Glow (Glimmer and Glow #2)(51)
“But the kidnappers planned to ransom Addie. Isn’t money motive enough?”
“Maybe,” he said quietly. “But personally, I think there was never any plan to actually send a ransom note. Cunningham and Stout might have thought that was the intention when they kidnapped Addie Durand. But at some point after the kidnapping, I believe whoever hired them told them the plan had changed. I think they—or possibly just Cunningham alone—were given orders to murder Addie . . . to make her disappear forever.”
“So it really wasn’t a matter of accidental death from an overdose of the sedative they gave her?”
“I don’t think so. Given Stout’s confession about Cunningham accidentally over-sedating Addie, and his insistence that he wasn’t responsible, he might not have been involved in the murder. Then again, he might have just been pointing the finger before Cunningham fingered him.”
Her entire body seemed to pulse with the beat of her heart. It was so strange, talking about these cruel facts so rationally.
“Why?” she asked. “What makes you think that another person was involved, and an order was given to murder her?”
He shook his head, and she once again felt his restrained frustration. “It’s the only thing that makes sense to me. It’s hard to explain what it was like talking to Cunningham. The guy was a sociopath. He’d mix up facts with straight-up lies, but he’d also twist the facts. I’m not even sure he was aware of doing it sometimes. He’d just automatically try to recast himself and his actions in a more positive light.”
“Like the fact that he claims the reason he saved Addie from the creek and turned her over to Sissy was because he was suddenly a saved man.”
“Right. Don’t get me wrong. There might have been a tiny sliver of truth to that. I remember Addie’s eyes. She was such a pretty little girl. She practically glowed with life. If any human being could spark a redemption, it was Addie,” he said, his voice going hoarse. Alice held her breath when he paused, his focus clearly in the past. Suddenly, his gaze sharpened on her. “It wouldn’t shock me to find out there was a bit of fact to Cunningham’s story, enough for him to fabricate a lie around that kernel of truth, anyway. But Cunningham was a manipulator at heart, so when he pulled Addie out of that creek, he was planning for the future. That’s the bottom line. He’d probably considered it before, but his scheme kicked in when he realized that Addie was miraculously alive and amnesiac to his crime. Fate nudged him in that direction. He might have gotten a sweet deal in payment from whomever hired him to kidnap and kill Addie, but how much sweeter would it be if he threatened whomever had hired him with the knowledge that Adelaide Durand was still alive and stashed away in a place only Cunningham knew? What kind of blackmail money might he be able to get, dangling the threat of an anonymous tip to the police? With Addie alive and in his possession, there was always the chance of a future ransom, too. Plus, although Alan hadn’t yet put up a reward for useful clues that would lead to his daughter, Cunningham must have realized Alan eventually would.”
“Alan put up reward money?”
“Yeah. He offered half a million dollars to anyone who provided information that would lead to Addie’s recovery. When Addie was still missing after . . . after ten months, he raised the award money price to one million.”
She stared at him, mute with disbelief and confusion. A million dollars of reward money, and no one stepped forward? And . . .
“Why ten months?” she demanded.
His gaze bounced off her.
“Dylan? What’s the significance of ten months? Why did Alan raise the reward to a million then?” she repeated, thinking he hadn’t understood her query.
“It was ten months after Addie was kidnapped that Jim Stout was arrested and made the drunk confession he later recanted. Before that, the FBI assumed Addie was most likely dead, given simple crime statistics and the amount of time that had passed without a ransom request. After Stout confessed that she was accidentally killed, they were even more certain. Despite the fact that Stout recanted once he was sober, that incident altered the flavor of the investigation. Almost no one held any hope after that point that Addie was still alive.”
“Oh,” Alice whispered, imagining the horrible scene when the Durands received the news that Stout had claimed Addie had been accidentally killed.
“Alan flat-out refused to believe Stout, though. He never stopped believing Addie could be alive, even on his death bed,” Dylan said quietly. She was glad he didn’t comment when she looked away and furtively wiped at a tear. For a moment, they didn’t speak as Alice struggled to calm herself.
“My whole point is,” Dylan continued somberly after a moment, “why should Avery Cunningham go along with the moneyman’s plan to get rid of Addie? Between potential blackmail, ransom, and reward money, she was a precious commodity.”
“But Cunningham never admitted he was hired by someone, did he?”
“No. He denied it, but in the same sly way he used to deny that he had anything to do with the kidnapping for all those years. I started to recognize when he was lying.”
“If it were true that they were hired for the job, why wouldn’t Cunningham just confess? He was dying and admitted to the kidnapping. What would it matter to him at that point?”
“Again, I don’t know exactly. It could be any number of things. It’s possible whoever hired him had some kind of hold on Cunningham or a family member. We’ll never know for sure. I think it was some combination of the fact that Cunningham wanted to see himself as a misunderstood hero—a sort of scoundrel with a heart of gold—and that he actually did feel some twisted sense of liking or loyalty toward Sissy, Addie, or both. He was a convicted murderer. He was going to die in prison, and knew it. Exposing who had hired him for the kidnapping and possibly murder wouldn’t get him anything substantial. Plus, if he confessed that he’d been hired by someone, it might bring into question his motives for keeping Addie alive. Had he kept Addie alive to blackmail whomever hired him? If people questioned his motives, then how could Cunningham continue to tell himself that he’d been a decent man, even a hero, for one brief flashing moment in his life? How could he claim any worth when he met his maker? People lie to others and the world for much less motivation,” he finished grimly.