Page 7 of Beyond Her Reach (Bree Taggert #10)

He didn’t answer. Lines bracketed his mouth as he clamped his lips shut, as if he knew better than to answer the question honestly. His gaze shifted to Matt for a few seconds, then back to Bree. “I asked what this is about.”

Bree said, “We’re here to give you bad news.” Unless he hated his estranged wife or resented any financial difficulties the divorce was causing him—then he might consider the news good. “We regret to inform you that your wife was found dead this morning.” Bree watched him closely.

His face didn’t change, not at all, for several seconds as he appeared to absorb her words. Then his head shook back and forth once. His gaze slipped to Matt, his expression questioning, as if Bree weren’t making any sense. “What?”

“Kelly is dead,” Matt said without preamble.

Harrison’s jaw went slack, and his lips parted. Something flickered in his eyes, a revelation perhaps, some mental puzzle pieces sliding into place. Then he blinked it away. “I can’t believe it.”

Bree reworded her question. “When did you last speak to her?”

He paused, calculating his answer. Caution shuttered the emotions from his face.

They were still standing in the dining room.

He took two steps sideways and lifted his phone from the table to scroll.

When he spoke, it was clear he’d chosen his words carefully.

“We spoke on Friday.” He gave no details.

His evasion spurred Bree’s suspicion. “What did you talk about?”

“As I said, we’re still ironing out the divorce settlement,” he said.

More evasion.

Bree shifted course. “What prompted the divorce?”

He shrugged, but the casual gesture seemed stiff. “Empty-nest syndrome? Our youngest left for college, and we realized we were like two strangers sharing a house. We’d been focused on raising kids for twenty years. Kelly and I no longer had anything in common.”

His explanation sounded good, though clichéd, but Bree wasn’t feeling sincerity. His words felt flat.

Rehearsed?

Suddenly, Harrison took a step backward and eased onto the couch. “I have to tell the kids. How am I going to break it to them?” His words weren’t directed at Bree or Matt. It sounded more as if Harrison were thinking out loud.

Ironically, Bree thought these were the first completely honest sentences he’d uttered and the first authentic emotion he’d expressed since they’d arrived.

“Where are they?” Matt asked.

“Sierra is a junior at Boston College. Shane is a freshman at the University of Miami.” Harrison opened the calendar app on the phone still in his hand. “They’ll both be home for winter break soon. They’re in the middle of finals. This news is going to derail their studies.”

What the fuck? The death of their mother would devastate most people, especially when the death was violent and shocking.

Sierra and Shane were young. Assuming they didn’t hate their mother for unknown reasons, this would—or at least should —derail more than their schoolwork.

Bree had been shepherding her niece and nephew through their own grief for nearly two years.

Like Kelly, their mother had been violently murdered.

Bree had shielded them from as many of the horrific details as possible, but Grey’s Hollow was a small town with the typical gossip chain.

Luke and Kayla had had to process more details about their mother’s murder than children should have.

Kelly Gibson’s kids would have it worse.

They were young adults. They would hear it all.

If there was a trial, they might attend.

They might see the crime scene photos and pictures of their mother’s injuries.

The trial would traumatize them all over again.

And if the case wasn’t solved, they’d have to live with the knowledge that their mother’s killer was out in the same world as them.

Free.

Free to kill again.

No. Bree would do her best to make sure that didn’t happen. She’d do everything in her power to at least give them closure, like she had for Luke and Kayla.

“Maybe I shouldn’t tell them until they finish their exams,” Harrison said, again seemingly to himself. “It’s only another week.”

Bree cleared her throat. “It’ll be in the news.”

Slumped on the couch, he looked up, his eyes blank, as if he’d been so lost in his own thoughts, he’d forgotten she and Matt were there.

Again, it was Matt who said what needed to be said with the bluntness Harrison clearly required. “Kelly was murdered.”

Bree was off her game this afternoon. Maybe she needed more coffee.

She suddenly realized Harrison hadn’t asked how Kelly had died.

Bree had been so distracted by the parallels to her own past that she’d missed his omission.

Frustrated, she exhaled. She’d been too connected on her last case and had nearly blown it.

She supposed it was better to realize what was happening now and correct for it. Live and learn.

“Murdered?” Harrison’s voice echoed with disbelief. “I assumed she’d been in an accident or something. Was she, like, mugged?”

Bree said, “She was attacked in her own home.”

Harrison sat upright. “Someone broke in?”

“We don’t know.” Bree wasn’t giving him any details at this point. If Harrison had killed Kelly, Bree needed to leave enough slack in the metaphorical rope for him to hang himself.

He fell back against the cushions, dragged a hand through his hair, and breathed out. “Fuck.”

That about sums it up.

Bree fired the heavy cannon. “Where were you yesterday between noon and six p.m.?”

Harrison’s head snapped up. His nostrils flared. Was he angry? Indignant? He suppressed his emotions with a deep breath. “My girlfriend’s two boys had a half day at school. She had to work, so I took the afternoon off and took them to the indoor trampoline park.”

“You didn’t have to work?” Bree asked.

He shrugged. “I have a flexible schedule. I work in the accounting department for Farris Corp.”

Bree nodded, hoping some rapid-fire questions would have him answering without thinking. “And you work from home?”

“Some days,” he answered.

“What time did you pick up the kids?”

“School ended at twelve twenty.”

“What time did you leave the park?”

Harrison lifted a shoulder. “Around four thirty. I had the boys home by five o’clock.”

“What time did you leave their house?” Bree pressed.

“I don’t remember exactly. Probably sixish.”

“What’s your girlfriend’s name?” Bree pulled out her notepad and pen and waited expectantly.

