Chapter 41

41

The next morning, Monday, Catherine realizes the date. Not that it’s six days since her parents were found murdered. But that it’s April 29. With everything that’s happened, she’s lost track of time. She’s late.

Ted has already left for work, but Catherine has taken more time off. She’s glad he’s not here. She slips into the upstairs bathroom, nervous. The police had been there the day before, and she remembers how they had rifled through all the things in the bathroom cupboard. Now she takes out a pregnancy test. She removes it from its package and prepares to pee on the test strip. She tries not to get her hopes up. She’s only four days late. And all this stress—it could easily throw her off. She’s probably not pregnant at all. But she could really use some good news.

She pees on the strip and waits.

She can hardly bring herself to look. When she does, she bursts into tears.

She’s pregnant. At last.

---

•   •   •at nine o’clock, Reyes has Jenna back in the interview room. She assures him that she doesn’t need an attorney. Once they’re settled in, the tape running, Reyes says, “Easter Sunday, when you stayed an hour longer than anyone else after dinner, did your father or your mother mention anything about your father planning to change his will to leave half of his estate to his sister?”

She frowns, shakes her head. “No. There’s nothing to that—it’s just what Audrey’s saying. It’s bullshit.”

“Maybe not. Your father had pancreatic cancer. He was dying, putting his affairs in order.”

She seems surprised. “We didn’t know that.”

He looks at her steadily. “Your brother, Dan, said some things at the funeral,” Reyes says.

“Yeah, well, that’s Dan.”

“Did you know about those disposable coveralls in his garage?”

“Yes, we all knew about them, Irena too. We’d all seen him in one of those suits, when he was working on the attic.”

“Did you know he left his garage unlocked?”

“I suppose we all did. He never locked it, for some reason. Just the house.”

“He’s suggesting it was you or your sister who murdered your parents.”

She raises her eyebrows at him. “You’re not taking him seriously, are you? He’s always had a chip on his shoulder. He thinks he got it the worst of all of us, that Catherine and I had it so much better.” She sighs deeply. “We don’t get too upset about it, because he’s right.”

---

•   •   •audrey wakes in a hospital bed, wearing a hospital gown, surrounded by machines, and with an IV in her arm. For a moment she can’t make sense of it. What is she doing here? Was she in an accident? And then it comes back to her—the illness, the vomiting—dialing 911 just before collapsing on the floor. Thinking that she might be dying, slipping into unconsciousness. She doesn’t remember anything after that.

But before that, she’d been drinking iced tea, from her fridge.

She’s absolutely parched, and reaches for the paper cup of water on the table beside her and drinks all of it. She presses the call button and waits for someone to come.

---

•   •   •catherine merton arrives, with her attorney.

“Good morning,” Reyes says to her politely as the four of them get settled in the interview room. He starts the tape, makes the necessary introductions, and begins.

“Did you know that your father intended to leave half his estate to his sister, Audrey?”

She snorts. “That’s what she says. None of us believe her.”

“This wasn’t discussed at dinner that night?”

“No, of course not. Because she’s making it up. He would never have done that.”

“I’m not so sure,” Reyes says. “He tried to make an appointment, but his lawyer was away. He made an appointment for the following week, but by then he was dead.” She holds his gaze without wavering. “Your father was dying,” he says. He sees a twitch of surprise in her eyes. “Perhaps that’s why he was reorganizing his affairs.”

“I didn’t know,” she says. “What was wrong with him?”

“Advanced pancreatic cancer. He probably had only a few months.” He lets her digest that for a moment. Then he says, “We found something interesting when we were searching your house.”

She focuses her eyes on him, suddenly wary. “What are you talking about?”

“A pair of earrings.”

“You’ll have to be more specific,” she says sharply. “I have a lot of earrings.”

“But this was a pair of earrings that went missing from your mother’s jewelry box on the night she died.”

“What?” She looks on her guard now.

“A pair of diamond earrings. Square cut and a carat each. Quite valuable.” He opens the folder in front of him and hands her a picture of the earrings. She stares down at the photograph, her face coloring. Reyes says, “This is from an inventory of what was missing from your parents’ home—from the insurers.”

“I borrowed these. A couple of weeks ago.”

“Can anyone confirm that?”

She looks up at him angrily. “What are you suggesting? That I murdered my parents and kept these earrings?”

“They’re the only pieces missing from your parents’ home that we’ve found, and we found them in your jewelry box.”

“Because I borrowed them!”

“I’ll ask you again, can anyone confirm that you borrowed them?”

“No, of course not. It was between me and my mother. But I occasionally borrowed things from her.”

“Did anyone see you wear them, in the week or two before your parents were murdered?”

Here, the attorney intervenes. “She said she borrowed them. Let’s move on.”

He can’t tell if Catherine is telling him the truth. She’s a hard one to read. Her attorney, however, is looking increasingly concerned.

“Why did you leave your cell phone at home that night, when you went back to your parents?”

She looks startled. She swallows nervously. “I forgot it. I left it behind on the hall table when I picked up my keys. I-I often forget things when I have a lot on my mind.”

Reyes gives her a disbelieving look. He leans forward. “Here’s the thing, Catherine. You and your siblings stand to gain millions from your parents’ deaths. Your brother says you knew about the protective suits in his garage and that you knew he doesn’t keep the side door to the garage locked, something confirmed by your sister, Jenna. The only recovered pieces of the missing jewelry were found in your house. We know you were there again later that night—you admitted it. But first you lied about it, and had your husband lie about it too. And you left your cell phone at home that night, perhaps so your movements couldn’t be traced.”

“This is ridiculous,” Catherine exclaims hotly. “I didn’t kill them—they were already dead when I got there!” She stares back at him in the sudden silence; she seems shocked at what she’s just said.

Her attorney looks stunned.

After a long moment, Reyes says, “But that doesn’t make sense. If that’s true, why didn’t you call 911?”

She says miserably, “I think you know why.”

He simply sits there and waits.

At last she says it, her voice breaking. “Because I thought Dan did it.”