Chapter 73
Traci intercepted the sheriff in the hallway outside the interview room. “I want to be at that house when Madelyn gets there.”
“Nope.” Coyle looked over her shoulder, and she turned to see Deputy Shapley escort a handcuffed Garrett out of the room.
“Get that nose doctored,” Coyle called out. “And clean him up so it doesn’t look like he was mugged by a girl gang.”
Garrett looked over his shoulder at Traci and Whelan. “Madelyn ain’t coming to that house. She’s super smart and crafty.”
“Not crafty enough to make sure you deleted all those text messages between the two of you,” Traci sniped.
Shapley gave Garrett a shove. “You better hope she does show up. Or you’re going down for murder, while she walks. This better be the performance of your life.”
Traci waited until Garrett was out of earshot. “Sheriff? Those two conspired to murder a member of my family, a young woman who was very dear to me. They stole hundreds of thousands of dollars from my business, attempted to kill two more of my employees, and burned down one of my buildings in the process. I intend to be there when you arrest Madelyn Eddings.”
“No, ma’am,” Coyle said. “You’re here strictly as a courtesy. Now, you go on home, and we’ll call you when and if we have Madelyn Eddings in custody.” He gave her a curt nod.
“Screw that,” Traci muttered, watching him walk away. “I wasn’t asking for permission.”
Whelan had been standing behind her, observing the exchange. She turned to him now.
“Are you in?”
“All the way.”
“I know which house Garrett calls the hookup house,” Traci told Whelan, on the way back to the island. “It backs up to the seventh hole. Owned by Joe and Anita Deibel. We manage the house through the Saint’s rental program.”
They were halfway across the causeway. “What makes you so sure?”
“His car is broken down, so he must have walked over from there to my house tonight. Plus, I know Madelyn helped Anita Deibel order new furniture and window treatments for their cottage this past spring. Makes sense she would still have the key. It’s Oleander Cottage.”
“Aren’t oleanders poisonous?”
“Like Madelyn,” she said.
They walked across the golf course from Traci’s house, keeping to the shadows. She pointed to the small stucco cottage. “That’s it.”
Oleander was one of the original 1920s cottages Hoke’s grandfather, F. A. Eddings, built when he developed the resort. She knew it had the same floor plan as Gardenia Cottage, where, ironically, Fred Eddings had drawn his last breath only days before.
The house was dark, with a screen porch that ran across the back.
“How do you propose we get in?” Whelan asked.
Just then a light blinked on from within the house, and a couple of silhouetted figures were visible moving about.
“We’re gonna walk up and tell the sheriff we’re here.”
“And if the sheriff doesn’t like that plan?”
“He’ll have to arrest me. But I’m betting he doesn’t have the will, or the time, to do that before Madelyn arrives.”
“You really think she’ll show up?”
“She can’t afford not to. That prenup? She’s got to convince Garrett to keep his mouth shut, or she’ll lose everything.”
The door to the screened porch was unlocked. They stepped inside, then walked over to the French doors leading inside, where they saw the sheriff and Shapley, who was taping something to Garrett’s bare chest.
She tapped lightly on the glass. The sheriff whirled around, his hand on his holstered service weapon.
“Judas Priest!” he exclaimed, opening the door. “You’re lucky I didn’t just put a bullet in you. What the hell are you two doing here? I don’t want you spooking our suspect.”
Traci stepped past him. Whelan hesitated for a moment, then followed.
“We won’t spook anyone.” She pointed to a doorway on the far wall of the living room. “That’s the powder room. We can hang out in there.”
“This is so fucked up,” Garrett moaned. His nose was bandaged, but already bruises bloomed beneath both eyes. “As soon as she sees me like this, she’s gonna figure it out.”
“Tell her you got in a fistfight with KJ,” Whelan suggested.
“Did you text her yet?” Traci asked, looking around the living room, wondering if Madelyn had ripped off Anita Deibel the way she’d ripped off the Saint. She touched the drapery stretching across the front window, which was some kind of cheap, synthetic fabric. Yup, Madelyn had been here. She pointed at Garrett, who’d pulled his shirt down. “Is he miked up?”
“Never mind that,” Coyle said. “You two need to leave. Now.”
Shapley walked to the front of the house. “Too late,” he called softly. “She just pulled into the driveway.”
“Judas Priest!” Coyle pointed to the powder room. “Get in there and don’t make a goddamn sound.”
The powder room in Oleander Cottage was much smaller than the one in Fred Eddings’s house. Traci sat on the closed lid of the commode and Whelan leaned against the sink.
They heard the front door open, and the sound of footsteps crossing the tile floor.
“Hey.” Garrett’s voice was muffled, but audible.
“Oh my God, baby. What happened to your face?”
“Last night I got up to pee and in the dark I tripped over the chair in the bedroom.”
“Let me see,” Madelyn cooed.
The sound of her sister-in-law’s voice made Traci want to puke.
“I’m okay. Just… I really need to get the hell out of Dodge. Did you bring the money?”
“I only had a couple hundred. Tomorrow, when I can get to the bank—”
Garrett’s voice was shrill. “Jesus, Madelyn. I did everything you told me to. I put my life, my job on the line. A couple hundred?”
“I shouldn’t even give you that,” Madelyn said. There was a hard edge in her normally breathy little-girl voice. “You had one job. Get rid of Olivia Grayson. Instead you killed Parrish, screwed up the fire at the dorm, and that girl is still alive. You could fuck up a one-car funeral.”
“None of that was my fault,” Garrett protested. “I need money—more than a lousy two hundred bucks—and a car, so I can get off this island. I can’t stay here another night, Madelyn.”
“Where am I supposed to get a car? Ric’s gonna notice if his Porsche goes missing.”
“I don’t care. Gimme the keys to the Lexus. You can tell him it got stolen.”
There was a long pause.
What the fuck?Traci turned to Whelan and mouthed the words.
“Jesus, Madelyn!”
There was a scuffle, and then muffled thuds, and finally, a loud bang, unmistakably a gunshot, followed by a bone-chilling scream, and then more scuffling, and a door banging open.
Whelan reached past her and burst out of the powder room with Traci close behind, at the same time the sheriff and his deputy ran from the nearby master bedroom and tackled Madelyn.
Garrett Wycoff was sprawled on the floor, cradling his right elbow, in a spreading pool of blood, moaning and cursing. The sheriff hauled Madelyn, dressed in her stylish pastel Lululemon workout gear, to her feet. She squirmed as Coyle pinned her arms behind her back and snapped handcuffs on her wrists.
Shapley pulled a radio from his utility belt and called for an ambulance.
Madelyn’s eyes narrowed when she noticed her sister-in-law. “What the hell are you doing here?”
“I came to watch you get your ass arrested,” Traci said. She whipped her phone from the pocket of her jeans and clicked off a few frames. “Smile, please.”
Traci looked over at Shapley, who was kneeling beside Garrett, wrapping a towel around his arm. “She shot me,” Garrett whimpered. He looked over at Traci. “You believe she shot me?”
“You needed shooting,” Traci said. “So does she.”