“Where are you?” Valerie asked, obviously expecting me to say something that fit with her worldview. Heaven or hell, it probably wouldn’t matter to her. Because of Aunt DeeDee I was ready for this one.
“At The Rose,” I said, in a vague enough way that no one could contradict the statement.
Valerie moved as if to stand, but Will whispered something to her and kept her from leaving.
“Brett,” Presley said, as she stood. I could feel the shift in her tone as she spat out the next words: “Don’t you have anything to say to me? To Lacy?”
I scrambled for the best response. I needed to say something that sounded like her boyfriend but that would also invite her to confess to killing him—if that was indeed what had happened.
I tried to channel my best narcissist, keeping my eyes closed. “I know you both miss me. Terribly.”
When there was no response, I opened my eyes and looked directly at Presley, who had a sad smile on her face. Then, she began to laugh. Or, perhapscacklemight be a better word. She pointed a finger at me as the conduit for Brett. “You have no idea how glad I am that you’re gone, that I don’t have to keep up this silly charade anymore.”
My eyes widened, and I wasn’t sure I could keep up the Brett pretense in the face of her obvious disdain.
“You trapped me,” Presley continued. “You threatened me. You said that if I left you, I would lose everything I’d built. It’s the only reason I stayed with you for as long as I did when I have someone who”—Presley looked at Joe, her anger melting—“someone who actually loves me.” She sniffled and let Joe pull her close, burying her head in his shoulder before seemingto remember something. “Brett Brinkley, I hope you pay for everything terrible you’ve done.”
Her last words took me by surprise. I’d only glimpsed one layer of Presley, the supposedly grieving girlfriend, and I was now seeing that she, like the rest of us, contained multitudes. She could love and hate Brett at the same time, though it seemed like hate was currently winning.
“Is your killer in the room?” Joe asked, likely wanting to take the attention off Presley. Though he obviously wanted to protect her, to keep her from looking even more guilty, I appreciated that he was getting right to the point.
I took a chance, opened both eyes super wide, and pointed at theGo to Jailspot on the Monopoly board. I figured that was a yes if there was one.
Though I was staring straight ahead, I could tell in my periphery that the attendees were looking at one another. Even Lee Frank seemed to be concerned as he squirmed in his seat.
“Tell us who did it,” Aunt DeeDee called from the back, just as we’d planned.
“I need to speak with the one who got away,” I growled. After all my investigating, I was more and more certain that this would point me in the right direction.
“Is it me?” Lacy asked, right on time.
I took a few beats as if Brett might be considering, and then felt the table for paper and pen, scribblingNOT YOUin large letters.
A gasp, or perhaps a hiccup this time.
“Is it me?” Presley asked, briefly lifting her head from Joe’s shoulder.
I hadn’t expected a question like that from her. Of course she wasn’t the one to get away. She’d met him on the showafterhe’d written the song, right? I took a guess and scribbled a giantNOon the opposite page.
I let my eyes flit back again in a way that I hoped was frightening enough to a potential lover or killer—or both.
“Is it me?” asked a faint voice, that younger mirror of Miss 1962’s, that faceless voice that had traveled into households across America asSmall Town, Big Romanceaired each week in the fall of 2023.
Mina Davis’s words left her mouth, swirling and rising above me.
My eyes flew open to see Mina silhouetted by the candles, and that’s when I recognized the woman from the video, hidden in shadows. I suddenly knew why that form and figure were so familiar. It wasn’t just her voice I knew. It was all of her. She was the woman in the music video, the one that the Rose Diamond may have once been intended for.
Mina Davis was the one that got away.
I took a chance, sensing that a revelation was on the horizon.
YES, I scribbled, staring straight at her.
“I miss you, Brett,” Mina mumbled, as she cried into her hands. “I always will.”
Her words contained longing and wistfulness and… love? Whatever the mixture, Mina Davis and Brett Brinkley apparently went way, way back.
THIRTY-THREE
