“They can’t make her.”
“No, but if a wife actually saw her husband performing autoerotic asphyxiation, why would she refuse to take a polygraph about it?”
“Doesn’t matter. The company’s not gonna pay just because she passes a polygraph.”
“No, but it might help them believe her story.”
“What about me?” I ask. “I saw David with a noose around his neck.”
“No offense, but Alison doubts that story. And anyway, sitting on the closet floor with a noose around your neck isn’t the same as hanging yourself for sexual gratification.”
“From what I understand there was no evidence David’s death was probable, expected, or a natural result of his activity. He did it for the sole purpose of getting off, and had every expectation he’d come out of the experience alive, without injury, as he had many times before.”
“Well, as I said, if there was a shred of credible evidence David had done this at least once before, we could probably get the company to reconsider.”
I think about my two-hour video, and how I recorded all of David’s erotic asphyxiation episodes including the one where he did every part of it himself, from tying the knot to saving himself after the fact. That’s the only one that would count, but Blass said one was enough.
I ask, “If someone could prove David had done it before, how much would his family stand to benefit?”
“If all David’s policies paid the accident benefit, it would add more than seven million dollars to his estate, tax free.”
“Wow. Too bad there’s no credible evidence.”
Alison joins the conversation: “Are you sure about that?”
“What are you suggesting?”
“I think you know a helluva lot more than you’re saying. I’ve known David all my life. There’s no way he came up with this hanging thing all by himself, and there’s no way he gave you all that money hoping to have an affair with you.”
“We’ve had this discussion before, Mom, and my answer’s not gonna change.”
“Are you willing to accept two-point-five million to walk away? You’d also have to agree to stop seeing Jessie.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about with regard to Jessie. I haven’t seen her since the funeral. But since you’ve lowered your offer to two-point-five, I’m going to respectfully decline. I’ll contest David’s will and sue his estate for the portion that’s rightfully mine.”
“I see. And does that mean you’re going to keep seeing Jessie?”
“Again, I have no idea what you mean.”
“You had sex with my daughter!” she yells. She starts yelling something else, but I can’t hear her over the loud banging on my front door.
Now a man’s voice shouts, “Nicki Hill? Shelbyville Police Department. We have a warrant to search the premises. Would you mind opening the door?”
I open the door to see Detectives Broadus and Rudd, and four policemen. Broadus hands me a piece of paper and says, “Miss Hill, this is an official search warrant issued by Derrick Compton, Magistrate, District 1, Shelbyville, Kentucky. Please stand aside and allow the officers to do their job. We’ll try our best to make this as quick and painless as possible, but we expect your full cooperation.” To the officers he says, “Be sure to confiscate her computer and any electronic devices.” Then he asks for my phone. Before turning it over I hear Alison shout: “Rot in hell you fucking bitch!”
3.
I WASN’T STARTLED by the police.
Moments earlier, while talking to Mr. Blass, I heard a slight beep and walked to my bedroom and lifted a single wooden slat a quarter inch so I could peer out my window undetected. The reason I knew someone was in my driveway is because I’m in the same house in Shelbyville that I rented last April, before David and I began our affair. Back then I installed a driveway alert so I’d know when he pulled into my driveway each Friday. That way I’d be able to open the garage door for him.
When I looked out the window moments ago I saw two sedans in my driveway and one on the street in front of my house. All three appeared to be standard police issue, but the one on the street looked exactly like the one I saw three weeks ago at the Thorne estate: the one that belonged to Detective Broadus.
There was no need to panic then or now.
I’ve been expecting them for weeks.
Broadus says, “Would you consider answering some questions? It would save us having to take you down to the station.”
I laugh. “Which station is that? The one in Lexington?”
Detective Rudd smiles.
Broadus says, “Are you going to talk or not?”
“Let’s sit at the kitchen table.”
The three of us sit down and I say, “Go ahead and ask your questions, and I’ll consider answering them.”
“Very well. You understand we’re just doing our job.”
“Of course. What would you like to know?”
He presses a button on his phone and says, “Do I have your permission to record this?”
“Yes.”
He tells the recorder the date and time, who we are, why they’re here and gets me to give him permission. Then says, “How many times has David Thorne been inside your house?”
“This house?”
He nods.
“To the best of my knowledge, he’s never been in this house.”
“Either he has or he hasn’t. Which is it?”
“As far as I know he had no clue where I lived. Neither did any of the Thornes.”
“Then your answer is?
“I don’t know.”
“Why’s that?”
“As I told you three weeks ago, David was determined to have an affair with me, but I turned him down because—as I’m sure you know—I’m his biological daughter. But David didn’t know that, and so he pursued me. As you also know, David was quite wealthy, and it’s possible he hired a private detective to locate me. If so, he may have been stalking me without my knowledge. If so, he may have broken into my house when I wasn’t here.”
“Have you reported any break ins to the local police?”
