Anderson looked around the large room. “This is a beautiful house.”
“Thank you.”
“You only just moved here?”
“That’s right.”
“Expensive though. And a big step up from your last home?”
“To be fair, that wasn’t exactly small either.” Marcie smiled, but not too confidently.
“It must be hard to keep up when you’re close friends with someone like William Radford. A big house. Exclusive country club fees. Designer furniture.” She paused. “A failed business. It must all add up.”
“Do you mean my boutique?” Marcie’s back stiffened. “That risk had been factored in before we started.” Her face flushed again, her tell of anger. She hoped the detective misread it as embarrassment.
“So you never argued over money?”
“No,” she answered, ignoring the memories of the fights in this very room over her expensive choices. “Never.”
“I guess it was difficult for Jason though. An older man with a much younger, beautiful wife to impress.”
Marcie laughed. “I was a waitress when we met. He didn’t have to do much to impress me. He fell in love with me, that was enough.”
Anderson nodded, as if satisfied, before becoming thoughtful. She wasn’t fooling Marcie, pretending that her questions were coming to her on the spot. This was a planned attack. Anderson was nobody’s fool.
“When did your husband get home after the party?”
“I don’t know. He didn’t wake me.” She didn’t say that he’d slept in a guest bedroom. Hopefully they wouldn’t notice that the sheets were used.
“Jason bought and refilled the coolant in Keisha Radford’s Corvette, is that correct? You saw him?”
Marcie’s eyes widened. “Well, yes, but . . .”
“And the coolant cap was loose, he said, and that had caused the leak? Is it possible, do you think, that someone could have loosened that cap on purpose? To make sure Mrs. Radford was seen learning about such a toxic substance and that it would be found in her house after the attack on her husband?”
“I don’t know what you’re . . . I don’t understand . . .” Marcie’s face was no longer flushing. It was burning.
“The grass you smoked with Keisha Radford that she’d found in Eleanor Radford’s drawer—”
“I already spoke about this with the officer who talked to me after William was found. I don’t make a habit of it and—”
“I can totally understand how you and Mrs. Radford ended up getting high.” Anderson smiled again, all faux friendship and sisterly confidence. “Two young women together. A new friendship. That’s not what I was going to ask you about. No.” She leaned forward, resting her elbows on her spread knees, a masculine pose designed to intimidate. “What I wondered was if your husband knew about the other drugs Keisha found in that drawer. The morphine, needles, and syringes. Did he know about those?”
“No,” she answered, her mouth drying even as she answered truthfully. “No, he didn’t.” She let her hands clasp together, tight and afraid. She didn’t have to fake that. “Look, this is all some kind of mistake. Jason and William are best friends. Jason would never hurt William. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t—” She was cut off as Anderson’s cell rang and the detective was on her feet, her back to Marcie. What now?
The call took less than a minute, and when it finished Marcie knew they were in trouble. There was a shift in the air. Her stomach turned to ice.
“We’re going to need a full search,” she said to her sidekick before turning back to Marcie. “Mrs. Maddox, do you have a friend you can stay with tonight?”
A friend? Keisha was her friend, but Keisha was locked up. “I think so.” Her voice was quiet. “Why can’t I stay here? What are you looking for? When is Jason coming home?”
“You’d better go and pack what you need. Detective Washington, go with Mrs. Maddox, please.”
They didn’t even trust her to get some clothes without watching her. This was bad. What had they found at the office? What were they going to find here?
She knew what they were looking for. The syringe. But they wouldn’t find it. Jason hadn’t known about the needles. Jason didn’t hurt William. Still, as she threw her toiletries, a nightie, and some fresh clothes in the duffel she’d only just emptied from Jason’s attempt at fleeing, she felt dizzy with fear.
It was only later, when she was in the cab, that she remembered. They’d been in the car on the way home after the first time she’d hung out with Keisha. After the first kiss. He’d been angry with her for getting high and she’d laughed and said it wasn’t hers. She’d told him where Keisha had found the grass. She’d told him what else had been in Eleanor’s drawer.
