“I’m intuitive,” Luanne said.
“No,” I walked over to Dylan. He handed me Jennifer’s journal. “You’re nosy. Recognize this? If you were snooping through Jennifer’s journal, then chances are you were snooping through her mail too. You’ve got your own key to the house. You had access to Ned’s and Jennifer’s itineraries. You knew when the were home and when they weren’t.”
Luanne paled, but she lifted her chin. “Someone had to protect Ned!”
“It’s too bad no one protected Jennifer,” I said. “You knew about this journal when no one else did.”
“Luanne?” Ned said in disbelief. “You … you spied on my wife?”
“I had to. Don’t you see, Ned?” she implored. “I always knew that little tart would betray you. So I did what I did to protect you.”
“How … how much protecting did you do?” Ned asked, his voice trembling as if he was afraid of the answer. “You’ve never lied to me before, Luanne. Please don’t start now.”
Luanne’s bottom lip quivered. But she squared her shoulders as she answered. “Over the years of your marriage, I’ve read all of her mail. Every letter she put in that desk drawer, I’d sneak in here and read it. And of course, I read her journal. Kept track of her activities. But I did it all to protect you, Ned!”
Billy glared at her. “You bitch! You killed her!”
In a flash, Billy was on Luanne; his hands wrapped around her throat. Almost as quickly Dylan and two male cops pulled him off of her.
“How could you kill her?” Billy shouted, straining in the grip of the two officers. “How could you do such a thing?”
“I didn’t!” Luanne shifted her gaze from Billy to me. “Ms. Dodd, you’ve got to believe me. I didn’t kill Jennifer.”
I nodded slowly. “I know you didn’t.”
Chapter 20
You know, I don’t normally enjoy being the center of attention.
Ahahaha! That is so not true. I just love being the center of attention. Smack dab in the middle of it. Like right about now. No one in the room was entirely sure where I was going with this. Well, no one but me, Dylan, and possibly now the murderer.
After Luanne’s denial of guilt and my attestation also to her innocence, the room was so quiet you could hear the proverbial pin drop. I mentally broke into a chorus of Queen’s We are the Champions but thought better of actually belting it out loud. Too cocky, even for me. And besides, I had a ways to go before I was home free on this.
But things were definitely moving along.
And every set of eyes in the room was on me. I felt them. Some more than others. Dickhead, of course, was glaring at me. But I have to give him credit; he’d been quiet while I had my say. He might not know where this was going, but he wasn’t so stupid or vindictive as to stop me. Not when there was murder involved. Not even he would stoop so low as to let a killer go free just to bust my ass. And I could tell by the set of his jaw and the way he was listening to me, that he knew I was on to something.
As I stood taking a deep breath before continuing, I heard Ned’s mother mumbling. “I don’t know … I know that face from somewhere. Somewhere recent….”
Oh shit.
Jeremy Poole sat in the corner, so pale and still he could have been a wax statue. Elizabeth Bee sat perched on the edge of her chair, waiting to see what would happen next. Rochelle and Judge Stephanopoulos remained in the doorway, watching intently from the periphery, but not missing a thing.
Dylan was looking at me too, of course. I’d catch his eye every once in a while. I saw the encouraging nods. The hint of a smile. And I liked that. It felt good to be on top of my game while he watched. Strangely good. Weirdly good.
Cautiously good, Dix, I reminded myself. Cautiously good.
I let my gaze sweep again over the people assembled, each with their own agendas and fears and loves. Ah, yes, love. What a crazy thing it was. It could make us laugh or cry. It could scare the crap out of us or make us feel renewed. Make us feel stupid and brilliant all at once. It made old men pat their wives’ hands and call them ‘Dearest’. And as I knew all too well, love could break our hearts. It could turn us into romantic fools. And, yes, it could turn us into murderers.
+++
“Well!” It was Mrs. Presley’s voice that broke the silence. “If that don’t beat all! I had the secretary pegged for sure.” She nudged Dylan. “Just look at those beady eyes on her, will ya.” She opened her purse, turned toward Kenny Kent the baker, and handed him twenty bucks. “You won that bet, Baker Boy,” she said. “Double or nothing on Round Two?”
Swiftly pocketing the money, Kent replied, “I’ll quit while I’m ahead.”
Luanne wasn’t my favorite person in the world, and Billy Star wasn’t topping my warm and fuzzy list either. But neither of them had killed Jennifer. I was sure of it. Despite his initial reasons for wooing Jennifer, Billy had loved her too much to hurt her, and Luanne loved Ned too much to hurt him.
I began again. “You’re all forgetting something here. Whoever killed Jennifer, also did a damn good job of covering their tracks. Arranged for a mysterious Flashing Fashion Queen to come to my office disguised as Jennifer, and ask me to tail Ned Weatherby for the week. And I had to wonder why.”
“To frame you!” an enthusiastic Mrs. P shouted.
“That’s exactly what I thought at first, Mrs. Presley. But then I thought maybe it was more. Maybe it was so that Ned’s whereabouts would be alibied very carefully. So that he couldn’t be blamed for the murder of his wife.”
Ned looked at me, clearly shocked. “Surely … surely you don’t think I hired someone to pose as Jennifer, then killed her myself?”
“Actually, Ned,” I said. “That very thought has crossed my mind.”
“Ms. Dodd!” Jeremy Poole leapt to Ned’s defense. “If you’re going to accuse my client of murder, I’d make damn sure that you know just what you’re getting yourself into here. With all the charges against you now criminally, I don’t think you really wish to add a civil suit to your legal woes. As Mr. Weatherby’s legal counsel I must advise him not to participate in any further discussions with you here today. In fact, I strongly suggest to Detective Head that this meeting is a sham, a travesty, and that this meeting should be over.”
“Oh, I’m not accusing Ned Weatherby of murdering Jennifer Weatherby, Mr. Poole. Not at all. As I said the thought crossed my mind, then kept on walking.” I turned and walked over to the lawyer. “I’m accusing you.”
“Yes!” Elizabeth Bee hissed, pumping her arm in the air. She held her hand out flat and Mrs. Presley grumblingly pressed a twenty-dollar bill into it, which Elizabeth quickly secreted into her bra.
“What the hell are you talking about, Dix?” Dickhead said. But he didn’t say it with quite so much of a snarl this time. He didn’t say it with a ha ha belly roar of a laugh. He said it like a man who wanted to hear what I had to say. I had his attention.
Hell, I had everyone’s attention.