“No, I’m not. This is William! He’s weak, he’s just like his father, but he’s not cruel.”
“No, he’s not.” Max had to act fast to clear Williams name. “Grandmother, this is extremely important. Find out from William’s attorney exactly what the police found in his car. I need to go to his house before the police get there with a search warrant.”
“No one’s there—Caitlin took the boys to her parents’ house.”
“Good. No one should be there. And call me or send me a text message when you find out. The faster, the better.”
“Are you going to destroy evidence?”
Max looked at her, stunned. “No, of course not.”
“But if William did what they say, we need to take care of it.”
Max didn’t know if she was talking to the same woman. “You just said you didn’t believe William did all these things. I don’t, either.”
“I don’t want to believe, but there is evidence. And if not William, who?”
“That’s what I’m going to find out.”
“Maxine, you could make it worse.”
“Worse? It can’t get worse, Grandmother.”
*
Max let herself into William’s house using the security code her grandmother gave her.
She didn’t know how long she’d have before the police showed up to search the house. If they had the warrant to search the car, they probably did it after the interview that morning. Once they found evidence of a crime, they could go back to the judge and ask for a broader warrant. She might have a few hours because it was late Friday night, but most likely the clock was ticking down fast.
She didn’t know exactly what she was looking for, but she slipped on leather gloves and started in William and Caitlin’s bedroom. Drawers, the desk, cabinets, boxes—nothing was obvious.
“Think,” she said to herself. If she were hiding something she knew she should get rid of, but was compelled to keep it, where would she hide it?
She wouldn’t. If she killed someone, she would get rid of the evidence as fast as possible.
Unless she was framing someone. Then she’d put it exactly where the police would be most likely to find it.
She went to William’s office and searched the room.
She found a 9 mm. gun in a box on the top shelf, behind WW II history books.
She left it there and went to Caitlin’s study.
Caitlin was almost as meticulous as Eleanor. She had a date book, like Eleanor’s (and probably copied her in other ways, too) but she wasn’t as detailed in her notations, or as neat. Max took a picture of the date book and sent that, along with a photo of one of Faith’s postcards, to a friend of hers who was a handwriting expert. Were these written by the same person?
On the Saturday after Thanksgiving, Caitlin had the day blocked off as time at her parents’ house. But there was no notation as to when she had returned.
Caitlin drove a Range Rover. William drove a BMW. If she took William’s car, it was deliberate.
In fact, if Max was right—if Caitlin orchestrated this entire thing—she’d wanted William to be found guilty if the investigation got this far.
William had a fight with Lindy the night she was murdered, and had Andy not messed with the evidence, physical evidence of his affair would have been on her body. The police would have looked at him—seriously looked at him.
The postcards from Carrie to Faith almost completely matched up with trips William took to Europe with Caitlin. The gun in William’s office, his car being used to transport Carrie’s remains, all of it—Caitlin had planned, that if the police got close, they would stop at William.
Just like they’d stopped at Kevin when they thought they could make a case.
Motive. Motive was the one thing Maxine couldn’t figure out. Caitlin had always been half in love with William. She told everyone in high school that they’d get married one day. Max never believed it, just the dreams of a teenager; she always thought William would go to college and find someone. Instead, he slept around and never settled down, until after college and he came home and Caitlin was here.
Max pulled Kevin’s letter from her pocket, the letter he’d left with the diary. He talked about Lindy’s last entry. Hester has returned. Max thought that meant the teacher who’d been having an affair with the headmaster. Except … what if it meant Carrie? William had never been faithful to any of his girlfriends, but it was usually the girl who got the bad reputation. William didn’t kiss and tell, it was more just by reputation that everyone knew he fooled around. And he always went back to Caitlin.
Carrie was only a year older than William, he could easily have had a fling with her. But how would Lindy have known? Was that why she and William fought?
She squeezed her eyes shut. That gave William another motive to kill Lindy.
Except. Why would he? He’d been eighteen, he wasn’t married, why would he kill Lindy to keep his relationship with Carrie a secret?
Carrie and Lindy had lunch prior to their murders. What if Carrie told Lindy about being pregnant? What if William was the father? Lindy would have been furious—at Carrie, at William, at the whole situation. Calling Carrie Hester was a bit harsh, but it fit with Lindy’s character and her obsession with keeping her secret diary in code to prevent it from getting out like it had when they were freshmen.
Olivia had said that Caitlin had been the one to show Lindy’s first diary to Mrs. Frauke, which got Lindy suspended. It had been the impetus for Lindy to write in code and be more secretive.