“No.”
“So can I assume we’re not going to find any of David’s clothing, toothbrush, or personal effects today?”
“I wouldn’t assume anything. Maybe the men searching my home will plant something. Maybe David planted something after breaking in.”
“Why would David break into your home and leave evidence?”
“I have no idea. But this is the same guy who broke into Michael’s phone and stole my photos.”
“Have you seen any of Mr. Thorne’s personal items in your house?”
“No. And by the way, I’d be shocked if you found a single skin cell or hair follicle that belongs to David.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because he’s never been in this house, as far as I know.”
“We think he has, and I’ll tell you why: For six straight Fridays David drove to Frankfort and rented a car and drove precisely 45.8 miles before returning it.”
“Precisely 45.8 miles? Every single time?”
“Close enough.”
“How close, exactly?”
“Within a range of two miles over six different Fridays. So you know what we did last week?”
“You drove from Frankfort to my house and back and logged precisely 45.8 miles?”
“Bingo. How do you explain that?”
“I’d call it a mild coincidence.”
“Mild?”
“If you start by assuming he went to the same place every Friday there might be a hundred possible destinations that total 45.8 miles’ roundtrip, including virtually every house in this neighborhood. Since my house is one of them, I’d call that a mild coincidence.”
“And if we find some of his personal items or DNA today?”
“That could only happen if David or the officers planted it.”
Detective Rudd says, “I can’t help but notice
you’ve got three sturdy beams in your den.”
“Maybe you should check them for rope fibers.”
“Good idea. Too bad it’s not on our search warrant.”
Broadus glares at him.
I say, “You have my permission to search the beams for rope fibers.”
“We do?”
“Certainly. You do understand this isn’t my house, right? And that I’m just renting it? I have no idea if the owner or any of the other tenants ever hanged themselves on those beams, but that would be another coincidence, don’t you think?”
Broadus says, “Three weeks ago you said you put a million dollars into a mutual fund in Michael Thorne’s name.”
“That’s correct.”
“Can you provide us with that information?”
“It’s in my purse. Want me to get it?”
They look surprised. Rudd says, “Please.”
I locate the piece of paper that contains the fund’s name, Michael’s account number, and all the prompts and passwords.
Broadus looks at it and frowns, then hands it to Rudd.
“Mind if we call them?”
“Suit yourselves.”
Rudd takes out his phone, punches in the numbers, and after a few minutes of dealing with the automated phone prompts he gets a human on the phone who verifies the account, the balance, and the sole owner: Michael Thorne.
“When did you open this account?” Broadus asks.
“The day after David wired me the money.”
He tells Rudd to hand him the phone. Rudd does, and Broadus asks the rep for the date the account was set up and the amount of the initial deposit. Then he hangs up.
“Satisfied?” I say.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“You told Alison Thorne you lied to me about setting up this account.”
“Did I?”
“According to Mrs. Thorne, you told her you kept the money for yourself. You said if you had put it into Michael’s name you would have had to pay the gift taxes and wouldn’t have had the money to do that.”
I shake my head. “I love Alison, but I think between David’s death and finding out that I’m the daughter she gave away at birth, she’s been through a lot. I think it’s taken quite a toll on her.”
“So you’re saying you never told her that?”
“That’s what I’m saying. But even more to the point, why would I tell her I kept the money for myself when clearly I had given it to Michael weeks earlier?”
“Good question, and here’s another: why haven’t you told Michael?”
“I did. In fact, you were right there in the hotel lobby when I told him.”
“But you haven’t told him since then. According to Michael, you’ve never identified the account.”
“Well surely he admitted the $200,000 was in the joint checking account.”
“He did. But why haven’t you given him the mutual fund information?”
“We haven’t actually been speaking. But when we do, I’ll be glad to tell him, or you can, if you like. Meanwhile, the money’s sitting there, building up value for him. And if he hasn’t received the first monthly statement by now I’m sure he’ll get it soon, since I put his address on the account.”
“With Michael out of the picture, how do you intend to pay the gift tax on the initial wire transfer?”
“I was hoping to inherit money from my father’s estate.”
“My understanding is, you made a five-million-dollar deal with Mrs. Thorne.”
“That’s correct. She offered me five million not to contest the will or sue the estate. But a few minutes ago she rescinded that offer, so I guess I’ll have to sue.”
“Why did you give Michael the money?”
“I trusted him. At the time, I thought we were going to get married.”
“According to Mrs. Thorne, you had sex with her underage daughter.”
“I know.”
“Excuse me?”
“She told me the same thing on the phone just now!”
“What’s your response to that accusation?”
“It’s the first I’ve heard of it. Like I said, I think the strain of David’s death has gotten to her. First she claimed I lied to you and kept the money for myself. Well, you just cleared that up, didn’t you? Then she claimed I had sex with her daughter. Surely you asked Jessie if that’s true.”
