Cassie stared at him, gutted by what he’d just shared with her.
Her hands had steadied enough for her to drink some of the sweet, milky tea and Dylan nodded in approval.
“I’m so sorry about Benjamin,” she said.
Dylan shrugged.
“I had to choose,” he said unemotionally. “But that’s what she’s like. Unreasonable. And it’s all about her, her, her. If you go against her, she torments you. She wouldn’t let Maddie do acting. She banned her from doing the school play and said she couldn’t take part unless she was top of the class in math.”
Dylan laughed scornfully.
“Maddie would never be even halfway to the top. Then she told Maddie she couldn’t be the drama club captain or even in the club. She wants a daughter who excels academically. That’s Maddie’s role and she’ll force her into it. That’s how she is.”
“Oh, no,” Cassie breathed. This revelation explained so much about Madison’s behavior. That wasn’t mothering, that was forcing your own demented agenda onto your children.
Cassie had a new image of Trish now, a darker one.
She was a woman who wouldn’t see reason or brook any argument.
And she wasn’t normal. In fact, she was the furthest thing from it.
“Thank you for coming to find me,” she told Dylan. “You’ve helped me a lot. We should go to bed now. It’s getting very late.”
“OK.” Dylan stood up, stretched, and yawned.
“See you in the morning.”
He turned and walked quietly back down the hall.
Cassie turned off the light and made sure the outside door was locked. She took the diamond necklace from her suitcase and placed it outside Trish’s door. Let her have it. With all the lies and misery surrounding it she didn’t want it.
Then she headed to bed, but once there, her panic returned.
Dylan’s sympathy had been comforting, but it couldn’t help her out of her predicament. The taped confession had sealed her fate. She marveled at Trish’s cunning in obtaining it from her before forcing her to flee the house.
The police would track her down in no time. There was no way she would be able to hide, and without a passport, she couldn’t leave.
The best idea might be to go straight to the police station and turn herself in. Perhaps the sympathetic constable would be there—but she remembered, again, the hard, uncompromising face of Detective Parker, and the way he’d looked at her as if she was already a criminal.
She remembered the hardness of the bed in the jail cell, with its scratchy blue blanket, and the chemical stink of the metal toilet, and the harsh fluorescent light of the cell that had burned itself into her vision.
That was where she’d be again, and who knew for how long?
She had no money for a defense and guessed she would be allocated an overworked public defendant. Meanwhile, Trish would be mustering her resources to ensure that her version was believed.
Cassie wondered what she would do if she was a judge.
Whose testimony would carry more weight—that of the wealthy, highly qualified career woman who was a pillar of local society? Or that of the traveler who was working illegally, had confessed her desire to kill Ryan Ellis, and despite her cocktail of anxiety meds, suffered from nightmares, sleepwalking, and memory loss.
It was a no-brainer.
The situation was hopeless.
As Cassie tossed and turned on her bed, trying her best to banish her thoughts for long enough to get some rest, one fact became crystal clear to her.
Trish Ellis had killed her husband.
It was the only way her actions this evening could be explained, and Dylan had confirmed that this was who she was.
CHAPTER THIRTY NINE
Cassie was driving out of the village, heading down a dark and empty road. Rain spattered on the windscreen, and the wipers sluiced it away.
“I’m not supposed to be here,” she said, as fear uncoiled inside her. “My bail conditions don’t allow it. I’m out of the village and I’m all alone.”
“You’re not alone.”
Cassie looked at the person sitting in the passenger seat. She hadn’t known anyone was there, but when she turned her head, she saw her sister, Jacqui.
Jacqui was dressed as if she was going to a fancy dinner. Her hair was curled, held back by a crystal-studded pin, and her dress and jacket looked smart and new.
“I came into some money,” she said. “I can help you.”
“How?” Cassie asked, because she knew it was impossible. Jacqui couldn’t possibly have a steady job, and in any case, money couldn’t buy her way out of this predicament. She was in deep trouble, and it was getting worse with every mile that passed.
“We need to turn back,” Cassie said.
“No. Stop.”
They got out of the car and walked to the edge of the cliff. Far away, across the ocean, she saw twinkling lights. If she could get there, she would be free, but it seemed so far away.
“Have some wine.”
Jacqui passed her a glass of red wine and Cassie lifted it to her lips, but as she was about to drink, she realized that the wine was poisoned. There was a greenish tinge on the surface of the deep red liquid and she could see it was starting to eat away at the glass, leaving it pitted and discolored.
“No!” she screamed. “We can’t!”
But Jacqui had already drained her glass, and she lurched toward Cassie.
“You can,” she hissed. “You must!”
Her face was changing, hardening, growing pale, and Cassie realized she’d been wrong. It wasn’t her sister at all. She was trapped now, and with her back to the cliff, there was nowhere she could go.
The person stumbling toward her with a gray, bloated face and outstretched arms was Ryan Ellis.
*
Cassie sat up in bed, breathing rapidly. She was drenched in sweat. More nightmares. Laced with poison, they all started with her breaking her bail conditions and ended with the vision of Ryan’s corpse.
She had barely slept. Checking the time, she saw it was seven in the morning. Finally, she could get up, but she dreaded what the day would bring.
When she went
