Chapter 35 Thérèse
Thérèse
Now
Her husband’s body is not in the ground yet, but Cassie is out here kissing her ex-boyfriend like nothing happened.
When I saw them in the car two streets back, I couldn’t believe my eyes.
Was Cassie really driving around town with him for anyone to see?
I tried to tell myself that it didn’t mean anything.
To my knowledge, Darren hasn’t come by the house since news of Olivier’s death spread around town, but it’s possible I missed him.
All of this could be explained away. Until the kiss.
The kiss tells me everything I need to know. It answers all of my questions.
The kiss is the end.
I drive home slowly, staying back from Cassie, who’s walking along the sidewalk, her head down. Every now and then, she wipes her eyes with the back of her hand, like she’s drying tears. But she won’t fool me anymore. I wait until she’s inside the house to pull into the driveway.
A sense of calm overwhelms me as I go up to the door. It’s over. She killed him. I know it and there’s nothing she can do to stop me. No tricks she can pull on me.
“Cassie?” I say when I walk in.
Her strangled voice comes from the living room. “Here.”
For a few seconds we stare at each other. Her eyes are puffy, her lips swollen.
“He loved me,” I say. The evenness of my voice startles us both. I keep going. “He fell in love with me. I know it’s completely unfathomable to you, but he did.”
“Not now, Taylor,” she says, starting to turn away.
“Yes, now, Cassie. You don’t get to boss me around anymore. You don’t have anything. You’re going to jail.”
She chuckles dryly. “No, I’m not. Nice voicemail you left my husband, by the way.
It almost moved me to tears.” She must see the shock in my eyes, because she adds.
“Oh yes, I know about that. Actually, I think it helped my case a lot. Because the police think I said that. I left my husband and then I regretted it. I couldn’t have done anything to him if I called him the next day to say I was in love with him and wanted to get back together. ”
I can’t breathe. “I’ll call them now. I’ll tell them everything.”
“Sure you will,” Cassie says, walking closer to me.
I flinch. The look in her eyes, it’s deadly.
“And you’ll tell them you were in Paris, too.
” She pulls something out of the pocket of her dress, a black plastic rectangle.
“You’ll explain to them why I found the key card to my hotel suite in your jeans.
That’s right, Taylor, I know you were there. ”
“I—You—” No other words come to me.
She shakes the key card in front of my face. “Oh yes, sure. Maybe I can’t prove it myself. But what if I called the detectives and told them to check your passport? Or maybe they could look up if there was a passenger with the name of Taylor Quinn on a flight to Paris recently?”
She grabs her phone, pretends to go through her contacts. Or maybe she really does. “Shall I call them?”
“You killed him.”
“See, Taylor. I kind of think that you did. You slept with my husband. You followed us to Paris in secret. I knew your voice sounded weird on the phone, but I couldn’t put my finger on why.
Now I know. Maybe you planned this all along.
Somebody stole my wallet, the wallet in which I kept the key card to my suite.
And, that same night, I was drugged and left for dead in a bathtub. ”
“I didn’t drug you,” is all I can say back.
Her eyes go wide with shock, and for a moment neither of us speaks. She wasn’t sure until now, but I confirmed it all.
“Even if you didn’t”—she says at last, voice a whisper—“do you really want the police to know all that?”
I start pulling my own phone out of my pocket. “I want them to know you killed him.”
She lunges at me, flicking the phone out of my hand. It lands on the floor with a thump, at equal distance from each of us.
“I have money now,” she says. “More money than you can ever dream of. But of course you already know that. You stole that from me, too.”
I let out a laugh. “Didn’t you use to say that Mom should never store money in the cookie jar? That it was the first place anyone would look?”
Cassie’s jaw clenches. “She wasn’t your mother.”
I crouch down to get my phone, but she’s faster than me. She kicks it and it slides under the sideboard.
“You think you’re so fucking smart, Taylor.”
“My name’s not Taylor.”
“You’re so much better than me. Sure, call the cops.
And why don’t you tell them you’re going to inherit my millions if something happens to me?
” I wince. “But you already know that. You two had a plan, didn’t you?
You were going to kill me and run away with my money.
And you, specifically, were going to be the biggest winner of all if Olivier had gone through with it.
Do you want to tell the police that, or should I? ”
“You killed him,” I say. She still hasn’t denied it. Only one person died, and she’s responsible for that. It’s not a crime for me to have been in Paris. It’s not even a crime for me to have been sleeping with Olivier.
Cassie sighs. “Nothing’s going to bring him back now.”
Tears pool at the corner of my eyes and start streaming down my cheeks.
Cassie’s face softens as she speaks again. “I’ll share my money with you, fifty-fifty. We’ll do up the inn, make it all nice and pretty. I’ll handle the paperwork so it belongs to us both. Wouldn’t you like that, to have your own home, at last?”
I don’t respond.
“It’s more money than you’ll ever see in your life.
And Olivier was right, this house has so much potential.
If we do it well”—I cough, and she corrects herself—“I’ll help.
But, fine, if you do it well, and I know you will, because you do everything so fucking perfectly, it could be a huge hit.
We’ll make so much more. You won’t have to work these shitty jobs anymore. You’ll be free.”
“I’ll never be free as long as I’m with you.”
She takes a deep breath, waits a moment. Then: “You were right about your dad. He’s French. Or he was at least.”
I shake my head. I’m numb. She’s a born liar. “I don’t believe a word you say.”
“Denis, his name is. Mom told me when she was dying. I think she was having regrets. Maybe she felt like she should have helped you find out more about your family. She said he might still be in Paris. That’s all I know. I swear.”
“If your mom knew about my dad, she would have told me. She was loving and kind.”
Cassie rolls her eyes. “That’s what you tell yourself.
If she was so kind, why didn’t she tell you your mother came by to see you after she was released from prison?
She wanted to be in your life again but Mom shooed her away.
She was terrified of losing you and being stuck with me.
So she told your mother to leave. You could have seen her again before she died.
Honestly, I’m pretty sure that’s why Mom adopted you.
She felt guilty that she kept you away from your family for her own benefit. ”
To say that this new information stuns me is an understatement. My mom came for me. My dad might still be out there somewhere. And yes, Cassie could be lying. She’s so desperate right now, she’d say anything. But somehow she sounds more genuine than she ever has before.
“Why are you telling me all this?”
“I’m trying to get you to see that we’re stuck together now. We are sisters, after all.”
She crosses her arms against her chest, daring me to contradict her.
But I can’t. As much as it kills me to admit it, she’s right.
I can’t prove that she killed Olivier. I could share everything I know and it might still not be enough.
Cassie could spin this. She could spin anything.
And what would happen to Olivier? I don’t want his memory to go down as the man who tried to kill his wife. That wouldn’t solve anything.
As for me… Well, I could lose everything, again. If I give away Cassie and the police don’t convict her, I’ll have nothing. No house, no money, no Olivier. And, like always, she’ll have won.
“Do we have an agreement?” Cassie says, staring me down.
“I hope you understand that I can’t let you walk out of this room until we do.
And I’m going to keep a close eye on you from now on.
I can’t take the risk of you running off to the police with your crazy little theory.
So what’s it going to be, Taylor? Do you want to be poor and miserable for the rest of your life, or do you want to be like me? ”