“That was Nick. Something big must’ve happened today with the case. He’s on his way here to tell us.”
Nina’s shoulders straighten. “Good.”
Lanie claps her hands and opens a cabinet, pulling down four shot glasses.
“What are you up to?” I ask, watching as she keeps busy pulling a bottle of liquor from the top of the refrigerator.
“We need a toast before he gets here. Can’t drink in front of him, but I’ll need the shot to take off the edge.”
I roll my eyes. “You’re a boozehound.”
“I thought we discussed this,” Corinne grumbles. “You’re forty, not eighty. Lose your grandmother’s vocabulary and start calling her a lush. That I’ll accept.”
“You’re impossible.”
She shrugs, grabbing her shot of gin that Lanie poured.
“Why gin? It’s not exactly a good choice for a shot,” Nina interjects.
“It’s what we have. It’ll do.”
Lanie lifts her shot glass. “To Nick and his team. May they have the information they need to put those assholes away for life.”
“I’ll drink to that,” I say, lifting my glass.
The other two follow suit.
“Cheers,” we say in unison, slugging back the liquor.
?“WE HIT THEjackpot with Jenna’s phone records,” Nick says, leg bouncing from adrenaline. “It’ll be hard for any of them to enter a not-guilty plea. Jenna’s cell phone and iCloud were packed with incriminating evidence. Especially for Richard.” He glances at Nina, but she doesn’t react.
She’s sat stone-faced and quiet through Nick’s news. I wonder what’s going through her head, but right now, I just want to hear everything Nick has to say.
“She had videos of Charlie admitting what he did and Richardalluding to collusion among other things. She was clearly documenting everything.”
“Why?” I ask, confused since she was supposedly in a relationship with Richard.
“According to a string of text messages exchanged between the two, she was trying to get him to leave Nina and he refused.”
Nina huffs a humorless laugh. “Of course he did. God forbid the man does me a favor.”
“A scorned woman looking for revenge,” Lanie chimes in and Nick shrugs one shoulder.
“He told her she could keep the items he purchased, but they were over.”
I chance a glance at Nina, but again, she doesn’t give anything away.
“That’s when she started threatening to expose him.”
“Motive,” Corinne muses. “She was going to expose him, so he took her out first.”
“It would seem so.” Nick sighs. “We have a team on their way to Jenna’s. Her mom gave permission for us to search the place.” He turns toward Nina. “They’re in the process of obtaining a search warrant for your home too. I shouldn’t be telling you this, but since I know you have nothing to hide, I’m giving you a heads-up. They’ll have it in hand by the end of the day.”
She nods. “I have nothing to hide. Let ’em search.”
Nick offers a tight-lipped smile.
“What about Jackson’s case? Any progress there?” I ask, thinking about the burly biker I came to adore.
