26 Framed
Framed
I didn’t sleep a wink that night, curled up in a ball on the couch and barely moving, not even bothering to change out of my breezy white summer dress.
I’d dropped everything by the couch—my purse with the signed NDA and the thumb drive, my shoes, the house and car keys, my high-heeled sandals.
I’d sunk into a daze, dissociating from the reality I couldn’t handle.
And waited.
For a while, I senselessly kept waiting for the phone to come back to life with a ring or a text chime, but it remained eerily silent. Winston had stopped trying to reach me.
I thought he’d show up at the door, demanding answers. I flinched with every car that drove down the street, with every slammed door and squealing brake, not sure what I would do if he showed up. But he didn’t come. In only a couple of hours, he’d given up on me. On us. I couldn’t understand it.
It was about four in the morning when I finally rose, faltering shakily into the kitchen for a drink of water.
I considered going back to bed for about a thousand years, but decided the only good thing for me to do was to leave Vegas, right after speaking with Winston.
Not later today, as I had planned . . . Now.
I had no destination in mind, and no idea where to go; I only knew I couldn’t stay there anymore.
How was I going to walk past the fountains again or see the sun shining in the clear blue sky, and not remember what we’d had?
I started the coffee maker and brewed an extra-strong pot, then filled a mug to the brim.
For a while, I stared at the black steaming fluid, mindlessly looking at the few bubbles that congregated near the edges and slowly disappeared, bursting one by one.
Then I took a sip, and another, welcoming the burn in my throat, the refreshing smell, and the surge of life instilled into my body.
My mind was made up. I was leaving Vegas, with the first flight out, wherever that would happen to go. Anywhere except Seattle.
Before I could leave town, though, I had a few things I needed to do.
Collecting my purse and keys from the floor, I put them on the countertop by the coffee mug.
The keys reminded me I’d left the Beemer in the driveway yesterday because the garage door wouldn’t open.
I’d been planning to speak to the Realtor about it.
One less thing to worry about now; it didn’t matter anymore.
Instead, I would drop the house keys off at her office on my way to the airport.
After taking the thumb drive from my purse, I connected it to my phone and moved the crypto ransom into my personal account, then erased the thumb drive with a format function that ensured the deleted information would stay deleted.
I took photos of the signed NDA, Jack’s criminal record, and the photo I’d kept, and saved them on my secure cloud.
Then I tore everything except the photo into small bits and flushed them down the drain.
I could never be careful enough.
After a couple more swigs of black coffee, I started packing my spinner.
My laptop went in the front pocket, and then I packed my underwear, a few T-shirts, and the Prada jeans I’d only worn once.
Sifting through the clothes hanging in the closet, I found myself picking out things that reminded me of Winston.
The lacy backless Versace gown I’d worn at the gala.
The tie-front denim shirt I’d had on when horseback riding.
The cutout one-piece swimsuit I’d worn that day on the Colorado River.
Even if I knew it was a mistake, taking all those memories with me, I just couldn’t leave them behind.
Zipping the spinner took some effort, but then I rolled it to the door. It was getting light outside. At this early hour, the perfectly clear Vegas sky was a shade of deep purple promising to turn into the vibrant blue I would always remember.
I was about to change into my travel jeans when I noticed faint flickers of red and blue flashes coming through the slit between the curtains.
Then I heard some noises outside my door.
Startled, I froze in place, holding my breath as I listened.
There were more than one set of footfalls, and low, hushed voices, drawing closer.
A pounding on the door resounded loudly, rattling the frame. “Police! Open up!” The pounding continued.
My heart raced, my thoughts screaming inside my mind. I had no way out. I forced my lungs to draw air, steeling myself. “Coming!” I shouted. The pounding stopped for a mere second, then resumed.
Barefooted, I turned on the lights in the living room and opened the door. Several police cars were stopped around the house, their lights flashing brightly in the early morning light. I raised my arm to shield my eyes and tried to understand what was going on.
Four men stood by the door. One wore civilian clothes, but the other three around him were in uniform.
Two of the officers had their guns drawn—pointing down, but ready to take aim at me.
I felt a surge of panic and dread. My heart pounded in my chest and my breathing quickened as I broke out in a cold sweat that dripped down my spine.
This wasn’t the way they usually took down a small-time con artist like myself.
My thoughts went to the one person who could’ve done this.
Claire.
