Chapter Thirty-Nine
Fucking finally. After four weeks, two murders, and one slug to the face, Juliette finally had the key to her salvation in her hands.
It wasn’t very thick—she’d have to hire a ghostwriter to bulk it up—and Warren had chosen the title Taking a Mulligan: Lessons Late in Life, which would obviously have to be changed, but here it was.
At long last. Warren Ellingham’s unintentional final words.
“You stole Warren’s memoir,” Juliette said, flipping through the opening pages.
Mostly self-aggrandizing intro text about how Warren did everything all on his own with literally no one else’s help, which Juliette found after several years of working with businesspeople writing these types of books was par for the course.
The speech consultant who had dedicated his book to his secretary because she’d typed the whole thing up had been a real chef’s kiss.
“I don’t know how that got in there,” Chipper said in a terrible attempt at a lie.
“I hope you’re a better golfer than you are a liar,” Juliette said dryly.
She’d flipped ahead, but Warren was still patting himself on the back for a job so well done in life.
Juliette would have loved nothing more than to pull up a chair and immediately dive into the full manuscript, but there was the small matter of two unsolved murders and Chipper’s potential role in them.
“So, what happened, Chipper? Warren found out about your little gambling problem with Brad, threatened to expose you both in his memoir, and the two of you killed him and stole the memoir to cover it up?”
“What?” Chipper practically screeched, looking truly shocked. “I didn’t kill Warren, that’s insane! The old guy died of a heart attack. Brad told me so!”
“And what happened with Brad?” Juliette pressed.
“Knowing Brad, he tried to blackmail him,” Brigitte offered.
“He did!” Chipper said, nodding along like an idiot before realizing how badly he’d just incriminated himself.
“I didn’t kill him, though! And he wasn’t trying to blackmail me about Warren.
He was trying to get me to throw the PGA tournament for some gambling scheme.
I told him I wouldn’t do it! I wanted to come back clean, you know?
Restore my reputation. I’ve been working my ass off the last three years getting my form and my swing back.
I couldn’t have anything getting in the way of that. ”
“So, you killed Brad to stop the blackmail,” Juliette said.
“No!” Chipper shouted, truly panicked. He tried to surge forward before remembering the security guard.
He shoved his hands into his hair, his composure fracturing.
“I can’t believe this is happening. I didn’t kill anybody, I swear!
I just took the book, all right? I figured if the old guy already bit the big one, what did anybody care what happened to the book? ”
“I cared,” Juliette said, her voice like ice. “You’re in a world of trouble here, Chipper. I suggest you start talking.”
“Shit,” Chipper said, wandering over to a collection of armchairs and collapsing into the nearest one. “I knew it was all gonna blow up in my face, I knew it. I just wanted my career back, you understand? I just wanted to prove myself. That I wasn’t one big fuckup.”
Juliette could well understand the sentiment, but she wouldn’t go so far as to condone murder to get it. Even if she’d wanted to take some people out in her career along the way.
“Listen, you gotta believe me, I didn’t kill him!
” Chipper insisted, looking up desperately.
“Sure, I hated him. The little shit almost got me kicked out of college over the whole sports betting ring he set up. But he didn’t end up turning on me, and he acted like he’d done me a favor.
Like I owed him one. And he finally came to collect after my first tournament win. ”
“He wanted you to throw another game,” Juliette guessed.
“With a hell of a lot higher stakes, for a lot more money,” Chipper said miserably.
“And I said no, of course I did. But I’d made a few more mistakes by then.
I was on my first divorce, I’d had some bullshit DUI charges, and the fees were adding up.
A couple of sponsors had quietly parted ways with me. Long story short, I needed the money.”
“So, your no turned into a reluctant yes,” Juliette said.
“I love golf,” Chipper said, giving her an angry look.
“Whatever else I screw up in my life, I’ve always been good at golf.
The idea of throwing a hole, much less a whole game, made me sick to my stomach.
I didn’t have any choice. They never had any proof, but the stink of the rumor was bad enough.
I lost ten years of my career, at the height of my game, because of him.
So when he started sniffing around this time, I could have been dead broke on the streets and I still would have told him no.
I had finally learned my lesson. But then Brad started threatening to expose me for the deal we made ten years ago, and the college stuff.
Said it would prove a track record, and then nobody would touch me. ”
“He wasn’t the only one who threatened you, though,” Juliette said, thinking back to the argument she’d overhead between Chipper and Warren. “His father knew, too.”
“I don’t know how the old man found out,” Chipper said, pulling at his hair again.
He was going to pull out his hair plugs if he wasn’t careful.
“I guess Brad had gotten in bad with some sports bookies out in Atlantic City. Warren thought I was in on it, threatened to expose me. I told him I wasn’t involved, but the old bastard was tough. ”
“You’re not giving us a compelling reason for why you didn’t kill him,” Juliette pointed out.
“But I didn’t!” Chipper said. “I know I’ve got my temper, but I’ve never hit anybody in my life.
Well, not since my third DUI. I was trying to save my reputation, not blow it up.
Warren kept talking about this book he was writing.
That it was gonna make everybody stand up and take notice.
Remind everybody who had the power. So yeah, fine.
I stole the manuscript. But I didn’t know he’d been murdered!
I figured it was a heart attack, like the cops said.
When we got back to the club after the party there were cops swarming all over the place and I got worried somebody might catch me with the manuscript, so I stashed it in the men’s locker room.
Then June starts these damn renovations and suddenly the place is locked down like Fort Knox. ”
“What about Brad? I know you got the Floyd Flock to cover for you.”
“I didn’t ask them to, my fans just really adore me,” Chipper said, completely un-self-aware.
“I got a text from Brad the day of the membership drive telling me to meet him to discuss the tournament, so I suggested the locker room. I was just going to slip in and get the manuscript, but then I saw that chef guy running out with blood on his hands and I freaked out. I never even saw Brad.”
Juliette had made it to the end of the manuscript while Chipper gave his story, and she frowned at the last page. “Where’s the rest of it?” she demanded.
“What do you mean?” Chipper asked.
“The manuscript, this can’t be all of it,” Juliette said, holding up the slim stack. “Where’s the rest? Did you destroy it? Stuff it down a laundry chute? Eat the incriminating pages?”
“That’s it, that’s all of it,” Chipper said, sounding confused. “I never even had a chance to look through the damn thing.”
“This can’t be all of it,” Juliette said, bile rising in the back of her throat. “There has to be more.”
“Why?” Brigitte asked, looking at her carefully. “What’s wrong with it?”
“Everything,” Juliette said, seeing spots. “Every fucking thing.”