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Josie pointed to his scarf. “That’s a very nice scarf, Mr. Flint. Where did you get it?”
Behind his glasses, his eyes bulged. “It was a gift.”
“From Claudia?” she asked, even though she already knew. The day Claudia had saved Harris from a bike-on-pedestrian accident, one of the items in her bag was a tan cashmere scarf exactly like the one Liam now wore.
He stared at them for a few seconds, letting go of the scarf. “I really have to go,” he said.
“Claudia gave you that scarf, didn’t she?” Josie pressed. “For Christmas.”
He said nothing, slowly inching away from them. For a moment, she wondered if he was going to run. At the end of the hall was a door marked EXIT.
“You like to play golf, don’t you?” she asked.
Confusion lined his face at the sudden change in subject. “I, uh, I—yes, but how did you know that?”
Liam gave the exit door a furtive glance. Josie kept pushing. “Claudia also gave you a set of golf balls and tees for Christmas, didn’t she?”
“It’s not what you think,” he blurted out.
Noah said, “You’ve taken Claudia’s murder hardest of anyone on the show. You clearly haven’t been forthcoming with our team in terms of your relationship with Claudia. Mr. Flint, it kind of looks like you and Claudia were having an affair.”
Liam looked stricken. “That’s not true. We absolutely were not.”
“But obviously Claudia was very special to you,” Josie said.
He hung his head. “She was, yes. I was in love with her, but we weren’t having an affair. It wasn’t like that.”
Noah said, “It sounds like it was.”
Liam shook his head. “It wasn’t. I swear to you. It’s not what you think. Believe me, I wanted to consummate our attraction, but Claudia would never do that. Not while she was married to Beau.”
“There was something between you,” said Josie. “Did Claudia feel the same way about you?”
“I believe she did, but we never crossed the line.” They must have looked unconvinced because he added, “I don’t expect you to understand.”
Josie let the silence do the work, waiting to see what Liam Flint would say when he felt compelled to fill it. Finally, he whispered, “He did it, you know.”
Before Josie or Noah could respond, a woman came striding around the corner and down the hall toward them. Josie didn’t recognize her, but she barely gave them a glance, passing them with a curt nod and disappearing into a room near the end of the hallway.
Once the door closed behind her, Josie said, “Who did what?”
Liam kept his voice low. “Beau Collins made his secretary take that job application out of a stack of outgoing mail so that Claudia wouldn’t be considered for that job.”
Noah asked, “How do you know that?”
Liam took a deep breath. “Claudia told me.”
Josie said, “Claudia knew about the application?”
“She always suspected that Beau had sabotaged her application, but she could never prove it. Then, a few months ago, Trudy confessed to it.”
Josie said, “What happened a few months ago?”
“They got their first offer to go national with the show,” Liam said. “Apparently, Trudy was worried about her job. She told Claudia she was afraid that if the show got any bigger, Claudia would have to close the practice. Claudia said she would never do that. That’s her favorite part of the work. That was always the rule between her and Beau. They could do whatever he wanted—a book, a show, a podcast—but she would maintain her practice no matter what. That’s when Trudy said that Beau would get what he wanted no matter what he had to do. Claudia asked her what she meant by that and after some discussion, the whole thing came pouring out. At the time that Trudy took the application, Claudia was only part-time at the practice. Everyone knew she had no intention of staying and that she wanted to work with domestic violence survivors. She put the application package into the outgoing mail bin. Beau convinced Trudy to take it and destroy it.”
Josie said, “Trudy just went along with this?”
Liam shrugged. “Haven’t you guys seen Beau on television? He can be pretty convincing. Besides, Trudy got a raise and job security out of it.”