Jason very definitely had known about the needles.
50.
Marcie had burst into tears as soon as Iris opened the door—real, hot tears of shame and fear that made her sob loudly, surprised by her own loss of control, and she felt a rush of gratitude when the older woman wrapped an arm around her shoulder and ushered her inside to the safety of the polished wooden floor and elegant class of the old colonial mansion.
Iris had sent the housekeeper to her rooms for the evening to give them privacy, and then soothed Marcie, made her chicken soup and reassured her that it was all no doubt a terrible mistake.
Noah was out. Iris didn’t say as much but he was obviously trying to manage the shitfest of William’s attempted murder. The media was loving every sordid detail of it and Marcie knew that Jason would be all over the news by morning.
“I don’t think it can be a mistake,” she said quietly, wiping her eyes with her sweatshirt sleeve. “I don’t mean that I think Jason hurt William—God, I don’t believe that, I can’t—but the money . . .” Tears threatened to spill again. Whatever happened now, she was pretty sure her life was in ruins. The police had found something. She was going to be broke again. Back in the gutter. Jason probably going to be in prison for a long time. She didn’t have to fake how upset she was, and she knew it would be worse when the reality sank in. She’d be alone again.
But Iris, she thought as she sipped the homemade broth, was turning out to be a kinder person than Marcie had ever given her credit for. She wasn’t the snob she’d always thought. She’d had sympathy for Keisha even when unsure whether she might have poisoned William. Would she also be sympathetic to Marcie’s plight? Maybe they’d all rally around her? Make sure she wasn’t left destitute? “I mean, surely they’d have let him go by now if there was nothing?”
Iris leaned across the kitchen table and squeezed her hand. “There is no point in worrying until you know if there is something to worry about. Which I know is easier said than done.”
“But why would he steal from the firm? It’s so . . . not Jason. Do you think maybe he has a gambling problem?”
Iris sipped her tea. “The things men do never fail to surprise me. Surprise and disappoint in equal measure. Even Noah still has his moments, old as he is. They all like to keep up, don’t they? But the problem with a race is that someone is always ahead and the rest are always chasing. The keeping up is endless. And exhausting. The benefit of being as old as I am, my dear, is that you learn to stop giving a shit.”
Marcie giggled through her tears as Iris smiled. “That’s better. Nothing like an old woman swearing to make youth laugh. Now dry your eyes and finish your soup. You don’t need to get any thinner. Not while I’m looking after you.”
The doorbell rang and Marcie stiffened, her heart racing, as Iris went to answer it. What now?
Virginia. Of course it was, and Marcie heard her before she saw her, as was often the way.
“What a day, Iris. Emmett’s still talking to the police about Jason’s investments—now there’s a situation that’s floored me, I don’t mind saying.” She stopped in the doorway mid-sentence. “Oh. You didn’t say Marcie was here.”
“To be fair, dear, you haven’t given me a chance. Marcie’s staying the night.” Iris didn�
�t add because the police are searching her house and neither did she look overly happy that Virginia had shown up unannounced.
“If you’d rather, I can go,” Virginia said. “I only stopped by for thirty minutes or so.”
“Don’t be silly,” Iris said. “Let’s have a glass of wine. I think we all probably need it.”
“What investments?” Marcie asked lightly. The email to Emmett telling him to pick up his phone. Just how much of his ill-gotten gains had Jason gambled on the markets with?
“You didn’t know?” Virginia waved Iris on to fill the large glass to the top. “Although neither did I. Not my business and all, and Emmett doesn’t like to talk about friends’ money.” She took a long sip.
“What investments?” Marcie repeated, wanting to take the glass and smash it into Virginia’s too smooth, expensively plumped face.
