Chapter Thirty-nine
“Kerry Jones, is the kidnapper?” Roman said in disbelief.
In a flash, Mia felt the truth of it. “She murdered Maryanne, too, didn’t she?”
“Yes. I didn’t know at first, but later, after the funeral, she came to me.” Eliza swiped angrily at her tears. “Told me she’d killed my sister and said she’d make everyone believe I’d done it if I didn’t go along with her plan.”
“But why on earth would anyone think you’d killed her?” Mia said.
“Because ….” She let out a weary sigh and got to her feet. Snatching up several Kleenex from the side table, she mopped at her face. “Since Kerry was my sister’s roommate, she knew everything that was going on. Plenty of times she overheard her talking about what I’d done to my dad.”
She swung to Roman now, her eyes pleading. “I never meant to kill him. Or my mom. I did buy the peanut oil, like you said, but I only wanted to make him a little sick. How was I supposed to know there weren’t any EpiPens in the house? And why didn’t my mom call the paramedics?” She shook her head. “I’ve replayed that night over so many times, and if only I’d stayed home, they never would have died.”
“Or if you hadn’t dosed your dad’s dinner, they wouldn’t have died either,” Mia said.
“You think I don’t know that? I feel the guilt every single day and probably will for the rest of my life. I can’t change what happened,” she said stubbornly. “All I can do is be better going forward.”
“But Maryanne knew about the peanut oil,” Roman said.
“Yeah. And she got really upset. I guess she talked about it a lot. Kerry recorded some of the conversations she had with Tracey.”
“Okay. I can see that. But why kill her in the first place?” Mia asked.
Eliza’s head tipped back until she looked up at the ceiling. “This whole thing is so twisted it’s hard to explain. Mostly it’s about Kerry being a complete monster. I swear she gets off on hurting people. Anyway, she came to me, played the recordings of Maryanne venting about how I needed to pay for what I’d done. It was apparently going to be my motivation for killing her. Kerry also claimed to have one witness who would testify that I’d bought fentanyl from someone he knew the day of her … of her passing … and someone else who’d supposedly swear they’d seen me coming out of the dorm room early the next morning.”
“Meaning she could potentially frame you for the murder. But what was the point?” Roman asked.
Eliza’s laugh was harsh. “See that’s the thing. Maryanne’s murder was just a means to an end. What Kerry really wanted was to bleed money from the Lambs and she wanted me to help her.”
Mia shook her head, trying to make sense of everything. “But why couldn’t she have married Scott herself? Or wait, did she try, and he wasn’t interested?”
“Not that I know of. She said there was no way she’d be directly involved. Too risky. She wanted to make sure if anything went wrong, I’d take the fall. I didn’t want to do it, I swear. But I was scared of her. Scared I’d get pinned with Maryanne’s murder and maybe even my parents’. And kind of scared she’d just out- and-out kill me.” Eliza surged to her feet. “We don’t have time for this. You need to find Scott.”
Roman nodded slowly, his eyes on Eliza’s face. “Yeah. I hear you. But you’re coming with us. You can fill out the rest of the details on the way. Let’s go.”
“I don’t know … okay, okay, I’m coming,” Eliza said when Roman grabbed her elbow. “But Kerry can’t see me there, otherwise I’ll never get JP back.”
While Eliza locked her door, Roman and Mia jogged down the hallway.
“Do we trust her?” he asked softly.
“Yeah. One hundred percent. I had a vision of Kerry snatching poor little JP. And another of her raging at Eliza about you and me and demanding the wedding be moved up.”
“Where to?” Roman asked once Eliza joined them in the elevator and they started their descent.
“I’m not sure. He said he was going to his lawyer to change the will. I don’t know if that was true or not. He was kind of ranting.”
Mia pulled out her phone to check the time. “It’s after seven o’clock. I kind of doubt he’d get an appointment. Where else would he go? And if we can’t find him, why the worry Kerry will find him any faster than us?”
“Because she put a tracker on his Range Rover. By the way, there’s one on your car too.”
“What the what,” Roman said, then strode out of the elevator when the doors opened. “Now that’s just rude.”
They hurried after Roman. Outside, the air remained as thick as a wet blanket, but it was no longer still. Gusts of wind sent trees bowing sideways. Pieces of litter swept along the sidewalk and into the condo building where they twirled for several seconds before jamming into corners and cervices. People scurried past, hair blowing every which way and clothing fluttering around them.
“I don’t suppose you have access to the tracking monitor?” Mia asked.
Eliza snorted. “Right. Like Kerry looked on me as an equal partner. Get real. I was her pawn, plain and simple.”
They fought their way across the parking lot and into the Lexus. With the doors shut, it seemed weirdly quiet after the howling wind outside.
Roman rubbed a hand across the dash of the borrowed car. “At least she can’t track us right now.” He started the engine. “Okay folks. Where do we start looking?”
“Maybe we should call him?” Mia suggested.
“Not me. I’m pretty sure he won’t pick up,” Eliza said.
“I’ll do it.” Roman pulled out his phone. “It’s going to voice mail … hey, Scott. Heard you weren’t at the lake house. Just wanted to check in. I have news on your mom. Call me.”
He dropped his phone into the cup holder of the console and drove out of the parking lot.
Eliza peered out the window. “Where are you going?”
Roman shrugged. “I figure the most likely places are his house, the office, or back to his parents’. Whatever place, he’s probably not in Nashville anymore.”
“If he calls back, let me talk to him,” Mia said.
