“What’s going on, Rock?” Lacey asked, her lips trembling slightly.
“Lace, have you ever been in the rose garden in back of St. Andrew’s?”
“No, I haven’t,” she said. “I’d never even been to St. Andrew’s until the funeral.”
“Fuck.” Rock shoved the weather-beaten business card across the table to his wife. “Zee found this in the rose garden. Today.”
Lace picked up the card. “I didn’t put it there. Looks like it’s been there a while, though. This has been stepped on and rained on.”
“Which means it could have been there before Dad’s death,” Rock said.
“Circumstantial,” Lacey said. “Just because it’s my business card doesn’t mean I put it there. Also, as far as anyone else knows, the church and Father Jim have nothing to do with the murder.”
Rock raked his fingers through his hair. “I still don’t like it.”
“Neither do I.” Lacey let go of the card as if it were burning her.
I picked it up and stuck it in my wallet. “No reason anyone needs to know about this.”
“Give it back to me,” Rock demanded.
“Why?”
“Because I’m going to fucking destroy it.”
I looked to Lacey. She was an attorney, and she knew destroying potential evidence was not a good idea.
Still, she nodded at me slightly.
Good enough. My sister-in-law had not killed my father, and if this card could tie her to the murder, I was fine with getting rid of it. I took it out of my wallet and handed it back to my brother. He tore it in two. Then four.
“I need to get back,” I said. “They’re questioning Zee and I don’t want to be too far away in case she needs me.”
Rock nodded. “Go ahead. Lace and I have got this.”
I stood and walked back to the building. Though the day was clear, a cloud hovered over me, invisible but dense. Something was brewing.
Something bad.
37
Zee
I really wanted to throw up.
Detective Morgan creeped me out with his bad blond comb over and polyester tie, but he was nice, sort of. He didn’t ask a lot of questions at first, and he let me go at my own pace. In a voice that didn’t seem quite like my own, I told the story.
The story of how I’d woken up in that dark and windowless room. How I’d received good and hearty meals. How my clothes, my purse, my ID were all gone.
How one day, a masked man came for me.
How someone cut the tops of my breasts with a sharp blade.
The pain of the incision came back to me with a vengeance, and I had to stop talking.
“Do you need a break?” Moira asked me gently.
I shook my head. “I need to keep going. If I leave this room, I may never return.”
She nodded. “All right. Just take your time, Zee.”
“They cut me,” I said. “They said it was to lessen my advantage. They considered me worthy prey. Those were the exact words they used.”
“When you say ‘they,’” Detective Morgan interrupted, “who do you mean?”
“Derek Wolfe and the other one. The priest.”
“And by priest you mean Father James Wilkins?”
“Yes.”
“You’re sure?”
“Of course I’m sure. Why else would they have both forced me to sign a non-disclosure agreement when they paid me off?”
“As I understand it, none of this story is stated in the agreement.”
“I don’t remember.”
“Derek Wolfe would have been pretty stupid to spell out what he had done to you in any written agreement,” Morgan said. “But tell me. Why did you sign it?”
“It was the only way he’d give me the money I needed.”
“Why not go to him before then? You went five years after the incident took place.”
A lump lodged in my throat. Now his not-so-nice side was showing. His “I’m determined to pin this on one of you” side.
“Detective,” Moira said, “Ms. Jones is here of her own volition to tell you her story. This isn’t an interrogation.”
“Noted,” the detective said. “Ms. Jones?”
“What?”
“Could you answer my question, please?”
“Don’t answer,” Moira said. “It’s irrelevant.”
“It’s very relevant,” Morgan countered. “I need to make sure Ms. Jones didn’t make up this story and then threaten to go public with false allegations as a way to blackmail Mr. Wolfe into giving her money.”
Zach stood, his eyes fiery and angry. “Are you serious?”
“Calm down, Hayes,” Morgan said. “We both know it wouldn’t be the first time that a money-hungry young woman blackmailed an older man with money for her own gain. The allegations are usually false.”
Tears threatened, but I inhaled, willing them away. No way was this guy going to make me cry.
“For the life of me,” Moira said, “I have no idea why you’re asking this question. She’s telling you that there are others besides his children who had a motive for killing Derek Wolfe.”
“All she’s telling me is that she had a motive,” Morgan said icily.
“We’ve already established that Ms. Jones was not in New York at the time of the murder,” Zach said, his tone adamant.
“Zach is right,” Moira agreed. “I think this meeting is over.”
“No,” I said softly.
“Zee,” Moira said. “You don’t have to do this.”
“I do have to. I have to for all those women who didn’t survive. And I also have to for myself. To put this to bed in my own mind. I’ve carried it around for far too long.”
Moira smiled. She reminded me of my grandmother, who died when I was ten. Very nurturing but also a spitfire who didn’t let anyone push her around. “As you wish.”
I cleared my throat. “I didn’t come forward earlier because I was afraid, Detective. I was a mess. Men had kidnapped me, cut me, and then hunted me with the intention of killing me. That’s not something you get over quickly.”
“I never meant to suggest that it was,” Morgan said.
“Well, you kind of did. What woman in her right mind would go straight to the person who violated her and demand money to keep her mouth shut?”
“You could have gone to the police.”
“I should have. But I was kind of catatonic for a while. I have no idea how I got to the ER. I have no idea how I got home. I was a mess, and my mother wanted me to get back into modeling right away.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“I hated modeling. I wanted to go to college.”
“Why didn’t you go? You said you had a scholarship.”
“Because I couldn’t.”
“Why?”
Rage swirled through me like a black storm. “It’s all so easy to sit in judgment of me, isn’t it? But you’ve never been through what I’ve been through. I was a mess. I needed an escape.”