“Where’s my Ferrari?” he said.
Portia told him.
And then he emptied the entire magazine into them.
Chapter Fifty-four
The wrecker arrived right before noon. I stood next to Trey as it rumbled down the grassy lane. I left him just long enough to get an update from Finn, who’d arrived on the premises with a flurry of paperwork. Trey never took his eyes off the wrecker, though. He was still watching it when I returned.
“What happened?” he said.
I took a deep breath. “It’s hard to piece together with Quint and Portia throwing blame all over each other, but here’s how I understand things. When the Jaguar was stolen, Portia panicked. She told Quint they had to make a run for it, and he agreed. But neither of them planned on taking the other with them. They both saw this getaway as a solo act. That’s why they both came armed.”
“Quint killed Jessica.”
“Yes. That much is clear.”
Trey had his arms folded, eyes on the wrecker. “How did Macklin get involved?”
“Macklin and Quint went to the same underground poker game.”
“Of course. Macklin had a history of gambling.”
“And prostitutes. Expensive hobbies. He and Quint got into similar problems with the same people, and they decided to work together and split Nick’s money once Quint managed to get control of it. They came up with the idea that Macklin would smuggle Quint onto the property during his first check that day.”
“How?”
“In the trunk of his cruiser. Then Quint killed Jessica, left for the production company—”
“Through the backyard and into Chastain Park.”
“Yes, just like you suspected Nick had done. Portia was waiting for him there with a car.”
Trey didn’t react. “And Macklin?”
“He drove around until the deed was done, then went back for his second ‘gut check’ and pretended to catch the killer in the act. That way both he and Quint would have an alibi. And Nick wouldn’t, or so Quint thought. He thought Nick was off golfing by himself. He didn’t know Nick was having an affair with Addison, that she would alibi him. And nobody predicted that you’d show up too quickly for Macklin to properly stage the scene. He did a pretty good job, though, of making it look like Nick had done a bad job with it. But then he had to clock himself in the head and pretend to chase the pretend assailant, which wasn’t exactly part of the plan.”
“Quint admitted this?”
“No. Portia did. She’s flipping on him so fast it’s hard to keep up.”
Trey nodded again, still not looking my way. He’d already been interviewed. I had too. The rain had lifted to reveal bright sunshine, sudden and clear. It felt suspicious somehow, too cheerful, as if someone had delivered the wrong morning. Beyond the police tape, the wrecker crew and the cops were coordinating their efforts.
“Has someone told Price?” he said.
“Yes. She said the poor burglar guy is actually relieved. He’s been living under a murder warrant for four years. Now he can stop looking over his shoulder. She also said to tell you that as soon as she gets him squared away, she’s finding you.”
“But I have no information. The detective in charge—”
“She’s not coming as a cop. She’s coming as your friend.”
“Oh. Right.” Trey kept his eyes on the gathered crowd and the wrecker crew. “What happened with Quint and Portia? In the Ferrari?”
“Apparently, Portia tried to grab Quint’s gun, he lost control of the car, and the gun went flying. He managed to get out of the car before it sank and took off running. She caught up with him at the ruins.”
Trey winced at the word “sank.” The cops had yelled at him a little for his overenthusiastic use of peppershot. But they understood, they’d said. “Good on ya,” they’d said, ending the situation with no loss of life. I suppressed my annoyance. If I’d smothered two people in capsaicin powder ballistics, the cops would have sequestered me in a corner and lectured me until my ears bled. But Trey was still one of them. He got a pass. I didn’t bother telling them that it was the car he’d been pissed off about.
The car.
The wrecking crew had it winched now and was pulling it out of the lake one painful centimeter at a time. Branches snagged on the fender, mud sucked at the tires. My cousin Billie was a mechanic, and she always said she could fix a lot of things, but a car that had been submerged was a total loss.
I examined Trey out of the corner of my eye. His eyes were a little unfocused, his mouth in a straight line. He looked perplexed more than anything. He blinked, tilted his head. Blinked again.
“Portia knew everything,” he said.
“Yeah. Quint’s throwing massive blame her way. She’ll definitely go down as a co-conspirator. Thanks to you, they’ll both be behind bars tonight. The racketeering gamerunners will be answering some hard questions. The Buckhead Burglar is working a plea deal. And Nick Talbot will finally be exonerated.” I poked his shoulder. “You made all that happen.”
“No. We did.”
I felt a warm pleasantness spread in my chest. “Nick sends his thanks, by the way. He had a little bit of a nervous breakdown at all the news, but Addison leapt into action like a high-strung Florence Nightingale.”
“Is he okay?”
“He will be. And you will be too.”
He took a deep breath. “Yes. I will.”
Dozens of cop cars choked the pristine resort. The ambulance had arrived hot on their heels. The paramedics wore hazmat gear to deal with Quint and Portia, rinsing them in cold water and flushing their noses and eyes with saline drips before packing them off to the ER like drowned cats.
“You’re right,” I said. “About not carrying a gun anymore.”
“I know.”
“I don’t think I should either, to tell the truth.” I hesitated, then kept going. “I’m angry. All the time. And it’s so easy to channel that into…you understand.”
“I do.”
We stood very close in the rain-washed, late summer light. It felt like the first
