Like Debbie, Decker and Gemma have no social footprints to each other. I breeze through his birthday Facebook messages—the ones I swore I’d never revisit—and see no well wishes from her. You’d have thought the mother of his child would have hit his wall with at least an “HBD.”

And frankly, the more I look at her, the more I can’t even really see him being all that into her, looks-wise. She’s attractive, sure. But she’s way too LA and also the complete opposite of me. I like to think that I’m my own husband’s type, for fuck’s sake.

As I bring my dirty wineglass back to the kitchen, I check the clock on the microwave and see that it’s nearly two o’clock in the morning and there’s been no sign of Casey. I can bet that after tonight’s blowout, she won’t be making an appearance at apartment 518. In fact, I’d say there’s a good chance she found her way back to that guy from speed dating and is banging him at his dingy apartment right now. Or who knows, maybe she’s at Justin’s place just trying to stick one to me.

I wish I could pull an all-nighter and drive my investigation home, but I’m exhausted and Leno needs to be popped out for a pee before we go to bed for the night. So I take one last look at my wall before heading outside. Absorbing what I have done, I can’t help but feel proud. This is me, thriving under adversity. This is what I wish I could have done in the hospital.

Chapter 20

“Charlotte. It’s 7:00 a.m. I promise you I was going to bring the urn back before noon,” a groggy-eyed Brian says as he answers the door in gray sweatpants and no shirt.

“Sorry, I know it’s early,” I acknowledge. “Can I come in?”

Before he has a chance to answer, I roll past him through the foyer and straight into his living room. I set my bag on his Chesterton sofa like it’s some sort of old habit. In my hand is the stack of sticky notes from my wall. I begin placing them, in order, on a blank wall below his flat screen. I’ve even stapled the profile pages of a few key people to the correlating Post-it. Sure, it may look like a police lineup as I press them onto the wall, but I figure in different light, with fresh eyes, there is a better chance I will see the truth.

“What are you doing?” he asks. By now he’s fetched a T-shirt and a pair of glasses.

“You said you wanted to help me with things, right?” I don’t make eye contact. I just continue re-creating the bracket.

“Yeah, but—”

“So then help me figure out why my client told me she slept with Decker and had his baby in college.”

He takes a few steps forward and looks up at the wall. “What is all this, Charlotte?” Brian asks with the same shock and horror of stumbling upon a gruesome murder scene. “Why are these names on my wall?”