Lisa had told me this herself: It’s not like she was on the witness stand. Without Majors, Lisa lacked a character witness. And with her physical evidence ruled out, there was no chance for a criminal proceeding. “Majors could have been a second voice, changed the your-word-against-his narrative, but she didn’t come to your aid. A year later she realized that McTavish stole her idea for his new book, and her only evidence came from that very same night. You were a witness to the conversation when Majors told McTavish her story. She turned to you, but by then you’d already signed your own NDA. Besides, you must have been too hurt to back up her story. Am I close?”
“I don’t blame her.” Lisa tossed a rock into the pit, watched it disappear into the dark. I didn’t hear it hit the bottom, which made my stomach quiver. “She didn’t have much of a choice. They would have ruined her career. And I would have had to break my NDA to back her up. But it hurt. So I guess I chose not to help her too. The number of times I’ve seen it.” She shook her head. “The world can’t stomach two strong successful women in the same place, so we have to hate each other, we have to compete. That’s how people like Wyatt designed it. I’ve got nothing against her, I just . . . let Wyatt and Henry win. Even if I didn’t know that was what I was doing at the time.” Another rock sailed into the abyss.
“That’s the key to how I knew,” I said. “Wyatt wouldn’t have taken losing your new book to a new publisher too easily. And McTavish was a bitter soul. So they cooked up a stunt. Of course, your new publisher would have been delighted to see the Henry McTavish quote on the cover, even with the caveat that you weren’t to see it before this trip. I thought at first that you were overwhelmed when you saw the quote, but you weren’t: you were horrified. Because that’s the exact word Henry used in a message he sent you. Simone’s his old assistant, and Royce is a perv, but I heard the same word from both of them. Firecracker. So by putting that word on something that was supposed to be yours, they marked it. Forever. A humiliation only you would know.”
“This all sounds like a pretty good reason to kill both of them,” Lisa said. “You still have no reason to believe me, so why do you?”
“I figure seeing the quote was the final straw. You marched into McTavish’s room and told him you didn’t care about the NDA and that you were done keeping his secrets. He wrote out a check for twenty-five thousand dollars, tried to pay you off, the same as he did before, but you burned it in front of him. The world’s changed: you hoped people might listen to you this time. You were done. Was that when he grabbed you?”
Lisa nodded. “Yeah.”
I sighed. “I’m disappointed. I thought we had a bit of truth-telling going on. Why bother lying?”
Lisa swallowed thickly. She’d stopped throwing rocks into the hole but was peering down it like jumping in was a viable way to get out of the conversation.
I kept on. “Henry didn’t grab you. He was crippled down his left side; his left hand was always clutching his cane. If he was going to reach out and grab you, he would have done it with his right hand, so if you were in front of him, which you’d have to be to hit him in the nose, he would have grabbed your left side. Your bruise is on the wrong arm.”
Lisa sucked her teeth.
“It’s okay,” I continued. “This isn’t an accusation, I’m just trying to get all the pieces on the board. You were always going to hit McTavish, that’s why you went there. You headbutted him straight in the nose. Partly because it felt good, and partly because you could pocket a bloody tissue. You gave yourself the bruise so you could claim it was self-defense if McTavish dared to pursue the injury, but that was just insurance: you knew he’d stay quiet, given what you were talking about. What you really wanted was the tissue. Well, the blood on it, anyway. Here’s where it gets tricky.”
Lisa laughed, but it sounded shaky. “Why would I want a bloody tissue?”
“You had a child. His child. You kept it. That’s why you took the hush money in the first place, because you were pregnant. Now, fast-forward all these years, you wanted his DNA to prove it. It’s taken you two decades to write your second book, partly because of how you felt about the industry—how hard it was to trust anyone with your work, with your life, again—and partly because you were raising a kid on your own. Staging a fight is fine and all, and you walked away with what you wanted: the DNA. But then McTavish dies and you realize that you might be the prime suspect. There’s the history between you, and now there’s also physical evidence of a violent altercation. And now you’ve got even clearer motive, because the copyright in all his books, including the new one, should go to his estate. And your child is the estate. Or at least that’s supposed to be what the DNA test will prove. So you pinch the manuscript to protect it, and hope that by the time anyone realizes you’re gone, we might have caught the real killer. Your only problem was that hot-wiring a car in real life is far more difficult than just researching it. And, of course, that you had to leave your daughter behind.”
Lisa paled so much I think she got immediately sunburned.
I stood up, dusted my knees. “Let’s put your car thieving to the test, because you need to help me get back on the train. Then Brooke can tell me her side of the story herself.”
Chapter 30
It took twice as long as it should have to walk back to the Land Cruiser. Even on flat, safe ground we walked like we were crossing a river on loose stones. I checked every spot I put my foot twice.
“I thought I’d hidden it so well,” Lisa said. “I didn’t want Henry to know.”
“Like mother, like daughter,” I said, pointing to her bruises. “Wrong arm.”
Her shoulders rose. “He hurt her?”
“No. Brooke’s right arm is sunburned. The festival punters are all in carriages on the east side of the train—they paid for the tickets so they get the sunrise views. The writers are all on the west, so we get the sunset. Each cabin only gets sun half a day. If she was sitting by the window in a guest cabin, where she’s supposed to be, she should have had sunburn on her left arm, not her right. If she’d just been burned outside, it would be across both arms evenly. Which means she’s been staying in a writer’s cabin. That, and it was pretty obvious she was lying about her cabin number when I asked her. She’s someone’s plus-one.”
Lisa chuckled. We’d reached the Land Cruiser. I brushed flecks of broken window glass off the seat and hopped in the passenger side. Lisa crouched by the driver’s footwell, alongside the dislodged panel and dangling wires she’d been fiddling with before I gave chase. “Gosh,” she said. “All that out of a sunburned arm.”
“Not just the arm,” I said. “When Royce woke us all up, you made sure to slip out of your cabin quickly, so no one would see anyone else was inside. Royce only deliberately woke the writers, but of course knocking on your door woke her as well. Her curiosity got the better of her and she followed you. That’s why she was last to arrive, and why you were annoyed to see her when she sat down next to you. Then there was her fascination with McTavish, which didn’t quite fit her age; it just took me a while to figure out if it was psychopathic or not. Plus you guided her away from Wyatt’s body. You told her to be careful when she was skipping rocks in the canyon. You gave her aloe vera cream to use on her sunburn. That all points to a motherly instinct. That and the fact that she was in the Chairman’s Carriage looking for the manuscript.”
“Very good,” Lisa said, a cable in her mouth.