by B. J Daniels
“At the cemetery.”
Lizzy knew it was one of Ariel’s favorite places—especially at night. Probably because Ariel knew the rest of them weren’t that comfortable there. Ariel liked to sit on the steps of her family’s mausoleum like she was holding court.
“So you went there. How long after Ariel’s text?” If Ariel had told them to be there, Ashley, Stephanie and Jennifer would have shown up and on time if they knew what was good for them.
“She told me to tell the others and leave right away. I did.”
“What time was this?”
“Eleven fifty. I know because I glanced at the time on my phone after I checked the text.”
“You told the others?”
She shook her head. “I couldn’t find them so I texted them.”
“And when did they show up at the cemetery?”
Ashley seemed to give that some thought. “Jennifer was about twenty minutes late, said she didn’t get the text right away. Stephanie was closer to forty-five minutes late.”
“Do you know where they’d been?”
“At the party. At least that’s what they said.”
Lizzy studied Ashley. “You didn’t believe them. Where did you think they’d been?”
The woman shifted on the couch. “I didn’t say I didn’t believe them. Maybe they didn’t get my texts. It was loud at the party.”
Or maybe one or both of them was busy tying Ariel to her steering wheel and pushing her SUV into the pond. These women lived with their phones in their hands, constantly checking them as if bored with the people around them. It seemed unlikely that they hadn’t gotten the texts right away.
Lizzy chuckled to herself as Ashley proved her point by checking her phone before standing.
“I really have to go.”
Lizzy put away her notebook and pen and rose, as well. “Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions.”
Ashley shrugged as if to say she had nothing to hide.
“One more thing. How long did you all stay at the cemetery before you realized that Ariel wasn’t going to show?”
“Until a little after two.”
“That long?” She wondered if one or more of them had known Ariel wasn’t going to show, but had to sit there and pretend otherwise. “Were you worried about her?”
Ashley rolled her eyes. “It was Ariel. It would have been just like her to run into someone and change her mind and not bother to tell us.”
Ariel would have enjoyed making them wait at the cemetery for her, knowing that they were uncomfortable but that they would do as she asked.
“What did Ariel have on you?” Lizzy asked, making the young woman start.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. Ariel and I were friends. You had more reason to want to kill her than I did. But Shade had even more reason. She was having his baby and he wasn’t happy about it.”
“Did she tell you that?”
“She told me everything.” Ashley met her gaze and held it with a hard one of her own. “Shade isn’t as innocent as you think.” The woman’s gaze slid away. “I really have things to do. If we’re done here?”
As Lizzy left, she realized two things. Depending on whether or not forensics could establish a time of death, the three friends had given themselves an alibi from after midnight until two in the morning. But before that, their whereabouts were questionable since Lizzy didn’t remember seeing either Jennifer or Stephanie at the party about the time Ariel left.
The second thing that struck her was that Ashley could have lied about the text from Ariel. She could have established her own alibi. Phone companies were required to keep phone records for at least five years for tax purposes. But ten years? Maybe she would get lucky.
She felt a chill as she had a disturbing thought. Even if the text really had been sent from Ariel’s phone, it didn’t mean that she was the one who’d sent it. By then she could have been in the pond. Which would mean the killer could have sent it. To establish their own alibi?
Lizzy wondered how long it would take to subdue Ariel enough to bind her to the steering wheel and push her car into the lake. She assumed the killer would want to wait until the car sank—just to be safe. Or for more morbid, cruel reasons.
But all of that could have happened within thirty to forty-five minutes. The killer wouldn’t even have had to get her hands dirty.
As Lizzy drove away, though, she kept thinking about what Ashley had said about Shade.
* * *
I DON’T THINK I ever realized what Ashley was truly like—until now. I knew she was a liar and that she had a daddy complex when it came to men, but I never realized what a mean woman she could be. She actually rivals me in that department, which makes me wonder what she was saying about me behind my back.
Not that I mind her giving the sheriff a hard time. I would have done the same thing. What’s interesting is that Lizzy is smarter than I thought she was. Better at her job, too. That surprises me. Maybe she can find my killer before it’s too late.
Or not.
Let’s face it, my killer has gotten away with my murder for more than ten years. What am I saying? No one even knew I was dead. That was brilliant, dumping me in the pond. Was I supposed to have been found sooner than now? Or did my killer just get lucky?
It’s just a matter of time before the sheriff interviews them all. Will she sense which ones have the most to lose? Which ones have the most to hide? Or will they all fool her and my killer will still be walking around free while I’m...dead.
* * *
STEPHANIE HAD TO have known that the sheriff would be stopping by, but she still seemed shocked to see her. Because of the hour, Lizzy knew she could catch her at home—and off guard.
Stephanie had married Eric Tanner, the local dentist—a man known for his punctuality. He arrived at work each morning at the same time, closed his one-man office every weekday at noon to go home for lunch, and left a sign on the outer door saying he would be back at one sharp and he was. He always left at exactly 4:45 in the afternoon.
