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“Not Becky, nitwit. Mrs. Merritt.”
Barrie set down her mirror and took the telephone receiver back into her hand. “Mrs. Merritt?”
“Ain’t that what I said? Vanessa Armbruster Merritt.”
Surely she’d missed something. With one eye on the clock, one on her mirror, and Charlene chattering in her ear, she’d missed a vital segue. “Are you saying you told Vanessa Merritt about Becky Sturgis?”
“Duh!”
“When, Charlene?”
“When what?”
“When did you speak with her—when did you tell her about Becky Sturgis and her baby?”
“Let’s see now. It was after Becky told me, of course. Must have been shortly after Mrs. Merritt became First Lady.”
“Charlene, if this is one of your tales—”
“You’re my friend. I don’t tell tales to my friends.”
Barrie’s mind was spinning. “Let me be sure I understand. You told Mrs. Merritt, the First Lady, about Becky Sturgis—about her involvement years ago with David Merritt?”
“All of it. Just like I told you. I told her that David Merritt had killed Becky’s kid and that the senator had covered it up for him.”
Barrie placed her elbow on her desk and rested her forehead in her palm to stop the room from whirling.
“I wrote her letter after letter,” Charlene went on, “warning her that she was married to a killer, but she ignored me. At least I thought she did. Then one day, she calls me up here at the prison. Gave a false name, of course, but left a number where I should call her back collect. We talked for half an hour or more. Pissed off the ladies waiting in line to use the phone, but I told them to screw off.”
The clock on Barrie’s desk was ticking, but not as loudly as her heart. She swallowed a surge of nausea.
An assistant producer poked her head through the door of her office. “Barrie? Ninety seconds.”
Barrie acknowledged the notice. “Charlene, didn’t you tell anyone that the First Lady had called you?”
“Course I did!” she exclaimed. “But you think they believed me?”
The woman who’d been Robert Redford’s college sweetheart and had borne Elvis’s love child? Who would have believed her?
“So…” Barrie couldn’t hold a thought. “So…”
“Barrie?” The assistant producer reappeared. “You okay? We’re on in one minute.”
“I’ll be right there.” Then she said to Charlene, “So after you told her the Becky Sturgis story, what did she say?”
“She said to keep it between us and stop writing her letters or she’d sic the FBI on me. I said she could come down here, meet Becky, and hear the story for herself, but she said no, she couldn’t do that. She said it had happened a long time ago and that it probably wasn’t true anyway. Made me mad as hell, me going to all that trouble to get in touch with her, and her not even heeding my warning. Less than two years later, she comes up pregnant. After what I told her, she still went and had a baby with that man. She must be crazy.”
Vanessa Armbruster Merritt was anything but crazy.
Barrie, please help me. Don’t you know what I’m trying to tell you?
What if her motive was plain ol’ everyday spite?
I did not kill Robert Rushton. She did!
About that, David Merritt had been telling the truth.
She’s the crazy one.
