All Dressed in White Page 15

  “Until he became involved with Meghan,” Alex said.

  A flash of anger crossed Nick’s face. “That’s not fair. Was the guy supposed to become a monk for the rest of his life? Is it that surprising that he’d fall for someone Amanda also loved and respected?”

  “You’ll have to forgive Nick,” Austin observed. “He’s fiercely protective when it comes to Jeff.”

  Laurie thought she detected a note of jealousy in Austin’s voice.

  “Now, you’ve both said that you last saw Amanda around five o’clock, after you finished group photographs.”

  Both confirmed the same timeline they’d provided to police. After the photo shoot, they’d gone to the bar for an hour and then to their rooms. A little before eight, they met in the lobby and went to dinner at the Steak and Fin, finishing around ten. Henry left while they stayed for an after-dinner drink there. Then they had a nightcap in Jeff’s room and went to their rooms around eleven.

  “It’s our understanding that you were down here around the time Amanda and her girlfriends were coming back to the hotel. Did you cross paths with them?”

  Nick shook his head. “No, I didn’t see Amanda again after they took pictures.”

  Austin gave the same answer.

  Laurie listened intently as Alex hammered questions at them.

  “So you two fun-loving bachelors left Jeff’s room and went to bed around eleven o’clock. Isn’t that a little on the early side for both of you?”

  “We’d been out late the night before. We’d been in the sun all day. We had plenty to drink before dinner, at dinner, and then in Jeff’s room.” Nick turned to Austin. “I don’t know about you, but I was beat.”

  As usual, Austin quickly agreed. “I’d had enough. I went straight to my room and to bed.”

  “Okay, let’s go back to when you two were alone with Jeff in his room. You have both told me previously that Jeff expressed reservations about marrying Amanda. What did he actually say?”

  “I jokingly asked him if he was getting cold feet,” Nick said. “We were both astonished when he said, ‘Yes.’ ”

  “And what was said after that?”

  This time it was Austin who answered. “Jeff said that Amanda wanted him to change jobs. That he was too good of a lawyer to waste his time working for peanuts at the Public Defender’s office. Jeff told her that he liked being a public defender and helping people, and he was really good at it.”

  “What was your response to that?” Alex asked.

  “We laughed it off,” Nick said. “I told him getting married always means she’s going to start managing your life. Get used to it.”

  “And what was Jeff’s response?”

  “He laughed with us,” Nick said. “But we got the impression he was sorry he had started this conversation. It was right after that that we said good night and headed to our rooms.”

  “So you went to your respective rooms at eleven o’clock and you contend that you stayed in your rooms all night. Is that right?”

  “Yes,” they both answered.

  “And as far as you know, Jeff was not planning to leave his room after eleven?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And is it fair to say no one can confirm that you were in your rooms for the night beginning at eleven o’clock, which is approximately the last time anyone ever saw Amanda?”

  A flash of anger came over Austin’s face. “I guess not.” Nick nodded in agreement.

  “Were you aware at the time that in her will Amanda had left Jeff her two-million-dollar trust fund?”

  “We found out about that after she disappeared,” Nick said.

  “Do you think Amanda would have told Jeff about his potential inheritance?”

  They looked at each other. “It’s entirely possible,” Austin said quietly.

  Laurie could tell that they both desperately wanted to vouch for their friend, but they couldn’t. There was no getting around one basic fact: Jeff had the most to gain by Amanda’s disappearance.

  45

  “Mom, those ladies over there are drinking blue martinis.” Timmy was pointing to a group of four women. Their drinks were the color of dishwashing liquid. “You wouldn’t want one of those. You like martinis dry.”

  Alex’s eyes sparkled with amusement behind his glasses. “Timmy certainly does know his mother.”

  Laurie and Alex had postponed their plans for a dinner alone at a Michelin three-star restaurant after Timmy pleaded to go to the hotel’s sushi restaurant. Leo could not stand the thought of eating raw fish. He called it sea slime.

