“Of course.”
Guidry’s staring me down again. “And the days following the batching? Anyone account for your presence then?”
“Claudette. People at the preschool.”
“But not consistently.”
“Never not for fourteen hours in a row, which is the minimum it would have taken me to drive up there and back.”
“Even overnight?”
I hold his stare. I didn’t do it.
“And no one can account for Micah,” he says. “We know that.”
“You think Micah did it?”
“I’ve got a dead woman who had a relationship with your husband. Two dead boys fathered by your husband. Access to benzodiazepine and death by drowning. Indications you’re attempting to purchase a house out of the country, and you’ve already gone against my advisement in coming to Key West. Not to mention your prescription for Xanax that was recently refilled, according to your pharmacy.”
“Wait, what? But I didn’t refill it. I didn’t! I didn’t like taking it. So I never took it. I wouldn’t have to refill it.”
“How tall are you, Veronica?”
“Five-eight.”
“What do you weigh?”
The question takes me aback. No one should ask it and expect an answer. But he blinks at me expectantly.
“Your license says one-thirty-five.”
“I gained a few pounds with treatment.”
“Gabrielle was five-one. Weighed ninety-five pounds.”
“Good for her.”
“You could overpower someone of that size.”
“I could. But that doesn’t mean I would, detective. I couldn’t fathom doing something like that.”
“Yet this isn’t the first time you’ve been accused of doing something like that.”
“I was a kid,” I say, voice breaking. “My mother was sick. She did it to herself, and the county record will confirm it.”
He nods, still not breaking his deadpan stare. “Benzos in a bathtub.”
“Yes.” I know this doesn’t look good. “And later with a knife.”
“Uh-huh. The knife did the job?”
“Yes.” I can’t look away. I don’t want to give him any reason to think I’m not being truthful. I have nothing to hide.
“Tragedy seems to follow you.”
“Maybe Diamante killed Gabrielle and the boys?” I offer. “Because Micah owed them money?”
“Could be.” He bites on his lower lip for a moment. “In that case, you and your daughter would be in real trouble but—”
“Someone followed us toward Wisconsin. I told you this. That’s how we ended up here. And the guy who lives through the alleyway—at least I thought he lived there—he’s working with them. He was in the house—possibly searching it—when I arrived. It might have only been a matter of time before . . .” I shudder with the thought. I let him in. He carried my daughter to bed. He could’ve hurt us.
I think of the notation on Christian’s desk. Owes Diamond Corporation 5M. He knows Micah owes big money.
“The luminol test . . . turns out it wasn’t a false positive. There were traces of blood found in Micah’s car,” Guidry says. “It’s his blood, but it appears to have been staged. The patterns aren’t consistent with a body bleeding out.”
“He staged his death? To escape debt?”
“Or it’s a ploy to collect the life insurance.”
“I didn’t know about the insurance policy,” I remind him. “And how would I get blood from my husband to spill into a car that I had no idea where to find?”
“I don’t know. Give me another scenario. How do you explain all this?”
If Lincoln works for Diamante, and if Christian Renwick is working for them, too, they’re after me for the money Micah owes. Because I had access to the safe-deposit box. Because I’m the beneficiary of an exorbitant policy. Because I’m squatting in a house where Micah might have stashed millions of dollars.
A chill runs up my spine. “Did I burn up five million dollars in the kiln?”
God, if I did . . . there’s no getting it back. If I’d known, I would’ve handed the money over, no questions asked. But now the money is gone.
I look Guidry in the eye. “If I were in on this for the insurance money, would I have burned up twice that amount?”
“Good point.”
I flash back to a night filled with mojitos and dancing and kisses tasting of Frogman ale. “Azul,” I remind him. “It was the name of a boat at the harbor by Simonton Street Beach.”
His notebook is out. “When, again, did you see this boat?”
“Maybe it’s Micah’s boat. Or Micah was on the boat. Maybe he was watching me. And then I got the phone call on the beach.” I don’t iterate that it’s possible he wanted to stop what was about to happen between Christian and me on that beach.
Suddenly, more pieces of the puzzle fall into place. “Maybe Micah was trying to lure us here, to where he stashed the money. He planted the seeds with Elizabella before he left. She knew he’d be going to God Land because he told her. How else do you explain her telling her teachers he was at God Land? I’ll bet he’s the one who called me, telling me to listen to my daughter. He was trying to get us down here.”
It makes sense. Elizabella ran off at Centennial Park, then claimed Nini thought she saw Micah. She claimed to see him near this house. He was in the trees, she said.
But if he was at first trying to save us, my recent behavior could have changed his mind. God, what kind of wife grieving her husband would do the things I considered doing with Christian? Leaving aside Micah’s own hypocrisy, have I made myself expendable in his eyes?
“And now, because I don’t have that much money here at this house, we’re in danger.”
Shell—texting Micah accidentally on the thread I began—is clearing the house in the Shadowlands. Ready to sell it. Ready to hide whatever evidence the police may have missed. She knows more than she’s telling. I can’t imagine the Shell I know supporting this kind of activity, but I can’t imagine Micah being involved in anything like this, either.
“The insurance money won’t pay out without a death certificate,” Guidry says. “And I’m not about to declare Micah Cavanaugh dead.”
“I’ll prove to you that I don’t know anything about any of this Diamante business. That I had nothing to do with Gabrielle and her boys drowning. That I don’t know where Micah is.”
“Nini, dolphins can’t live on land.” Elizabella belly laughs. “You’re so funny.”
I share a glance with Detective Guidry. “Are you going to check out the boat? Or are you going to keep wasting time, pointing your finger at me?”
“I’ll send someone to check out the boat. In plain clothes. You sit tight.”
“I don’t feel safe here.”
“I’ve got eyes on you here. This might be the safest place for you.”
If that’s true, it’s not saying much.
Chapter 53
December 8
“Nini!”
Elizabella’s shriek and subsequent laughter, filtering in from the hallway, jars me from a fitful sleep.
“Ellie-Belle!” Another little girl.
This voice doesn’t belong to my daughter. And I can’t deny I heard it.
I catapult out of Bella’s bed, where I’ve been sleeping for the past four nights since the beach incident, and trip on the toys strewn about the room on my way toward the hallway.
Silence.
I listen hard for a second or two, but when I hear nothing, I wonder if I imagined the second voice. As I make my way toward the stairs, I call to her. “Bella!”
“Nini!” Her voice echoes up the stairs.
“Bella.” I reach the staircase.
“Where’s my daddy?” my daughter asks. “He came to kiss me at night night. Kissed me on the nose.”
“Bella!” I’m halfway down the stairs now.
Elizabella’s pudgy hands are pressed to the window in the foyer; and outside, another little girl is pressing her hands to the glass, too.
I scoop up my daughter.
“Mommy! It’s Nini!”
Now that my daughter is secure in my arms, I brave a glance out at the porch, where a little girl is smiling and waving.
Bella slobbers a kiss onto my cheek. “She came out of my hair to visit today!”
There’s no mistaking the child’s red hair.
A second later, I see her mother: Natasha Markham.
She’s staring at me.