Page 65 of Accidental Murder
“Ashley adored you. She wished she was more like you. If the choice had been hers, she would have wanted you to live.”
Kayla shook her head. No matter how he tried to appease her, her future would not be guiltless. She trudged to the window again to steal another look, and out of nowhere, a terrible theory invaded her mind. After his initial shock, Peter had become too sane. Too cool.
She spun to face him. “Aren’t you angry?”
“Of course I am.” Peter switched off the bathroom light. “I miss her. I will always miss her. But remember, she informed me, in no uncertain terms, we were through. While in Paris, I was working through the rejection phase when I heard about your murder.”
“Hermurder.”
“Yes”—he licked his lips—“but I didn’t know that. I came home because I assumed she would need a friend to help her get through the ordeal.”
“She loved you. She just couldn’t say the words.”
“No, Kayla.” Peter perched on the edge of the bed, his gaze riveted on the floor as if he was trying to keep a deep-seated pain at bay. “Be honest. She loved the idea of being in love.” He lifted his chin. Sadness filled his gaze. “I don’t mean to paint her in a bad light, but we weren’t right for each other. She spoke four languages. I speak one. She loved fine dining. I preferhamburgers.” He laughed softly. “And she was a health nut. If I smoked a celebratory cigar, she would go ballistic.” He sighed. “If only I’d been dark and mysterious.”
Kayla flashed on Richard Troy. Were her uncle’s and Eve’s hunches right? Was Troy a player in this? Could he have been the passenger in the Town Car? She’d seen something glint from within, believing it was a cell phone at the time. Could the glint have come from Troy’s silver braces? Did he kill Ashley, thinking she was Kayla, because she’d stood him up?
No. That wouldn’t explain his participation in the group that had murdered the others.
Peter patted the bed. “Lie down. You need sleep.”
She shook her head.
“C’mon. I don’t bite.” He wedged a pillow against the backboard, swung his legs onto the bedcover, and extended his arm.
After a moment, Kayla kicked off her filthy tennis shoes, climbed onto the bed, and sat stiffly beside him. He smelled good, like a mixture of oil paint and turpentine. After a long while, she said, “Ashley loved Bon Jovi.”
“And dancing barefoot in fountains.”
“And expensive chardonnays.”
“And the weirdest smelling candles.”
“Lavender isn’t weird.” A chuckle escaped Kayla’s lips as she remembered a trip she’d taken with Ashley. “One time we spent a weekend at Squaw Valley skiing. I think we were twenty-two. And—” She tried to stifle her laughter, but she couldn’t help it as images flickered in her mind like an old movie. “On the last run of the day a shadowy portion of the mountain had iced over. Ashley took a spill. All of a sudden she was skidding down the hill on her belly. She scraped her chin, but that was all. When she stood up, people going up the lift applauded, and Ashley took a bow. How she loved an audience.”
Out of nowhere, Kayla’s laughter turned into jagged sobs. Unable to stave the flow of tears any longer, she curled into Peter and let sorrow tumble out.
CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE
At the precinctMegan had asked the computer tech twice to explain the phrasedata mining. Once she understood the expression, she was convinced Ashley—or Kayla, posing as her sister—had been searching Kayla’s clients’ records because she believed a client killed her sister. But which clients had she researched?
After two more hours, as the tech continued to drum up answers, Megan sent Rodrigo home and focused on what information she did have. She jotted her reflections on a legal pad. After writing Kayla’s name in the center, she added suspects’ names around it like planets orbiting the sun:Richard Troy,William Norton,Dennis Wald. Per their history, Captain Wald had had a contentious relationship with Kayla Macintyre. He could have figured out how to slip into Ventano’s cell undetected. He had been eager for Megan to settle on Ventano so they could close the case. But then he did a huge reversal and ordered her to interview more of Kayla’s clients. She considered scratching his name off the list until she remembered how he’d tensed up at the mention of Richard Troy.
Beneath each name Megan scribbled notes.
Troy: pharmacist, blind date, set up by uncle.
Norton: CFO convalescent facility, abusive husband, wife is client of Kayla’s.
Capt. Wald: access to Ventano, Kayla’s ex-boyfriend, knows Richard Troy from car club.
She added two more names to the mix:Jacob Feinstein, Kayla’s client, andDavid Macintyre, the twins’ uncle. Both had left Ashley messages. Both had sounded desperate to touch base with her.
Below the new chart, Megan jotted two clients’ names:Timothy Jenkins, the archaeologist who had died from an allergic reaction, andSara Simmons, the bioethicist who had committed suicide. She scribbled a question mark by each. Were their deaths related to Kayla’s? She drew a line from David Macintyre to Richard Troy, since David had set up the blind date, and another line from David Macintyre to Sara Simmons because they’d worked together. She double-circled Sara Simmons’s name. Was her husband’s assumption correct? Had his wife been having an affair? Megan supposed some women might kill themselves if their husbands found out they’d cheated. Had Kayla known about it? Had Sara Simmons’s alleged lover killed Kayla to protect his secret? What if Sara Simmons’s death wasn’t suicide? What if her husband had a hand in it? Except if he’d killed her because she’d had an affair, he would have kept quiet about it and let the suicide stand.
At two a.m. she ripped off the sheet, folded it, and slotted it into her evening purse. First thing in the morning, she would visit David Macintyre. He was the sole name with three lines connecting him to the others.
Halfway across the precinct parking lot she ran into Captain Wald. He was carrying a Burger King bag in his hand.
