Page 124 of Burning Caine

I watched.

I waited.

She didn’t come.

My name was called for the flight. I was late.

I pulled the newspaper clipping from my back pocket and unfolded it, looking at the image of us on the dance floor. The only picture I had of us together. Throat thick with the tears I refused to shed in public, I whispered to her for the hundredth time. “I am so sorry.”

Dropping my head to the paper, I said a silent prayer she would contact me once I was in Napoli. I folded it and put it away, then pulled out my phone.

One last text, then I would go.

I love you

No, that was not it. She wouldn’t believe me.

I’ll miss you

No, she wouldn’t care.

Forgive me

No, it was not enough. Apologies didn’t matter. But the words came to me at last and I sent her my final text.

It was up to her now.

Chapter 50

Samantha

Oliviahadelectedtotell her story without a lawyer, and the group of us sat in an interview room at the Brenton Police Department Tuesday afternoon. Olivia and David Scott, Janelle and Jimmy representing Brenton PD, and me. Lucy sat outside.

“My husband, Bobby Scott, left for work early in the morning.” She clutched her tissue. “We had some upgrades planned for the house, and the workers arrived around eight in the morning. Sometime around nine thirty, I received a phone call from my neighbor, Kathy Becker, who told me she was downtown and had seen Bobby get into a car accident. The two of them had just ended…” She paused and looked to her son. “David, I’m so sorry you have to find out this way, but the two of them had just ended an affair.”

David’s eyes bulged, but a gentle hand from his mother kept him quiet.

“She’d been obsessed with him for years, ever since her husband died. I was afraid she’d done something to him. I was in a panic, so I forced the workers out and sped off to where she said the accident had been. There was nothing. I spent a good half hour looking around the area, in case she’d given me the wrong address. Then, I went to the bookstore to check if he was there.”

“And was he?” asked Janelle.

“No, he’d left about an hour earlier. His employee didn’t know why or where he’d gone. I thought maybe he’d forgotten something at home, so I headed back. When I arrived, the house was in flames, and the firefighters were already there.” She stopped to press the tissue to her eyes. “And I found out my Bobby had been inside.”

Jimmy placed a photo in front of her, a blown-up image of the figure behind the house. The team at the police station had been able to magnify and sharpen the photo, so additional details were visible in this copy. Other than revealing some blond hair, I couldn’t make anything out well enough for an identification.

“Do you recognize the person in this photo?” asked Jimmy.

“I do.” Her face hardened. “Kathy Becker. Can we talk about the blackmail now?”

“Yes,” said Janelle. “Please tell us about that.”

“She called me two days ago, demanding I pay her fifty thousand dollars. She said I’d had a windfall since his death. She told me she would tell everyone about the affair unless I paid her.”

“Did she tell you when and where she wants you to deliver the money?”

“Yes.” Olivia smoothed her jacket. “Thursday morning at The Haberdasher Café, downtown.”

“Would you be willing to help us catch her?”