The receptionist at Sky buzzed up to the condo where Jenn Cassidy was staying. “Hester Crimstein is here to see you.” The receptionist looked over at Wilde. “And your name?”
“Wilde.”
“And a Mr. Wilde too.”
The receptionist listened for a moment. She turned away as though to be discreet. Hester could see how this was going. She yelled out loud enough for Jenn to hear, “You’ll want to see us before this story breaks, believe me.”
The receptionist stiffened. A moment later, she hung up and said, “The elevator will bring you up to Miss Cassidy’s home. Enjoy your visit.”
The elevator door opened. The button for the second floor was already lit. When the door slid open, Jenn Cassidy, dressed in Versace, was waiting by the door to apartment two. She did not look happy to see Hester again. Hester didn’t care.
Jenn squinted at Wilde. “How do I know you? Wait. You’re that Tarzan kid. I saw a documentary on you a few years ago.”
He stuck out his hand. “My name is Wilde.”
She shook it, albeit reluctantly. “Look,” Jenn said, blocking access to her apartment and meeting Hester’s gaze, “I don’t know what you want, but I think we said everything last time.”
“We didn’t,” Hester said.
Jenn motioned toward Wilde. “And he’s here because…”
“Wilde is related to Peter.”
“My Peter?”
“Well, he’s not yours anymore, is he? That’s why we’re here, in fact.”
“I don’t understand.”
Wilde took that one. “Marnie lied. Peter never attacked her.”
Jenn smiled at that. Actually smiled. “That’s not possible.”
“I spoke to her,” Wilde said. “She admitted it.”
The smile started to falter. “Marnie told you—”
“Do we really want to continue to have this discussion in the hallway?” Hester asked.
Jenn still smiled, but there was nothing behind it. It was a defense mechanism, a reflex, nothing more. She stumbled back into her apartment. Hester pushed in first, followed by Wilde.
“Let’s all sit down,” Hester said. “It’s been a long day, and I’m pooped.”
They did. Jenn staggered and collapsed onto the couch. The smile was gone now. Her entire expression had caved in, like a house with the support beams giving way. She cleared her throat and said, “Please tell me what happened.”
Wilde told her about stopping Marnie in the street. She listened attentively, but every once in a while, she closed her eyes as if someone had struck her. When Wilde finished, Jenn asked, “Why would I believe you?”
“Call Marnie,” Hester said.
Jenn chuckled without an iota of humor. “No need.”
“What do you mean?”
“Marnie’s on her way here now. We’re heading to a new burger place in Tribeca.”
It took ten more minutes before the receptionist buzzed up and announced Marnie’s arrival. Hester spent the time talking to her office. The Richard Levine jury had still not come back, and the judge seemed prepared to call a mistrial. Wilde replayed his Las Vegas visit with Daniel Carter. How could his birth father possibly fit into what was happening with Peter Bennett? How did it relate to the murders of Henry McAndrews and Katherine Frole?
For her part, Jenn simply stared straight ahead.
When they heard the knock, all three of them stood. Jenn moved in a haze toward the front door. When she opened it, Marnie was in mid-blather. “You should just give me a key, Jenn. It’s ridiculous not to. I mean, suppose you need someone to come by when you’re away or what’s the point in you having to get up and open the door, oh and this burger place, my friend Terry, remember him, he’s that tall guy with the weird Adam’s apple? He said it’s great and they pay top dollar for influencer photos…”
That was when she spotted Wilde.
Marnie’s eyes flew open. “No!” she screamed at him. “You promised! You promised you wouldn’t tell anyone!”
Wilde said nothing.
Tears sprang from her eyes. “Why are you so mean?”
Jenn’s voice was too quiet: “What did you do, Marnie?”
“What? You believe him?”
Jenn said, “Marnie.”
“I didn’t do anything!” Then: “I did it for you! To protect you!”
Jenn’s eyes closed.
“And it was all true! Don’t you see? Peter was a monster! He confessed! That’s what you told me, right?”
Jenn sounded so exhausted as she repeated the question. “What did you do, Marnie?”
“I did the right thing!”
With more steel in the tone: “What. Did. You. Do?”