Harrison gritted his teeth. “I’d rather not involve her.”

Next to Bree, Matt snorted. “That’s really not an option, not if you want an alibi.”

Harrison gave them another slack-jawed look to note the second surprise of the conversation. “I’m a suspect?” His tone was incredulous.

“At this time, everyone close to Kelly is a person of interest,” Bree said vaguely.

She tucked the pen into the spiral metal edge of her notepad.

“Look, if you have a solid alibi we can easily confirm, then we can check you off our list and move on to other suspects. I don’t want to waste time and effort chasing an innocent person. ”

Her answer seemed to pacify him. He huffed. “Her name is Marina Maxwell.” He read off a phone number.

“Thank you.” Bree wrote both down. “How long have you been seeing Ms. Maxwell?”

“I don’t know exactly.” Harrison glanced down at his phone. “Six months or so.”

Again, Matt went with blunt. “Were you seeing her before or after your marriage broke up?”

“After.” Harrison made the staring kind of eye contact that was a deliberate attempt to sell his answer. One eyelid twitched.

Liar.

Did he realize his phone records would probably give him away? Bree underlined his answer in her notepad and marked it with a question mark.

Harrison rocketed to his feet. “How fast will this be on the news?”

“I can’t say for sure,” Bree said. “The media usually picks up on murder cases quickly.”

Matt frowned. “I would assume the case will at least make the local news today.”

Harrison shoved his hand through his hair again. “I have to call my kids. Would you give me time before you contact them? It might take me a couple of hours to get in touch with them. They have to turn off their phones for classes and exams. I don’t want them to hear it from anyone else.”

The cop in Bree wanted to see or at least hear the reactions from the kids when they got the news. But the parent in her agreed with Harrison. The parent won, but Bree didn’t love it. “Yes. I’ll give you until tomorrow before I contact them.”

Harrison sagged in relief. “Thank you.”

Bree remembered Kelly’s fuller face in her driver’s license photo. Had she been ill? “Did Kelly lose weight recently?”

Harrison nodded. “She started a strict exercise and diet plan about a year ago.” He frowned. “It worked. She lost a bunch of weight.”

“But?” Bree prompted.

“But she was no fun. None. She wouldn’t eat a crumb that she didn’t allow in her calorie budget.

She completely gave up alcohol. Before that, we used to go to wine tastings and have a nice dinner out once a week.

She stopped doing all of that. All she made for dinner was salad or chicken breast and broccoli.

” He made a disgusted face. “Don’t get me wrong.

I was the one who encouraged her to get healthier, and I commended her for her discipline, but you have to have some balance, you know?

A glass of wine once in a while would have loosened her up.

When we first dated, she was a party girl. ”

Bree made a noncommittal sound.

“I didn’t mind that as much as I hated the lectures.

” He changed to a falsetto, clearly impersonating Kelly.

“‘Wine destroys your metabolism,’” he mocked.

“That sort of thing. I like a nightcap after a long day of work, but Kelly was suddenly a nag about it. She acted like alcohol was the devil.” He rolled his eyes.

Bree had grown up with a drunk for a father. For some people, alcohol was the devil. Did Kelly struggle with substance abuse? Did her husband not support her efforts to be sober? Or was Harrison a nasty drunk?

“Does Kelly have any friends?” Matt asked.

Harrison nodded. “Yeah. Her best friend is Virginia Hobbs. She’s local. I don’t have her number. It’ll be on Kelly’s phone.” He straightened. “She was seeing someone new.”

“Kelly was dating?” Bree asked.

“Yeah.” Harrison’s head bobbed. “He has a stupid name. Trevor? No. Troy!” He sneered as he pronounced it.

Troy sounded like a normal name to Bree, but she suspected Harrison was biased. “Did you meet this Troy?”

“No,” Harrison said.

“Then how do you know she was dating him?”

“She told me.” Harrison’s tone turned sullen. “Apparently, he’s rich. I guess she wanted me to be jealous or something.”

Which is exactly what he seems.

She left him with a final thought. “I’m sure I’ll have additional questions for you as the investigation proceeds.”

He frowned, clearly not appreciating her parting words.

Outside, Matt strode straight for the SUV. “I love my parents, but I can’t imagine living with them as a forty-six-year-old. That is a small house.”

“The lack of privacy would drive me up a wall,” Bree said.

Matt paused, one hand on the door handle. “He didn’t ask how Kelly died.”

“Nope.” Bree walked around the front of the vehicle. “He could have been so shocked that he wasn’t thinking straight. Accidents are common. Murder is not.” She slid behind the wheel.

Matt climbed in the passenger seat. Closing the door, he stared through the windshield. “He considered not telling his kids so they could finish their exams. That was either clueless or cold.”

“I could believe both.” Bree started the engine. “Let’s talk to the girlfriend. Can you get her address? I’d rather drop by than call first. Unrehearsed answers are best, when possible.”

“He could be on the phone with her right now,” Matt suggested.

“Making sure her answers will match his?”

“Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“No kidding.” Bree drove out of the lot toward the station. “How much do you want to bet he’s been seeing the girlfriend since before he left Kelly?”

“Not a penny,” Matt said. “He was lying so hard when he answered, his pants should have self-combusted.”

Bree snorted. “Glad you saw it too.”

“And he was definitely jealous of her new boyfriend.”

“Ironic, isn’t it?” Bree asked. “He left her and now he resents the man she’s dating.”

“Some guys want to have it all.” Matt woke the dashboard computer. “Maybe Harrison didn’t ask how Kelly died because he already knew.”

Because he killed her?