AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Josie took in a breath. “We got the DNA results back from the crime scenes. Claudia. Eve. Trudy.”
“Okay,” he said.
“The DNA of two people were found on Claudia’s person. Rafferty Sullivan and Archie Gamble.”
At the mention of Gamble’s name, a pallor appeared beneath his bruising.
“At the other two scenes, only one person’s DNA was found,” Josie went on. “Rafferty Sullivan.”
He waited for her to continue, so she did. “We know why Rafferty Sullivan’s DNA was here, in this house. He was planning an elaborate killing game in which he exposed all your secrets and killed everyone you loved. But Archie Gamble?”
She let the name hang in the air.
“I don’t know him,” Beau said. “I told you that.”
Noah said, “He was following your wife for months. We have his records. He followed her to the studio. To the practice. To The Grotto, where she was having lunch with Liam Flint.”
At this, Beau said, “Who?”
Margot piped up. “The camera operator from the show!”
“The guy with the glasses?” Beau said.
Josie didn’t answer him, instead continuing, “Gamble even followed her twice to Raffy Sullivan’s home—the one he shared with Brooke in Lenore County. It took me a while to make the connection but Gamble took notes from when he followed her. One entry appeared twice: 4342SSRR. 4342 Silver Springs Road—Brooke and Raffy’s home.”
“I don’t understand,” said Beau.
“Neither did we,” said Noah. “So we went back and looked at the timeline. You said that you’d never met Archie Gamble—”
“It’s true! It’s true. I never met the man.”
Margot stepped forward, arms crossed over her chest. “You literally have no reason to lie right now, you know that, right?”
Josie knew exactly why he was lying but they had to get him to admit it. She said, “You and Gamble had an altercation at the DMV four months before Claudia’s murder.”
“So?” Beau said, trying a weak smile. “I meet lots of people all the time, everywhere. I don’t remember it.”
“Do you remember meeting the bartender at Leo’s bar two weeks after the DMV incident?” asked Noah. “’Cause he remembers you. Quite well, actually. You didn’t exactly fit in there.”
Beau said nothing.
Josie said, “It was around that time that Margot overheard you and Claudia at WYEP arguing over a large amount of cash that had been withdrawn from one of your accounts. Thirty thousand dollars, to be exact.”
“We already discussed this,” Beau said. “I told you. Claudia took it out to give to some charity. Maybe it wasn’t the one I thought it was, but that’s what she said she was doing.”
“As you know, the women’s center never received it,” Josie said. “She actually took that money and gave it to Raffy. Well, she gave it to Brooke, because only she was there that day.”
“So what? I told you on the bridge. It was Claudia’s idea to leave Brooke there. I thought Brooke had died. I never looked back because it was too painful. I thought if either Brooke or Raffy wanted to speak with me, they would get in touch. They didn’t.”
Josie reached inside her coat and pulled out a folded piece of paper. She placed it on the table and smoothed it out. “This is a copy of the diary entry that Brooke wrote the day that Claudia showed up on her doorstep with thirty thousand dollars in cash.”
When he made no move to read it, Margot strode over and snatched it up. She read it out loud, her voice trembling as she neared the end.
“The accident lady was here again today. She brought all this money. My husband was not home. She said it was for him and I should give it to him. She said something like it was for him to keep quiet at the station. I’m not sure what station she means. Then she got upset and started crying. She said maybe I should take it and get away from him, get out of here. I don’t know where I would go. She hugged me and it felt so wonderful. I can’t remember the last time that happened. But then she said she was sorry for what she did to me. I didn’t know what she meant. Not then, at least. Even after she said that, I still didn’t want her to leave even though she kept crying. I asked her why she was crying and she smiled and stroked my hair, like a mother. It felt so good. She said her husband had withdrawn the money and she caught him with it and she thought he was going to do something very bad with it. To her. ‘My days are numbered, I think,’ she told me. ‘But maybe if you take the money, we’ll both make it out of this alive.’ I didn’t know what that meant.
“I didn’t even know who her husband was until I came to write in this diary and I saw my last several entries. Her husband is my lover. The one who hasn’t come back. He’s on television with her, and now he’s going to do something bad to her. Something to do with this money. I still don’t understand any of it, but the harder I thought about her, and about Beau, the memories started coming back. About the accident.”
Margot stopped there. She knew about the revelations on the bridge—how Beau had been in the car and unable to free Brooke. How he had called Claudia for help, and she had insisted they leave Brooke behind.