“I don’t know exactly, I’m afraid. Some big sums apparently. High risk, high yield. Some more secure but with longer investment periods. That’s all I’ve gleaned. But now I know why Emmett was getting all those early-morning calls when we were in the islands. Jason wanted his returns or his money back. It was getting very heated apparently. Emmett couldn’t get the money out as fast as Jason wanted it. I don’t know how all this works, if I’m honest. But Emmett didn’t know that it wasn’t—” Virginia checked herself. “Might not have been—all Jason’s money. He figured Jason was playing the market to raise the money to buy William out and pay the house off or whatever.”
She at least had the decency to look slightly flustered and embarrassed as she spoke, but Marcie barely noticed. Her head was spinning. All those late-night and predawn calls? Were they all to Emmett? Why had Jason started panicking?
William came back from Europe early. Of course. Marcie’s throat constricted as if a noose were around it. A social noose for her, and potentially a literal one for Jason. Could he have tried to kill William because the audit was going to show what he’d been doing and there was no longer enough time to put it right? He knew about the syringes—although there was no way she’d be telling the police that—he knew where the coolant was, and he knew Keisha was a bit crazy and maybe even knew that William was having second thoughts. If William had told Noah he could easily have mentioned it to Jason too.
She swallowed some wine, her fingers trembling on the glass. What was the prison time for fraud or embezzlement or whatever he’d done? It was enough for Jason’s father to have killed himself rather than face it. Was it worth killing William to save himself from prison and to keep his position in this world? No, not keep. Improve it.
“We don’t know anything yet,” Iris said. “And Marcie’s worried enough.” She flashed Virginia a look. “After everything that happened with Jason’s father, and how hard Jason fought to get back on track after it, I can’t believe that it won’t all turn out to be a mistake until someone presents me with hard evidence. And you should do the same too, Virginia.”
“I was only saying,” Virginia replied, archly.
“Well don’t, dear.”
And that was that. Iris moved the conversation to tennis and the latest tornado to hit Florida and how lucky they’d been to escape it, but maybe there was something they could do to raise money for those who’d lost their homes. Virginia didn’t stay long, thankfully, a call from Emmett summoning her home like a good wife, but at least while she’d been there, Marcie had been able to zone out and sit lost in her own dire thoughts.
Would they let her see Jason tomorrow? Maybe they’d let him go. That didn’t seem likely. Investing large sums with Emmett. The office being ripped apart. Their house being searched. They wouldn’t do that to Jason if they didn’t have some sort of evidence already. He was too well connected to want to get him pissed if they weren’t pretty sure something was awry. Everyone involved in this was too well connected. Except Keisha. Had she been thrown to the wolves as a distraction?
Underlying everything, all of it, was her terrible fear for herself. Jason had said he’d thrown the yearbook away, but was it still sitting in the trash? What about her hidden box? What had he done with that? Would the police find it? Was the person who’d sent the yearbook to Jason the same one who’d tipped off the police about his fraud? And if so, why? Why try to destroy them? And why now?
“I think an early night is what you need, dear,” Iris said. “I’ll settle you into Eleanor’s room and then bring you up a hot chocolate.”
“Eleanor’s room?”
“I need to stop calling it that. But it’s the room she used to sleep in when she stayed over.”
“Did she stay here a lot?”
Marcie’s legs felt like lead as she followed Iris up the grand old staircase, her bag over her shoulder. She was dog-tired even though she was convinced she wouldn’t sleep.
“Sometimes. When William would be away for work when we were a lot younger. When the kids were small they’d all play together. Lyle was smaller but such a sweet boy. And then of course, after . . .” Iris opened a door down the corridor leading to the master bedroom. “She needed somewhere she could grieve properly. So we gave her this room to have as her own. It’s not the largest guest room, but the coziest I think. This house is too big. If it hadn’t been in Noah’s family for generations, I’d have wanted to sell and move somewhere smaller. Somewhere homier.” She sighed. “I don’t see why everything has to be so big all the time. You must feel it in that monstrosity of a house Jason just moved you into.”