They say nothing, which tells me what I already knew: there’s no way in hell Jessie would rat me out. When I told her I was Michael’s sister she didn’t bat an eye. She’s tough as nails. And, she’s in love.
I laugh.
“What part of this strikes you as funny?” Broadus says.
“Think about it: I’ve been accused by Alison of having sex with everyone in her family except her.”
“You knowingly had sex with your biological brother.”
“I wouldn’t call it having sex, and I doubt he would, either.”
“You certainly lived together as a romantic couple. Why?”
“Michael and I were like roommates. If you ask, he’ll tell you we were never officially engaged. That’s just a story I agreed to let him tell people so they’d stop bothering him about it. But I couldn’t be engaged to him or have sex with him. Like I said, I’m his sister. I never told him that, but I wanted to. I just never found the words.”
“That’s a load of bullshit.”
“Well, of course there’s more to it. I never had a family of my own, so I gravitated to Michael and accepted his affection…to a point. But I was going through a lot of personal stuff, and—you know the expression ‘any port in a storm?’ —That’s what Michael represented to me.”
“Mrs. Thorne says you used him to…” He stops in mid-sentence and shakes his head. “Oh, never mind. She destroyed her credibility with the mutual fund thing.”
“I’ll admit I stayed with Michael longer than I should have, but I did it so I could be around my real family.”
“Why didn’t you just tell them who you were?”
“Can you imagine how awkward that would have been? They didn’t want me, Detective. If they had, they would have located me and invited me into their lives. But they didn’t, so I had to force the situation. I wanted them to meet me as a stranger, with no preconceived notions. I knew they hated all of Michael’s former girlfriends, so this was my chance to see if they would like me. And they did. They loved me.”
Rudd says, “We never stopped working the blackmail angle. But since you gave the money to Michael before we began the investigation, it’s going to be hard to get any traction.” He looked at Broadus. “Can we turn off the recorder?”
He does, and Rudd says, “You know what I think? I think David had the hots for you and when you broke up with Michael he saw an opportunity, made his move and you told him you couldn’t have an affair with him because he was your father. And I think he felt bad about leaving you all those years ago, and wanted you to have something, so he sent you the cash.”
Broadus says, “Wrong and wrong. Because if that was the truth, she wouldn’t have had to transfer the money to Michael. But she had to.”
“How do you know?”
“Because no one’s going to give up $1.2 million if they don’t have to.”
Rudd says, “It’s going to be hard to prove it.”
“Not if we find evidence linking her to sexual activity with her father.”
“You won’t,” I say.
“Because you clean up well?”
“Because there isn’t any.”
4.
THE OFFICERS REMAINED in my house nearly four hours, and never found any evidence of David.
Like Detective Broadus said, I clean up well.
From the minute he and Rudd claimed they were terminating the investigation I knew they were lying and hoped to lull me into a false sense of security. So that very day, after getting my stuff from Michael’s apartment, I washed all my clothes, threw away my bed spread, shee
ts, pillow cases, all the items inside my refrigerator and closets, and scrubbed every surface in my house. I washed all the silverware and every dish and glass and all the pots and pans I own. I even got a ladder and wiped off all traces of rope fibers from the beams. I cut both ropes we used into one-foot pieces, and dumped them in gas station trash cans and dumpsters all over Louisville. I bought a new laptop, threw away the old one (after removing the hard drive and drilling holes in it with an industrial strength drill Michael had in his utility room). I also destroyed and threw away the video recorders and the pieces of both copies of the videos I made that chronicled my sexual activities with David.
After talking to Alison in the hotel that day I told Jessie who I was, and said the only reason I’d remained with Michael was so I could get closer to her. I said I intended for us to be together, though it couldn’t be right away. She said she’d wait for me till her eighteenth birthday if she had to, but no longer. I told her it might very well be that long, but said I’d be in contact as soon as I was convinced the police had concluded their investigation.
Then, even though I was convinced all traces of David were removed, I hired a cleaning crew to clean the house from top to bottom, including all surfaces, light switches, wall plugs, light bulbs, appliances, and I supervised their efforts. Two days later, I hired another cleaning crew to do the same.
As it turned out, Alison and Arthur Blass were lying about the insurance company denying the accidental death claim. Their call was a sting operation. She had called Detective Broadus to report I was her biological daughter and told him I’d been having sex with Jessie. Then they put their heads together and came up with the idea of trying to get me to come forth with evidence that David had performed his autoerotic activities previously. This, because Broadus was still convinced I had seduced David and blackmailed him into sending me the money. The plan was for Alison to call me on the phone even while the police were ready to surprise me with a search warrant. No doubt Alison was hoping to get two things from the phone call: a confession about being with Jessie, and evidence of David’s sexual activity that I could only provide if I had, in fact, been sleeping with him. Alison hoped I’d be put in prison, and she’d be able to keep Jessie from my clutches and the family could move on with their lives.