Chapter 40
Chapter Forty
“This isn’t the first time the Seminoles have been connected to something suspicious in South Florida.”
The investigator taps his pen against a spiral-bound notebook, the soft, rhythmic click cutting through the stale air of the interview room. The sound is steady, deliberate, as if he’s marking time rather than taking notes.
“Have you spoken to many of the members?” Bennett asks, his hand resting lightly on my knee beneath the table, grounding me in a way I didn’t realize I needed until the tremor in my leg begins to settle.
“I put a call in,” the investigator replies without looking up. “Even if they are involved, they’re not the kind of men who leave anything behind. They’ve been tied to a dozen cases over the years and not once has anything stuck.”
He lifts his gaze then, fixing it on me.
“Says here you grew up on the reservation.”
For a moment, my heart stutters, caught between past and present. I haven’t thought about that part of my life in years, not in any meaningful way. Leaving was supposed to be enough. It was supposed to draw a clean line between who I was and who I became.
But records don’t forget.
People like him don’t forget.
“No,” I say, shaking my head, my voice controlled. “I was born there, but I was placed into foster care when I was two. Adopted by three. I don’t remember any of it.”
He watches me for a beat longer than necessary, then nods and makes a note, as if filing me away under something already decided.
Beside me, Bennett’s grip tightens slightly, his thumb brushing once against my knee. I don’t have to look at him to know he’s thinking, recalibrating, assessing the direction this conversation is taking.
“Anything of interest?” Bennett asks, his tone measured. “The club didn’t exactly seem friendly when they came through the neighborhood.”
The investigator exhales through his nose, leaning back slightly in his chair. “Butch isn’t talking. We’ve got a few guys looking into it, but even if we get a warrant for the clubhouse, I don’t expect we’ll find anything useful. We’ve been down this road before.”
He taps the pen again, slower this time.
“The thing about groups like that is they thrive on reputation. Fear. Intimidation. That’s how they maintain control. Killing someone who owes them money doesn’t help them collect, does it?”
The logic lands flat, too clean, too simple for something that feels anything but.
I draw in a breath, steadying myself. “Do you think Whitney and Phillip’s deaths are connected?”
His eyes shift back to me, something flickering there before it settles again into disinterest. “Who?”
“My best friend,” I say, sharper than I intend. “Phillip’s wife.”
“Oh.” He nods once, tapping his pen again. “Right. The wife.”
The dismissal stings more than it should.
“We’re looking into it,” he adds, though there’s no urgency in it, no weight behind the words.
I press my lips together, frustration building in the space where answers should be. “And Chrissy?”
That seems to land differently.
He pauses, his expression tightening slightly. “She’s the most likely suspect at the moment. But we haven’t been able to get much from her. She’s too distraught to give a coherent statement.”
A cold unease settles into my chest. I picture her again, kneeling in the grass, her hands slick with blood, her voice breaking under the weight of what she’d seen. Or what she’d done.
“She’s been through a lot,” I say quietly, though even to my own ears it sounds insufficient.
Bennett shifts beside me, then stands, his hand closing around mine as he pulls me gently to my feet. “Are we done here?”
The investigator glances down at his notebook, then closes it with a soft snap, tossing the pen on top. “Sure. You got somewhere to be?”
“Work,” Bennett replies, his tone clipped now, already done with the conversation. “I have work.”
The investigator’s attention sharpens for the first time, his focus shifting fully onto Bennett. “What line of work is that?”
Bennett doesn’t hesitate. “A variety of things. Venture capital, primarily. Citrus. Tourism. Tech. A little of everything.”
“Is that so?” The investigator smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Always been curious how that works.”
“What, specifically?” Bennett asks, already angling us toward the door.
“The venture side,” the investigator says, leaning forward slightly. “Seems like the kind of business where you’d accumulate enemies. How do you decide where the money goes? What happens when it doesn’t come back?”
The questions linger in the air, heavier than they should be.
Bennett doesn’t answer.
He doesn’t need to.
I can feel the shift in him, the subtle tightening, the quiet irritation that always surfaces when someone pushes too far into something he keeps carefully contained. It’s one of the few boundaries he doesn’t soften for anyone, not even me.
“Oh,” the investigator adds, almost as an afterthought, “before you go. You ever heard of Tigertail Enterprises? Delaware LLC. Operates mostly out of Miami.”
“I haven’t,” Bennett says, already opening the door, ending the conversation before it can take another turn.
We don’t stop walking until we’re outside, the doors of the station closing behind us with a final, hollow sound. The sunlight feels too bright after the dimness inside, the heat pressing down against my skin as if to remind me I’m still here, still grounded in something real.
And yet, something has shifted.
“Something on your mind, beautiful?” Bennett asks once we’re settled in the car, his tone softer now, familiar again.
I stare out through the windshield, my thoughts circling, tightening. “Do you think…” I start, then falter, the words catching before they can take shape.
“Do you think what?” he prompts, pulling out of the lot.
I swallow, forcing it through. “Do you think Phillip and Chrissy were working together? That maybe they were planning something… before Whitney died. Insurance, maybe. That she knew about the boating accident before it even happened.”
Bennett goes quiet for a moment, his hands steady on the wheel as he considers it. Then he lets out a small breath, something almost like a laugh.
“I’ve seen stranger things,” he says finally.
“She’s in over her head if that’s true,” I murmur, more to myself than to him.
“She has no idea what she’s involved in,” Bennett replies, his jaw tightening slightly, something unreadable flickering across his expression before it disappears.
I turn my gaze toward him, studying the profile I know so well, searching for something that isn’t there, or maybe something that is.
Because for the first time, a thought takes hold that I can’t easily dismiss.
That maybe I’m the one who’s in over her head.
With Whitney.
With Phillip.
With Chrissy.
And maybe, even with Bennett.
The realization settles slowly, uneasily, threading its way through everything I thought I understood. My trust has been eroding piece by piece over the past few weeks, worn down by secrets, by omissions, by the quiet sense that something is happening just out of view.
And now, with the knowledge that I’ve been sleeping beside a man who keeps parts of his life carefully locked away, I have to ask myself something I never thought I would.
How well do I really know my own husband?