“Yes,” I manage weakly, cotton gathering in my throat at the grimness of those memories. “That’s all accurate.”
“Did she ever say she’d kill you?” he asks.
“Inside the house when she launched herself at me, she shouted that she’d kill me like she did Rebecca.”
“And why do you think she wanted to kill you, or even Rebecca for that matter?”
“Considering she went nuts over me simply talking to Mark, I can only assume jealousy.”
This earns me a quick and uncomfortable question. “Were you having sex with Mr. Compton?”
“No,” I say firmly, hyperaware of Chris by my side. “I was with Chris then, as I am now.”
Detective Grant’s look is as cynical as they come. “Did you want to?”
My defenses prickle. “No. Not that night, and not ever.”
“Did he want to have sex with you?”
“I . . . I don’t know.”
Detective Miller scoffs. “Please, Ms. McMillan. A woman knows if a man wants to have sex with her.”
“Yes,” Chris supplies. “Mark wanted to have sex with Sara.” Cringing, I squeeze my eyes shut as he adds, “I knew he did. I’m sure Ava knew as well.”
“But you, Ms. McMillan,” Detective Grant says, “didn’t want to have sex with him.”
“Move on,” David orders.
Detective Grant changes the subject. “Do you believe it was her intent to hit and kill you with the car?”
I inhale, those horrible few seconds returning with vicious force. I can almost feel the night air, hear the car engine and my own breathing. “Yes. She wanted to kill me. That tree saved my life. I darted behind it or I wouldn’t be here now.”
“When she failed, she held you at gunpoint?” he presses.
I nod. “That’s right.”
“And she ordered you into the car?”
“Yes.”
“So she had the chance to shoot you, but she didn’t.”
It’s not a question and my anger is sharp and instant. “She intended to kill me.” I lean in closer. “She tried to kill me with the car. And if not for Chris risking his own life to disarm her, I wouldn’t be here right now.”
Chris’s fingers slide under my hair to my neck, an act he normally reserves for those intimate moments when he is in control. The effect is jolting, and I realize instantly that’s his intent. As I focus on him my anger levels off, and I inhale a calming breath. Chris’s hand slowly slides from my neck, settling back on my leg.
After a short count of ten, I open my eyes. The two detectives have turned away, heads lowered as they whisper between themselves. They straighten and Detective Miller takes over the conversation.
“I’m sure everyone here is aware that Ms. Perez retracted her confession to the murder of Rebecca Mason. It’s difficult to secure an indictment in a murder charge without a body, and we are going to temporarily drop those charges to build a case. We have until Friday morning to decide if we’re going to proceed with the attempted murder charges.”
Abruptly, David scoots his chair to the head of the table, firmly grabbing both sides and smiling. “Damn, I’m good.” He motions to Chris and me. “Aren’t I good? Go ahead. Say it.”
“That’s why I hired you,” Chris assures him.
Detective Miller grimaces. “Please, David. Tell us why you’re gloating. We can’t wait to hear.”
“Don’t mind if I do,” David says, looking as pleased as he sounds. “I knew you were going to bluff on the attempted murder charges. It’s all part of your head game to get information they’ll willingly give you anyway. And it’s really as low as it gets, considering the defendant tried to kill Sara.”
“Innocent until proven guilty,” Detective Miller comments.
My anger returns like a swish of a now-sharpened blade. “She tried to run me down with a car. It was smashed into the tree when the police got there. How much more proof do you need?”
“And what about the four witnesses?” David asks. “Should I count them out?” He raises a finger. “One.” Then another finger. “Two. Should I continue the demonstration?”
“We can count,” Detective Miller snaps.
David scoffs. “Apparently not, because you keeping ‘forgetting.’ Let me be clear. Ms. Perez is a danger to my clients and to society. If you and your people aren’t good enough to convince a judge she needs to stay behind bars, protection orders for Chris and Sara must be in place before that woman leaves custody. And she’d better have a leg monitor that’s watched nonstop. You don’t want to know how deep I’ll cut if anything happens to one of my clients.”
“It’s not as simple as you make it, Counselor,” Detective Grant says tightly. “There are complicated relationships involved in this case and the ever-changing stories have given me whiplash.”
“We haven’t changed our stories,” David points out. “If Ms. Perez has, that makes her look even more unstable, and unstable is dangerous.”
“We aren’t at liberty to say more at this point,” Detective Miller informs him. “We’d like to continue our questioning and go from there.”
David leans back in his chair and taps his pen on the table a few times before he agrees. “Five minutes. Make the time count.”
Detective Miller immediately turns to me. “Who’s Ella Ferguson?”
“My neighbor and friend, who bought Rebecca’s storage unit. She eloped and left me with the unit.”
“And she’s where now?”
“You know she filed a missing person’s report,” David answers irritably. “Get to the point or we’re done here.”
“Her point,” Detective Grant says tightly, “is clear. We want to know where Ella is.”
They’ve hit a raw nerve, and I say heatedly, “So do I. Where is she? I’ve filed a report here, and in France, but no one seems to be looking for her. Just like no one seemed to care about Rebecca, even after I started looking for her.”
