Page 38 of She Didn’t See It Coming

“The problem is,” Jayne is saying, frustrated, “forensics has nothing showing that Derek Gardner was ever in that apartment. The fingerprints found in the apartment have all been accounted for. We have no physical evidence to tie him to the crime. Even if we know he was sleeping with Bryden Frost, it doesn’t mean he killed her. ”

“True,” Kilgour agrees, “but he could have motive. What if Bryden was threatening to tell his wife about them, and she’s protecting him on the hit-and-run?”

An officer appears at the door. “A young woman’s just come in saying she saw someone in the condo with a suitcase at the relevant time. Thought you’d want to do the interview yourself. She’s in interview room three.”

Jayne feels a rush of adrenaline. Together, she and Kilgour head to the interview room.

The young woman is sitting at the table, waiting for them.

She can’t be more than twenty, Jayne thinks.

She seems a little nervous, and Jayne tries to put her at ease.

“Please relax,” she says, smiling. “Can we get you anything? A coffee? Water?”

The young woman shakes her head. “No, thank you.”

Jayne sits down and looks across the table at the other woman, trying to get the measure of her. This could be the break they’ve been hoping for.

“Let’s start with your name,” Jayne says, after introducing herself and Kilgour.

“Francine Logan,” she says.

“Francine, tell us what you saw.”

Her eyes move back and forth between the two detectives nervously. “I saw someone in one of the elevators with a suitcase in the building where that woman died.”

“That’s the condominium at 100 Constitution Drive?” Jayne clarifies.

“Yes.”

“When was that?”

“On Tuesday.”

“Do you live in the building?”

“No, I was visiting a friend. I went over for coffee. We both work from home now, and I don’t live too far away, so we do that sometimes.”

“Okay. And your friend’s name?”

“Lisa Kenney? She lives with her parents in unit 402. But they go out to work during the day.” She adds, “Lisa can confirm that I was there.”

“And what time did you visit your friend Lisa?”

“It was around lunchtime when I got there, around noon. I’m not sure exactly what time I left. But around one thirty, give or take a few minutes.”

“And when did you see this person?”

“When I left. I got on the elevator on the fourth floor to go down to the lobby and there was already someone in the elevator going down. And they had a suitcase.”

Jayne knows that fits with the relevant time frame. If Bryden was killed sometime after 12:42 p.m., she might have been removed at around 1:30 or thereabouts. “Can you describe the suitcase?”

“Not really. It was big. And darkish? I’m sorry, I wasn’t really paying attention. I just remember wondering if they were going somewhere and wishing I could take a vacation. It’s been on my mind lately, but I can’t really afford it.”

“Can you describe this person?”

“I’m sorry. But I didn’t really notice.”

“Well, was it a man or a woman?”

“I honestly don’t know,” she says, embarrassed.

“I was looking at my phone when the elevator opened, and I turned to face the front, but I was still looking down at my phone. I noticed the suitcase on the floor beside me but I didn’t really notice the person.

” She adds, “I just remember wishing I had the money to go somewhere.”

“So you can’t describe this person at all?”

Francine shakes her head. “No,” the young woman admits unhelpfully.

“Try,” Jayne says, waiting. “You might have noticed something—a scent?” She tries again. “An impression?”

She shakes her head again. “Sorry. I’m not a very good witness, am I?

I don’t notice things, probably because I’m always staring at my phone, especially in elevators, because it’s awkward, you know?

” She grows flustered. “I don’t mean to waste anyone’s time.

It’s just that Lisa told me that the police were questioning everybody about seeing someone with a suitcase, and I told her what I saw, and she told me I had to tell the police even though I couldn’t remember much, so I came in. ”

“Well, we’re glad you did, Francine,” Jayne says. “This person in the elevator. Did they get off at the lobby too?”

“No, they stayed on.”

“Are you sure you can’t remember anything else? This is important.” The young woman flushes and shakes her head. “Well, thank you for coming in,” Jayne says. She hands her a card. “And please give us a call if anything else comes to mind, okay?”

“Sure,” she says, and gets up, her face faintly pink as she leaves.

“What do you make of that?” Kilgour asks Jayne after she’s gone.

“I don’t know,” Jayne says. “She was exceptionally vague. The timing is bang on, so she could be telling the truth. Or she might be making it all up. Enjoying her fifteen minutes. But I don’t think so.

” She sighs. “Check in with the team at the condo—see if they’ve heard of anyone else in the building going somewhere that day with a suitcase.

If there’s no one to account for it, Francine Logan may have been in the elevator with our killer. ”

···

Derek Gardner is coldly furious as he drives downtown.

He’s agitated, and he doesn’t like the feeling.

He’s usually quite cool, unruffled. He likes to be in control.

He’s got a problem now, and he’s not sure how to handle it.

He wasn’t that worried about Bryden Frost, not really, not till that bitch of a detective had brought up Alice’s mother.

He drives into the downtown core. He wanted to get away from Alice, who’d decided not to go into work after all.

He was going to hide out at his office downtown.

He’ll have to face everyone there at some point anyway.

Better to carry on like business as usual, get in front of things, reassure everyone that they might hear things about him, but it’s all bullshit.

He has a business to run. He must hold his nerve till all this blows over.

But his thoughts take him down an uncomfortable path.

He has this business because of his wife’s money.

The cool, hip offices with the good address, the smart employees, the top-of-the-line equipment—all bought with her inheritance.

The high-end clients he got himself, but still. She gave him his start.

Alice loves him, as well as she can love anyone. But can he trust her? He knows what she’s capable of. She killed her own mother in cold blood. And then came home and told him about it, as if she were a cat dropping the gift of a dead mouse at his feet.

He pulls into the underground parking garage beneath his office building.

He circles around to his level and finds his own space.

There’s someone parked next to it. A car he doesn’t recognize, a black Range Rover.

It’s parked too close, so that when he goes to get out of his car, he barely has enough room to open his door to exit his vehicle.

It annoys him. Who the hell does this guy think he is?

He resists the impulse to smash his own car door into the side of the Range Rover. Fucking asshole .

He squeezes out of his car awkwardly, sucking in his breath.

Once he’s out he closes his own door and stares malevolently at the other car.

He reaches into his trouser pocket for his keys.

He glances around him, but there’s nobody there; he’s quite alone.

He knows where the cameras are. Derek takes his keys in his right hand, singles out one, and walks around the back of the Range Rover to the other side of it and digs the point into the Rover’s new paint near the front fender.

Then he drags the key with great force along the entire side of the vehicle, leaving a bold, ugly scar across the length of it.

···

“I spoke to the people in charge of the hit-and-run investigation in New Hampshire,” Jayne says to Kilgour in her office later in the afternoon. “They did a shoddy job, if you ask me. There wasn’t much of an investigation. They didn’t find any witnesses.”

“Maybe there weren’t any,” Kilgour points out.

“Well, I suppose. Apparently, it’s a rural area—very little traffic on that road.

But what better place to run over your mother-in-law?

” She muses, “There’s a very poor solve rate for hit-and-runs, only about ten percent.

” She sighs. “Maybe I should cut them some slack. Anyway,” she continues, “they decided that it was a simple hit-and-run, not a murder.” She sighs heavily.

“You saw how I tried to rattle Alice. I practically told her that if she’s lying to give her husband an alibi, and if he killed her mother, and Bryden Frost, she might be next. ”

“It didn’t seem to faze her.”

“No, it didn’t. She seems almost as cold-blooded as he is. Maybe they’re meant for each other.”