The Trapped Girl (Tracy Crosswhite #4)(95)

“Is it your gun?”

“I don’t own a gun.”

“Did Megan Chen own a gun?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Why did you ask to talk to me, Mr. Strickland?”

His eyes went wide, pupils dilated. Fight or flight they called it. Strickland had fled but now seemed intent on fighting. “Because someone is deliberately trying to ruin my life.”

“Why would someone want to ruin your life?”

Strickland rocked in his chair and gazed up to the corner of the ceiling. A tear trickled down his cheek. “Because of Andrea.”

“What about Andrea?”

He wiped at his tears before redirecting his attention across the table. After several long moments he said, “Look, I did intend to kill Andrea.” He paused again. Phil Montgomery never moved. Tracy waited. “She wanted to climb Rainier. I didn’t want to do it. That’s the truth. I didn’t make it the first time and really didn’t want to try a second time. I got altitude sickness and I really didn’t want to go to the effort to train again. But then . . .” He swallowed and wiped more tears. “. . . I thought about it.”

Tracy looked down at her phone to ensure it was continuing to record. She spoke softly, deliberately. “And you saw it as an opportunity to kill your wife.”

“He didn’t say that,” Montgomery said.

Tracy ignored him.

Strickland closed his eyes, rocking in his chair. “Yes,” he said, though it was nearly inaudible.

“Did you say, ‘Yes’?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Did you kill her?”

“No.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I was going to push her off the mountain. But I didn’t,” Strickland added quickly. “I didn’t do it. What I told that detective about her getting up to use the bathroom was the truth. I didn’t do it.”

“Tell me,” Tracy said. “What happened to her?”

Strickland took a few additional deep breaths. Montgomery sat with his chin resting in his hand, elbow propped on the table. He hadn’t taken a note.

“My business was failing. I’d invested everything we had and I was going to lose it all, everything. I’d forged a letter from one of the partners at the firm saying I was going to be made partner and earn a higher salary, and the bank was intimating that I would be prosecuted if I couldn’t find a way to pay back the money. I begged Andrea to let me borrow some of the money from her trust account, but she wouldn’t give it to me. So I told her that I’d forged her name on the personal guaranties to the bank and to the landlord, and if she didn’t give me some of the money to pay off our creditors she was going to lose it all.”

“What was her response?”

“She got angry. We fought.”

“Did it become physical?”

“I was angry. I’d been drinking. I grabbed her and she kicked me. I hit her. I’m not proud of it, but I hit her. Then I left.”

“Had you been abusive before?”

“No. It was just that one time. It was just the heat of the moment.” Tracy doubted it. “I felt like everything was crashing down around me and she wouldn’t do anything to help me.”

Tracy couldn’t muster any sympathy, but she went where Strickland directed the conversation. “Where did you go?”

“A bar. I went to a bar near our loft, and I thought about what to do, about how I could get the money.”

“You started thinking of ways you could kill her.”

“He didn’t say that,” Montgomery said, giving Tracy a second, quick glance.

“Were you considering killing Andrea as a way to get the money?”

“No, not then,” Strickland said. “I hadn’t even thought of Mount Rainier then. Andrea brought it up when I went back to the loft two days later, but that’s not what I want to tell you. What I want to tell you is this. When I was in that bar that night someone said my name and when I looked up, I saw Devin Chambers.”

“Devin Chambers was in the bar?” Tracy asked, skeptical.

“Yes.”

“So you knew her.”

“We’d met a couple of times but I can’t say I knew her.”

“Did you ask her what she was doing there?”

“No.”

“Had you been to that bar before?”

“Sure, many times.”

“Had you ever seen her there before?”

“No.”

“And you didn’t ask her what she was doing there?”

“No. It was just ‘Graham?’ and I turned around.”

“Was she alone?”

“No, she was with a few people. They were leaving and she spotted me and came over to say hello. I guess I looked like I was in pretty bad shape because she asked me what was wrong.”

“What did you tell her?”

“I told her everything. I told her I’d drunk too much and that I was mad at Andrea, and that we’d had a fight. I wanted to make Andrea look bad, you know, selfish. So I just told Devin everything.”

“Did you tell her about Andrea’s trust?”

“Yes. I said she had all this money and she wouldn’t let me use it to help us.”