  Timmy, on the other hand, was even more adventurous with a sushi menu than Laurie. But she suspected that her son’s excitement about this particular restaurant was less about food than about the two L-shaped aquarium bar counters where live fish swam beneath the glass.

  Alex was about to check in with the hostess when Timmy asked if they could sit at the bar. “You’re always saying we should try new experiences,” he argued. “We don’t have this back home.”

  Alex broke the bad news. “You’re a little young for the bar, buddy. Try again in about twelve years.”

  “I can’t wait to be old enough to sit at the bar.”

  “Just what a mother wants to hear,” Laurie said dryly. “I don’t want him to end up like those two barflies Austin and Nick.”

  Once they were at the table, Alex said, “Speaking of the two Romeos, what did you make of their interview today?”

  She shrugged. “They’re exactly as Sandra described them. I don’t get the appeal, personally, but I know Brett will be happy. At least they’re entertaining for television.”

  “Enough about those two,” Alex sighed. “So Leo’s already convinced the photography intern was involved.”

  Without new facts, Laurie wasn’t eager to revisit this topic. “I know you think he’s jumping to conclusions,” she said. “Maybe we should leave it on the back burner for now.”

  Later, as they walked through the lobby, Timmy asked if he could sleep in Grandpa’s room tonight. Laurie found herself happy to have even more time to spend with Alex.

  46

  Laurie was shocked the next morning when Charlotte Pierce arrived on set at the courtyard behind the hotel. She wore an impeccably tailored white suit with a black silk shell. Her hair and makeup were camera-perfect. This did not look like the same woman she’d met in the office at Ladyform.

  “Don’t look so surprised,” Charlotte said, perching herself comfortably on the love seat they had staged for the occasion. “You didn’t think I’d go on national television looking like the ugly duckling, did you?”

  Alex took his place, nodded, and the cameras began to roll.

  Five minutes later, Laurie checked her watch. Charlotte had already recited the same information she’d given Laurie when they met in New York. She was a businesswoman who was used to communicating efficiently.

  But part of Alex’s talent was to introduce questions that his subjects hadn’t anticipated. “What was it like being Amanda Pierce’s sister?” he asked casually.

  “I have no idea what you mean by that. It’s like asking me what it’s like to breathe. She was the only sister I ever had.”

  “Yet I sense in you a woman who could in fact describe what it’s like to breathe, if someone asked you the question.”

  She gave him a half smile. Laurie could almost hear her deciding to play along. “Fine. It was like being the weed next to the rose. In any other family, I would have been a superstar. I graduated at the top of my class from the University of North Carolina. I’m a pretty nice person. I work hard. But Amanda was special. Men wanted to marry her, women wanted to be her. She knew how to please people.”

  “Jeff’s friends sensed that you weren’t especially happy about the wedding. Disinterested was the word one of them used.”

  “Well, first of all”—Charlotte waved her hands dismissively—“Jeff’s friends are idiots. Second of all, I wasn’t disinterested
. I was worried, and not about Amanda. I thought Jeff was the one making a mistake. I loved my sister, but I was probably the only person who really knew her. She looked like a princess from a fairy tale, with bluebirds brushing her hair. But she was cunning. Ambitious. And there’s nothing wrong with that, but she hid it behind this perfect, gentle façade.”

  Laurie found herself fascinated by Charlotte’s description. It felt utterly honest.

  “So why were you worried about Jeff?” Alex asked.

  “Because he had no clue what he was getting himself into. He started dating Amanda and then almost immediately she became very sick. Weak,” she added sorrowfully. “It was the only time in her life when she was vulnerable, but if anything the experience only hardened her. I can tell you this. She was going to put him through the ringer. She was going to change him the way she changed Ladyform. Her idea of a successful husband was not a public defender.”

  Alex leaned toward Charlotte. “So do you suspect Jeff Hunter in your sister’s disappearance?”

  She paused a long time before answering. “I guess that depends.”

