“Was I . . . ? No! Were you?” I shouted. “I mean, get all outraged if you like, HP, but let’s just have a think for a minute about where you were. ‘Play it by ear,’ you say, ‘let’s just go with the flow’?”—I knew my face was vicious—“and then you ignore me for the whole of our biggest night in Oxford and wander off with some random fucking Australian who’s clearly hitting on you. How am I supposed to feel?”
HP looked at me like I’d grown a second head. “I was being friendly! Jesus Christ, hang a guy for wanting to have some fun. You know what you are, LJ? Jealous and clingy.” He daggered a look at Freddy. “And shady with friendships.” He stalked away through the mud towards the beer tent.
I watched the back of him until he was gone.
“I’m not shady.”
Freddy readjusted his waistcoat, shaking his head at me. He didn’t reply. A moment later he’d gone, too.
chapter
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11
Novak glances at the clock on the wall. “That was cruel.”
I shrug. “Which part?”
“You toying with Freddy like that. The boy was clearly in love with you.”
I shake my head, sighing. “You’re not very good at spotting villains, are you?”
“You don’t know me well enough to tell.” He’s pleased with that one. “Has it occurred to you that HP might not be your Prince Charming? The way I remember it, Prince Charming stays all night by his true love’s side, enraptured by her, lavishing her with attention, searching high and low for her when she vanishes. Yours didn’t even buy you a drink.”
I shift in my chair. “It was Saskia’s fault. If she hadn’t shown up, the whole evening would have been different.”
“And yet you say you’re not building a motive.” He writes something down.
“Motive for what?”
He pretends he hasn’t heard. “I wonder if Lacy wishes you hadn’t shown up at the grad party.”
I frown. He pulled that one out of nowhere. “That was different.”
“Sure, okay.” Novak looks up. “So, is this where your lifetime of hating Saskia began? Oxford?”
“I never said I hated her. I said she was a thief.”
“Did you see her again before you left town?” He’s like the keen kid in the front row of the movie theater now. Suddenly my story’s top billing.
“No. Ezra called from the airport. I could hear his husky voice dwarfed by beeps and announcements over loudspeakers. HP wouldn’t speak to me.”
“How does that link to Saskia?”
“Take a guess, Detective.”
“She was at the airport, too?”
It’s tiring having to go through this again. It was hard enough the first time. “Wow,” he says. “Talk about crashing the party.”
It’s almost like he finally gets it. I hear something buzz along his belt line. He’s wearing a pager? Who uses those anymore?
Novak stands up and glances at the screen. “We need a break. Can I get you a snack, or coffee? Milk? Sugar?”
“Plain black is good, thanks.”
When he reaches the door, he turns. “Don’t go anywhere.”
Very funny. Novak leaves me alone in this room again, the blink of the video camera the only sign of life. I grab both granola bars Novak brought at the very start and eat one after the other, dropping the wrappers onto the floor.
When he returns, he’s not carrying the promised coffee. He has a bundle of letters that he sets on the table, facedown, so only the cream backs of the envelopes show. He pinches his suit pants up at the thigh before he sits, choosing his normal side of the table.
“The May Ball wasn’t the last you ever saw or heard from Freddy Montgomery?” This question feels weighted: Novak’s holding his breath.
“Is that what you have there? The letters Freddy wrote me after?”
“Can you generalize what most of these letters were about?”
“Why?” I wait for a beat. “They’re right there. You’ve read them.”
“I suspect he wrote you more than what I have here.” Novak thrums the ten or so letters with his fingernail. “You can tell me this isn’t a love story, but I think Freddy Montgomery might beg to differ.”
I feel myself blushing. “They’re not love letters. Not really.”
“Who wrote the first one?” He’s looking me in the eye a lot since he returned.
“Me. I wrote to say sorry for being a crappy friend.” Why is he so interested in Freddy?
Novak eases a fatter letter from the file, takes his time unfolding it.
“Dear Angela,” he begins. “Most certainly you are welcome at my place next weekend—I think by now we can both assume the invite’s ongoing.” Novak stops reading. “What’s he talking about?”
“His apartment. In New York. He has a nice apartment there.”
“I thought he was British.”
“Sometimes British people decide not to live in Britain.”
The muscle in Detective Novak’s jaw tightens. “We know he’s big in chemical weaponry. Biochemistry made him rich.”
“You’ve done your Googling. Yes, he’s a millionaire. He can buy apartments wherever he wants.”
He goes back to reading out loud. “I’d invite you to a ‘work do’ I have on the Saturday, only it’ll be filled with dreadful bores who’ll spend the evening quoting opinions they’ve read in The New York Times, trying to pretend they’re their own.” Novak stops. “What is it about you two that you think you’re smarter than everyone else?” Novak tosses the letter back to the table, where it spins for a second on the chrome. “Haven’t you ever met your match?”
“Not so far.” Novak’s eyes bore into my face. “Detective, you can’t seriously think Freddy’s involved in this. He barely knows Saskia.”
“He hates her, though, by default.” Novak stabs the bottom of the letter on the table. “What does this mean? Good luck navigating the unimaginative people.”
“He always signs off with that. Cross-reference the other letters, if you haven’t already.” I glance up at the window. “Freddy understands me.”
“How much imagination does it take to orchestrate a homicide, do you think, Angela? Surely there’s a lot of planning.”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“Did you two come up with a plan to show the world how clever you could be? Get us all running in circles?” He folds the letter and eases it back into its envelope. “Whoever took Saskia did it carefully. There’s no sign of struggle at her house, no blood spatter and, so far, no trace of a body.”
“That’s what I’m telling you. She’s fine! She’s just wandered off.”
“She’s a mother, Angela. They tend not to do that.”
I shrug. “You said people did all kinds of things. You said you’d seen all sorts.”
“Somebody’s taken her. This is a crime with forethought, with intelligent planning.”
“It really might not be.”
“Freddy Montgomery is a brilliant man with a background in chemical violence and a reputation as being cutthroat when it comes to business.”
“Oh, please.”
“How else do you think he became a millionaire so fast?”
“His dad gave him a massive leg up. He’s got nothing to do with Saskia.”
“We’ve asked around. Word on the street is he’s meaner than you think. At the very least, I’d say he’s an interesting resource.”
I feel heat blotch at my neck. “Freddy didn’t do anything. Just find Saskia already, would you? And leave us all alone.”
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12