The Victim's Wife Read online

  She nodded. “It is strange how it sometimes works like that. I know something. I just can’t prove it. I am certain she killed him. I just don’t know how to bring her to justice.”

  “I believe you.” I let the words hang, hoping this would calm Penny. She seemed intent on trying to make me believe her, without evidence, and my admission cost me nothing.

  A look of relief crossed Penny’s faith. “Thank you. It just helps to hear you say that. Thank you.”

  “In the end, if we’re hoping to pin Max’s death on her, we need evidence to show they provoked Mason.”

  “I recognize that. I just don’t think I have anything to offer you.” Penny looked truly crestfallen. “Coming to you was a long shot. You must find something.”

  I took a deep breath and let it out. It was time to take a different approach.

  “Talk to me about Max’s and Mason’s relationship. It was contentious; there’s no getting around that. Everybody I’ve spoken to has reiterated that. Was it always like that?”

  Penny hesitated and licked her lips. “No, in the beginning, they were good friends.”

  “What went wrong?”

  Penny hesitated. “You’re going to think less of me if I tell you.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “It’s complicated. I dated Mason before I dated Max. You could say everything else stems from that.”

  27

  I stared at Penny, wondering if I had heard her correctly. I expected her to say “gotcha” or “just kidding,” but she stared back without an ounce of amusement on her face. She was dead serious.

  “Could you explain?” I said when it was apparent she didn’t want to volunteer anything else.

  “Mason and I dated a long time ago.”

  “How long ago?”

  “Before he met his current wife, Justine.” She said Justine’s name with an emphasis that made me envision her holding out a piece of garbage at arm’s length.

  “And Max?”

  Penny’s cheeks reddened. “At the time, Max was married to somebody else.”

  I nodded. “How did you meet Max?”

  She was bright pink now. “Through Mason.”

  “You dated Mason first and met Max through him. Is that when you started seeing Max, while he was still married?”

  “What do you take me for?” Even as she spoke, she must have recognized how the situation seemed to me because she immediately went on. “Relationships can get complicated. I hope you have enough experience to know that.” She stared at me. “However, this one became more complicated than most.”

  “This is unexpected and something I wish you would’ve disclosed sooner.”

  “Well, it is so far in the past now it hardly seemed relevant.”

  “That your ex-boyfriend killed your husband? You don’t think that is relevant?”

  “I was afraid if I told you that’s all you would focus on, but when you put it like that, I can see why you think that.” She nodded. “I’m sorry, this is something I should’ve mentioned.”

  “What happened?”

  “After Mason and I broke up—again, his choice, not mine—I ran into Max at the club, and we started talking. One thing led to another, and here we are all these years later.” She looked around the room as if to point at a picture of Max on the wall, but then looked down, remembering she’d taken them off. A fleeting look of shame crossed her face. It was so quick that if I had blinked, I would’ve missed it.

  “How long was it after things ended with Mason before you started seeing Max?”

  Penny shrugged. “I don’t know, a few months? Looking back on it, it doesn’t seem like it was much time, but at the time, it felt like a long time. Possibly six months.”

  “Is it safe to assume that this is what caused the friction between them?”

  “No, strangely, Mason was supportive. He can be a complicated man. I expected him to be jealous, but he seemed to find it amusing. Perhaps he thought Max was getting his sloppy seconds.”

  “When did the friction arise? Your statement earlier made me think you had something to do with it.”

  “I’m at the heart of the matter still, unfortunately.” Penny rubbed her forehead and then leaned back. “I really hope this never gets brought out in court because if it did, it would make me look bad.” Penny gave me a wary look. “What I’m about to tell you is something very few know.”

  I just waited, not daring to say anything, fearing she would change her mind, and I might have to figure out what happened a different way.

  “The problem was not originally between Mason and Max. The initial problem arose between Justine and me.” Penny looked as if that said enough, but I just shrugged.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, do I have to spell it out? Justine couldn’t stand the fact that I had dated Mason and then married Max. It turned out that she had a lot more jealousy running through her system than any of the rest of us.”

  “Even though Mason was the one who dumped you?”

  “Precisely.” She threw her hands up in the air. “That’s been my point all along.”

  “Why did you say that you didn’t want to make me to think less of you?”

  Penny looked away and frowned. “I might have done something to Justine.”

  “Such as?”

  “She got a little drunk one night at an office party. I stumbled upon her and took some liberty with the makeup in her purse. I made her look like a clown. I took some pictures.”

  “Why?”

  She shrugged. “It was perhaps a bit juvenile, I suppose. After I took those pictures, I sent them to Mason from an anonymous email account. I really don’t know what I was thinking at the time, I was half drunk. Perhaps I thought he would think of it as a joke.

  “He got really angry. He didn’t ever figure out that it was me who sent the pictures. He thought it was Max.”

  “That’s when things got bad between them?”

  “Yes.” Penny stared at me. “Please, I really don’t want this to get out into the open.”

  “Did anybody else at the company know about this?”

  “No, they did not, thankfully.”

