Carlson ended the call.
“Dickhead,” I said, handing the phone back to Sarita.
“What happened?”
I shook my head, too angry to repeat it. “They’ve arrested Marla,” I said. “She’s being questioned now.” I paused to let it sink in. “She’ll go to jail, Sarita. She’ll go to jail if you don’t tell the police what you know, and what you did.”
“What if they think I did it?” she asked. “I had Ms. Gaynor’s blood on me.”
“No, they’re not going to be looking at you. They’re going to be looking at Dr. Sturgess and Mr. Gaynor. Sarita, in five more seconds, Sturgess would have killed me. He was going to stick me with that fucking needle. And then he would have done you. The safest thing for you to do is tell the cops everything you know.”
She bit her lower lip, stared out her window again. “Okay,” she said, not looking at me. “I will do it. I will help. I won’t try to run away.”
“Thank you.”
“I think . . . I think running and hiding would be even harder.” She turned, and I saw that she had been crying. “At least there is good news for Marla, yes? She must at least feel good to know her baby is alive.”
“She doesn’t know,” I said. “Not yet.”
“What?”
“You didn’t actually tell her, did you? When you handed Matthew to her?”
Sarita had to think. “I . . . I guess I didn’t. I guess I thought she would just know. I mean, all she would have to do is look into the face of that baby and she’d have to know it was hers.”
That made me smile. “Marla’s not good with faces,” I said.
? ? ?
I kept glancing in the rearview mirror all the way home, and never saw the Audi. As soon as I got into the house, I’d try Duckworth again. I’d tell him why Marla was innocent. I’d tell him about Sturgess and Gaynor. What I didn’t know, I’d get Sarita to tell him.
There was a lot of it I still did not understand.
If the doctor had somehow tricked Marla into thinking her child was dead so that he could arrange for the Gaynors to have him, how had he been able to trick Agnes?
She’d been right there.
Unless she wasn’t.
No, Agnes had gone to the cabin. There was no way she wouldn’t be totally involved in everything that was going on. Aunt Agnes wasn’t someone who was easily fooled.
I was hoping to get some answers very soon, provided Agnes showed up at the house as promised.
When I pulled into the driveway, I saw Dad coming out of the side door of the garage, a beer in hand. That wasn’t like him.
He approached the car as Sarita and I were getting out. He gave Sarita a puzzled look.
“Sarita,” I said, “this is my father, Don Harwood.”
“Hello,” she said, extending a hand.
“Uh, yeah,” Dad said, accepting it, glancing back and forth between us. Maybe he was wondering if I had a new girlfriend. “Nice to meet you. So, how do you two know each other?”
“Long story, Dad,” I said. “Where’s Mom?”
“In the house someplace. She might have gone upstairs to lie down. Her leg’s been bugging her.” He looked up the street, his attention caught by another approaching car. “Hello, what’s this?”
It was Agnes. The car screeched to a halt. She got out so hurriedly she didn’t even bother to close the door. I could hear the chiming of a key left in the ignition. She came straight to me.
“You’re okay,” she said.
“Yeah,” I said. “You knew.”
Her face paled.
“You knew something was going to happen. That Dr. Sturgess was going to try something. He had a syringe, Agnes. He was getting ready to jab the thing—”
She held up a hand. “Please. I know.” She set her eyes on Sarita. “You’re the nanny.”
Sarita nodded.
“You took the baby to Marla’s house. That has to be how Matthew got there.”
Sarita nodded again.
“Because you knew,” Agnes said.
A third nod from Sarita.
“Do you know who did it?” my aunt asked her.
“Excuse me?”
“Do you know who killed that woman? It wasn’t Marla. It can’t have been Marla. Tell me it wasn’t her.”
I stepped in. “The blood on Marla’s door came from Sarita.”
“But I did not kill Ms. Gaynor,” Sarita said. “I loved Ms. Gaynor. I found her, but I would never hurt her.”
“Who, then?” Agnes asked.
Sarita shook her head slowly. “I have ideas, but I don’t know.”
Agnes looked back at me. “There are things I need to explain.”
“No shit,” I said.
“I never meant . . . I never could have imagined it would go this far,” my aunt said. “I need to tell you . . . what I did.” She took in the three of us, as if doing a count, and said, “Where’s your mother? Where’s my sister?”
“In the house,” Dad said. “You shouldn’t leave your keys in the car, Agnes.”
She was already walking toward the front door. “There’s no sense telling this any more times than I have to. Let’s find her.”
The second we were in the house, Dad shouted, “Arlene!”