Marcie let the unintentional insult slide. Monstrosity. The house had been her choice. She’d demanded it. She’d thought it was as good as this one. Maybe Iris thought this was a monstrosity too. An albatross of history around her neck. Marcie didn’t comment though, because she was too distracted by the wall of her room for the night, a room that by nobody’s standards was anything other than large, at the center of which was an oversized double bed with a huge patchwork comforter on it. A thick rug lay on either side of the bed, and away from the dresser and wardrobe, against the far wall, were four bookshelves of different heights that created a quirky skyline of colored spines. Iris was right. There was something comforting about it. The wall though, the one that her eyes were drawn back to, that was something else. So many framed photographs. So many of Eleanor and Lyle. A lifetime in images.
“Wow,” she said softly.
“William made it hard for her to grieve sometimes. He wanted to put it all away. Out of sight, out of mind. He couldn’t cope, he said.” She sighed, leaning casually against the doorframe, and in the soft yellow lighting from the bedroom lamp and the hall chandelier, there was the echo of the woman she’d been in her thirties and forties. It was hard for Marcie to imagine. But then Marcie had never imagined Eleanor as youthful and free as she appeared in some of these pictures. It took a moment before she realized that Iris was in a few too, laughing on the beach with Lyle holding her hand on one side and Eleanor’s on the other, the two women having a great time. Best friends. How nice to have a friend like that, Marcie thought with a pang of envy.
“Men always think their feelings run deeper than ours when the situation is about them,” Iris continued. “But it’s not true. They just make more noise about theirs. And they have deep feelings so rarely compared to women that the emotions come as something of a surprise to them.” She paused and then straightened up. “Anyway, there’s a shower or bath and fresh towels in the bathroom, and a robe in the closet if you need it. There’s also a TV tucked away in the cabinet by the window if you can’t sleep. Or a book, of course. But you get settled. I’ll be back up with a hot chocolate, and if you’re in the bathroom, I’ll just leave it by the bed. And try not to make yourself too upset. We’ll know more in the morning, I’m sure. Life is always better when you know exactly what it is you have to deal with.”
As she turned to go, Marcie, on impulse, called her back. “I know I’ve not always been too friendly,” she said awkwardly. “And thank you for being very kind to me. I know a lot of people
wouldn’t, given everything that’s going on right now.”
“Oh, you’d be surprised,” Iris said. “We can be funny in this town, I’ll give you that. Little things matter. Surface things can become overly important. But when it comes down to it, when the big storms come, all that disappears. We take pride in our Christian values. The real ones. Not judging others too harshly. Looking for the best in people. Fairness. Kindness. I suppose that’s why I ended up married to a judge.” She smiled. “Plus, of course, we’re all steeped in history here. Everyone has shame at some point in their family’s past. You learn to be sympathetic and not judge one person for the sins of another.”
“I found it hard being the second wife,” Marcie said. “After the divorce and everything. I always feel—felt—that everyone thought I wasn’t good enough to be part of all this. I was too coarse. Too common. Hard. Too trailer trash, I guess.” The final words were out before she could stop them. No one knew about the trailer park. Not until Jason on Saturday night. But it was only a turn of phrase and Iris didn’t show any curiosity.
“It’s hard to come into something so established, that is true,” Iris said. “But everyone worries. I remember Jacquie worrying about her Creole roots being judged. But you know what I’ve found in life?”
Marcie looked up at her from her seat on the side of the bed.
“Often what you worry other people might be thinking of you is most likely to be what you think of yourself. Be kinder to yourself, Marcie. Nobody’s perfect.”
Marcie’s exhaustion took hold fast and after barely a sip of her hot chocolate, and with the bedside lamp still on, she closed her eyes for a second and was gone. She slept deep and long and dreamless, as if the dead mother and son trapped smiling on the wall had gifted her a taste of their eternal rest, and if Iris hadn’t shaken her awake she’d probably have stayed lost in the darkness all day.
“What?” she muttered as she was dragged unwillingly back to consciousness. The lamplight had been eclipsed by streaks of early morning sunshine from beyond the shutters and drawn drapes. She squinted and looked up at Iris looming over her, resisting the urge to close her eyes again.
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