Chapter Fifty-Nine Savannah
| Fifty-Nine |
Savannah
The next morning, Savannah went back to her search even though she had no idea what she was looking for.
Bennett was tidy and all the kitchen drawers were neatly organized.
No junk drawer in this kitchen. She walked over to the armoire and opened the cabinet doors first. Carefully folded throw blankets and extra pillows filled the two shelves.
Pulling open the next drawer, she found games, some decks of cards, and a backgammon set.
This was pointless. She needed to clear her head.
She called over to Finn. “Ready for your walk, Finny?”
His ears perked up and he jumped up, ran to the mudroom, and sat under the coat rack on the wall where his leash hung. She pulled it down along with his coat. It was especially cold today, so she decided to borrow Bennett’s down jacket. She pulled it from the rack and slipped it on.
She was going over everything in her mind as she drove, and the more she thought about it all, the more she began to believe that Bennett couldn’t be guilty.
She’d done enough research on serial killers to know they didn’t just stop.
Why would he kill two women in the span of a few years and then get married?
Unless he was escalating, she thought. Maybe graduating from killing women he dated to women he married?
It had only been a year since Poppy had died and he’d known her only a short time before marrying her—just as he had with Savannah.
There could have been other women in between that they weren’t aware of.
But no, he was famous. Maybe not as recognizable as an actor, but still, it would be hard for him to get away with meeting and killing women.
“Stop it. This isn’t the plot to some movie of the week,” she said out loud.
She had let Isabel make her paranoid. She would text her and tell her she didn’t want any more contact. This was over.
She parked the SUV and got Finn out of the car. A light snow was falling, and she pulled the hood up over her head. Shit. She’d forgotten her gloves.
“It will have to be a short one today, buddy.”
As they began to walk, the snow picked up. Her hands were already turning red, and she put her free hand in the jacket pocket. She felt something hard. She pulled it out. A key. His office key? She needed to get back to the house and check.
“Sorry, Finny, only one loop today.”
She couldn’t wait to try the key, but when they got home Felicia was bustling around the kitchen, cleaning up. Savannah shook the snow from her feet in the mudroom and called over to Felicia.
“I’m in the mood to bake, but I don’t want to be in your way. Why don’t you go home and relax. The house is fine.”
“I’m almost finished. Just want to finish cleaning the microwave, and I’ll be out of your hair.”
There was no point in arguing. She’d just have to wait.
Savannah hung Bennett’s jacket back on the hook.
That was when she noticed it. A woman’s scarf.
It was crumpled in a heap on the floor. It must have fallen off when she’d grabbed the jacket.
She bent down and picked it up, unfolding it with both hands.
It looked expensive, and the tag said Made in France.
It wasn’t something she’d ever wear. Four blue interlacing saddles with a horse and carriage in the center of the scarf.
She opened her computer and did an image search.
Hermès. There was a photo of a woman wearing it, and that was when Savannah realized she’d seen it before.
Her palms were wet with sweat, and she wiped them on her jeans, then picked up her phone and pulled up Angela’s Facebook page.
There it was. A photo of her wearing this exact scarf.
This was too much of a coincidence for her to ignore.
How many women had this exact Hermès scarf?
It had to be hers. And another thought occurred to her.
What woman would leave behind a scarf worth close to three hundred dollars?