about Bert and Betty, about her father, about the big roiling mess that everything had become.
She thought about X. She knocked on the window-she didn't know why. He was out there somewhere. She shouldn't have let him go, but she couldn't exactly force him to stay.
Zoe headed back to the table. She knew what she was going to say.
"We didn't see anybody but Stan. Why?"
The moment Zoe said it, she knew she'd made a mistake. Miscalculated, somehow. Even her mother seemed to know she was lying, but how could she? Zoe's stomach tightened again, like someone was turning a wheel.
Officer Maerz, she noticed, hadn't written her answer down-not because he'd forgotten but because he knew it would be used against her later. Zoe thought that was cool and kind. In her mind, she put a star next to Maerz's name, though she knew his little rebellion was about to get crushed.
"Stuart, write down what our young friend just said, word for word."
This was Baldino. He smiled, drummed on the tabletop, and sat up straight. Now he looked merely three or four months pregnant, like he'd just begun telling people he was having a baby.
"Brian," he said, "let's show her the photo. You got it handy?"
So there was a photo. How could there be? And of what? The wheel in Zoe's stomach turned three times in quick succession.
She was about to speak when her mother startled everyone by slamming her computer shut.
"What photo?" she said. "Why are we only hearing about it now-and why are you playing games with a seventeen-year-old girl?"
"I'm sorry, Ms. Bissell," Vilkomerson said, as he searched his phone for the picture.
"Why on earth are you apologizing to this woman?" Baldino said. "We gave the kid a chance to tell the truth."
"I accept your apology, Brian," said Zoe's mom. "But you"-she was pointing at Chief Baldino now-"are starting to piss me off."
It was the Instagram. Brian had an annoying daughter a couple of years behind Zoe at school, and the girl had seen the photo, thought it was hot, and left some lame comment, like YAASS! She'd also shown it to her dad.
The photo showed X from behind, his arms and legs spread so wide that he looked like an actual X. You could see his broad, shirtless back, lit by the glow coming off the ice. You could see the primitive tattoos running down his forearms. You could see Stan cowering miserably at his feet.
"Now, there are many odd things about this photograph," said Chief Baldino. "For instance, the lake is orange."
"That's just a filter," said Maerz. "Everybody uses them."
Zoe had stopped listening. She was staring not at X but at Stan. Her mother was staring at him, too. She seemed stunned to see him again after what must have been decades. The man was vile: The buzz cut. The shock-white eyebrow. The ugly boulder of a head. Zoe had not just let him live, she had let him escape. She couldn't pull her eyes away, even when she tasted bile in the back of her throat.