“Olivia Taylor?” the man in the wrinkled, worn-out suit asked. I nodded weakly, paralyzed. “Detective Aaron Stanek, LVMPD,” he said, flashing a badge in front of my eyes and then slipping it into his pocket. “You’re under arrest.”
His hand clasped my arm tightly and turned me around, slamming me against the open door.
The cold steel of the handcuffs gripped my wrists, and I reacted instinctively, whimpering and trying to break free.
The grasp on my arm returned, merciless, spinning me again until his eyes could drill into mine.
“Don’t,” the detective said coldly. He didn’t need to say more.
Turning to the other cops, he started barking orders. “Search the house, the garage, and the backyard! I want everything bagged and tagged. Search the car, too.”
It was surreal.
“W-why are you arresting me?” I asked, my voice shaky, stammering a little.
The detective looked at me with a grimace I couldn’t read. Disgust, perhaps, or inflamed ire. “Ah, yes, your precious Miranda rights.”
He cleared his voice ostentatiously. “Olivia Taylor, you’re under arrest for the murder of Winston Donovan. You have the right . . .”
My breath hitched, my pulse a violent hammering in my ears. The room tilted, everything narrowing to the officer’s face, his unreadable expression.
No. No, this isn’t happening.
A sharp jolt of panic shot through me, my mind scrambling for sense, for logic, for anything that made this real. My lips parted, but for a second, no sound came.
Then the dam broke. “He’s dead?” My voice cracked, high, disbelieving.
“No!” I screamed, lunging forward despite the cuffs cutting into my wrists.
My shoulder slammed into his chest, wild and uncoordinated, but I didn’t care.
I twisted, trying to throw my weight into him, to knock him off balance—anything to fight against the impossible words he had just spoken.
His hand landed heavy on my shoulder. I stopped with my face inches away from his. “No,” I repeated, looking straight at him, tears springing from my eyes. “He can’t be dead! No . . .” I wailed. “You don’t understand—” I gasped for air, shaken by uncontrollable sobs.
The detective didn’t care about anything I had to say. He stared at me with a derisive smirk on his face. Winston couldn’t be dead. He’d been okay yesterday, so full of life, so in love. He’d been waiting for me—
Claire.
It had to have been her.
But nothing hit harder than knowing Winston was gone .
. . and that gutted me. The realization slammed into me, stealing the air from my lungs.
My throat constricted, each breath coming in short, uneven gasps.
I tried to steady myself, to pull in enough air, but it wouldn’t come.
My pulse pounded, a frantic rhythm in my ears, my body teetering between fight and collapse.
“No . . .” I cried again, my knees buckling beneath me. I stumbled back, my body giving in to the weight of it all, and let myself collapse onto the cold floor. My breath came in sharp, broken gasps, my cuffed hands useless behind me as I tried to brace for the impact.
Winston was gone. And nothing could hurt more than that. He was dead because of me. The thought sliced right through me, spreading a sorrow inside my heart that I’d never have thought possible.
The same detective grabbed my arm and forced me back to my feet.
“When’s the last time you saw Winston Donovan?
” he asked, but I wasn’t paying attention.
Behind him, two officers wearing blue nitrile gloves were conducting a thorough search of my rental car, parked only a few feet away from where we stood.
One of them reached into the passenger-door pocket and extracted a small white object.
A bottle of eye drops. How did that get in there? It wasn’t mine.
A chill shook me as I remembered how Claire had casually asked me to put Visine in her eyes. I saw myself touching that bottle, squeezing it, leaving my fingerprints on it.
“Stanek!” the officer called, drawing the detective’s attention to the find. The detective gestured with his thumb up, then grabbed my arm and led me to an unmarked Tahoe parked behind the Beemer.
Barefoot and still in shock, I let myself be handled by him while I watched the officer seal the bottle of Visine in a transparent evidence pouch, then sign the back of the pouch with a black Sharpie.
“When did you see Winston Donovan last?” the detective asked me again, opening the back door of the Tahoe and putting a hand on my head to shove me inside.
I didn’t answer. My thoughts raced, spinning out of control, chanting a name rhythmically, like an inescapable obsession. It must’ve been her.
“I need a lawyer and a phone call, please.” He stared at me with loathsome eyes, but I didn’t flinch. Didn’t look away. “I know my rights.” He slammed the door so forcefully that the entire car shook.
Claire.
She’d killed him, and framed me for it.