  “Did Max know it was you?”

  “Of course, he did.” Penny looked at a blank space on the wall; again, there was another shameful grimace. “Max covered for me, don’t you see?”

  “With Mason?”

  “Yes. He apologized, said he was tipsy, refusing to implicate me in any way.”

  “What happened after that?”

  “Mason went ballistic. There was no physical altercation, or if there was, I was not aware of it. It was the beginning of a massive slow-moving landslide that ultimately ended in Max’s death all these years later.” Penny looked at me. “In a real way, I am responsible for Max’s death, not the way Vivian is to be sure, but I was the one who accidentally sowed the seeds of anger that reaped this hateful result.”

  “Do you blame Mason for Max’s death?” I asked.

  “The man was a loaded gun. Vivian pulled the trigger. She stoked the flames. She knew what was happening between these two men, even if she didn’t know all the details. I pray she never does learn the whole truth. She had no problem fanning the flames.”

  “Let’s say that I believe everything you just told me.”

  “You think I would lie?”

  “No, not necessarily, but you did withhold this when you should’ve disclosed it when you first came to my office seeking to hire me.”

  “I have no responsibility to disclose anything to you, Mr. Turner.”

  I hesitated and realized she was correct. “I misspoke.” I was thinking of her as a client when she was not.

  “Mr. Turner, I hope you can appreciate that the information I’ve given you is sensitive. While I recognize there is no professional relationship between us, I would hope for your discretion in this matter. Not just for my sake, but for Justine’s. The woman has already lost her future with Mason; she doesn’t need to add fur
ther insult to injury.”

  There was something on Penny’s face when she spoke of Justine, but I couldn’t readily identify what it was.

  “I will do my best.”

  “Do better than that.”

  I nodded and tried just to let the matter pass.

  “Mr. Turner, I want you to promise you will never disclose this to anybody.”

  “How about this? If the pictures are ever discovered, I’ll do my best to work around them unless I have to use them in court.”

  “That’s not good enough.”

  “I will also never disclose the existence of the pictures or your role to anybody other than my investigator.”

  Penny stared at me for a long moment and then nodded. “I don’t like it, but I should’ve negotiated my restrictions with you beforehand. I suppose that’s fair. You’re gonna have to give him a place to start, won’t you?”

  I nodded, waiting to see if she had anything else to say on the subject, but as she didn’t volunteer anything, I barreled on. “Back to Vivian. I still don’t understand why you blame her.”

  “I have a sense about these things.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “You expect me to go to court because you have a feeling?”

  “I don’t know what else to tell you.”

  “How about the truth? If there’s any reason you have to believe that Vivian was behind all of this, somehow provoking Mason into killing Max, now is the time to tell me.”

  “You would not understand.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Try me.”

  “Can we just call it a woman’s intuition and leave it at that?”

  “You have got to give me something; otherwise, Mason is going to jail for a long time, and Vivian won’t be touched.” I stared at Penny. “She will not only be walking free; she will run Meridian Solutions. Is that something you can live with?”

  Penny took in a long breath and let it out slowly. “I have a sense for these things. I don’t know exactly how to explain it, but I can just tell you that Vivian is a manipulative person, capable of convincing or provoking somebody to kill for her.”

  I frowned. This was getting me nowhere. I was convinced now that there was something Penny knew that she wasn’t telling me. I just didn’t know how to go about learning what it was.

  “Have you had an experience with a person like her in the past?”

  Penny’s eyes bulged. “What makes you ask that?”

  I was onto something.

  “Was it your father or your mother?”

  Penny turned red in the face. “How dare you suggest my parents were like Vivian! They were nothing like her. The thought is laughable.”

  “Why are you giving me nothing else to go on?”

  “I just know, okay.”

  “A past boyfriend?”

  “Stop asking questions!”

  I stared at Penny. She stared back.

  “You told me that you had some information you are willing to share,” she said. “Perhaps now is the time.”

  I shook my head. “You know something vital to the case I am representing right now. I must know what it is.”

  “How about we agree to an exchange. You give me a true and honest update on where the case is with Mason, and I will tell you exactly how I know Vivian is the type of person she is.”

  “No deal.” I gave her an empathetic look. “I would love to but—”

  “Mr. Turner, I am going to scream if you say attorney-client privilege.”

  “I want you to imagine Mason going to jail, probably for the rest of his life. Vivian walks free and one day becomes the CEO of Meridian Solutions. That is what she’s angling for, isn’t it? She’s gonna get it too. The only person who has a chance of stopping her is you. You know something, and you are refusing to tell me. She’s going to fly in that Gulfstream jet Max used to take everywhere. How often did you ride with him?

  “She’ll also buy a yacht. She’ll have houses all over the world. She’s going to live the lifestyles of the rich and famous while you’re left mourning for a dead husband. If you really want to—”

  “Enough, Mitch.” Penny looked defeated. “Enough.”

  I waited, the clock ticked, the minutes seeming to slip away as fast as a second. At last, Penny finally looked up and made eye contact.