“And when exactly did you start looking for Ella?” Detective Miller asks, ignoring my inquiries.
“It’s all in the reports,” David says irritably.
“I want to hear it again,” Detective Miller counters.
I jump in, ready to get out of this tiny cage of a room. “Ella handed me the key to the unit the night she eloped, along with the journals. I started reading them and got concerned for Rebecca’s safety. I decided to try to find her. When I was told she was on extended vacation it heightened my concern, so I went to the gallery.”
Detective Grant tilts his head. “And then ended up taking her job.”
“Temporarily. I was off for the summer, and since I have an art degree I thought I’d look for Rebecca and earn extra income.”
“You basically started living her life.” His tone is pure accusation.
I make a disgusted sound, fed up with their lack of action, which they blame on everyone else. “That job, and the connection reading those journals gave me to Rebecca, is what drove me to look for her. I’m the only reason anyone was looking for her.” Chris squeezes my hand in silent support. “I couldn’t save her, but I can at least see justice done for her. Ava has to be stopped before she hurts someone else.”
Detective Grant dismisses me, turning his attention on Chris. “Are you a member of Mark Compton’s club, Mr. Merit?”
“Yes,” Chris replies without hesitation, appearing unfazed by the abrupt change of topic.
The detective cuts a look back to me. “Are you, Ms. McMillan?”
“No,” I say, following Chris’s lead of less is more.
“Have you ever been to the club?” he presses me.
“She’s been twice,” Chris replies on my behalf. “Both times with me.”
That earns Chris another of Grant’s accusing questions. “Were you ever at the club when Rebecca was there?”
Chris doesn’t give him so much as a blink of hesitation. “Not that I’m aware of, but I stuck to my private room. I had no interest in the r
est of the club.”
Grant studies him for long seconds, then cuts sharply to me. “Did you ever see Rebecca at the club, Ms. McMillan?”
My pulse leaps with the accusation, but David never gives me a chance to defend myself. He gives the table an angry pound and declares, “No games. She never met Rebecca. Refer to the date the storage unit was purchased. She’d already left town.”
“What about after Rebecca returned to San Francisco?” Grant argues and then turns his wrath on me again. “Did you meet her then?”
“I never met Rebecca,” I say, and I swear my heart has moved to my throat. “The reason I had a job was to fill in for her.”
“So if Rebecca returned, you would have lost a dream job, right?” he says.
“What? No.” I pull my suddenly trembling hand from the table to my lap. “I could have kept my job. I talked to Mark about that.”
“Rebecca’s return date was before Sara started at the gallery,” David reminds him. “So game over and move on. Stop taunting her.”
“Actually,” Detective Miller says, “we aren’t prepared to disclose Rebecca’s specific travel dates at this point.”
David eyes her for several seconds and makes that snorting noise. “Let me get this straight. You’ve now decided Rebecca Mason came to the city, left again, and came back?”
“What I’m saying, Counselor,” she replies tartly, “is nothing. We aren’t prepared to release what we know about her travel at this point.”
“Of course you aren’t,” David says with acidic sarcasm. “How else would you victimize the victim?” He sighs heavily and motions with his hand. “Move on to another subject, or this interview is over.”
“Gladly.” Her attention lands on me. “Back to the club, then. Ms. McMillan—”
“I’ll spare us all some time,” Chris interrupts, leaning forward. “Sara was not, and is not, a part of the club.”
“Let her tell me,” she insists.
I repeat Chris’s words. “I have not been, and am not, a part of the club.”
Chris continues, “I took Sara to the club for one reason only: to show her what I’d been involved with, and why I didn’t want her to be a part of what I considered my past. We didn’t have sex while we were there. We didn’t go to the public areas. I didn’t even allow her to talk to anyone on the way in.”
“You didn’t allow her?” Detective Miller asks, sounding appalled.
“To protect her,” Chris explains.
Detective Grant scoffs. “We’ve heard that before.”
“What does that mean?” I ask, my defenses flaring for Chris.
David intervenes, demanding, “How is any of this related to Ava trying to kill my client?”
Again Detective Miller answers. “There’s a personal relationship between the defendant and the witnesses. We need to understand that dynamic.”
“Not for the bail hearing,” David counters.
Detective Grant replies, “You know as well as we do that we have to be prepared for anything.”
“Furthermore,” Detective Miller adds, “if Ms. Perez is awarded a lower bond and she’s released, it’s in everyone’s best interest that the DA feels comfortable putting his neck on the line to even take it to the grand jury to indict her.”
David’s brow wrinkles and his lips twist. “I smell a bad fish and it stinks to high heaven. I don’t like it when things stink. So fair warning. I gave you five minutes; you have about two left.”
Detective Miller instigates a back and forth with Chris. “You don’t want Sara at the club because you think it’s what? Dangerous?”
“Far from it. Mark Compton takes his responsibility to protect the members of the club seriously, or I would never have stepped foot inside. It’s simply not right for me or Sara.”
“Meaning BDSM, or the lifestyle, or . . . ?”
