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“So then you’ve seen her? I assume she came down for the funeral.”
She stared at me. “Why is any of this your business?”
I pulled my spine as tall as I could and dove in. “She married my ex-husband, and my children are living with her. I have some concerns about that, and I would like your help.”
“I see.” She cleared her throat. “I haven’t seen her since she took off the night after her high school graduation. She wanted to come back and see me after she learned about her father, but I told her not to. She broke her father’s heart. He had such high hopes for her, but all she cared about was herself.”
“I’m sorry,” I repeated, not sure what else to say. “Were you aware that she remarried after Ethan died?”
Marion shrugged. “No, but it’s not surprising. She was so young when she ran off with him. I’m really not that interested, to tell you the truth. We did everything for her, and she thanked us by running away without so much as a goodbye. She was supposed to start at Virginia Tech in the fall. We’d been counting on her going there, on her making us proud.”
It was obvious that she was still very angry, but I couldn’t tell if she genuinely thought Piper didn’t—couldn’t?—truly care for others, or if these were the words of a mother whose only child had rejected her.
Before I could formulate a response, she continued. “We always had to work so hard to ground her. She was too vain for her owngood, always primping in the mirror and trying to charm people. She was elected homecoming queen, of all the anti-feminist, frivolous things . . . We wanted her to focus on her academics, her intelligence. She’s a brilliant girl, but she threw it all away. Thought she’d run off to Hollywood and get discovered.”
“I didn’t realize she’d wanted to be an actress.”
“Oh yes,” she sneered. “Thought she was quite the little star. Even when she was little, she always wanted to put on plays for us with her friends, insisted on being the center of attention. We’d tell her we weren’t interested. I mean, really. It does no good to coddle children, to lull them into a false sense of security about unattainable goals. Do you realize how minuscule the chances are that she would be able to support herself by acting?” She didn’t wait for me to answer, clearly warming to the subject. “Close to zero. We wanted her to go into a meaningful field, be a doctor or an engineer. We thought we’d talked sense into her when she chose Virginia Tech, but then she ran off with Ethan. A spoiled rich boy.”
I jumped in. “Her second husband was rich, too. He and his daughter also died in an accident.”
I watched her face as that sank in.
“What kind of accident?”
“Sailing. Apparently the daughter fell off the boat, and her father jumped in after her. They weren’t wearing life vests, and they both drowned.”
She raised her eyebrows. “Very odd, indeed. Pamela was with them?”
I nodded.
“I can’t imagine why they weren’t wearing life vests. That’s sailing 101.”
I decided to plunge ahead. “I have to wonder if maybe it wasn’t an accident.”
She narrowed her eyes. “Are you accusing my daughter of murder?”
“No. But you have to admit, two husbands with untimely deaths is awfully coincidental. Ethan died while the two of them were hiking, and she inherited the money from his trust fund. And her second husband, Matthew Dunn, left her an estate worth twenty million. Don’t you think that’s suspicious?”
“It may be, but what do you expectmeto do? I don’t have any influence over her any longer. If you’re so worried, you should go to the police. I can’t help you.”
I leaned forward. “Dr. Rayfield, please. Just tell me: Do you think she’s capable of murder?”
She leaned back in her chair, clasped her hands together, and closed her eyes. “Honestly, I don’t know. I never really understood her. There was one incident...”
My heartbeat quickened. “What?”
“There was graffiti spray-painted on a teacher’s blackboard, threatening to kill him. It was the same teacher who’d given her a bad grade.”
“You thought she might have spray-painted the threat because someone failed her?”
“No, no. He’d given her a B, and we’d grounded her for two weeks, so she had to miss the homecoming dance. In the end, they crowned the runner-up since she couldn’t go.”
They’d grounded her for a B and made her miss homecoming when she was selected queen? It was a wonder she hadn’t threatened to killthem, Joanna thought.
Marion shook her head. “She swore she had nothing to do with it. But there was black spray paint in our garage.”
“Had she bought it?”