  “On what?”

  “On whether he figured out that if he married Amanda, he’d be under her thumb as I always was.”

  47

  Leo woke up feeling completely rested. This bed is great, he thought. It had been ten years since Eileen passed. Since then, it was only on trips with Laurie that he slept somewhere other than in his own bed or in Laurie’s guest room. He realized it was probably time to buy a new mattress. Maybe he’d think about it when they were back in New York.

  He looked at the clock. It was already ten A.M. He saw a note beneath the door that joined his room to Laurie and Timmy’s. He felt his hamstrings ache as he bent down for it. At sixty-four years of age, he was in good shape but needed to stretch more. Figured I’d let you two sleep in, the note read.

  Timmy was getting older. He could sleep until noon if undisturbed.

  Leo walked over to the small desk in the corner, opened the laptop Laurie had bought him for his birthday, and clicked on the Internet browser. He could spend a few minutes working on his pet project before waking his grandson for a late breakfast. He used two fingers to type facebook.com into the search window. Grace was the one who was teaching him how to “cyberstalk,” as she called it. When he was on the job, gathering background information had required knocking on doors and pounding the pavement. These days, people posted their entire lives, including what they ate for breakfast, on social media.

  He typed “Carly Romano” into the search window of Facebook. He read recently that it was increasingly common for families and friends to maintain pages of those who had passed, as a place for loved ones to post memories. Sure enough, he found her wall, with a posting as recent as two months ago, from a Jenna Romano: Happy Birthday, Sis. You’re still in my heart. Xoxo.

  He had called the police in Waterville and confirmed that Carly’s case was still unsolved. According to the detective he spoke to, the primary suspect was her high school boyfriend back in Michigan. The two had tried a long-distance relationship during their freshman year, but Carly broke things off when she returned to campus for her sophomore year. He didn’t take the news well. But police had never been able to build a case against him.

  It seemed like a good case for Laurie’s show.

  Leo clicked through the photographs on Carly’s profile, searching for one of the old boyfriend. He checked the dates. He was still browsing the college years. He needed to keep scrolling back to high school.

  He couldn’t help but notice that Carly looked happy and lively in every photograph. She had thick, dark hair and big brown eyes. She seemed to always be smiling. He was scanning the pictures so quickly that he almost missed it: a familiar face.

  He flipped back two pages. The caption on the photograph read, “DJ Night at the Bob-In!” Carly looked straight at the camera. The man next to her in the booth had his arm around her. He was younger, Leo thought to himself, but that’s definitely him.

  Younger, but familiar. He spotted him two more times in other photographs taken within a few days of this one.

  He clicked over to his email and found the production schedule that Jerry had sent everyone prior to the trip. Alex was interviewing Charlotte at nine A.M. in the courtyard behind the hotel, with Kate to follow at 10:30. If he hurried, he could find Laurie on a break in between.

  • • •

  Leo waited until he saw Charlotte Pierce leave the set. Laurie smiled when she saw him, but then a moment of panic crossed her face. “Dad, where’s Timmy?”

  “He’s fine. I woke him up and he’s in your room getting ready for breakfast.” They had lived for five years in the shadow of a killer’s threat that he would someday return to kill both Laurie and her son. That kind of fear doesn’t fade easily. “I think Alex may have been right when he said I was jumping to conclusions about Jeremy Carroll. You need to see this.” He opened his laptop screen.

  Laurie’s mouth opened in surprise. “Is that—? Oh my God, it is.”

  He clicked to the other two photographs. “His arm’s around her here. And check out the way he’s looking at her in this one. I think Jeff was dating Carly Romano. Amanda may not have been his first victim.”

  48

  Jerry was waving in Laurie’s direction. “Is everything okay? We’re ready to go over here.” They had scheduled Charlotte Pierce and Kate Fulton in back-to-back interview sessions.

