I saw her stretched on a chaise longue, her hair pulled back from her face, her eyes hidden behind reflective sunglasses. She wore a fitted white cotton shirt and a yellow-and-black sarong. She stared out at the lake. Her skin glowed in the sun. I took a seat next to her, and she didn’t move.
“It’s amazing how deceptive the water can be at times like this,” she said. “It looks so calm and inviting, so unthreatening. But when you get out there in the middle of it, you realize it’s so powerful and dangerous and unpredictable.”
“I’ve never seen this side of the lake before,” I said. “Something makes it look different. Seems so much more tranquil and welcoming than what we have in Chicago.” She took a sip of her drink, something that looked cool and very sweet. “Tinsley, my name is Ashe Cayne.”
“I know who you are,” she said. “I saw your car as it approached.” She took another sip. “You can actually see some of the Chicago skyline from here. Best to see it during the spring and on a fall day like today. The clouds are blocking it right now, but I saw it last night right before sunset.”
We sat there looking at the horizon, admiring how the sky kissed the earth. The wind blew easily and rustled the leaves.
“How did you find me?” she said.
“It wasn’t easy. But it was something Blair Malone said to me. He mentioned meeting your family out here. Your father has a company called Lakeview Holdings. It’s the only thing that made sense.”
“I got Chopper killed,” she said. Her voice quivered. She kept looking into the lake. “There’s so much I could’ve done that would’ve protected him. We could’ve picked up and left. I had enough money to do it. I never met his uncle before, but I could’ve found him and told him I was worried. He was like a father to Chopper. He would’ve done something. Why didn’t I think? I’m the one who got him involved in this mess.”
“The mess with your father and the charity?”
She nodded softly. “He told me to leave it alone, but I couldn’t. I was so pissed at them for what they had done. Robert and Weston were such frauds. They dragged my father into all of this. But he still shoudn’t’ve done it. My father knows better.”
“Do what?”
“He was trying to help them, but the way he decided to do it was illegal and unethical.”
“Why did they need help?”
“Because they were practically bankrupt,” Tinsley said. “Robert had made some really risky investments; then the crash happened in 2008 and wiped them out. Almost completely. They only had their two houses—the one in Chicago, the one in Florida—and an apartment in New York. But they had mortgages and no real income. Weston was the one who came to my dad. Robert was too proud at first to do it. Weston told my dad how bad things were and suggested they do the land deal through the charity. My father went along with it. It took them a couple of years, but then the money really started coming in. They made all their money back and then some.”
“When did you find all this out?” I said.
“About a year and a half ago,” Tinsley said. “I overheard the three of them talking after dinner one night. They didn’t know I was in the hallway. Weston was talking about some company he had purchased using funds from the charity, and how they were making a lot of money. He’s such a pompous ass.”
“Then Chopper brought you to the guys at Liberate,” I said.
“I told Chopper all about what my dad and Weston had done. I told him how much I hated Weston and how I wanted him to be exposed for the person he really was. Chopper told me to let it go. I wouldn’t. So, he said he would help me if I was determined to do something. When he was in college, he played pickup ball with this guy at DePaul who was big on fighting inequities. He started some campus group that raised awareness. Then, after he graduated, he started working with a bigger group that was trying to shine a light on all the fraud and corruption by the elite in the city. I asked Chopper to introduce me.” Tinsley closed her eyes and shook her head. “Biggest mistake was getting Chopper involved in all this. First, they tried to buy his silence. He would never take their money. Then they threatened him. First my dad, then Weston. But Chopper wasn’t afraid. He was such a man. I loved him, and I killed him.”
“You can’t blame yourself for someone else’s bad decisions. You didn’t kill him. Weston had plenty of options other than shooting him. That was his decision.”
“I should’ve told Chopper about the argument we all had after dinner that night,” Tinsley said. “I was planning to but never got around to it. Then the next night when I left, I should’ve taken him with me.”
“What exactly happened that night?”
Tinsley sighed as she tilted her head back. “Hunter and I had been having the biggest fights, so I wouldn’t talk to her for a couple of days. She was upset about the pregnancy. She was upset because I was considering exposing what our fathers and her brother did with the charity. She blamed Chopper for everything. She said he was making me think backward. She wanted