  “I know from first-hand experience. Can we just leave it at that?”

  “You must understand the reality of the situation.”

  “It’s not enough, is it?”

  I shook my head.

  “I was once in a situation where I experienced things happening around me that went unexplained. I was naïve. I was young. I was focused on other things. Ultimately, when I came to myself, I could trace it back to one person. When I figured it out, I got out of there.”

  “You have prior experience that makes you certain Vivian can manipulate somebody into murdering?”

  “Yes. I don’t even hesitate to say that. I know what this kind of murderer does. I know how they act. I know how they think. I know almost everything about them. Vivian has the ability to get people to do what she wants. She has the skill to explain her actions, so it seems ordinary to anybody who questions her. Those close to her will not recognize what’s going on, but those looking from the outside will recognize the truth, or they will at least see that something is off.”

  I waited. She still had not answered my question. I needed to know more.

  “What makes you qualified to talk about this?” I finally asked.

  Penny closed her eyes and shuddered. “You are gonna dig it all out of me today, aren’t you?”

  “If you want to help Mason—” I didn’t finish the thought. I didn’t need to. I could see that she was surrendering now and was going to tell me the truth.

  “I used to belong to a cult, Mr. Turner.”

  28

  My first thought was that I had misheard her. Perhaps she had just become flustered and misspoke.

  “What do you mean, a cult?” I asked, resisting an urge to take another sip of my drink as I feared it might disrupt the flow of our conversation.

  “There used to be an organization that I belonged to that was a cult. It was in the south, and no, I’m not gonna tell you where. Mason doesn’t know. Max didn’t know everything, just a few high-level details that I told him early on when things were looking like we were going to get serious.”

  “A religious cult?”

  “You know, I thought it was a religion, but it wasn’t, not really. It was all just a façade. It was one man who had some charisma, making up his own belief system and getting anybody he could to follow him. He preyed on the poor and weak when he had to, but he targeted the wealthy and famous. With his natural good looks and his way with words, it wasn’t long before he amassed five hundred followers.”

  My heart went out to Penny, but I had a hard time comparing Vivian, a friendly woman with whom I had shared a pleasant and forthcoming conversation, to a coldhearted cult leader who took advantage of his followers to make his way in the world.

  “Were you there from the beginning?”

  “I came in at the end. We all lived on a compound together. It was a hundred acres, donated by one of the wealthy founding members.”

  She choked up and looked as if she was going to clam up. She stood abruptly. “I need a Kleenex. I will be right back.”

  She left before I had a chance to stop her. I pulled up my drink and took a long sip, following it up with one more as I tried to fit this all into a framework that made sense.

  I had spent less than half an hour with Vivian, but that had been plenty of time to recognize she was lucid, smart, likable.

  She didn’t scream cult leader to me.

  Did I take this case because an abused woman convinced me that what she saw was real when it was all just in her head because she was reliving her past?

  What was it about Penny that had made me believe her?

  The tears?

  I shook my head, re
membering how, at the time, I had thought them to be fake. The bare places on the wall where pictures used to hang were enough to know that there was a reason why the tears were not real. She had been careful to only speak of Max in a positive light, but there had been trouble in their marriage.

  No, I remembered now, it was the challenge. That’s what got me here. It had been an interesting problem and I had jumped at the opportunity.

  A mistake I was not going to make again.

  Penny returned a few minutes later with a box of tissues in her hand. “I’m sorry about that. Remembering those days is difficult. I hope you understand. If you don’t get anything else, please just know that it was traumatic.”

  I nodded. “So I take it you see some of the same characteristics in Vivian as you saw in this cult leader. Is that correct?”

  “Once you have been around a wolf, it’s much harder for them to hide in sheep’s clothing. It feels good to talk to somebody about this. I didn’t even dare mention it to my therapist because he’s Max’s good friend. I figured that doctor confidentiality only went so far.” She gave me a wan smile. “Apparently, there are some professionals who take their oaths seriously.”

  I smiled at the compliment but didn’t let it touch me. “Feel free to tell me more.”

  I refrained from glancing at my watch and settled in as she told me all about how she had been recruited. She joined the cult as a young girl, right out of high school before she’d even turned eighteen, and had been swept into a world so unlike anything I’d ever experienced.

  I found the tale mesmerizing.

  “It was several years later when I felt like I was enjoying what we thought was the good life when the light clicked on. I’m not gonna get into the details, but I slowly became aware of who our leader truly was.

  “It galled me. I was ashamed this man had duped me. It turned out he was anything but the spiritual man he presented himself to be. I watched him manipulate and coerce people into doing things you wouldn’t think possible.”

  “What types of things?”

  “It started small, shoplifting, stealing cars. It progressed from there. He had this crazy belief that it wasn’t wrong to go into a store and walk out with what you needed, as long as you honestly needed it. I got picked up for shoplifting a couple of times. Luckily, my parents remained in contact with me throughout all of this, and they got the legal charges dismissed. Even after that, I did not wake up to what was going on.”