‘Does she look familiar?’ Choi asked, reading Mary’s reaction.
‘Umm…’ Mary shrugged, still searching her memory. ‘She does… a little… yes, but I can’t…’ All of a sudden, it came back to her. ‘Oh my god.’ She pointed at the photo. ‘Yes. I met her in New Orleans.’ She took a pause to properly remember. ‘I think it was about two months or so after I met Luke.’
‘Do you remember where in New Orleans you met her?’ Kendall asked.
‘Yes, I met her in a bar called Lafitte’s Blacksmith Shop.’
‘Lafitte’s Blacksmith Shop,’ Choi repeated it, as he wrote the name down.
‘Yes, this woman…’ She tapped the photo with her index finger. ‘Was also there… by herself. Her name is…’ Mary closed her eyes and searched her memory once again. It took her a few seconds. ‘Natálie.’ She snapped her fingers and pointed at the photo again. ‘Yes, her name is Natálie. She was visiting from London. We shared a table in the bar and had a few drinks together.’ Mary paused and lifted a hand at the detectives. ‘Why? What do she and Luke have to do with any of this? And how did you get these photos?’
‘From the basement that you told us to go look.’ The replycame from Choi. ‘These photos were on the wall to the right of the one with all the Polaroids, but apparently, you never saw them.’
‘Because they weren’t there,’ Mary shot back. ‘They weren’t there last night.’
‘So how come they were there when we got back to the house to check the secret basement, like you told us to, just a couple of hours after we arrested you?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You said that you and Mr. Cameron… or Quaddra… were the only two people in the house, right?’ Choi pushed.
‘Yes.’
‘So how did these photos come to be on that wall, all neatly spread out into a coherent storyboard and timeline?’
‘A what?’ A pit opened up at the bottom of Mary’s stomach. ‘A storyboard and timeline?’
‘Just like the ones you see in films,’ Kendall confirmed, gesturing as he explained. ‘With colored strings linking photos together and all.’
How’s that even possible?the voice inside Mary’s head asked.Why would Quaddra have these photos?
Kendal clearly wasn’t done yet, as he, once again, reached inside the envelope for a new photograph.
Mary chuckled nervously, as he placed the picture on the table. This time she didn’t need to search her memory for who the person in that photograph was. She was looking at Betsy – Betsy Fletcher – the waitress that she’d met at the Jolt N Bolt bakery in the Dogpatch. The same Betsy who had invited her to the exhibition where she met Quaddra for the first time.
‘From your reaction,’ Choi said, resting his elbows on the table. ‘I take it you know her.’
‘Yes, I know her,’ Mary confirmed. ‘Her name is Betsy Fletcher. She’s an artist.’
‘From San Francisco?’ Kendall asked.
‘She used to live here, yes,’ Mary replied. ‘But she’s moved to LA.’ She sat back on her chair and once again, raised her hands at Kendall and Choi. ‘Look, I’m seriously very confused here. You first show me all the Polaroids I found down in that basement before telling me that all of those women aren’t dead… they are, in fact, actresses auditioning for a role. Now you’re showing me all these photos from completely random people, who I’ve met sometime in the past two years, telling me that these photos were also down in that basement, arranged in some kind of storyboard. I don’t know what’s going on here.’
‘Don’t you?’ Choi challenged.
‘No. I don’t.’ Fear was starting to take hold of Mary’s tone as well.
‘After we left the house,’ Kendall took over again, ‘we had to drop by the hospital to have a chat with Mr. Cameron – the man you stabbed.’
This time, Mary didn’t try to correct him.
‘There was a lot that needed clearing up,’ Kendall continued. ‘The Polaroids… the storyboard… that basement… nothing was really making a lot of sense.’
‘That’s exactly what I’m saying,’ Mary agreed, wondering if either of the detectives had listened to anything she’d said.
‘Oh, but it will,’ Kendall told her. ‘And here’s where this story jumps from the crazy to the absolutely fucking insane.’
One Hundred and Two
