“Then why have we spent so much time with them? Why all the dinners? Why the stupid pop-ins? Admit it—Neena. It was because ofhim.” He stared at me with a look I couldn’t escape two decades ago and was helpless to avoid now. “Look at me, Neena, and tell me the truth.”
“He’s my boss,” I said quietly. “Anything I did was to keep my job and to give us new opportunities.” Like a weed, the idea immediately grew. William could have forced himself on me. Made inappropriate comments. Touches. No one knew what happened in that boardroom. It’d be my word against his. Maybe tonight was all William. Maybe he’d grown obsessed with me and hired a hit man to kill my husband. It could work. And even if it couldn’t, the threat of it to William’s empire would be enough to get something. Some additional reward for all this.
“There was this, also.” The detective crouched beside the open cavity and pulled out a picture frame, one that had been under the box. She held it out to me, and Matt flinched, recognizing the carved wooden frame that used to hold our wedding photo. As if pulled to the spot, I looked at the dresser where it had previously sat.
“The frame is ours, but the image ...” I shook my head and lied. “I’ve never seen that photo before.” It was a solo picture of William, a candid shot where he was smiling into the camera. The photo was from an African safari that he and Cat had gone on—the photo one of hundreds on her Instagram feed.
“These pictures are all of your neighbor.” She tapped the glass, her short nails dotting William’s face. “William Winthorpe.”
I cleared my throat. “Yes, but I didn’t do any of these. I’ve never seenanyof this.”
“You just said that you might have put the cash here.”
“Well, I lied. It’s not my money.”
“Were you aware of this compartment in the floor?”
My chest grew tight, panic running like a fever through my chest. My fingerprints had to be on that handle. I hesitated. “Maybe.”
“Maybe?” Matt repeated. He stared down at the photos, and I needed to get him alone before the images of me and William were seared on his brain forever. He pushed himself to his feet.
“Are you feeling okay, Mr. Ryder?” The detective’s words floated from somewhere to my left, and I stared up at Matt, alarm rising as I saw the gray pallor of his skin.
“Honestly?” He held the side of his chest, and I thought of his heart, the thickening of his ventricles that had shown on his latest ultrasound. “I feel like I’m about to vomit. I didn’t know ...” He swept his hand across the display. “About any of this.”
“Neither did I,” I snapped, frustrated with everyone’s inability to believe me.
The detective also stood, moving toward Matt with a concerned look. “Would you like some water? To use the restroom?”
He shook his head. “No. I just—am I done here? Did you have more questions for me?”
Detective Cullen’s gaze swung to me. “No ...,” she said slowly. “You can go. But Neena, we have more questions for you.”
Matt brushed by me, his steps unsteady as he went for the door, and I followed after him. “Matt, you know I didn’t put that there. You know I don’t—”
“I don’t know anything about you anymore.” His voice was low, but each word punctured through me like a bullet. “Stay away from me.” Just before the door, he paused and looked over his shoulder. “And, Detective? You might want to look in our safe.”
I opened my mouth but could find nothing to say. Inside me, everything catapulted and twisted, my biggest fears tunneling into one slow and silent scream of agony.
My husband, my sweet, stupid husband, had betrayed me.
CHAPTER 44
CAT
We were in the kitchen, surrounded by a quartet of staff who had rallied, making the twenty-minute drive at three thirty in the morning without complaint. There were a few wrinkled uniforms, and our chef had yawned twice during the last ten minutes, but we already had french toast sizzling in skillets, our guesthouse fridge stocked, the beds turned down, and fresh flowers being clipped for arrangement. I inhaled the scents of coffee, butter, and roses and had a moment of nostalgia for my own early mornings back in high school. I’d leave the house by five thirty, two hours clocked feeding horses and mucking stalls before school each day. My father would always shuffle into the kitchen before I left, a few minutes stolen over coffee and buttered toast, his proud smile boosting my spirits on the way out the door.
I’d come a long way from that scratched kitchen table and slightly burned toast. I met William’s eyes from across the room, and he smiled, setting down his fork and moving over to me.
Pulling me into his arms, he pressed a kiss on the top of my head. “I love you.”
I returned the sentiment, my hands stealing around his waist.
“This is so crazy,” he said quietly. “What if this guy had come to our house instead of theirs?”
“Then our security system would have gone nuts, and we would have been in the panic room and on the phone with the cops before he even got in the front door.” I rose on my toes and kissed him. “Assuming I could keep you from storming downstairs and trying to tackle him.”
“I am an excellent tackler,” he admitted. “And it’s been a long time since I got to use anything other than my sharp tongue in a confrontation.”