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Emma pulls in a breath. “And what was that, Brittany?”
“I tried to make you doubt Tom, make you worry something was wrong.... Taylor and I both did.”
Her pulse quickens. She doesn’t like where this is going.
“Taylor?” She’s keeping her voice calm, afraid that if she betrays any anger, Brittany might clam up.
“Taylor was the friend I was always hanging out with—we got to know each other after the intern lunch. She thought you were using Tom for his money and connections and wanted to get you away from him and... and she talked me into helping her.”
“Helping her with what?”
“Mostly screwing with your head. She thought you had some suspicions about Tom—because of something she told you about a dinner—and she wanted to make it worse.”
Emma feels like she’s been punched in the gut. “Make it worse how?”
“Like by saying certain things to you. And having me say things, too. So you’d wonder about him.”
For a split second she’s back in the kitchen, observing Brittany’s catlike smile and hearing her describe Tom’s love of “the long game.”
“That’s all? Just saying things?”
Brittany groans. “Uh, she had me stick a note in the door of the studio before we left for the concert.... And leave a file in Tom’s office after I told her you seemed to want to sneak in there. And—I’mreallysorry—she made me give her a key and the security code to the studio so she could get a look around in there.”
Emma sighs. She has so many answers now. But at what cost? She knew Brittany didn’t like her, but she can’t believe she would be part of such a concerted campaign to hurt her. And Tom.
“Butwhy? Why did you go along with Taylor?”
“I thought you were wrong for Tom, too, that you just liked the money. And then when I could see that you actually loved him, I tried to pull away from Taylor, but she wouldn’t let me. She said she’d tell him what I did.”
“You have to call Tom and come clean, Brittany. You can’t leave it to me to fill him in.”
“I can’t... because...”
“Because what?”
“That’s another thing I need to tell you.” She lets out another groan. “Oh god, I think he killed Taylor.”
Emma’s heart skips. “That’s not true. He had no reason to do that. And besides—”
“Hedida have reason,” Brittany blurts out. “Taylor told me she was asking him about this ski trip he took—and where he had dinner. It was the night your husband was killed, and Tom snapped at her, told her to stay out of his business. He—”
“Brittany, stop. Justine Carr killed Taylor. She was arrested this afternoon.”
“What?Then why did he snap at—?”
“He’s been under enormous pressure—there’s a lot going on that you know nothing about.”
Emma realizes as she’s speaking that Taylor must have suspected the real reason she was eager for details about the Stowe weekend, and Taylor brought it up to Tom even though Emma had asked her not to. After all, it was an additional opportunity to cause trouble, make Emma keep doubting her husband.
“Brittany, youhaveto call Tom,” she adds. “He needs to hear this from you.”
More silence.
“I will,” Brittany says finally. “I promise I will—but tomorrow. I need to think through how to say it.”
Emma manages a subdued goodbye, roiled by what she’s heard. At least it’s answered her last, lingering questions: who’d snuck into the studio that evening and how Tom’s “E.H.” file got into the home office.
As she watches Tom dart from the store with a case of bottled water under one arm, she considers filling him in herself and trying to soften the blow. But Brittany promised to do it and she needs to give the girl a chance to follow through.
