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“It’s my shampoo,” she’d told him.
He’d smiled and said, “No. It’s you. Promise me you’ll always keep your hair long.”
The two men she had loved most in the world had loved her hair. Her heart pinched, and she forced their images away.
She tried to think of what else she needed to do. She had to get her hands on some money. If she could get in touch with Vanessa Cromwell, she might lend her enough to get by. When Dania had been convicted, Vanessa must have felt bad that she’d recommended Leonard Goldman to represent her because she’d helped sort out Dania’s finances and hired someone to look over the house. Dania and Matthew’s home. Flashes of seeing her husband lying dead on the floor and then the intruder grabbing her and throwing her down returned.
She rubbed her forehead, fighting against the nightmare. No good would come from reliving that agony. Maybe she needed to go to the house to face the memories head-on.
No! That was the first place the police would look for her.
She’d figure something out.
Vanessa might lend her money to pay for a room somewhere. How would she get in touch with the woman? Dania didn’t have access to a phone. Maybe she could meet Vanessa on her morning jog or on her way to her car either at her home or the office. Whatever place she chose, Dania had to catch Vanessa where there would be no danger of anyone recognizing her.
But what if Vanessa tried to get her to turn herself in? Come to think of it, that was exactly what she would do. Maybe Dania couldn’t go to Vanessa for help.
Val? He liked living life on the edge. He’d been so supportive during her trial. He’d lend her money now without question. The problem again was how she could get in touch with him without getting caught.
Her escape would be all over the news: TV, papers, internet. So, the very first thing she needed to do was change her appearance. But to do that, she’d need money. And how would she get money if she didn’t ask Val for help first? Her thoughts were going in circles and getting all mashed together. She had to stop spinning and focus.
She took a deep breath. First, she would find some way to change her appearance. There. With that settled as the top priority, she turned her thoughts to what she’d do next. The desire to see her son burned strong within her, but she couldn’t risk doing that yet. Her main goal was to find the man who had murdered Matthew.
After all these years, finding the man would be no small task. Many times in prison, she had wondered if the old feud between her family and Matthew’s had been the cause of Matthew’s death. But that would mean someone from her family had killed him, and that was impossible. All her distant relatives had moved away from Montana, and as far as she knew, they had little interest in ever returning. Besides, they wouldn’t kill the man she loved. There had been no reason to.
She rubbed her brow. How did she expect to find a man missing his ring and pinkie fingers if the police couldn’t?
Had her father-in-law stopped the authorities from looking? He hadn’t believed her story about the man breaking into her home and using her gun to shoot Matthew. She should have made more of an effort to get along with Walter before they’d lost Matthew, but there was no way she could right the wrongs of the past, and that was what he’d wanted. She’d had to move forward without Walter.
Maybe she should start by talking to Sherry, Matthew’s secretary. Though her testimony had been devastating at the trial, Dania knew she was only telling the truth as far as she could remember. There had to be some way to jog her memory.
And suddenly, Dania knew. She almost sat up in the RZR, she was so excited.
Matthew’s day planner! He liked to keep a handwritten bullet journal.
Even though Vanessa had constantly teased him for not using the planner in his cell phone, which he did, he used his binder as a backup. Dania had pleaded with Leonard to look for it, but he’d said it couldn’t be found. The police didn’t have it, and it wasn’t at the house.
The last place Dania had seen it had been in Matthew’s home office. After his death, there must have been a lot of people coming and going from their house. Mainly police. No. Not just them. Matthew’s father had probably paid a visit. Would Walter have taken his son’s planner?
A helicopter flew overhead, interrupting her thoughts.
Life-flight?
Her mind went to Olivia. Life-flight would have taken her to the nearest hospital hours ago. She’d lost a lot of blood and had been so pale. But Dania had seen many patients in worse condition pull through. Besides, Olivia had to have a lot of grit to become a U.S. Marshal. She had it in her to fight for her life.
U.S. Marshal. Brett’s face came to Dania.
She could almost hear Matthew telling her that Brett had been through a lot in his life, what with his father killing his mother. That was why Brett had lived with his grandmother. When Dania had first heard this, she’d felt bad for the way she’d treated Brett. His father was a real piece of work, not only selling drugs to her poor mother but then killing Brett’s mother too.
Even after years of being married, Dania had never told Matthew that her mother had died of an overdose. She hadn’t wanted to visit the pain of the past, so she’d just listened to Matthew tell her how the kids at school had tormented Brett. But Matthew had seen something in him that others had missed. He’d told Dania of a time when he’d caught Brett feeding scraps of his lunch to an alley cat. Any kid who cared about a feral cat was someone he’d wanted as his friend.
The truck slowed and came to a stop, bringing her back to the here and now. She took a chance and peered above the seat.
A roadblock. They were behind about twenty cars.
She couldn’t stay here. They’d search the RZR for sure.
She had to make a run for it.