Since it was 12:45, Lizzy was pretty certain that she would catch Eric leaving the house for his walk to his office. Stephanie would be cleaning up their lunch dishes.
As she started to ring the doorbell, Eric came out. He was a balding thirtysomething with a slight paunch but a set of perfect, brilliantly white teeth that he flashed when he saw her.
“I’m looking for Stephanie,” Lizzy said.
“You definitely came to the right place,” Eric said. “She’s just inside the kitchen. Go on in.”
She did, wandering through the house as she followed the clink of silverware and plates going into the dishwasher.
“Eric told me to come on in,” she said at the edge of the kitchen.
Stephanie jumped, dropping one of the glasses. Fortunately, it landed in the dishwasher unbroken.
“Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.”
Stephanie continued arranging the dirty dishes in the washer, adding detergent and closing it before she turned around. She was a strawberry blonde with blue eyes. Her hair had darkened some since high school, but her eyes were still that intense blue. The skin around them was lined now as if she’d spent the past ten years staring into the sun.
Leaning against the kitchen counter, Stephanie crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m not sure I want to do this.”
“Answer questions about the night of the graduation party?” Lizzy asked.
“On TV they tell you not to say anything to the cops without your lawyer present.” She appeared serious.
“That’s your choice if you feel you need a lawyer present,” Lizzy said. “But if you did, it would make me wonder what you’re afraid of me finding out.”
“That’s just it,” the woman cried. “I know nothing about what happened to Ariel.”
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“Then there shouldn’t be a problem. You were at the party. I know that because I saw you there early on. I’m trying to establish where everyone was that night when Ariel left. You can help me by telling me where you were.”
Stephanie shook her head. “I didn’t see Ariel leave at all.”
“You didn’t hear the argument she had with Christopher?”
The young woman was either stalling or she’d merely realized that she hadn’t started the dishwasher. Turning her back to Lizzy, she hit the button, then moved to the side to pick up a large red metal coffee cup with a lid. She took a sip.
“When did you leave the party, Stephanie?”
“Before ten.”
“Where did you go?” Lizzy asked as she stepped to the breakfast bar directly across from the woman.
Stephanie shook her head. “I knew this was a mistake. I don’t want to talk to you. I don’t have to, do I?” She put down the coffee container a little too hard. What squirted out the top definitely wasn’t coffee. It smelled like vodka. Stephanie gripped the back of one of the stools at the breakfast bar, her knuckles turning white.
“I just need to establish where you were at the time of Ariel’s death,” Lizzy said evenly. “Establish an alibi—”
“I didn’t kill her, and I don’t know who did.”
“Did you meet Ashley and Jennifer at the cemetery that night?”
The woman’s eyes widened. “Is that what they said?”
“I understand you were almost an hour late meeting them.”
Stephanie took another drink from her coffee container, her hands visibly shaking.
“If I can verify your alibi, I’ll be able to scratch you off my list.”
The woman clamped her lips shut in a stubborn, childish pose. Lizzy tried to recall whom Stephanie was dating back then and couldn’t remember her having a steady their senior year. She’d met Eric at her dentist’s office when he was interning at the end of her senior year. She’d had a crush on him but she hadn’t even gone out with him yet. In fact, Lizzy realized that she couldn’t remember Stephanie dating more than a couple of times their senior year—and then only at Ariel’s insistence when she wanted to double-date.
“You realize that without an alibi, this moves you up my suspect list,” Lizzy said.
Still Stephanie kept her lips clamped shut.
“If you have nothing to hide...” Lizzy’s words trailed off. Clearly, the woman had something to hide. But murder? Stephanie was the kind of woman who freaked out if she broke a nail.
Lizzy remembered how Stephanie had suggested cancelling the reunion. She’d also been quite vocal as to how she felt about Ariel at the meeting earlier.
“If you change your mind...” Lizzy left her card on the breakfast bar and started to leave but stopped. “One more thing. Did Ariel tell you she was pregnant?”
The shock on Stephanie’s face answered that question.
“I guess not. Apparently, you aren’t the only one with secrets.”
* * *
SHADE HAD TAKEN the photos up to the ranch, but he’d felt too antsy to do more than leave them. He told himself that he’d come back early tomorrow and get the slideshow ready to go. He thought about going through the box of prints, but he couldn’t get his mind off Ariel’s murder—and the sheriff.
So after barely returning to the valley ranch, he wasn’t surprised when he looked up to see a patrol SUV headed his way.
“I was wondering when I’d see you again,” he said as Lizzy pulled in.
“Do you have some time right now?”
He nodded and smiled. “Come on inside.”
Lizzy seemed nervous as they sat down.
“Whatever it is, just ask,” he said. “You seem upset.”
“You didn’t know about the pregnancy until today, right?”
“Right. I told you, the baby wasn’t mine.”
“Still, you would have been upset if you’d found out that Ariel was pregnant.”
Shade sighed. “What are you getting at?”
