Page 11 of XOXO, Little Butterfly (The Storyteller’s Bodyguard #2)
Birdie
I sit across from Jacob in the sterile interrogation room. The cold metal of the chair seeps through my clothes, a reminder of where I am and what is at stake.
Who am I looking at? The good man who promises a future of love and respect? The detective who has lost his trust in me and considers me a suspect again? The psychopathic killer hiding in plain sight whose hand I came all over last night?
The questions swirl in my mind, each one more terrifying than the last. Is Jacob Torrance the Butterfly Man like Tristan believes, playing some sick game with me?
Or does he genuinely suspect me of murdering Saldana and Gia?
I can’t read him. His face, a cold mask as steely as his eyes, gives nothing away.
His gaze is as sharp as ever, yet devoid of any of the warmth he’s shown me in the past few days.
I’m a butterfly pinned under glass, unable to break free, observed from every angle, and he’s the catcher.
“Mrs. Abel,” he starts formally, intimacy scrubbed clean, and the name feels awkward coming from him, staring at a thin file in his hand. “When was the last time you saw your assistant?”
The day Saldana died. “March 5th.”
“She hasn’t been coming to work since?”
“She texted she was sick.”
“At what time?”
“I don’t know exactly…sometime in the evening. I can check my phone for the exact timing.”
He brings out a pen and a notepad from the pocket of his suit jacket and starts writing. “Evening of March 5th?”
“No. March 6th.”
“So she missed a full day of work without notice. Is this normal for her?”
I shake my head. “She never missed a day at work.”
“And how was your reaction to that sudden change in behavior?”
“I found it odd,” I lie. We had a fight that night.
I totally expected she wouldn’t come to work the next day, perhaps not ever.
“I texted and called her that morning, but she didn’t answer.
Then at night, she texted she was sick…and she’d lost her phone.
That was why she didn’t call in sick earlier. ”
He pauses to read my face. “Did you make any contact with her after March 6th?”
“Of course. We were texting daily until a few days ago. I got worried so I asked my bodyguards to go check on her. They never found her home, though.”
He scribbles something on his notepad. “When she left your house on March 5th, was she upset about anything?”
Should I tell him about the shock in her eyes when she finally found out the truth about my husband, the man she loved and tried to steal from his wife, her boss and best friend, or the fight we had when she tried to spill my secrets to Tristan without my permission? “Saldana’s suicide. It shook us all.”
“Did it?” He can barely hide the scoff.
“Yes, Detective. Saldana stole from me, and I wanted her to pay the price, but not like that.” I wanted her to live through the shame, to watch her career fall apart in front of her eyes and feel the burn. But she was given an easy way out.
“Where were you on March 11th between seven p.m. and one a.m. on March 12th?”
“Is this a trick question? You knew exactly where I was that night.”
He glances at the camera nestled in the corner. “Please answer the question for the record.”
With a half-smile, I lean back in the chair. “Seven p.m. I was at home getting ready for a meeting with a friend . Eight p.m. he came to pick me up. We had dinner at The Alchemist. Then I went home around midnight and went to bed. I’m happy to give you his number to confirm.”
He rolls his eyes. “Can we check your security cameras as well to confirm your whereabouts at the hours you weren’t having dinner with your friend ?”
“Of course. My bodyguards can give you their statements, too.” I lean forward, examining his expression like he’s dissecting mine. “That timeframe, is that when Gia…?” If that was the time Butterfly Man killed her, Jacob couldn’t be him. He was with me all the time.
Unless he killed her right before or after our date.
Hello, I’m Jacob Torrance. I shoot people dead and then go buy flowers for the woman I like, go out with her, talk sexy books and eat vegan ice cream for dessert . And I’m the stupid woman who is falling for it.
“Why were you going to Edgartown’s lighthouse in the middle of the night, right where we discovered the body of your assistant?”
“I already answered that question. I had trouble sleeping and decided to go there. It’s one of my favorite spots.
I go there all the time. You can ask Spencer, the lightkeeper.
I even texted him to see if he could do me a favor and let me in.
The view from the gallery is the best, and we go way back, since my wedding photoshoot. ”
“Why do you need bodyguards, Mrs. Abel?” he asks.
To protect me from you, I guess. “I’m a celebrity. Better safe than sorry.”
He puckers his lips on a grunt. “When was the last time you saw your husband, Mrs. Abel?”
Why is he asking me about Blake? “The morning of March 5th. Why?”
“He’s an ex-cop, right?”
“Retired early, yes,” I answer warily.
“Why? Why did he retire?”
My fingers instinctively move to my mouth, but I clench my fist under the table before they give me away. “My career was taking off, and he decided to retire to become my manager. Can I ask why all these questions about Blake and what he has to do with Gia or Saldana?”
“Has your husband had any affairs during the course of your relationship?”
I cock a brow. Where does this come from? No one knows about Gia and Blake except me, Tristan and the team, and Butterfly Man. What does Jacob really know? And how? Could he really be my stalker? “I’ve had doubts. Only doubts.”
“I see, and how is your current relationship with your husband, Mrs. Abel?”
My jaw clenches. “We’re getting a divorce.”
“Because of suspicions of his infidelity?”
“Because Blake Abel is a violent man, Detective.”
Jacob’s eyes gleam as if he’s just discovered a precious secret, as if he hadn’t already known. “How is he violent, Mrs. Abel?”
An angry sigh leaves my chest. “Last year, we had a fight, and he pushed me down the stairs. The police wouldn’t help, so he got away with it.
I asked him for a divorce. He refused to give me one, said he’d go to therapy and work on his issues.
Unfortunately, the medication he was prescribed was too strong.
He’s developed a substance abuse issue that has gotten out of hand, so I’ve filed for divorce myself. ”
“How did he take it?”
“Not nicely.”
“Do you or your husband own a gun?”
The question catches me off guard. Of all the things I expect him to ask, this isn’t it.
He said Gia was shot. Does he suspect the murder weapon is a gun Blake or I own?
I blink, trying to hide my surprise. “I don’t own any guns, but Blake does.
” And it is nestled in my dresser. Butterfly Man has made sure of it.
Do the police think that is the murder weapon? My mind races. Blake hasn’t been near me in over a week. If someone used his gun, it wasn’t him.
Butterfly Man killed Gia with Blake’s gun and put it back in my dresser. If the police find it, along with the photos that prove Blake and Gia’s infidelity, and add it all up to the fight Gia and I had the last night I saw her, I’d be their number one suspect.
“What kind?” Jacob asks.
I stare at him, my pulse quickening. He’s bluffing—he has to be. In order for Butterfly Man to have used the gun to kill Gia, he must have entered the house to take the gun before yesterday. How is this possible?
But Jacob’s poker face is flawless. Is he using privileged information to shake me because he is Butterfly Man or has he found real evidence as a detective doing his job?
“A Glock. I don’t know the exact model, but he’s always had the same gun since he was on the force.
He was allowed to buy it after retirement.
Can you please tell me what this is all about? ”
He sighs, pulls a paper out of the file and slides it my way. “Ballistics report came. It identifies the weapon the killer used on the victim. It’s a Glock 23.”
I shrug at the paper. “I’m not an expert, but aren’t Glocks the most popular guns in the country?
” For officers and civilians. Blake has one.
Tristan, too. It was the backup gun he gave me the night my stalker was following me down the street.
I’m sure there are more Glocks with the rest of the team as well as with other officers. “The killer could be anyone.”
“Actually, the weapon is modified. Police modified. Precisely, with a Miami -compliant barrel. Wasn’t Blake Abel with Miami PD before he retired?”