Lonnie had not moved. He sat, statue-like, his mouth forming an O, his stare fixed on Jocelyn. Then he said, “She really poisoned him?”
Jocelyn nodded. “Knox knew it was the only way to get her to tell the truth. He sacrificed himself to get to the truth.”
Her voice had become hoarse, the lump in her throat making it difficult to speak.
Anita picked up the tale. “Unfortunately, Francine died before we could learn the identity of the shooter. Jocelyn spoke with a criminologist who had some ideas in terms of locating a suspect.”
Jocelyn cleared her throat. She smiled at Anita, a silent thank you. She told them what she and Whitman had discussed. Lonnie had saved all four of his yearbooks from Franklin West. They pored over them, Lonnie trying to pinpoint which male students had been known troublemakers until they had a list of five names.
“The trouble is,” he said. “I didn’t know everyone. I knew the people I hung around with. You need school records, if they even go back that far.”
“I already tried,” Anita replied. “They won’t release them to us. That’s something Trent will need to get.”
“You could go to the next closest source,” Jynx suggested.
They stared at her. She sighed, stood up, and retrieved her phone from the kitchen counter. A few taps and scrolls later, she found what she was looking for. She turned the display toward them. It was an article from their local NBC news. The headline read: Local Coach Released on Bond in Murder of High School Student. There was a photo of Cash making his way up his front walk amidst news reporters and yellow crime scene tape.
Jocelyn groaned. “So it’s out there now. What does it say about Francine?”
Jynx turned the phone back to her and scrolled some more. She read: “In a bizarre twist, just hours after Cash Rigo’s arrest in this cold case, investigators hired by the family of Sydney Adams confronted Francine Rigo in her home about her possible involvement in the death of the young student. There was a shootout that left Francine Rigo and one retired Philadelphia homicide detective dead. Police had just finished processing the crime scene about an hour before Cash Rigo arrived home. That is all the information police are providing at this time, but stay with NBC10 for the latest news and developments in this story.”
Anita checked the time on her phone. “Well, I expect that our office will be receiving about a thousand calls within the next few hours.”
“If they figure out that you’re the private investigators,” Jynx said.
Jocelyn rubbed her eyes with both hands. “They always find out. We’re taking the next few days off. Don’t even go back to the office.”
“But you could talk to Rigo,” Jynx said. “He’s home.”
“I shot his wife.”
Jynx shrugged. “So you apologize, then find out which students his wife was messing around with when Sydney died.”
They all laughed nervously until they realized that Jynx was serious. “Do you want to wait for Trent to do it?” she asked pointedly. “That man is messed up, I’m telling you. He was close to Knox. He’s not taking this well. If you want a name, the quickest, surest way is to ask Cash Rigo.”
Chapter 47
November 20, 2014
“You’ve got balls,” Cash said when he opened his front door to find Jocelyn standing there. From the street, cameras whirred and reporters shouted. She’d parked two blocks away, although the walk had weakened her resolve considerably. But now, here she stood.
There was only one way to do this. The matter-of-fact approach. “I need to talk to you.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Cash said. He tried closing the door, but Jocelyn wedged her foot between the door and its frame.
“I’m calling the police,” Cash said.
Jocelyn glanced behind her. “You sure you want to do that?”
He leaned in closer to her. “You killed my wife.”
Jocelyn kept her voice controlled and even. “I’m sorry for your loss, Mr. Rigo.”
“That’s it? You shoot my wife in our home, and that’s what you have to say?”
“I need to talk to you. Please. I don’t want to be here anymore than you want me here, but I’m trying to find the person who shot Sydney.”
At the mention of her name, his face softened. She hoped he’d be willing to talk to her for no other reason than finding the shooter would exonerate him. It was self-preservation.
He let her in.
She followed him into the kitchen, shuddering involuntarily as she entered. She looked to the floor where Knox had died, reliving every agonizing second. She didn’t even notice Cash down on his knees beside a bucket of soapy water, pushing a wet scrub brush back and forth across the floor, trying to get Francine’s blood out of the tile. “This is where she died, isn’t it? They said the other guy was poisoned, so I’m guessing he didn’t bleed.”
Jocelyn stepped closer. “You should use ammonia. Peroxide on the grout.”
He stopped, sat back on his heels and wiped his brow with a forearm. “They teach you that in private eye school?”
“I was a police officer for seventeen years. You pick things up.”
“Detective Razmus told me what Francine said. The things she . . . did.”
“You don’t believe him.”
Cash shook his head. “That’s the thing. I do believe him. Sort of. I mean some things I can believe. There was a side to Francine that was different. Like it wasn’t her. It was someone else. But I really only saw it one time.”
“When was that?”
“Right before our wedding. I—” he stopped himself. Whatever had happened wasn’t something he was willing to share. “It’s not important. My point is that she was like a totally different person. It was a shock.”
“You married her anyway.”
He laughed bitterly. “I had no choice.”
“Everyone has a choice, Mr. Rigo.”
“Not with Francine around.” He went back to scrubbing. “You know she used to watch talk shows? She loved talk shows. She liked to hear about peoples’—oh my God.” He stopped moving. Through his T-shirt, Jocelyn could see his shoulder blades draw together. “She liked to hear about other peoples’ suffering,” he went on, his voice a heavy sigh. “Of course she did,” he added, almost to himself. He resumed scrubbing, talking to Jocelyn over his shoulder in a voice laden with bone-weary exhaustion. “The more complicated and sordid the topic, the more interesting the show was to her. There was one host who used this expression all the time—Francine used to repeat it constantly—it was something like, ‘When a person shows you their true colors, take notice and don’t ever forget it.’ I don’t know, something like that.”
He looked back at her, a strained smile on his stubbled face. “Maybe she was talking about herself. I always assumed that the Francine I went to college with, the Francine I married, the Francine who lived with me here in this house all these years was the real Francine. I assumed those were her true colors. I guess I was wrong. The woman I met three days before our wedding—that was the true Francine. That’s what she was trying to tell me, I guess. You know, she used that expression about my best friend.”