Fool Me Once

She knew what this would sound like. If she blurted out what she had seen on the nanny cam, Kierce would think that she was a lunatic. Hell, it sounded crazy replaying it now in her own mind. There were still strands of cobwebs from the pepper spray. What exactly had happened here? Was she, for certain, thinking straight?

Take it slow.

“Mrs. Burkett?”

“I told you to call me Maya.”

The evidence for her crazy assertion-the SD card-was gone. Isabella had taken it. It would probably be wisest for Maya to handle that on her own. But at the same time, if she did that, if she didn’t tell him now and it came back…

“Isabella must have taken it.”

“Taken what?”

“The SD card.”

“After, what, she hit you with the pepper spray?”

“Yes,” Maya said, trying like hell to sound authoritative.

“So she sprays you, she grabs the video card, and then, what, she runs off?”

“Yes.”

Kierce nodded. “So what was on it?”

Maya glanced toward the den. Lily was happily engrossed in a giant four-piece zoo puzzle. “I saw a man.”

“A man?”

“Yes. On the video. Lily sat on his lap.”

“Whoa,” Kierce said. “I assume the man was a stranger?”

“No.”

“You knew him?”

She nodded.

“So who was it?”

“You won’t believe me. You’ll understandably think I’m delusional.”

“Try me.”

“It was Joe.”

To his credit, Kierce didn’t make a face or gasp or look at her as though she were the craziest person in the history of the world.

“I see,” he said, as though he too were trying to maintain his composure. “So it was an old tape?”

“Pardon?”

“It was something you taped when Joe was still alive and maybe, I don’t know, you thought you taped over it or-”

“I only got the nanny cam after the murder.”

Kierce just stood there.

“The date stamp said it was recorded yesterday,” Maya continued.

“But…”

Silence.

Then: “You know that can’t be.”

“I do,” Maya said.

They stared at each other. There was no point in trying to convince him. Instead, Maya changed the subject. “Why are you here?”

“I need you to come to the station.”

“Why?”

“I can’t tell you. But it’s really important.”

Chapter 7

The same young smiley thing was on duty at the Growin’ Up Day Care Center.

“Oh, I remember you,” she said. She bent down toward Lily. “And I remember you too. Hi, Lily!”

Lily said nothing. The two women left her with blocks and moved into the office.

“I’m ready to sign her up,” Maya said.

“Terrific! When would you like to start?”

“Now.”

“Um, that’s a little unusual. We usually need two weeks to process an application.”

“My nanny quit unexpectedly.”

“I’m sorry to hear that, but-”

“Miss… I’m sorry, I forget your name.”

“Kitty Shum.”

“Right, Miss Kitty, sorry. Kitty, do you see that green car out there?”

Kitty looked out the window. Her eyes narrowed. “Is that person bothering you? Do we need to call the police?”

“No, see, that’s an unmarked police car. My husband was murdered recently.”

“I read about that,” Kitty said. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you. The thing is, that police officer needs to take me to his precinct. I’m not sure why. He just stopped by. So I have a choice. I can bring Lily with me while they ask me about her father’s murder…”

“Mrs. Burkett?”

“Maya.”

“Maya.” Kitty still had her eyes on Kierce’s car. “You know how to download our phone app?”

“I do.”

Kitty nodded. “It’s best for your child if you don’t have a big emotional good-bye.”

“Thank you.”

* * *

When they reached the Central Park Precinct, Maya asked, “So can you tell me now why we are here?”

Kierce had barely spoken a word the entire ride over. That was okay with Maya. She needed the time to think everything through-the nanny cam, the video, Isabella, the forest green shirt.

“I need you to do two lineups for me.”

“Lineups of what?”

“I don’t want to prejudice your answers.”

“It can’t be the shooters. I told you. They wore ski masks.”

“Black ones, you said. Just eye and mouth holes?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, good. Come with me.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You’ll see.”

As they walked, Maya checked out the Growin’ Up Day Care’s app. The app allowed you to pay your bill, sign up for hours, review your child’s “curriculum of activities,” get bios on all the caregivers. But the best part of the app-the reason she’d been drawn to Growin’ Up in the first place-was one specific feature. She clicked on it now. There were three choices: the red room, the green room, the yellow room. Lily’s age group was in the yellow room. She clicked on the yellow icon.

Kierce opened the door. “Maya?”

“One second.”

The screen on her phone came alive, giving her a live feed of the yellow room. You would think Maya would have had enough with the surveillance videos for one day. But no. She turned her phone on the side to make the picture bigger. Lily was there. Safe. A caregiver-later Maya could look her up and read her bio-was stacking blocks with her and a boy about Lily’s age.