CHAPTER 61
Jenny had one more thing to do. She had gathered the wigs, gloves, shoes, anything that might incriminate her if it were ever found in her house, including the bloody sweater and the hammer, and put it all inside a garbage bag.
Then she put everything in the trunk of her car and went for a drive.
So much had changed in such a short period of time.
She felt like a newly blossoming bud. A beautiful flower. A butterfly that had just metamorphosed. Corny but true.
Ten minutes later, she parked as close as she could get to the apartment complex in Orangevale and realized this might not be as easy as breaking into a house. As far as apartment buildings go, there appeared to be a good amount of people coming and going. It didn’t help matters that for the first time, she wore no disguise.
She felt vulnerable, and she didn’t like it.
But she had to do what she had to do. She climbed out of her car, gathered the bag from the trunk, and headed for the main door.
Confidence, Jenny, confidence. She straightened her spine as she stepped inside the building. The place was decent enough, well kept. The actual apartment she needed to visit was on the fourth floor. She took the steps, passed a young couple carrying bikes over their heads on the stairwell. They smiled. She said, “Hi.”
No big deal.
Once she was on the second floor, the only floor without a camera, she hit the alarms and then waited for the chaos to begin.
It didn’t take long. She made her way up two more floors, weaving her way through fleeing residents, concerned expressions on their faces as they left their belongings behind them. One man, the man she’d hoped to see, was helping a woman who was having a difficult time getting three small children down the stairwell.
On the fourth floor, her gloved hand on the doorknob, she smiled when the door opened.
Two minutes later, she was rushing down the stairs with the rest of them, even helped an elderly woman when she tripped in her haste and almost fell.
As Jenny opened her car door and climbed behind the wheel, she realized she couldn’t remember the last time she’d heard the voices in her head.
She smiled.
The smell of freedom wafted through the open window. Starting today, she would begin her new life, a life filled with friends and family and endless possibilities.
The past was in the past. She was letting it all go.
She was ready.
Lizzy was in the car when the phone rang. It was the rookie reporter, Derek Murphy.
“Hey, Murphy. I’ve been meaning to call you and thank you for writing the story and getting the mucky-mucks over there to run it.”
“You’re welcome. But that’s not why I called. Guess who they’re bringing in for questioning in the next thirty minutes.”
She perked up. “Who?”
“I heard this through the grapevine, but I figured with your connections you might be able to finagle a way inside and get the scoop.”
“What’s going on? Who’s being questioned?”
“Jenny Pickett.”
A shot of adrenaline coursed through Lizzy’s body. “When did this happen? The investigator I talked to told me that my cookie connection theory was flimsy as best.”
“It wasn’t the cookies. They found Dean Newman. Seatbelted in his car at the bottom of the canal near Carmichael. Where are you? It’s all over the news.”
“I’m in the car on my way home.”
“Well, it shouldn’t surprise you that Dean Newman’s death looks like suicide, but he had an envelope addressed to Jenny Pickett tucked inside his pocket.”
“Had the letter been opened?”
“I don’t think so . . . not sure. But the GPS on his phone and in his car pointed to 55 Glen Tree Drive in Citrus Heights. Guess who lives there?”
“Jenny Pickett?”
“Yep, and I guess between the letter and the fact that Newman had been to her street, it was enough to bring her in.”
“Thanks for the call. I’m all over this.”
Lizzy pulled to the side of the road and keyed in the Citrus Heights address. It was 7:34 p.m. It would take her twenty minutes to get there. She made an illegal U-turn and headed for the freeway. If luck was on her side, she could get to Jenny’s house before they hauled her to the station. She would love to look Jenny Pickett in the eyes when they handcuffed her, let her know that sometimes justice really did prevail.