Page 78 of Behind These Four Walls
“Absolutely not. I mean, I did come here to get in with your family. I did omit where I was from and that I knew your sister. I nevermentioned that I was there her last day, when she disappeared. But that’s why I came back. To find out what happened after I saw her get in the Jeep, because I owed it to her.” She couldn’t bring herself to say what she thought. She’d let the recording do it for her because she was too chicken to say that she thought his sister was dead.
Myles laughed in disbelief. “You owed her? Don’t you think you’re a decade late? You could have told him something, anything, that would have helped him. Even if she was to say it to his face again that she never wanted to see him again, at least that would have been something. You were the last person who saw her.”
“But I wasn’t the last person who saw her. That’s why I did all this.”
She explained how she’d seen them in LA, how she’d worked as an investigator, for lack of a better word, with two of her friends. She said that was what had brought her here and that she’d had to see which of them might have done something to Eden, because Eden had been determined to move to LA and be an actress.
“You thought one of us could have hurt her?” Myles asked incredulously.
Isla shrugged. “Is that such a stretch? One of you framed her for sending her sister into anaphylactic shock. And framed me for the same thing with your dad. Money, power, and the keys to the Corrigan castle are a huge incentive to knock out the competition.”
They made it to town, and he asked, “Where am I taking you?” The way he sounded, like he’d been told there was no Santa Claus, made her feel like complete shit because, in a sense, that’s exactly what she was doing. She was about to tell him there was no Edie Corrigan anymore.
“To the Red Roof Inn.” She noted the raised brows of surprise at her choice of stay, but if she was going to do things right, she would show him everything and hope he’d let her finish.
In the room she had shared with Eden, she let Myles in. She showed him the interior of her closet, hidden by the clothes she’d left, and the wall of Corrigans that she had pieced together with photos, articles, and notes about them all. It hadn’t been updated in weeks.
“This is why I’m here,” she said, her voice trembling. “Eden was my friend. She disappeared, and someone you know did it. I didn’t come here to hurt anyone—I came here for the truth.”
Myles stared at the wall, his expression unreadable. “And what do you plan to do with this truth? Take down my entire family? Expose every secret we’ve ever tried to bury?”
Isla met his gaze, her own eyes filled with determination. “If that’s what it takes to get justice for Eden, then yes. Don’t you think it’s time to be held accountable for some wrongs your family has done? Don’t you want someone to pay for killing Eden?”
“How do you know she’s dead? How can you be so sure?” His eyes reddened.
She stared at the wall in the closet. Quietly, Isla pulled out the recorder holding the message she’d already heard twice. Once alone and the other when she’d played the recording for Nat and Rey. She’d relive the hell of Eden’s last moments once again.
“I will kill him,” Myles seethed when the recording ended. His hands balled into fists. “I will fucking kill him. I can’t. I can’t.” He paced the room. Isla didn’t know whether to comfort him or let him be. He wanted to break things. He wanted to cry, and he was. He wanted to rip Bennett’s head off. She took a chance, putting her arms around him from behind, holding him close while he released his guilt and his grief for his sister, for the pain she’d suffered.
“You have to play this for my father. The cops. They have to know what happened.”
“What if your dad buries this like he did that accident when they were kids? And what about Matthew Leonard? Will your dad cover that up for Bennett like he did that accident?” She paused, remembering what Jackson had said back at his house. Myles and Bennett weren’t brothers. But it wasn’t her place to disclose that. Not now. “If you knewabout your brother and Danny, then why is your brother not in jail? Why’s he still running your father’s LA branch? What will make your father different this time around?”
The look Myles gave her was incredulous, as if she’d lost her damn mind. “We’re talking about his daughter, Isla. That’s what’s different.”
“The same daughter who her stepmother framed by tricking her into giving her little sister almond cookies, which he believed, thus forcing her to leave. Same daughter who was struggling after that accident when they were kids and everyone covered for them because money and power erase all guilt?”
Except Danny was dead and James would be ruined for life, his guilt haunting him and the injuries he’d sustained in the accident a constant reminder.
“If you’ll let me finish what I need to do ...” Isla said. “Just give me some time. Please. Everything will come out at the reception. I think the other person who knows what happened to Eden will show themselves, and we’ll have the final piece of the puzzle.”
“But who did she run into?”
“I don’t know. Jackson had the recording and has been hiding it.”
“But it doesn’t mean he did anything. We never hear the voice of the person she ran into, so it might not be Jackson. He could have just found the recorder and hid it to use it later. Don’t forget the letter my father received from Edie after you two supposedly came here.”
“We’d already left Daytona by the time that letter was sent to your father. I saw the date on the envelope. So who sent it, and why? To make your dad not look for her. To make him think she rejected him and the family. When I play the recording for everyone, I think it’ll force that person out into the open. Jackson will know I stole it from his safe. He’ll either call me a thief, pissed I took his insurance, or he—or whomever—will try to tie up loose ends. We need to lay a trap for them to expose themselves. If she is truly dead, I think they’ll try to move the body, because no body, no case—”
“This isn’t some movie, Isla, it’s my real life. And you’re no detective.”
She’d expected him to say that, not missing a beat. “And with the recording, your father and the police will definitely launch a full investigation and conduct a full-scale search of the entire property. Your dad will turn the world upside down to find her.”
Myles sighed, running a hand over his head, knowing she was right and there was no changing her mind. “You’re playing a dangerous game, Isla. I don’t know if I can let you do this. But if what you’re saying is true ...”
“Then it’s a game worth playing,” she said. “My dad didn’t get justice. I can’t let it be the same for Eden, however this plays out.”
Myles finally conceded despite his doubt about her plan and his anger at her lies.