Marnie opened her mouth, probably to protest more, but when she saw her sister’s face, she realized that more denials would be futile or worse.
Her voice was suddenly very soft, like a little girl crouching in a corner. “I’m so sorry, Jenn. I’m so so sorry.”
* * *
Marnie came clean.
It took time, of course. There were a lot of I did this for you’s and Peter was a monster’s, but through that smoke, the story came out. As Marnie recounted the events that led her to make those accusations on that podcast, Jenn just sat in silence and continued to stare straight ahead.
“I was out in LA going on a ton of auditions. But nothing was happening for me. Not that that matters. Oh, shoot, I’m not telling this right, am I? Anyway, you know I was a finalist for Love Is a Battlefield, but there were issues finding the right story line to fit my talents. They said I had a ton of star potential, but because I was your sister, it would be weird to launch a separate subplot for me, but if they could tie our story lines together, that could be gold.”
“Who is they?” Hester asked.
“I was mostly talking to Jake.”
Hester looked at Jenn. Jenn closed her eyes and said, “Junior producer.”
Marnie recounted what she’d told Wilde about being called in, listening to a woman’s tearful story (a woman, she now confessed, she hadn’t known before that day or seen since), agreeing to go on the podcast to “help” the woman tell her story. Somewhere around then, Jenn stood up and said, “I have to reach him.”
“Who?” Marnie asked.
“Who do you think?” Jenn snapped.
“But Peter admitted it!”
Jenn dialed Peter’s phone number. The phone had been disconnected. Her texts bounced back. Wilde watched Jenn’s agitation grow. She dialed another number, and when someone picked up, Jenn said, “Vicky? Where is he? I need to talk to him.” She closed her eyes and listened, no doubt hearing Vicky tell her that she too didn’t know where her brother was.
Marnie’s cheeks were coated in tears. “Jenn, he confessed! You told me that! You said he admitted it!”
“No,” Jenn said.
“Hold up,” Hester said to her. “You told me the same thing—that Peter came clean to you, that he confessed right here on this couch.”
“But don’t you see?”
“See what?”
“What I saw on Peter’s face…it wasn’t guilt. It was betrayal. My betrayal. I broke our trust when I didn’t believe him. It’s all my fault.”
“But those awful pics!” Marnie shouted. “Those were him! They weren’t photoshopped!”
“I have to talk to him.” Jenn started plucking at her trembling lower lip. “We need to get this out there.”
“Get what out there?” Marnie started sobbing. “You can’t tell anyone!”
“We have to, Marnie.”
“Are you insane?”
“I’ll also need to post on Instagram right away.”
“What? No!”
“We need to make sure Peter sees the message and comes home.”
“Comes home?” Marnie repeated. “He’s probably dead.”
Jenn’s body went stiff. “We don’t know that.”
“Please, Jenn, just take a breath, okay? You can’t just blame me for all this! I spoke to that woman, the one Peter roofied—”
“Oh, come on, Marnie,” Jenn snapped, “you’re not that stupid. She was a plant. Probably another junior producer playacting.”
Marnie put her hands together in prayer position. “Please, Jenn, I’m begging you. You can’t—”
“Marnie?”
Marnie stopped talking, as though the word had slapped her across the face.
“I love you. You’re my sister. But you’ve done enough harm, don’t you think? Your best chance—your only chance now—is to do some good.”
Marnie just sat there, hands folded in her lap, looking lost.
Wilde turned to Jenn and said, “Peter told you he was adopted.”
The change of subject threw Jenn. It took her a second, but then she said, “Yeah, so? What does that have to do with this? For that matter, no offense, but what do you have to do with any of this?”
“Do you know Peter put his DNA into a genealogy website?”
“What does that…? Yes, I knew. When he found out he was adopted, he naturally wanted to learn about his birth family. He signed up for a bunch of those DNA sites, but I thought he deleted them all once he found out the truth.”
Wilde glanced at Hester. Hester gestured for him to ask the obvious. “Are you saying Peter found his birth family?”
“Yes.”
“Who were they?”
“He never told me.”
“But he found them? You’re certain?”
Jenn nodded. “He found the truth. That’s what he said. And that was enough for him, I guess. Once he found the truth about his family, he didn’t want anything to do with them.”