  “Just a second.” She turned to Leo and said, “Dad, let’s not share this discovery yet. If word gets back to Jeff that we’ve connected him to Carly, he might panic. We’re supposed to question him this afternoon.”

  Leo nodded. “I agree.”

  Laurie approached the set, smiling calmly at Kate, and then explained she just needed to speak to Alex briefly before they began.

  Alex knew her well enough to know that something unexpected had occurred. They stepped aside, out of earshot of the others.

  “Remember how I told you that a girl was killed near campus when they were all in college?” she asked.

  He nodded.

  “Dad found some photographs of Jeff and Carly together online. It looks like they may have dated.”

  “How come no one ever mentioned that?” Alex asked quickly.

  Laurie shrugged, still trying to process the new information herself. “The girls probably didn’t know; Kate said they weren’t friends with Carly, and they weren’t close to Jeff yet. But Jeff’s friends presumably knew.”

  “Should I ask Kate? Or maybe we should just wait until we have him on camera.”

  “Don’t ask Kate anything about this. I want to make sure we catch Jeff off guard later.”

  Grace was making her way toward them, her tanned legs revealed by an impossibly short minidress. “How are we doing over here? I told Jerry to calm down, but you did look a little worried.” Grace’s ability to read Laurie was almost eerie.

  “We’re all set,” Alex said confidently. He reached over and squeezed Laurie’s hand. Don’t worry, Alex is a pro, Laurie reminded herself. He’ll handle this perfectly.

  • • •

  “Now, Kate, you said Amanda expressed doubts about going through with the wedding. Can you tell me exactly what she said?” Alex asked pointedly.

  Kate pressed her lips together, appearing to concentrate deeply. “I don’t recall every word, but we were alone in the pool, and she was asking whether I ever wondered if I got married too young. She wanted to know if I had regrets, if I would have experienced more in life if I hadn’t—that kind of thing. She even asked if I thought it was too late to call things off.”

  “That sounds like more than last-minute nerves,” Alex said. “She actually mentioned the possibility of canceling the wedding?”

  “She didn’t say she wanted to cancel, but yes, I remember she said, ‘How bad would it be to pull the plug at this point?’ I told her it was normal to be nervous, but that she shouldn’t go through with a
wedding just to avoid upsetting other people.”

  “If this is true, Kate, you’re the only person we know of to whom Amanda expressed her reluctance. Pardon me for saying this, but wasn’t Meghan closer to her than you were? She was the maid of honor, after all. Why wouldn’t Amanda have disclosed these concerns to her?”

  She shrugged. “Maybe because Meghan was also friends with Jeff? She might have been worried Meghan would tell him.”

  “Are you sure that’s the only explanation?” Alex persisted. “Meghan made it sound as if she and Amanda were extremely close friends. Wouldn’t Amanda trust her with such an important confidence?”

  Kate cleared her throat. “It’s possible that over the years, I may have let it slip that, yes, I did used to wonder if I married too young. That I would picture how things might have been different if I had ventured off on my own for a while. But I told her when she asked if I loved my husband and my children. How could I possibly regret them? Later, when I asked whether she was seriously having second thoughts about marrying Jeff, she was a bit evasive.”

  “How so?” Alex asked.

  Laurie leaned forward, not wanting to miss a single facial expression or syllable.

  “She said that something had come up—she was very vague—and that she needed to learn more about it before making a final decision.”

  “What exactly did she need to learn?”

  “I have no idea. That’s all she would say.”

  “Was it something about Jeff?” Alex suggested. “Was she planning to talk to him?”

  “I honestly don’t know,” Kate said.

  Alex turned and looked to Laurie to see if he should press any further. She gave him a small headshake, indicating not to push. She didn’t want Kate to tip off Jeff that they were leaning in his direction.

  Alex was bringing the session to a close when Laurie saw Sandra Pierce walking quickly toward the hotel lobby, a handkerchief in her hand, her husband one step behind her. What was this all about? Seconds later, Amanda’s brother, Henry, emerged from the same door and ran toward Laurie.