“Linus Sykes wouldn’t speak with you?”
“The opposite.He was quite chatty, in fact.But he wasn’t involved in Amie’s disappearance.”
“You’re certain of that?”Dawson asked.He’d stayed in the house all day while Ari travelled to Richmond to dig up dirt on Raelene Holtz.“What about the private investigator?”
“He said it’s nothing to do with him, and I don’t think he was lying.”
“The man’s a lobbyist.He talks bullshit for a living.”
“Wasa lobbyist.Now he’s more or less retired.He lives on a yacht with his boyfriend, and they run a coffee bar as a sideline.”
Dawson’s jaw dropped.“His boyfriend?”
Brax ambled in, holding a beer.“Half of Congress is in the closet, so why not those in their orbit?But Justin’s right—Linus isn’t involved.To paraphrase: he was focused on his job, he never wanted to be a father, and he couldn’t stand his wife.But he stood to lose too much in the divorce, so he just screwed around on the side while she raised Levi.”
Dawson gave a low whistle.“Damn.”
“He said the stress of the trial killed her,” Justin added.
“Which he seemed quite chipper over.He used the life insurance payout to buy the yacht.Anyhow, he said Sophy must be lying about the hundred bucks a month, and we need to work out why.”
“She wasn’t lying,” Alexa said from the doorway.“Is there any more chocolate cake?”
For someone so small, she sure did eat a lot, but I’d baked two cakes with Violet filming the whole time, so there was plenty left.
“Uh, yes, of course.I’ll cut you a slice.”
With Violet’s encouragement, I’d found myself loosening up as I baked, and the second time around, there had even been laughter.There was one roughly edited “Dear Saylor” video ready to go, but Alexa had told me to hold off on uploading it while she made some tweaks to my new social media accounts.
“How do you know she wasn’t lying?”Justin asked.
“Because I checked Amie’s bank account.She hasn’t touched it since she disappeared, by the way.”
And Ari said she’d left her stash of cash behind.That didn’t sound good.
Justin raised his gaze to the ceiling.“I don’t want to know.”
“Good, because you probably wouldn’t understand the technicalities anyway.”
“Can you see where the money came from?”Dawson asked.
“Estonia.”
“What?”
“It’s a country in Northern Europe.”
“I know where Estonia is.But why would anyone be sending Amie money from there?”
“That’s the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question, isn’t it?Well, more like the eight-thousand-dollar question, but you get the picture.”
“Can you see who owns the account?”
“A company called Kahvel Peopesa OÜ.Which doesn’t seem to trade in any meaningful way, and the name translates as ‘Fork Palm.’”
“That doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.”
“It makes no sense at all, yet at the same time, it makes perfect sense.”
