‘Are you sure you didn’t let him slip out?’
She raised her face to mine, puzzled. ‘Whatever do you mean?’
‘He had an awfully easy time getting away. It was almost as if you wanted him to escape.’
‘Not true, Hoagy. I had no idea that Austin had a copy of the key to his room. And I certainly had no idea that Captain Rundle of Troop F, who must have sawdust between his ears, would actually return Austin’s patrol car to the house and leave the keys in the ignition. Seriously, how stupid is that?’
‘Seriously? Very stupid. But, on the other hand, it did provide you with a golden opportunity to do what you’d been wanting to do for years – avenge Paul’s death.’
She blinked at me in utter shock. ‘You think I’m the person who slashed Austin’s throat?’
‘No, I don’t think it. I know it. When I was ghosting Hollywood memoirs I learned quite a few things about the dark side of human nature. The single most important one I learned was that if a person lied to me from the get-go, that it was no fluke. It was who they really were, and that they would lie to me again and again. Lie to me whenever it furthered their personal agenda – which, in your particular case, happens to be covering up the fact that it was you who followed us up that mountain, cut Austin’s throat from ear to ear and shoved him over the safety railing into the gorge below. You lied to me from the get-go, Annabeth. You told me that Austin was hospitalized at McLean when Paul was killed. He wasn’t. That lie? That told me who you really are.’
She lowered her gaze, her face reddening. ‘Here I thought we were having a friendly conversation, maybe even a bit more than friendly, and it turns out that you invited me over to accuse me of murder. I truly don’t have the slightest idea what you’re talking about.’
‘See? You’re lying again right now. You do know what I’m talking about. Don’t bother to deny it, because that will just be another lie and we’ll keep going around and around in circles. When you were nice enough to drop off that delicious chicken noodle soup, you mentioned you’d been stuck in traffic on the Q Bridge in New Haven at the time of Austin’s murder. You said you’d been clearing off your desk at the med school that day.’
‘So?’
‘So I phoned my old Cambridge pal T.J. That would be Dr Thomas Joshua to you, whose office is right down the hall from yours. He told me he was in his office the entire day working on a book review that some scholarly journal had asked him to write. I said to him, hey, the writing thing is mine. Get off of my cloud. And he—’
‘Is there a point to this?’ she asked with a slight edge in her voice.
‘He swore to me he didn’t catch so much as a glimpse of you that day. In fact, he told me he hardly sees you at all anymore, and when he does you seem very somber. He’s been wondering if you’re doing OK, which it so happens you’re not. T.J. could tell. He has a razor-sharp mind, I understand.’
‘Is there a point to this?’ she repeated, this time with a much harder edge.
‘As a favor for a rowdy old friend – that would be me – he called Dr Prakesh, the psychiatrist who has the office directly across the hall from yours. Then he called me back five minutes later. Guess what? She didn’t see you in your office that day either, the reason being that you were never there. That was a lie. Yet another lie.’
I paused, waiting for Annabeth to contradict me. She didn’t. She didn’t so much as say a word. Just sat there, breathing in and out.
So I plowed ahead. ‘You do have my sympathy, you know. Austin murdered your soul mate. But you and I both know that you weren’t stuck in traffic on the Q Bridge in New Haven at the time of Austin’s death. You were high atop Mount Creepy with a hunting knife in your hand and Austin Talmadge’s steaming-hot blood all over you. So why don’t you just come clean? I can help you. The governor’s fixer, Colin Fielding, likes me for some reason. He told me if I ever needed a favor to give him a call. He’s a former spook. I guarantee he can make all of this disappear. But if you keep lying to me, I can’t help you. And I want to help you. You see, it so happens that I’ve grown rather fond of you.’ Her eyes searched mine. There was hope in them. Desperate hope. ‘More than fond, actually. The truth is that I’m absolutely crazy about you,’ I confessed as Lulu grumbled at me unhappily from the wing-backed chair.
Annabeth studied me curiously. ‘You’re a strange one. First you accuse me of being a pathological liar and murderer, then you tell me you’ve fallen for me.’
‘No one’s ever accused me of being normal. Go ahead, ask around.’
‘I don’t have to,’ Annabeth said softly. ‘Because I’ve fallen for you, too.’ She raised her face to mine and kissed me lightly on the lips. Her mouth tasted sour despite the honey she’d been drinking in her tea. She took my hand and held it, squeezing it tightly. Hers was ice cold. ‘Jim Conley phoned me at the sanitarium to tell me that Austin had just shot Truman Mainwaring at the beach club and then had gone roaring out of there. I knew immediately he’d flee to his mountain to hide. It was his safe place. So I drove straight home – the kids were still at school – changed into hiking boots, jeans and an old wool mackinaw shirt of Paul’s and
