'Til Death Do Us Part (38 page)

“That woman is insane! She’s just making trouble.”

The cop who had escorted me out of the silo gazed at me, almost warily this time.

“I want you to follow right behind us, okay? I want to see you in my rearview mirror.”

“Of course. But just please tell Detective Pichowski I’m coming.”

I was counting on the fact that once I was with Pichowski and could explain the whole thing to him, everything would finally be okay.

I took off in my Jeep, following the patrol car. My heart was no longer beating like a madwoman’s, but I was bone tired, as if all the fear I’d felt had somehow calcified in my body. As soon as I had maneuvered onto one of the main roads, I called Peyton’s house. According to Clara she wasn’t yet home, but David was and I poured out the story to him.

“Can you get hold of Peyton and let her know what’s happened?” I asked.

The next hour was grueling. I was told that Pichowski had gone home for the night but would now be returning. He didn’t show until thirty minutes after I did, so I was left to sit by his desk in the nearly empty detective room and stare at greasy Subway wrappers and stacks of crime reports. He was pleasant enough when he arrived, though it was clear right from the get-go that he wasn’t going to fall on his knees and beg my forgiveness for having dismissed my concerns. I could tell that all his skepticism about me wasn’t going to be washed away until he’d thoroughly investigated my story about tonight and could prove it was true.

I went through everything, starting with my memory of the argument between David and Trip and working my way up to the visit to David. I made a point of emphasizing what Trip had stated about David tonight—that he was worried David would start digging into things. I knew the situation might end up being pretty bad for David professionally, and I wanted to be sure the police understood that he didn’t appear to be directly involved.

“Has Trip confessed to anything?” I asked Pichowski.

He pursed his lips in that ugly way of his. I was tempted to advise him that it was an expression he should never make again.

“I’m not able to say just at this moment,” he announced as his eyes glanced over the notes he’d taken. “Let me just be clear on several points. Mr. Furland indicated to you that he had run you off the road and attacked you in New York?”

“Yes,” I said. “He said those had been warnings.”

“What about the deaths of the three women? What exactly did he say about those?”

“I started to ask him about them, but then he heard the police car and ran down the steps. He mentioned Jamie to me. He admitted that she had called him, suspicious about the argument he and David Slavin had. He said she was a real bottom feeder.”

“But he didn’t admit to murdering her?”

“No, but it makes sense, doesn’t it?” I said. A younger-looking detective who’d been on the phone hung up and handed Pichowski something to read. I couldn’t tell if it was about this case or something totally unrelated. While Pichowski studied it, my mind replayed the evening, and I suddenly thought of Phillipa. She had said she had evidence. Possibly she’d seen Trip the day of Ashley’s death. I wanted to raise her name with Pichowski, but I didn’t feel it was fair to do that until I had talked to her myself and heard exactly what she had to say.

After Pichowski finished reading, he asked what my plans were for the evening. It had occurred to me as I was driving to the police station that I would love to head straight back to New York tonight. But I was exhausted.

“I’m going to be staying at Peyton’s home tonight,” I said.

He told me that the case was still coming together, and he wanted me to be available tomorrow for another discussion.

“About what time—do you know?” I asked. “I need to arrange my schedule.”

“Unfortunately, I can’t say. It depends on a variety of factors. Why don’t you just plan to be around the whole day.”

It was after ten when I finally showed up at Peyton’s. I wanted to call her en route, but I was too fatigued even to take out my cell phone. David answered the door, dressed in black slacks and a blue cashmere cardigan, kind of like Mr. Roberts, Lotto winner. A second later Peyton came charging into the hall, wearing minty green sweats. David took my coat and suggested we retreat to the library, where a few small orange embers still glowed in the hearth. I was dying for a cup of tea, but the help had apparently been discharged for the night and Peyton wasn’t volunteering. Instead, I poured myself a glass of sparkling water from the tray on the bar and drank the entire glassful down in two seconds.

“You’ve got to fill us in,” David said as I wiped my mouth with the tips of my fingers. “What exactly happened?”

“Just let me sit down first,” I said. “I don’t think I’ve ever felt so exhausted.”

After crashing onto the sofa, I described what had happened, just as I had for Pichowski. David wore a scowl through most of my recounting; Peyton listened intently with the tip of her thumb pressed hard against her teeth.

“This is perfectly dreadful,” David said. “And it sounds as if I triggered the whole damn thing by calling him.”

“You told him I’d driven out to the farm?”

“Yes, and I’m sorry about that—it was totally inadvertent. I called him after you left and asked him point-blank if there was any connection between the deaths and the conversation that he and I had the night before the wedding. I think I said something about the fact that you and I were going to talk again after you got back from the farm—never imagining him bounding out of bed and heading out there to find you.”

“But why did he kill
Ashley
?” Peyton demanded, speaking up for the first time.

“Ashley?”
David said with a look of impatience. “Why, for god’s sake, did he kill
all
of them?”

I revealed my theory about the blackmail.

“I think that’s how Jamie got the money for her business. She threatened to go to the SEC or the IRS. Granted, she didn’t have any proof, but she had the name of the company, Phoenix, and Trip knew she could have directed the authorities that way. My guess is that Jamie said enough to Robin to make her, first, suspicious that Jamie’s death wasn’t an accident and then, later, suspicious of Trip. She possibly put it together and said something to him. He was apparently hanging around her this fall. Maybe he simply
suspected
she was getting closer to the truth. I’m not sure.

