Laurie watched through the binoculars as Leigh Ann opened the door and slid into the passenger’s seat while Brenner got behind the wheel. Their car faced her. A foot-high barrier of railroad ties separated the parking area from the ball field.
Her thoughts were racing with pieces of the investigation. For the last twenty-four hours—since Alex first recognized Joe Brenner’s photograph—she had been convinced that Brenner had killed Martin Bell in order to blackmail Kendra. But now she was replaying the words he had spoken earlier that day.
After all these years, I’d love to know the truth. You mean to tell me you didn’t have anything to do with taking out your husband?
Laurie should have realized it then. Brenner wasn’t hired to kill Martin, and he didn’t do it on his own.
Continuing to peer through the binoculars, she said, “Dad, we need to do something. Brenner’s not our killer. It’s Leigh Ann.”
She had typecast Brenner as the bad guy with the shaved head and the mean eyes. He was no angel, but that didn’t make him a killer.
Leigh Ann Longfellow, on the other hand, had played the role of the innocent bystander, maligned as “the other woman” by a paranoid wife. And Laurie, along with everyone else, had fallen for it.
She was thinking so quickly, she could barely get the words out. “Dad, when the police verified Leigh Ann’s alibi, it was all based on Daniel. He was the one who was meeting with senators. He was the one with the hotel reservation. He was the one with his picture in the papers. And he was the one who confirmed his wife had made the trip with him.”
She saw it as clearly as if the events were playing out in front of her in real time. An affair between two unhappy spouses: Martin because of his wife’s depression, Leigh Ann because her husband’s career had come to a halt in Albany. She pictured Leigh Ann’s reaction to her husband’s name on the lips of the governor. They could leave the state capital in the rearview mirror. He would hold federal office. They’d spend time in D.C. He’d be a strong contender for the White House.
But Martin Bell didn’t want any of that. He wanted a stay-at-home wife and a future stepmother to his children.
Leigh Ann . . . Bell? No. It would never happen. Leigh Ann’s children were her dogs. For her, Martin was a distraction when her picture-perfect marriage temporarily stalled.
And Martin wouldn’t have taken no for an answer. He was the man who steered his wife away from a medical career. Who told others that she was insane. Who drugged her up rather than get her the care she needed when she had a mental health problem.
Just as Laurie had initially said about the idea of Martin and Leigh Ann as a couple: They were oil and water.
It was all so clear.
“Dad, we need to do something. I think Leigh Ann’s going to kill Joe Brenner.”