Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #4: Books 13-16 (A Dead Cold Box Set), Blake Banner [story read aloud .txt] 📗

turned to look at me and I could see she had not put two and two together and it had not dawned on her. I said:

“Your last phone call to him, Penny. You lied to us. You said you’d been out with Shaw, you were hung over and you did not call Jack until the Friday. But that was another lie. You called him minutes before he disappeared. That is a very serious lie. You must see how that makes you look.”

She dropped her hands into her lap and looked out over the rooftops. She had tears in her eyes. “You know I didn’t kill him, John.”

“No.”

“But you said…”

“I said there were things I didn’t understand.”

“What? I’ll explain anything you want. I’ll do anything you want. I can’t go to prison, John. I can’t…”

“Stop. What did you call him for?”

“I…” She hesitated. “I wanted to talk to him about Stephen. He was taking it badly that…”

“You’re lying. You really need to understand, Penelope. Every time you lie, you get one step closer to spending the rest of your life in prison.”

“No!”

“If I ask Stephen when you met him, what is he going to tell me?”

She sat bolt upright. “No! You must not talk to Stephen.”

“Wrong again. I agreed to keep him out of it as long as you cooperated. And all you have done so far is lie to me. Is that your idea of cooperation? Penelope, you don’t seem to realize just how hard I can make life for you, or how close you are to being charged with murder. Now get smart and start cooperating with me, because I am the only thing right now standing between you and a murder charge.”

“You’re not serious…”

“Wake up, Penelope! You were the last person to speak to him! Minutes before he died! And you lied about it! Wake up!”

“Oh, Jesus…”

“What did you call him for?”

“We…” Her lips moved but she couldn’t form the words.

“I spoke to Shaw. I know it wasn’t Stephen you were planning to marry. He told me what you told him. You believed you were going to marry Jack.”

She folded up, curled up into her own lap, with her face buried in her hands. She didn’t sob or shake, but after a moment I realized she was crying.

“Did you kill him?”

“No, of course not!” She sat up, wiping her eyes with her sleeves. “I loved him. I adored him!”

“That’s why people kill each other, Penelope.” It came out with more bitterness than I intended. “Because they adore each other!”

“Don’t be facetious. You have no idea how much I loved that man. It wasn’t possessive ownership. I just worshipped the ground he trod on. He was….”

She ran out of words. She spread her hands, shrugged and let them drop in her lap again. “He was a jerk, arrogant and obstinate. He knew it all and had all the answers. But nine-tenths of the time he was right, and when I had him alone with me, the barriers came down and the human being came out: funny, vulnerable, tender, thoughtful! My god, that man could be thoughtful. He was a bossy organizer, but driving that bossy organizer was a human being who wanted people to be happy.”

“He was cheating on his wife and lying to her, Penny.”

She stared me straight in the face. “Yeah, and that was wrong. But he was human, and fallible, and Jesus! You’ve met her. She is the cold fish to end all cold fish. She gave him nothing, and I gave him everything. He was happy when he was with me. He used to laugh. I have seen him on that couch in there, wiping his eyes, helpless with laughter. Nobody has seen that. He told me: with me, he learned to laugh. With me, he learned that there was more to life than achieving in business and making your workers happy.”

“So why didn’t he leave his wife?”

Again the direct, unwavering stare. “He did.”

“What?”

“That’s why I dumped Grant. You think I’d be stupid enough to leave Grant without knowing that Jack had left Helena? A couple of days earlier, he told me he had spoken to Helena, that they were finished and that they were going to discuss a divorce settlement that was fair and would cause minimal disruption. He said she had taken it very well—no great surprise there, right?”

I scowled at her. “And your reaction to this was to go and screw the boyfriend you were breaking up with? You sneer at Helena for keeping her cool, while you go and cheat on your future husband before you’ve even married him? You’re mighty free with those rocks you keep hurling, Penelope, but I’d take care where you throw them.”

Her cheeks flushed red and her eyes were bright, but she looked away and said, “I deserve that. But I’m afraid that was another lie. I asked Grant to lie for me and he agreed. He was very good about it. With him, it was only ever really the sex. When Jack was killed, he was good to me and agreed to give me an alibi.”

“He didn’t do a great job.”

“I guess not.”

“So now you’re telling me you didn’t have break-up sex.”

“No, we didn’t. We spoke, I explained we were finished and I was marrying Jack, and I went home. Then I called Jack and told him it was done, I had broken up with Grant. He said he’d meet me for lunch, and that was the last I ever heard from him.”

“Where were you?”

“At home. When he never turned up, and it turned out he’d been killed, I panicked, put together an alibi with Grant, changed my phone and just tried to put as much distance between us as possible. But I was devastated. It