“As for Ashley,” I said, turning toward Peyton, “she’d been digging into Robin’s death, saying to people that she thought Robin and Jamie were murdered, not the victims of accidents. She was a clear danger to Trip. Just for the record, though, Trip never acknowledged anything to me about the murders.”

Peyton pressed her thumb to her teeth again. She seemed oddly subdued tonight. Knowing Peyton, knowing how in her mind all roads always led back to her, I wondered if she was pondering how tonight’s events would impact David’s business and then her own life.

David sighed. “You’ve got to tell me, Bailey. What exactly do the police know about Trip, and what he was up to at Slavin Capital?” It was as if he had read my mind.

“I had to tell them what I knew, David. But Trip indicated that this was something he was into by himself, and I made that clear to the police.”

“All right,” he said, suddenly distracted. “I think it would do us all good to turn in right now.”

“I’ll be the judge of when I need to go to sleep,” Peyton snapped.

“Actually, I think I
will
head up now,” I announced. I could understand why things would be tense tonight between Peyton and David, but I had no interest in sticking around to watch matters deteriorate.

“Of course,” Peyton said, turning back to me with a solicitous smile. “Feel better.”

The first thing I did when I got upstairs was to pour myself a hot bath. Even though the night wasn’t especially cold, I’d started to shiver, and I felt achy all over. I wasn’t sure if it was the early stages of a flu virus or the aftershocks from all the stress I’d experienced tonight. I lay in the hot, sudsy water for half an hour, my mind churning. What, if anything, had Trip admitted to the police? Did they have any evidence whatsoever to tie him to the murders? Would they at least be able to charge him with running me off the road? And what had he meant when he’d yelled, “You just don’t get it, do you”? What didn’t I get? I needed to reach Phillipa first thing in the morning. She might have information or evidence that would help nail Trip.

I lifted myself with a groan from the tub and changed into cotton pajamas. This was my third night at Peyton’s in two weeks and only the first time I actually had an overnight bag with me.

I switched off the lights and lay in the dark, working over even more questions. Would the police notify the SEC? How big an impact would this have on David’s business? For that matter, how big an impact would it have on his marriage?

I felt hopelessly tired but at the same time wide awake—and still a little frightened. I could only hope that David would never be stupid enough to let Trip into the house if he showed up tonight, his bail posted. I also found myself thinking of Jack. How nice it would have been to be able to call him right this minute for comfort. I wondered if there would ever be a point in the future when we would be friends, when I could phone him some night for some shrink advice for an article I was doing, not minding that there might be a half-naked chick sitting beside him on the couch. Right now the thought of Jack with another girl made me feel like puking.

I tossed and turned for what seemed like hours. As I finally started to drift off, a thought flashed in my mind: Jamie’s photographs. Now that I knew Trip was the killer, how did the photographs fit into everything? Was the shot of Trip talking to that man significant after all?

Once I finally fell asleep, I was out cold. When I awoke to gentle knocking on my door, the bedroom was filled with a soft gray light that signaled it was way past my usual wake-up time. I yelled out, “Yes?” at the same moment I squinted at my watch. To my dismay, it was ten forty-five. As I pushed myself up in bed, Clara opened the door and stuck her head in.

“Good morning, Miss Weggins,” she said. “Sorry to wake you, but I thought you might want to be called now.”

“Gosh, I can’t believe I slept so long. Has Peyton gone to work?”

“I’m not sure, but she left a note for you.” She pulled from her pocket a folded piece of stationery in a pale shade of yellow and handed it to me. Peyton had written to explain that she was conferencing with her PR team for a few hours this morning but would return to the house after lunch. She suggested that since I was stuck in Greenwich for the day, we might take a walk together in the afternoon.

“Okay, thank you, Clara,” I said, refolding the note. “Is it possible for me to get some coffee?”

“There’s breakfast laid out for you in the kitchen. And by the way, Ms. Cross’s cousin Phillipa called for you. Twice.”

I thanked her and told her I would take care of it. After staggering out of bed, I phoned the farm on my cell and asked for Phillipa. She was off buying supplies and wasn’t expected back until midday. Over the next two hours I showered, ate an omelet prepared by Clara, roamed the house and waited anxiously for calls from Pichowski and Phillipa. Finally, close to one, Phillipa phoned.

“I have to talk to you,” she said as soon as I picked up. “It’s more urgent than ever.”

“Did you hear about Trip?”

“Yes, yes. Everybody’s talking about it. And that’s why I
have
to see you as soon as possible.”

“Did you see Trip that day—the day Ashley was killed?”

“I can’t do this on the phone,” she said, “I have to meet with you in person.”

“All right.” I sighed, frustrated by her continual dangling of this carrot in front of me. “I probably shouldn’t leave the house, since the police said they might need to talk to me again. Could you get away for a while and come over here?”

She hesitated. “Yes, I guess so. Peyton’s gone off somewhere.”

I figured it wouldn’t take her long to drive to Peyton’s since she was probably familiar with the back roads, and I was right. She arrived in less than fifteen minutes as I stood in the giant hallway finishing a cup of coffee. I’d grown so used to
sour
Phillipa that I was shocked to see how drawn and panic-stricken she looked today. The expression on her face seemed to say she suspected that nearly everyone she knew had been body-snatched and replaced by alien imposters grown in giant seedpods.

Since Clara was at work in the kitchen, I suggested we go down to the library to talk. But a maid was buffing away with something lemony, so Phillipa, still wearing a long tan raincoat that made her seem even shorter, led me to a room she knew of toward the back of the house. Decorated in shades of purple and lavender, it was a small sitting room that I’d never noticed before—the kind of undesignated room you could find only in a house as huge as this one.