With a solid five minutes to spare, Ellie deposited the three black coffees—which she’d purchased in record time at Wally’s—on a patch of bare ground behind a thick boxwood hedge. Hiding behind a stand of shrubbery was not how she’d planned to spend the morning, but Abigail would not appear and go inside until Ellie left, and Ellie would not leave Meg alone with her. The chances of her being Lacey Vanderwald were remote, she knew, but the way to resolve such a question was for Ellie to see the mysterious Abigail in person. Would she recognize her? Only one way to find out.
If she was Lacey—and hadn’t Meg revealed inadvertent hints about that? That Abigail was nervous, hated Pharminex, didn’t want her “inflexible” family to know what had happened to her. That seemed important. Ellie should call the cops. Call Monteiro.
But he’d stopped texting. Something was going on, and this was not the time to interrupt him. She had no answers for Monteiro, only more questions.
She kept her gloved hand on the phone in her pocket, set to vibrate when Meg signaled Abigail’s arrival. As soon as Abigail headed up the front walkway, Ellie planned to get inside. Would she recognize Lacey Vanderwald?
This entire Abigail-as-Lacey scenario was so unlikely that Ellie was almost embarrassed at herself. But not enough to abandon Meg. Murder of who?
Still no cars on the street. No movement in any yard. Ellie’s freezing ears would never be the same. Should she tell Gabe where she was? Yes, sure, probably, definitely—all the answers skated though her mind.
Her phone buzzed with a message. What? No one had gone inside the house.
She pulled it from her pocket, baffled. Gabe. Checking in. He tell you?
Yeah. What was the most important question if she had to hang up? Who is the murder victim? she typed.
Husband. Trevor Vanderwald.
That took a second to comprehend. One gasping life-changing second. A snowplow rattled by. Ellie barely registered it.
Not a sailing accident? Ellie almost couldn’t get her thumbs to work. She edged back into the bushes, twigs scraping soft complaining whispers against her coat and catching in her hair. Many years ago?
Cold case but parents never gave up. She left town. But new info, Monteiro says: She might be in Boston.
Photo?
Three dots. Was he consulting someone? Her time was ticking away. Any minute now, she’d have to end the conversation.
Gabe? We at 348 Fogarty. Braintree. Soon talk w/victim “Abigail.”???? She LV? About to see her. Need current LV photo.
Coming.
The dots disappeared. He’d gone silent. Did Gabe mean he was coming here? Or that the photo was coming? Ellie pushed deeper into the boxwood branches, and a clump of snow dropped onto her head. She swiped it off, freezing and frustrated, as if nature herself had joined the conspiracy to make everything impossible. Talk about impossible. The police thought Lacey Vanderwald had killed her husband, Trevor. That it wasn’t an accident.
She took a deep breath, the cold air shocking her lungs. Tried to steady herself. She could not think about what might have happened to Trevor Vanderwald.
Meg should have texted by now. Meg, inside with the person police think killed him.
Staring at the lifeless screen, Ellie looked into the past and into the future. Lacey Vanderwald hadn’t been on that boat when he died, so said the news stories, so how could a sailing accident be murder?
Now, just in time for the Vanderwald gala and the ceremony honoring the Vanderwalds’ son Trevor, Lacey Vanderwald was in Boston. And her white car had been parked at James Armistead’s house.
She left town, Gabe had texted.
Her phone vibrated. Meg. You at Wally’s? Come back.
There was not a chance in hell anyone had passed Ellie on the way inside. No cars, white hatchback or any others, had passed by or parked. No pedestrians had been on the sidewalks.
She yanked open the triple-decker’s front door.
Ran up the three flights, fast as she could.
She put her hand on the apartment’s metal doorknob. Pulled. Locked. Knocked. Had Abigail—or Lacey—locked it to keep her out? Ellie knocked again, impatient and worrying, in case they hadn’t heard her.
“Hey, El.” Meg opened the door while she was still knocking, and stayed in the threshold of the apartment, not letting Ellie by. “That was fast. We’re pretty much set. Abigail says thank you.”
Ellie frowned. No one had come in. She put on an embarrassed expression. “Yeah, I’ll confess, okay? I didn’t get the coffee and just walked around.” She pretended to wince. “That store was kind of skeevy. So I was out front the whole time. How’d she get in?”
Meg stepped aside from the door, gesturing Ellie inside. “Duh, back door?” she said. “She lives here and parks in back. I was just about to text.”
“Silly me,” Ellie said. Maybe, late in the interview, she’d risk it. Ask Abigail: Does the name Trevor Vanderwald sound familiar? But that might put them—Meg and Ellie—in more danger. “Okay. Call me when it’s ready. Just make sure we get it on video.”
“Hey—are you ever gonna let me forget that? I’m sorry. Okay? Can we just—”
“When this works, all will be forgiven.” Ellie tried to behave as if this were just an interview. Plus, being alone in the living room would let her see if Gabe had sent a photo of Lacey. The glitch—she wouldn’t be able to access it on her phone after the taping began. “Is she okay?”
“Well, she wanted coffee…” Meg left that hanging for a second. “Kidding. She’s fine. I think the coffee was an excuse to give her time to get inside. This is about to work, sister. She says she has all kinds of Pharminex stuff. Inside documents. Slam-dunkers. So she says. And perfect, right? The day before the big gala.”
“What does Abigail look like?” Ellie kept it casual.
“Why?”
“Just trying to picture her,” Ellie said. “You know, so I can be interviewing a real person.”
Meg glanced toward the hallway. Seemed to make a decision. “After the interview, maybe? Let’s see how it goes. I’ll call you in three minutes when we check the final setup.”
“Tell her…” Ellie tried to think. Was it safe or sensible to let Meg be alone with Abigail? Ninety-nine percent yes. Plus, they both knew Ellie would be in the next room. “Tell her she’s incredibly important,” Ellie finally said. “Tell her women all over the world will be grateful to her. Look up to her.”
“Okay. She’ll love that. I guess.” Meg looked concerned. Kept turning toward the bedrooms.
“Tell her that if we can put her interview on TV, it will ruin Pharminex.”
“You think that’s true?” Meg’s voice dropped lower.
“Definitely,” Ellie said. “And tell her we’ll introduce her to lawyers who can make her millions in damages for what she has suffered.”
“Millions?” Meg’s eyes widened.
“Yup. Tell her all she has to do is help us with the story.”