Flynn and Wanda exchange a look.
“You don’t remember?” Wanda asks, her razor-thin lips curling at the edges.
“Well, I was passed out. I—”
“Again?” Wanda asks pointedly. “This seems to have become a pattern of yours, Mrs. O’Neill. Drinking too much, blacking out—”
“But I hadn’t had too much to drink, that’s the thing, I—” I flick my gaze to Flynn. “I—there’s something else I needed to tell you about that day, Mike, um, Detective Flynn.”
He tilts his head as if waiting for me to continue, but I pause, hoping he’ll grant us a moment alone. He doesn’t.
I’m whittled down by Wanda’s stare, but I manage to spit it out. “Callie drugged me. Again. She slipped something in my wine that day—I swear I’d only had a few glasses—and that’s why I passed out. She’s done it before to me, once when—”
But Flynn cuts me off with another wave of his hand. “Whatweunderstand,from Callie,” he says, then clears his throat, “Mrs. Jenkins, is that you showed up out there and threatened Mrs. Banks. Is that correct?”
“No, as I explained to you, I went out there to find out why Margotframedme for Abby’s murder. There was no threatening going on, other than Callie pulling a shotgun on me.” My neck burns with anger. “And as I’ve tried to explain, Margot now believes that Callie isactuallythe one responsible for Abby’s death. And for setting me up for it.”
I chase my words with a big swig of lukewarm coffee.
Flynn’s eyes are locked onto mine and I can feel the pinprick of Wanda’s gaze, but I keep my face turned toward Flynn’s.
“Have you talked to Margot yet?” I ask.
Flynn ignores my question.
“What time did you ‘pass out,’ would you say?” Wanda makes quotation marks with her fingers around the wordspass out.
“I didn’t take note of it at the time, but if I had to guess, around noonish.” Whenever Margot was done making love to me.
“And what did you do before blacking out?” Wanda’s lips are curled into that same insipid smile.
Am I on trial for getting it on with Margot? Do they know about that? I twist my hands in my lap, lower my eyes to the table. The hum of the tape recorder makes my nerves twitch and I wonder if I need to call that lawyer after all.
“Like I said, I had a few glasses of wine out on the boat dock and then went inside. And that’s where Margot and I discussed everything.” There. I’m not lying, just leaving out one very important detail.
“And when you came to,” Wanda asks, “who else was out there?”
I take a second before replying, carefully selecting my words. “When I woke up, Brad was there. Brad Simmons.”
I feel a perceptible hitch in Wanda’s line of questioning. I’ve stopped her in her tracks. She and Flynn bring their heads together and pass whispered words between them. Flynn scratches his pen across a notepad.
“You sayBrad Simmonswas there?” Wanda asks, with a note of surprise, and possibly doubt, in her voice.
“Yes. And he was the only one there. No Margot, and no Callie. I grabbed my things and left.”
“Did he mention what he was doing there?” Wanda folds her hands together, plants them on the table as she leans forward.
“Um, yeah. He told me that Margot had texted him to come out. But, I’m pretty sure he was lying. Margot had ended things with him.”
“And you didn’t see Mrs. Banks at all after you woke up?” This time it’s Flynn, and he chews on the cap of his pen as he waits for my reply, concern darkening his eyes.
“No. Have you talked to her yet? She’ll confirm everything I’m saying.”
Again, Flynn doesn’t answer me. Instead, he jots something down in his notepad and elbows Wanda to look at it. She heaves a huge sigh of annoyance and tosses me a withering look before standing and exiting the room.
I needle Flynn with my eyes. “Well?Haveyou talked to Margot?”
“No, Sophie, I haven’t.” Flynn leans back in his chair, scratches the stubble on his chin. “Because Margot, Mrs. Banks, is dead. She drowned.”
