Confusion rises as I try to make sense of how I ended up on the ground. Damien. Preston. The Rolex. I remember Damien wasn’t wearing Oliver’s watch.
My eyes further adjust to the darkness and I’m able to recognize Preston’s silhouette. The sight triggers another memory. The silhouette of the burglar when I first confronted him in my apartment, but I blink the image away, my fresh injury causing me to swap one memory out for another. Then I see what Preston is holding in his hands. Marmee’s gun, pointed right at me.
“Preston, what’s going on?”
“This entire night has already spiraled out of control.”
My confusion is at an all-time high. Minutes ago, Preston swung the shovel at Damien; he’d been protecting me. Now he’s wielding Marmee’s gun. “What does that mean?”
“Damien isn’t the person who has been blackmailing you,” he says. “I am.”
The shock of his response is enough to send me back on my knees, but I must stay strong. Focused. Try to make sense of what he’s saying.
“I don’t understand.” Until this moment, I didn’t think Preston even knew about the blackmail. “You said Damien attacked you.”
“Not exactly,” he says. “When I came looking for him, I spotted him by the pond. He was drunk and lost. I faked my injury to throw you off the scent. I heard you playing detective with Ava, so I hid Oliver’s phone in Damien’s room for that same reason. You clearly thought he was the person who pushed Marlowe, the person sending you those notes, and I wanted to give you plenty of reasons to stay focused on him, until I could get you alone.”
I’m struggling to keep up with what’s true and what’s false. I’ve pinned my suspicions onto Damien, the outsider, all night, been piecing together clues pointing toward him. His fascination with Marmee’s trinkets. The Rolex. Doc. Finding the phone had been what solidified my beliefs.
“I know your secret, Tippi. I saw what you did to Oliver,” he says. “I have to say, I didn’t think you had it in you. But now’s not the time for me to gush. We need to finish this before the police arrive.”
I look behind me, over the body of water that disguises Oliver’s beloved Alpine. I think of the photograph that shows me standing beside Oliver’s body. My body shivers, refusing to accept that Preston knows everything.
“What exactly are we finishing?”
“What Oliver and I started. We were selling Marmee’s jewels and splitting the profits, hoping to bank a lot more after you two got married,” he says. “It’s what Oliver did, you see. With his first wife. Lots ofwomen before that. He would stick around long enough to gain their trust and access to their funds, then he’d cut a trail.”
A bizarre image appears in my mind, a procession of women, Oliver having run through them, leaving them penniless. I recall the email chain.
“Are you Doc?”
He laughs. “Doc is just a middleman. The guy who connects Oliver to different buyers. I’ve never even met him.”
Preston nudges me away from the pond, back in the direction of the house, but the journey seems surreal, the destination unreachable. My legs feel like jelly. Finding out Oliver was manipulating me was heartbreaking; I never imagined Preston was his co-conspirator.
“Why were you helping Oliver steal?”
“Ava and I are over. Have been for a long time. I need a new start, but I’ve spent all the money I made from my baseball days. I’m in more debt than she even knows about, and her party planning business alone isn’t going to save us.
“Oliver and I first met at the Social Club. We became friends. He told me he was into sales, a vague enough answer. One night over drinks, he spilled the truth. The real way he’d come into so much money at a young age. Problem was, he’d started to run out of funds, too. He was scrambling to find his next job.
“That’s when it hit me. We could work together. He’d pay me a finder’s fee, of sorts. All I had to do was help him find the right woman.”
Betrayal is a bruise at the back of my throat. “You set me up with Oliver?”
“I thought the hardest part was going to be getting you to fall for the guy.” He smirks. “As much as you like to talk about being independent, you let your guard down in a second once you thought you found the right man.”
That seed of shame I first felt when I realized Oliver was playing me returns, pulsating. I recall all our common interests, our similar outlooks on life. None of that was organic; it was part of the scam. Preston compiled everything Oliver needed to know about me from Ava,through his own friendship with me. Add that to Oliver’s natural charm and good looks—they practically coerced me into falling for him.
“Why me?”
“It’s nothing personal. You’re the richest person I know. Evelyn has lived a long life, better than most.” He waves his arms around. “I mean, look at this place. Who actually lives like this? Calls it their childhood home? The only person left to inherit any of it is you. If Oliver married you, that would put him next in line.”
“That was the plan. He wanted to marry me and be entitled to half my estate,” I say. “Then what?”
I think about the prenup, how easily he signed it. Because his intention was never to divorce me—that wouldn’t have worked out for him. I consider Danielle’s condition, and eventual demise. He was going to kill me.
“As long as he had access to your accounts and Marmee’s jewels, he didn’t need a settlement right away,” he says. “Practicality tends to go out the window once someone thinks they’re in love. Just ask Ava.”