“I saw you go after her that night as she was leaving the party. Other people saw you, as well.”
He sat back. He’d been right. He was her number one suspect. He wondered if he needed a lawyer. “Like I told you, I didn’t want her driving in the condition she was in.”
“No one saw you after that,” she said.
“That’s because when I started back, I saw you with Christopher and I left.”
“Shade, a few days after she disappeared, I saw you. You had scratches down your left cheek.”
Nodding slowly, he said, “I told you that Ariel fought me when I tried to take her keys. You know what she was like.”
“But I also know that Ariel would have fought her killer. You have to admit that it looks suspicious. You left the party at about the same time she did. You could have been the last person to see her alive.”
“This is bullshit and you know it. The last person who saw her alive is whoever killed her.” He raked a hand through his hair. “You can’t seriously consider me a suspect. You know me.” He met her gaze. She held it for a moment before she looked down at her notebook again. He realized he wasn’t dealing with Lizzy, the woman he’d kissed that night. He was dealing with the sheriff.
“Do you have an alibi for the time after you left?” she asked.
“I went for a drive down to Flathead Lake, pulled over and sat for a while, thinking about you and unfortunately Ariel and hoping she wasn’t going to continue doing shitty things to try to keep us apart because quite frankly, I wanted to see more of you after our kiss.”
He saw Lizzy swallow. “I heard about the fight you had with her a few weeks before graduation,” she said.
Shade groaned inwardly. He should have known this would come up now. “I wanted out of the relationship. I had for months, but every time I started to talk to her, she wouldn’t listen. That day I made her listen.”
“I saw the bruise on her arm where you grabbed her.”
He swore. “I grabbed her to keep her from falling off the deck of her house. She was mad and out of control...” He sighed. “When she got like that... Well, that’s why I thought she’d ended up in the pond. She would get blind with rage. That day at her house, I told her it was over. She begged me not to tell anyone and spoil graduation. I said that I wouldn’t announce it at school but that we were done.”
“So why the scene at the graduation party?”
He let out a bark of a laugh. “Because she was Ariel Matheson and she liked to make scenes. She wanted to be the one to break up with me to save face—at least that’s what I thought until Ashley told me that Ariel said she was pregnant with my child. We were already broken up so it made no sense to me when she suddenly started screaming and crying and saying it was over between us. But knowing that she might have been pregnant with someone else’s baby...”
“You were angry with her. I heard you say that you wanted to wring her neck.”
Shade met her gaze and slowly shook his head. “I was sick of her playacting. Everything was drama with her. She’d kept you and me apart for months because she knew I wanted to ask you out.” He saw her eyes widen in surprise. “You didn’t know how I felt about you?” He let out a soft chuckle that died quickly. “Ariel knew. She was crazy jealous, even though she wanted to break up with me as badly as I did her. Actually, I was pretty sure she’d been seeing someone else for months. If she really was pregnant, then that proves it.”
Lizzy wrote something down in her notebook. He wanted to reach over and brush that lock of hair back from her eyes. More than anything, he wanted her to believe him.
“Come on, you know how she was,” he said. “Was there anyone who didn’t want to wring her neck?” He wagged his head for a moment before meeting her gaze again. “Is that how she was killed?”
She apparently wasn’t going to answer that question. “I’d never seen you as angry as you were with her at the graduation party,” Lizzy said.
He sighed. “I’d been dealing with Ariel for months. I was sick of her games, sick of her mean-spirited behavior, just sick of her. I wanted her to leave me the hell alone and like I said, I suspected she was seeing someone else. I just wanted to be free of her so that I would have a chance with you.”
“I guess you got your wish.”
“Lizzy. You know I didn’t kill her. Am I sorry she’s gone for good? No. I still wouldn’t wish her dead though. What we have to do is figure out who hated her worse than we did.”
“Wait a minute—”
“Don’t deny it. I saw how she treated you, always talking down to you, running your life. You think I don’t know the way you felt about her?”
She flushed. “I didn’t kill her.”
“Exactly. We both had motive but we know we didn’t do it. We just have to figure out who did. Practically everyone in our class had reason to hate her at one time or another. We weren’t the only ones she bullied. So let’s figure out who went after her that night from the party. There might be surveillance videos.” He realized how unlikely that was after ten years and knew he was clutching at straws. “Or someone might remember seeing her leave with one of our classmates.”
She held up a hand. “We aren’t going to do anything. You’re still a suspect and I’m still the sheriff.”
He held up both hands in surrender. “Sorry. You’re right. But I want to help because when this is over...” He looked into her eyes and lost himself. “I want to ask you out.”
“This isn’t the time to—”
“I know,” he said quickly.
“And I can’t have you interfering in my investigation, Shade. You need to let me do my job.”
He nodded. “I wouldn’t dream of keeping you from it, Sheriff.” He felt the tension between them lessen. “You know, I haven’t been able to think about anything but who might have done this. What if it isn’t a student in our class? Remember Miss Cline?”
