Fullepub 
Chapter 51
51
As Reyes and Barr approach Ellen Cutter’s modest but well-kept bungalow, Reyes muses about what kind of woman she is. She’s certainly able to keep a secret.
The door is opened by a woman in her early sixties. They produce their badges and introduce themselves. “May we come in?” Reyes asks.
She lets them in and they all sit down in the living room.
“We’re investigating the murders of Fred and Sheila Merton,” Reyes says. “We understand that your daughter, Rose, is the biological child of Fred Merton.”
“Yes, she is,” she answers a trifle sharply.
“We’re not here to dispute that,” Reyes says. “She shares equally in Fred Merton’s will with his other children.”
“Yes. It was quite a shock to learn that,” she says. “I just found out yesterday. Rose told me.”
“You had no idea that your daughter was a beneficiary?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Where were you on the night of April twenty-first, Easter Sunday?”
She seems taken aback. “What? Why?” He simply waits. “I was at home. My sister came, and my daughter, for Easter dinner. Rose left, but my sister stayed over and went home in the morning. She lives in Albany. Why are you asking me this?” He looks at her steadily. She gives a short laugh, uncertain. “You’re wondering if I killed them? That’s ridiculous.” She looks nervously now from Reyes to Barr, as if unsure of her footing.
Reyes explains. “Fred Merton had decided to change his will, cutting his children out of half of his considerable fortune.”
“How would I know that?” Ellen says.
“Because your friend Audrey Stancik told you.”
He notices her surprise, watches as she loses some of her assurance. “Maybe she did, I don’t remember,” she says, trying to be offhand about it. “But I had no idea Rose was in the will at all. I had nothing to do with this.”
He lets a silence fall, waiting to see if she’ll fill it. She does. “My sister stayed over that night, as I said. She didn’t go home until the next morning. You can ask her.”
“What about Rose? When did she leave?”
“About eight o’clock.” She reads their faces and says, “Rose didn’t even know Fred was her father till after he was already dead.” Reyes says nothing. “My daughter has nothing to do with this,” Ellen says dismissively. “Maybe you should look at the other children, the ones who knew they were going to inherit.”
Reyes isn’t going to tell her that her daughter is about to be arrested for fraud. He’ll leave that to Rose. But he can’t resist saying, as they leave, “Maybe you don’t know your daughter as well as you think you do.”
• • •ellen watches the detectives as they leave. Audrey’s behind this, she thinks, she must be. Audrey must have told them she’d told Ellen about the expected change to the will. And now Audrey’s turned on her—pointed the police at her and Rose, because she’s angry about Rose’s inheritance. That’s just crazy. Audrey is one of her oldest friends. She thinks bitterly, you really can’t trust anyone, can you?
She tries to call Rose, but there’s no answer.
• • •walter temple looks up from his desk and watches Janet Shewcuk scurry down the hall past his office with her head down. He stares after her, and it strikes him suddenly that she’s been avoiding him these last few days. The feeling of uneasiness that’s been tapping him on his shoulder lately now circles around and stares him in the face. He’s felt concerned ever since he met Rose Cutter. He turns to his computer and looks up where Rose Cutter went to law school, and when. He does the same for Janet Shewcuk, his junior associate.
Then he sits back anxiously in his big leather chair, dreading what he must do. He closes his eyes for a long moment and asks himself if he can just do nothing. Then he opens his eyes, pulls out the card from the top drawer of his desk, and calls Detective Reyes.
• • •the receptionist at Temple Black directs Reyes and Barr to Walter’s office as soon as they arrive. Walter looks as if he has something heavy weighing on his mind, Reyes thinks.
“What is it?” Reyes asks, as he and Barr seat themselves across from the attorney.
Walter sighs wearily and says, “Two or three months ago, I asked my junior associate, Janet Shewcuk, to do a wills review for Fred and Sheila Merton. It was coming up to five years since they’d looked at their wills and we usually do a review around that time.”
“Go on,” Reyes says.
“Yesterday, Rose Cutter was here to talk about the will. And something didn’t seem right.”
“Like what?”
Walter shakes his head. “I don’t know. Something was off. I just didn’t believe her—that she didn’t know about any of this.” He bites his lip pensively. “It’s been bothering me ever since. Then I did some digging and discovered that Janet and Rose had gone to the same law school at the same time.”
“And you thought they might know each other,” Reyes says, “and that she might have told Rose what was in the will?”
Walter nods miserably. “I thought maybe it would be better if you asked her.”
Reyes says, his pulse quickening, “Let’s talk to her.”
“I’ll get her for you,” Walter says and leaves his desk.
A couple of minutes later he returns to his office with a young woman in a gray suit, her blond hair pulled back in a neat ponytail. He pulls out a chair for her as she sits down nervously, then he introduces the detectives. When Janet Shewcuk realizes they’re detectives, she is clearly frightened. When Reyes tells her they’re investigating the Merton homicides, she begins to tremble.
Reyes says, “We understand you’re familiar with the Merton wills.” The young attorney flushes a guilty red. He waits.
“I reviewed them,” she admits, going redder still.
“You don’t happen to know Rose Cutter, do you?” Reyes asks.
She swallows, her eyes blink rapidly. “We went to law school together.”
“I see,” Reyes says. The woman attorney glances furtively at her boss and looks like she’s about to cry. “And you told her that she was a beneficiary under Fred Merton’s will.”
Then she does begin to cry, messily. Walter hands her a tissue from a box on his desk. They wait it out. At last she manages to say, “I know it was a breach of confidentiality. I should never have said anything.” Her face is a portrait in misery. “But Rose is a lawyer too—she wasn’t going to say anything. I didn’t think it would hurt anyone.” She looks at them, distraught. “How was I to know that they would be murdered ?”
“And when did you tell Rose about this potential windfall?” Reyes asks.
“It was maybe two months ago? It was such a surprise when I saw her name right there in the will. I didn’t tell her when I first found out. I didn’t mean to tell her at all. But we were out one night and I had a bit too much wine.”
Reyes steals a look at Walter and his face is like thunder. Reyes asks, “After the murders, did Rose ask you not to admit you’d told her?”
“No. She didn’t have to,” Janet answers miserably. “We both knew if it got out it would ruin my career.” She looks up at them and says, “Surely you don’t think she did it?”
