Until the Day I Die(93)
Had she ever loved anyone other than herself?
But that wasn’t the question I wanted to ask her. There was really only one question I needed an answer to.
Did you kill Perry?
It wouldn’t have surprised me if she had. She could’ve easily gotten to him that Monday evening after he met his friend and before he drove to meet Shorie and me at the lake. They did a toxicity screen on him at the hospital, but it was hours after his death. And I’ve read that GHB, the newest date rape drug, dissipates quickly in the blood and is often not recognized by emergency room doctors. If, somehow, Sabine was able to dose his beer, it’s too late to prove it now.
I do think somehow, maybe with someone’s help, she roofied me in Auburn. She—or a flunkie of hers—probably dropped some liquid or powder GHB in my wine glass when I went to the ladies’ room. I also think that later that night she had someone call me, pretending to be Dele and saying that Shorie wanted to see me. Of course, the phone records show the call, from a local Auburn number to mine, but the phone that made it, a burner bought by Arch Gaines the week previously, still hasn’t turned up. So impossible to prove.
At Sabine’s parents’ house, reporters swarmed the place like bees around a hive. I sat in my car for over an hour, but Sabine never showed her face. Not that I actually thought she would’ve told me the truth even if we’d had a face-to-face. I’ll never know exactly what she did or didn’t do.
There are other unanswered questions. Jess Monroe disappeared from the island, and no one’s seen or heard from her since. Arch vanished, too, somewhere into the ether between the Saint Lucia airport tarmac and Ministro Pistarini International Airport in Buenos Aires, which was supposed to be his destination according to the ticket that was purchased for him from Antonia’s computer at Hidden Sands.
But the feds are on it, and I will leave the old man to his reward. If he did have anything to do with Perry’s death—and did it for nothing more than a woman like Sabine and a couple of million dollars—then having to wake up, day after day, with only his desiccated, empty soul for company is a good start to his punishment.
Gigi’s experienced the biggest change of all of us. She’s reinvented herself—a spunkier, more resilient version of Ruth Madoff—and made her grand reappearance into Birmingham society. Who knows if she’s really okay or if she’s tossing back all kinds of pills and potions to get her through the day. There’s always the chance, too, that she’s plotting some kind of Count of Monte Cristo–level revenge and that’s what is giving her the extra bump. But I can’t worry about that.
So here we are. November. Thanksgiving. The weather’s been windy and gray for weeks, and I have to admit, I’m not looking forward to the rest of the holiday season. It’s been eight months since I’ve held my husband in my arms, but that feels like an eternity.
After dinner, Rhys and Shorie and their friends head out, and Ben stops by on the way home from his parents’ house. It rained during the day, so we spread beach towels over the Adirondack chairs by the clean, empty fire pit, and settle down to let our turkey and dressing and pumpkin pie digest.
After a while I speak. “I think I get why Sabine stole Perry’s journal—she didn’t want anybody to read about the error messages and put two and two together—but I can’t understand why she held on to it.” I sigh. “I think you were right about her, Ben. I think she had a thing for Perry. I think she loved him all along, and wanted to have something of his.”
“Maybe she had a thing for him.” Ben shakes his head. “But you’re wrong about the other part. She didn’t love Perry. She’s never loved anybody.”
He drums his fingers on the arm of the chair.
“I’ve been reading through the journal,” I say. “Looking for something that’ll explain what happened to him.”
He sighs. “Oh, Erin. You’ll just drive yourself crazy, you know that, right?”
“But I think I found something. Right before he died, Perry had put contacting the Global Cybergames on his to-do list.”
“For Shorie?”
“I don’t think so. One of the committee member’s phone numbers was in the back of the journal, somebody named Mason P., and I called the guy. Turns out he and Perry had talked, specifically about a certain student who competed back in 2016. He sent me an email with some interesting information.” I hand him the envelope from under my chair. “Check out the name and address on the last page.”
His eyes go wide.
I go on. “Two days before he died, Perry set up a meeting with Sabine. Probably to let her know about this information. That a few things had slipped through the cracks on one of the background checks she’d run. Only, my guess is, she already knew about it.”
Ben collapses back into his chair and shakes his head dumbly. “Holy shit, Erin.”
“Yeah, I know. Holy shit.”
We’re quiet for a long time, watching Tiger sniff out God-knows-what in the shadows of my backyard. We can deal with all this tomorrow, report everything to the FBI. Right now, I’m just glad Ben seems to want to enjoy the remainder of the day with me. It was a good one.
He turns to me. “So tell me. What are you thankful for today?”
“Hmm.” I think for a minute. “I’m thankful for my crappy garage door. And this fire pit.”