He stepped over the threshold. “I’m from the Hunterdon County Missing Persons Unit. I wanted to stop by to follow up with a status update.”
What status update? Here’s the status: Greg isn’t home yet.
“Do you want something to drink?” I asked, turning to walk to the kitchen.
He followed me down the hallway. “Uh… no, thank you, Mrs. Barnes.”
I detoured into the living room. “Please, call me Claire.” I motioned for him to sit on the couch, while I sat in Greg’s easy chair.
He lowered himself onto the middle cushion. “I’m going to be the lead investigator, and I promise you we will do everything we can to find your husband. Right now, we have no reason to believe he’s dead. We queried all the morgues within a twenty-mile radius of Rochester for a John Doe matching his description. So far, there’s no one. I’m leaving this afternoon for Rochester to discuss some of the details of the case with the local authorities there. We’ve had phone conversations with personnel at the hotel and the airline, and we’ve confirmed what you told us earlier. We do believe he landed in Rochester and checked into his hotel, but we don’t think he ever stayed in his room. In addition, we can’t locate his luggage.”
He pulled a pen and a small notebook out of his shirt pocket. He clicked the pen once, twice, and seemed to be waiting for me. I nodded for him to continue.
“This is all we know right now. But I do have a few follow-up questions, if you feel up to it.”
“Yes, of course. Anything.” All the talking seemed superfluous, taking up precious time. I couldn’t understand how talking to me would help them find Greg. I wanted to push him out the door, out into the real world where the clues would be.
“Mrs. Barnes… Claire, I need to ask you some tough questions, regarding your marriage, your life, things that may feel very personal. I don’t believe you had anything to do with Greg’s disappearance, but you may be able to tell me something about who did. And you might not even know it yourself, so it’s very important that you don’t hold back on me. Do you understand?”
I nodded again, frustrated at his careful pace. “Yes.”
“I need to understand the state of your marriage.”
Even though he had warned me, I was surprised at the candid statement, the abruptness of it. I inhaled deeply and closed my eyes, thinking about how to put into words what I avoided thinking about. How did I explain? We were like ships passing in the night. He went about his day, I went about mine, and if our days overlapped and we connected, great. But in the past three months, more often than not, we hadn’t.
“Greg and I have a marriage. We have highs and lows, but we don’t fight regularly.” I paused, searching for words. “But we don’t really… talk regularly either.”
“Is this a recent development?”
“He was up late at night. Working, he said, and sometimes I would hear him on the phone. When I pressed him on it, he got frustrated, frequently telling me not to worry about it. I needed to understand him. He needed me to not need that.” I stopped, staring at my hands, which were clenched in my lap. I took a deep breath, consciously relaxing them. “I don’t even know if everything I’m saying is making sense.”
Matt smiled. He had a kind smile and soft green eyes. I could see why he had become a detective. I instinctively wanted to tell him everything about my life, and I was quite sure he took a lot of confessions. I would have bet even hardened criminals trusted him.
“I understand, Claire. I was married once. It sounds familiar. It also doesn’t sound unusual. I think most marriages have these times, and more often than not, they pass. Do you think things will get better, or do you have a sense of your marriage ending?”
“No, we’ll pull out of it,” I said quickly, trying to convince the detective. And myself. “A few years ago, Greg had a friend who passed away. He became reclusive and moody. The only people who could reach him were the girls. I realized that’s how Greg deals with complicated, emotional situations. I think there’s something similar going on because his behavior lately has been the same. But this time, the reason behind it is a mystery to me. It’s been this way for close to a year, off and on, with the worst being the last four months or so. I expect to eventually know the reason behind his self–imposed exile. I was trying, but…”
Matt nodded.
Taking the gesture for encouragement, I continued. “I’d become impatient lately, pushing him, wanting to know what was in his head. I became insecure, needy. Did he still love me? I’m sure that pushed him further into himself. But I couldn’t see that at the time. I can see it a little more clearly now.”