They drove is silence for several minutes, then Roman glanced over his shoulder at Eliza in the back seat. “Why Scott? I get that his family is rich, but there’re lots of rich people.”
“I don’t know. At first Kerry just made me do stupid petty stuff like making friends with some woman in a coffee shop then stealing her credit cards, or going to luxury open houses and lifting perfume or Hermes scarves. It all changed partway through May. She came to me all stoked up and said we were going to stay at a rental house on the lake and it was my job to make the guy next door fall in love with me. I had one week to get it done. I remember she laughed so hard like she was telling a joke. I’d never really seen her laugh before and it gave me chills. Not the good kind, if you know what I mean.”
“Then you staged a drowning and he rescued you. Whose idea was it?” Mia asked.
“Honestly? It was mine. I know how guys like to be knights in shining armor. And Scott’s sort of physically … I mean … he’s not super built. I figured this would make him feel all hyped up on himself. And maybe he’d transfer the emotions to me. Being with me, I mean. It totally worked.”
“But the whole time you knew Kerry was going to kill him,” Mia sputtered.
Eliza held up a hand. “Whoa. Pump the brakes. She never said anything about murder. I thought it was just a money-heist thing, which is still messed up, but I figured if I did what she said and she got a nice fat paycheck, that’d be good enough. I looked Scott up first and saw he was loaded. He could afford to lose a couple of million.”
“You’re making it sound like you were fine with swindling some poor guy. Scott has been nothing but sweet to you,” Roman said, his eyes meeting Eliza’s in the rearview mirror.
She bowed her head. “I’m only telling you where my head was at in the beginning. But then I got to know Scott, and he was kind and adorable and … just … I didn’t expect to like him so much. A couple of weeks in, I felt so bad that I started being really bitchy and mean. Like I’m talking total brat. I figured If I could make him break up with me, it would save him.”
“What happened?” Mia asked.
“The doofus wouldn’t walk away no matter what I did. He just kept being his awesome self. I did some really crappy stuff to him, too. But then Kerry sort of twigged on and she told me the minute we broke up, she’d kill him and then me.”
“Have you already started siphoning money?” Roman asked.
“I only did for the first time an hour ago. As bad luck would have it, she was there when Scott showed up and said he wanted a divorce. When he left, she got real quiet then smiled her scary smile and told me to move as much money as I could into my account. She, of course, has access to it. I’m sure that money is already hers.”
Mia turned in her seat to face Eliza. “And JP?”
Immediately, tears filled her eyes. “She took him again. That’s why she was there in the first place. She was returning him to me because I hadn’t spilled the beans during the kidnapping. After Scott left, she grabbed him again. I couldn’t fight her because I knew she’d just break his neck or something. He looked so scared.”
“We’ll find him,” Mia said fiercely.
Eliza dabbed at her eyes. “Unless she’s already killed him.”
Roman’s phone pinged and Mia immediately snatched it up. “Hey, Scott. Roman stepped out so you get to talk to me ... no, nothing’s wrong. In fact, it sounds like she’s doing a little better. How are you? ... Wait, where are you? ... Oh, okay. Sure. Of course we can talk later.”
Mia punched her fist in the air. “He’s at his house. Let’s go.”
“He told you that?” Eliza said.
“Basically. I couldn’t tell if Kerry was there or not. I’m going to text him. Warn him about Kerry.”
Eliza reached forward and grabbed Mia’s arm. “Wait. Don’t. What if she sees?”
“Worst case, she’ll try and move up the timeline on whatever sick plan she has going. Best case, Scott is a least forewarned,” Mia said. She glanced at Roman. “Yes or no?”
“Yes. More information is always better. His chances improve if he’s already on guard.”
“Done.” Mia dropped the phone back in the console.
Roman hit the accelerator and they sped along the road. Fat drops started falling onto the windscreen and he turned on the wipers. Darkness was descending quickly as more storm clouds gathered.
“Where does Kerry live?” Mia asked.
“I’m not sure. She always came to my place. We never went to hers. Can you believe she forced me to give her a key? Hers was somewhere close though. At least she always seemed nearby.”
Mia grabbed the armrest and braced herself when Roman took a hard right. “Do you think she took JP to her house?”
“What about when she kidnapped Jennifer?” Roman asked.
Eliza shrugged and spread her arms wide. “I literally have no idea where she held her. Like I told you, I was just keeping my mouth shut as ordered. We weren’t exactly all BFFs and brushing each other’s hair.”
Roman rounded a corner and slammed on the brakes. A dozen or so cars were stopped ahead and all jockeying to turn around in the road. Beyond them, two police cruisers, with lights flashing, blocked access. He could just about make out a downed power line.
“Crap. I’ll have to go a back route. It’s gonna take a lot longer. Try calling Scott again,” he said.
“He’s not picking up. I’ll hit him with another text,” Mia said after being put through to voice mail. Once she’d recorded her message, she brought up the previous text and checked the details. “He never got my first text. It says ‘not received’. He must have turned his phone off.”
“Or this wind knocked out a cell tower the same way it brought the line down on the road,” Roman said, quickly executing a three-point turn and speeding back the way he’d come.
“This feels bad,” Eliza mumbled.
“Yeah. I agree.” Mia turned to Roman. “Hurry, okay?”
“Going as fast as I can.” His fists tightened on the wheel. “Hey, look in my contacts. You’ll find a Joe Kosinski of Walkerton PD. Tell him he needs to send backup.”