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“Reddish-brown shoulder-length hair,” Felina said.
“She’s shorter and thinner than the other woman,” Remy noted.
Crabtree turned toward the woman, a frown pulling his eyebrows low for a moment, then they shot up.
“He looks surprised for just a moment.”
“Like maybe he recognizes the woman?”
“Yeah, and then he’s frowning again.”
Remy pointed at the screen.“Watch her right hand on Crabtree’s arm.She slides it down and grips his arm.”
“We can’t see what’s happening with the other hand,” Felina said, leaning even closer as if it would help her see between the people crowded around Crabtree and the green-masked woman.It didn’t.
“No, we can’t, but her body movement tells the story.There,” Lucas said, his eyes narrowed.“She stiffens, and her left side pushes forward sharply.”
Landry paused the video.
“The police reports said Crabtree was stabbed in the chest.”
“Look at his face,” Lucas said.“His eyes are wide, surprised.”
Landry eased the video forward another second or two.
The green-masked woman said something to Crabtree, then stepped backward, fading into the crowd and out of view of the camera.
Crabtree stood for a moment longer as if suspended in time.Then he slipped below the heads of the crowd around him.At the same time, a float rolled by.People pushed toward the street, stepping or stumbling over the man on the ground without stopping to check on him.
Felina’s gut knotted.She’d just witnessed a murder.Seeing it happen in slow motion was even more gut-wrenching than in real-time.
“So, Crabtree was fooling around with a woman or two in New Orleans,” Lucas said.
“Appears so,” Landry said.
“There’s no doubt the woman in green killed him, but was the one in blue in on it?”Remy tilted his head slightly, his eyes narrowing.“Did she distract him so the other woman could slip in for the kill?”
“I can’t imagine either one of them hired Gaither to spy on the old man,” Felina said.
“No kidding,” Lucas said.“They wouldn’t have wanted any of what happened documented.”
“It leaves them vulnerable for blackmail.”
“A private investigator wouldn’t waste his time photographing a man unless he was being paid.”
“Could he have been following one of the women?”Felina asked.
Remy shook his head.“The PI’s camera was on Crabtree the entire time.The women came and went.Crabtree was his target.”
Lucas crossed his arms over his chest.“The sixty-four-million-dollar question is who paid Gaither to follow Crabtree?”
“The most logical answer would be Mrs.Crabtree,” Remy said.“She has to have suspected he was fooling around and hired Gaither to document it.”
“So, she could file for divorce and take him to the cleaners?”Landry asked.
Felina shook her head.“Even if she did have proof of his cheating, she couldn’t divorce him without losing everything.From what Missy Thornbridge told me today, Thomas Crabtree made his wife, Brenda, sign a pre-nuptial agreement that states she gets nothing if they divorce.”
“All the more reason to murder him.
