Bonnie dropped her head and focused on her hands. No one spoke. After a moment, she said in a low whisper, “Fine. I’ll tell you what happened.” As she recited her tale, Ann turned her head away in disgust. Bonnie saw the movement and threw her head back and glared defiantly at Ann. “Don’t you dare judge me!” she spat out. “Don’t you dare! You have no idea what a miserable man your father could be at times. He used me, plain and simple! He didn’t love me! I was nothing to him! Nothing!”
Ann glared back at her with contempt. “You could have left. You didn’t have to stay.”
“And do what? Go back to being a secretary? I don’t think so.”
“Seems to me, then,” Ann replied, “that he wasn’t the only one doing the using.”
Bonnie closed her eyes and said, “Fine. See what you want. Paint me as the bad guy. Why should any of that change now? Go ahead, what exactly do you want from me?”
Ann turned to Joe. Clearing his throat, he said, “We need you to do something for us, Mrs. Reynolds.”
“What?” came Bonnie’s wary reply.
When Joe told her, Bonnie blanched, then called him a son of a bitch and Ann far worse, but in the end she agreed to do what we asked. In silence, we watched her make the phone call.
Two hours later, I lay in the bed nervously readjusting the sleep mask on my face and the wig on my head. The room was unnaturally silent. I couldn’t hear Joe or Peter, and I had to restrain myself from calling out to them. When I finally heard the bedroom door ease open, I pretended to be asleep and forced my breath into a calm and even rhythm. Everything depended on how the next couple of minutes went. I had to sell this. My heart began to pound furiously and I prayed that the figure I sensed slowly easing my way couldn’t hear each terrified thump and beat.
The figure drew closer. I could hear the breathing; it was now practically next to me. My nerves were frayed and it took every ounce of my self-control not to fling myself out of the bed and run screaming for the door. Then I thought of everything that had happened, of the people killed and hurt, and I forced myself to remain still.
Suddenly a low voice hissed, “You stupid, greedy bitch!” and a pillow was roughly pushed down over my face. I flung my hands up to push the pillow off, but the hand that held it down wouldn’t budge. Panic overtook me and I frantically tried to get out from under the crushing pressure. Where was Joe? Within seconds, the pillow was yanked away and the hands holding the pillow were secured, but those seconds felt like an eternity. I sat up and pushed off the sleep mask and wig, blinking at the bright lights that now flooded the room. Before me, the figure struggled in Joe’s steely grip. Peter ran over to me. “Are you all right?” he asked, cradling my face in his hands. “I can’t believe I let you do this. You’re crazy, you know that, right?”
“I’m fine,” I assured him, although it would have been more convincing if my voice hadn’t come out in a scratchy croak. After taking a restorative breath of air, I glanced at the figure across the room from me, now being handcuffed. I studied the face; it was the same old face, but there was a ruthlessness in it that seemed new to me. Who knows? Maybe it had always been there and I’d just never noticed.
Seeing me in the bed and not Bonnie, the figure sputtered, “Elizabeth! What the hell is going on here?”
No remorse, just surprise. I was suddenly furious. “It’s over,” I said. “That’s what’s going on. It’s done. You’re done. You’re not going to hurt anyone anymore, Miles.”
Chapter 30
What is right to be done cannot be done too soon.
Miles glared at me and struggled against the handcuffs.
“How could you?” I asked. “How could you do this? You were a part of this family! And yet you stole, and killed an innocent man to cover your crime.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Miles said. “I didn’t steal…”
“Shut up,” I snapped, pushing myself up and out of the bed. “Just shut up.” Standing in front of him, I continued to berate him, my voice shaking with anger. “Bonnie told us what happened between you two. You were at the house in St. Michaels the night after the party. You didn’t expect anyone to be there, but someone was— Bonnie. You seduced Bonnie and convinced her never to reveal what happened between you two.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” cried Miles. “What did Bonnie say? She’s an idiot, for Christ’s sake! You can’t trust anything she says!”
I couldn’t believe him. He was still trying to pretend he was innocent. “Miles, for God’s sake! You just tried to kill me thinking I was Bonnie!” I yelled. “Don’t you get it? It’s over! We set you up! We were there when Bonnie called you earlier. We heard everything. You came here to kill her. You shoved a pillow over my face thinking it was her! It’s over!”
Miles turned away from me. “Stupid bitch,” he muttered. I didn’t know if he was referring to me or Bonnie. I didn’t care.
“Does Laura know?” I asked. That got his attention. His head whipped back to face me. “No!” he cried, finally showing some real emotion. “She has nothing to do with any of this. You have to believe me about that at least. She knows nothing. I did this for her. I did this alone.”
“Do you really think that was what she wanted? For you to steal and kill for her?”
He looked at me, his eyes suddenly pleading. “I had to, don’t you understand? I had to! She never would have married me unless I was a success.”
I shook my head. “You’re wrong. She loved you for
“I couldn’t take the chance.”
“That’s your justification? Did you never stop to think how Laura is going to react to all this? You’ve destroyed several lives, including hers!”
Miles lowered his head and said nothing.
Joe read him his rights.
Chapter 31
She told the story, however, with great spirit among her friends; for she had a lively, playful disposition, which delighted in any thing ridiculous.
We were in Ann’s living room. I sat on the couch curled up next to Peter. Across from me sat Aunt Winnie and Ann. Miles had been taken into custody. Reggie and Frances arrived full of questions. Ann deferred them to me. “Elizabeth’s the one who figured it out; she should really be the one to explain.”
They all looked expectantly at me. I have to admit, I felt very much like an Agatha Christie detective, calmly explaining the solution while in an elegant drawing room full of people. All that was missing was a tea cozy and a plate of cucumber sandwiches. “Well, I guess it all started with Reggie’s wedding arch,” I said. “I remember Miles laughing about what it looked like.” I paused, realizing my gaffe, and glanced at Reggie. “Sorry, Reggie.”
Reggie waved away my apology. “It doesn’t matter,” she said impatiently. “Get on with it.”
“Well, anyway, my point was that Miles knew what it looked like. But according to him, he left for New York City on July fifth and didn’t return until the twenty-ninth. However, Nana said the arch wasn’t delivered until the sixth and was removed on the fifteenth. By Miles’s own admission, he