“There’s nothing wrong with the lifestyle, if that’s what you’re getting at. BDSM is like anything else. It’s right for some and not for others. It can be a way people cope with things they might not otherwise deal with. It can be a simple escape from everyday pressures. It has many healthy, pleasurable purposes, but like anything, it can be taken to unhealthy extremes.”
Her lips curl. “Did you take it to an unhealthy extreme, Mr. Merit?”
I dig my fingernails into my leg, worried about where this is going, but Chris doesn’t miss a beat. “A couple of pieces of chocolate every day is safe for one person, but for a diabetic, it’s life threatening. Unhealthy is defined by the person.”
“That’s a nonanswer,” Detective Grant says, sounding more than a little displeased. “But if you don’t want to talk about you, let’s talk about Mark Compton. Does he take this BDSM thing to an unhealthy extreme?”
“Asked and answered,” David interjects. “He said extreme is defined by the individual.”
“And I said it’s a nonanswer,” Detective Grant snaps, focusing on me again. “Ms. McMillan, when you were reading the journals did you find Mr. Compton’s behavior to be extreme?”
“She’s not answering,” David says. “That would be opinion, which is nonadmissible in court, and we all know the journals don’t even mention Mark Compton’s name.”
Detective Grant cuts him a look. “Since when are you Compton’s attorney?”
“I didn’t like your question.” David motions with his hand again. “Move on.”
Lips thinning, Grant removes two journals from his accordion folder. “Did you read all of the journals you turned in to us, Ms. McMillan?”
“Yes. I was trying to find clues that would tell me how to find her.”
“Did you read the entry where Mr. Compton used a knife to taunt Rebecca during sex?”
“Again,” David interrupts. “We don’t have any proof the man in the journal is Mark Compton.”
Grant doesn’t look at him. “Did you read the scene, Ms. McMillan?”
My throat thickens and I nod, fearing a squeaked out reply will show some kind of guilt during this witch hunt.
“Is that why you went to look for her?” he presses. “Because you were afraid for her?”
“We didn’t come here to discuss Mr. Compton,” David interjects.
“We need to know what Ms. McMillan’s motivations were so we know she’s rock solid in front of a jury. If she looks bad, the defendant looks good.”
“It wasn’t about the journal entries,” I offer honestly. “I hate the idea of people losing their belongings to an auction, which is why I didn’t get involved in auction-hunting when Ella did.”
He pulls one of the journals from the accordion file and holds it up. “You know this journal, I assume?”
I nod. “That’s her work journal.”
“Did you read this note she wrote?” He opens it to a page and flips it around, showing me a passage highlighted with a pointed sticky note.
I read the familiar passage out loud. “Riptide auction piece. Legit? Find Expert.” I glance up at him. “I brought this note to the attention of the private eye we hired to help find Rebecca. I was concerned that it might have somehow led to her disappearance. That’s how Mary and Ricco’s actions were discovered.”
“The private eye would be who?” Detective Miller queries.
“Blake Walker of Walker Security,” David supplies. “Which you know since you questioned him.”
“Simply making sure there wasn’t another private eye,” Detective Miller states, the tension between her and David palpable.
Detective Grant stays focused on me. “Were you concerned they might have killed Rebecca?”
“In my interactions with Ricco, it was clear that he was in love with Rebecca. I didn’t believe he would hurt her.”
“And Mary?” he presses.
“She was prickly with me, and my understanding is that’s how she treated Rebecca.”
Grant arches a brow. “Why was that?”
“We both worked with Mark on Riptide auction items, and he trusted us over her
.”
“Did you ever sleep with Mr. Compton or engage in any form of sexual activity?”
“Asked and answered,” David says sharply.
Despite his objection, I say, “Never.”
Detective Miller shifts in her chair. “You seem to rule out Ricco as having anything to do with Rebecca’s disappearance. What about Mary?”
“She’s mean-spirited,” I say, “but Mary knew Ricco cared about Rebecca. He was vocal about it to everyone. And in my opinion, Mary’s more of a revenge kind of person. She’d want to hurt Rebecca and Mark—not kill either of them.”
Detective Grant moves the journal in front of Chris. “She marked out your name and her notes about you. Why?”
My heart starts racing. Do they know Chris fought with Mark over Rebecca? How would they know? Would Mark have told them?
“I don’t begin to assume I know why another person does anything,” Chris answers, in full avoidance mode.
The journal is scooted back in front of me. “Any idea why she marked out Mr. Merit’s name?”
Where is this going? Are they accusing Chris of something? “I saw no notes that indicated why in anything I read.” Somehow my voice is steady, though my knees aren’t.
David slaps his hands on the table. “And on that note, I’m going to ask my clients to leave so I can talk with you alone.” He pushes to his feet. “This interview is over.”
• • •
“I’m scared, Chris,” I say as we exit the police station into the parking lot, still reeling from the interrogation.
He stops walking and faces me, his hands settling solidly on my arms. “That wasn’t about you, baby. They’re using you for information. Think about them like you do Mark. Don’t let them intimidate you.”