Maja nodded, but her throat suddenly felt tight. It was all so overwhelming. They had so much of their money tied up in the house. She’d never thought about what would happen if something went wrong.

“Hey,” Ted said, putting his hand on hers. “I love you. It’s going to be okay. We’re going to get through this.”

“What about the money?” Maja asked.

“The insurance will come through,” Ted said. “In the meantime, we can float the expenses. Don’t worry about that part. Just focus on the house. I’ll worry about the money.”

Maja wanted to tell him that it wasn’t just the house that had her down. It was also the negative pregnancy test from the day before. She’d let herself get her hopes up too much, again, and she’d barely had time to process her disappointment. Everything she read told her not to frame it as a personal failure, but that’s what it felt like. Like she wasn’t holding up her end of the bargain. But Ted had enough on his plate right now. They could talk about it later.

“Let’s do something fun this weekend,” she said with forced cheerfulness. “Even if it’s just ordering delivery and watching a movie in bed. I feel like we’ve hardly seen each other lately.”

“Sounds great. We just need to get through this week first,” Ted said. “Is it really only Tuesday?”

“It feels like it should at least be Thursday,” Maja said. “Think we’ll make it?”

“Hold fast,” Ted advised, miming a sailor clinging to a ship’s rigging in a storm.

Maja held up her own fists, mirroring his motion. At least, she thought, we’re in this together.

11

Detective Murray pulled up in front of a small but impeccably neat Craftsman-style bungalow at the edge of town. A pickup in the driveway was emblazoned with a logo that read john williams, hearth & home builders. Murray knocked on the door, and John opened it, looking surprised to see the detective again. They sat on the front porch.

“Nice place you have here,” Detective Murray began. “Very different from the house that you’re building for the Jensens.”

“I prefer a traditional style,” John said. “Fits in better with the area, in my opinion. But my job is to build what the client wants. It’s a real shame what happened at that house. We were nearly done, and I was looking forward to getting those last checks.”

“I know Officer Cruz went over some of this with you, but just for my notes, can you tell me if you’d seen anyone hanging around the site recently who shouldn’t have been there?”