“Quite a coincidence that cops have come to your house twice in one day,” Locke remarked.
Disquieted by the way the two were regarding her, she folded her arms over her middle, even knowing how defensive it looked. “Why are you asking me all these questions?”
“We have to eliminate every possibility.”
“Possibility of what?”
She had addressed the question to Locke, but Menundez answered. “The possibility that Mrs. Conner’s death wasn’t an accident caused by misjudgment on her part. The possibility that foul play was involved.”
Before Talia could process that, Locke asked, “Did you walk your husband into the airport, see him off?”
It took several seconds for his seemingly unrelated inquiry to sink in. “No. No, we said our goodbyes in the parking garage. Why?”
“Because some of the people we’ve talked to who saw the Laney Belle leave the marina said that a man was steering her, not Mrs. Conner.”
Talia hugged her middle a little tighter.
Locke continued. “We were also told that Mrs. Conner often allowed your husband to pilot the boat.”
“That’s true,” Talia said, “but it couldn’t have been Jasper this evening.”
“Had Mrs. Conner ever invited anyone else to take the wheel?”
“Not to my knowledge, but that doesn’t mean that she didn’t.”
“You two were close friends.”
“Yes.”
“Were you acquainted with all her other friends?”
“Many of them.”
“Male friends?”
“Some.”
“If she had a new man in her life, would she have told you?”
“More than likely,” she said huskily.
“Has she taken a romantic interest in someone recently?”
Willing herself not to glance toward the apartment across the way, she gave her head a brisk shake.
“She wasn’t seeing anyone?”
“In the way you’re implying, I don’t believe so.”
The two detectives looked at each other, then back at her. Menundez said, “Mrs. Ford, is it possible that your husband changed his mind about going to Atlanta at the last minute?”
“He would have notified me. He would have been home hours ago.”
“Unless he was onboard the Laney Belle with Elaine Conner,” Locke said.
“That’s an offensive implication, Detective Locke.”
“The implications to you are more dire than marital unfaithfulness. If your husband was on the yacht, and there was an emergency, an accident, he could have suffered an injury. As we speak, search-and-rescue teams are out looking for him, or his—”