Chapter 8
For a few minutes, neither of us spoke, the only sound in the room coming from the ticking of the clock above the stove.
“Preston Sinclair?” I repeated. “My next-door neighbor?”
She nodded.
I shook my head, trying to make sense of it all. “I don’t understand.”
Estelle sighed. “I don’t either, and the man who saw the accident is no longer around to tell his story. He died about ten years ago.”
So I couldn’t even talk to him.
“What did he tell the police?” I asked.
She glanced down at her coffee. “He said he was sitting in his living room when your father drove past his house. It was late, almost midnight, and wherever your father was going, he seemed to be in a hurry. A few seconds later, he saw Preston drive straight into him.”
“I can’t believe it.”
“Nor could I.”
“What else did Gordon say?”
“In his opinion, the accident was deliberate. He said Preston hit him on purpose.”
I felt sick. “I remember one of the police officers telling my mother that my father wasn’t wearing a seatbelt.”
“The impact threw him right through the windshield. He died a short time later.”
I stared out the kitchen window. “If what Gordon said is true, why wasn’t Preston arrested? Why isn’t he in prison?”
“He was questioned by the police on more than one occasion from what I heard, and there was an investigation.”
“What happened?”
Estelle let out a slow breath. “For starters, Gordon didn’t speak to the police until the following day. Can’t say why. Maybe he was trying to figure out what he saw, or maybe he was too scared to come forward at first. Who knows? It made his testimony seem suspicious.”
“Are you saying Preston wasn’t even arrested?”
“Not to my knowledge.”
“Why not?”
“I’ve lived long enough to know that some people spend their entire lives believing the rules don’t apply to them. Preston Sinclair is one of those people. He was born into money. The kind that buys influence. His father was one of the wealthiest men in the country.”
It made sense.
Preston’s house was about four times the size of all the others in the neighborhood, and his backyard, which spanned several acres, included a tennis court and a lavish pool, among other things.
“I’d be willing to bet Preston has had people cleaning up his messes his entire life,” Estelle said. “Every mistake. Every bad decision. All wiped away like they never happened.”
“Bad decisions are one thing. But murder? Even with his father’s influence. How’d he get away with it?”
“Gordon was an elderly man, and Preston’s attorney made certain everyone knew it.
He called everything into question. His age.
His memory. His eyesight. His ability to judge distance.
His hesitation to come forward. By the time the lawyer was done with him, the poor man looked like he wasn’t capable of identifying his own wife. ”
“Are you saying the investigation into Preston was dropped?”
“When investigators failed to find any evidence of the truck Gordon described, Preston was free to go.”
Everything I believed about my father’s death was beginning to unravel, yet I still wasn’t convinced the old man's story was true. Maybe Preston’s lawyer had been right. Maybe Gordon had seen someone he thought was Preston, when in reality, it had been someone else.
“If my mother thought Preston killed my father, why did she wait to tell me until the moment she was dying?” I asked.
“I don’t know. She was a private person. I always figured she’d take what she knew to the grave.”
I thought about what my mother had said after she told me my father was murdered.
Don’t go …
Don’t go …
Had she been trying to warn me, to keep me away from this place?
I sat back, crossing my arms, trying to make sense of everything Estelle had just told me. “Preston came over last night and introduced himself. He brought me a bottle of gin as a housewarming gift.”
“He … what?”
“I’m embarrassed to admit that he caught me looking at him through my father’s binoculars.”
For the first time since we’d met, Estelle was speechless.
Once my words settled in, she said, “Oh, Olivia ...”
“It’s all right. He thought it was funny.”
“What happened after he introduced himself?”
“We talked for a few minutes, and I told him my last name is Nightingale, which was my married name. As far as I know, he doesn’t know who I am. We chatted for a minute, and then he tried to invite himself inside. I didn’t let him.”
“Then what happened?”
“He asked if he could take me to dinner so we could get to know each other better.”
Estelle stared at me. “And?”
“I said no.”
Relief washed over her face.
Relief that would be short-lived.
“He suggested he cook me dinner instead,” I said. “I agreed to it.”
Estelle shook her head. “When’s the dinner?”
“Tonight.”
She reached across the table and grabbed my hand. “Please, don’t go. Nothing good can come of it. You need to stay far away from him.”
“Do you think he killed my father?”
“I believe he’s the sort of man who always gets what he wants. Promise me you won’t go.”
I considered her request for a moment, then said, “I need time to think about it.”
Estelle left a few minutes later, and as soon as we said goodbye I’d already made my decision. If Preston Sinclair had anything to do with my father’s death, dinner wasn’t something I wanted to avoid.
Sometimes the truth can only be found by walking straight toward the one thing you fear most.