Page 136 of Hard Evidence
“No, you didn’t.But I have a gift from Alexa.Don’t pull that face; it isn’t for you anyway.”She held out a small notebook.“Here you go.”
I flipped through the pages.There was a series of email addresses, plus random words and phrases printed in lopsided handwriting.
“What is this?”Then I realised.“Passwords?To my accounts?”
“Ridge doesn’t get to die and take your hard work with him.”
A piece of paper fluttered to the floor, and Justin picked it up for me.A Western Union receipt, and for the amount of money I’d lost when all of this started.
“Is this…?”
“Saige is very sorry.”
Saige?Wait a second… No.No way.“You mean Saige…Tiffany?But…but I heard her voice, and I didn’t even recognise it.”
“She’s actually a reasonable actress, which is how she managed to screw at least thirty people out of money.This time, she used Justin’s address because—and I quote—at least she wasn’t sending women to some weirdo’s house to get murdered.”
“How did she even know where I live?”Justin asked.
“Apparently, you’re on Mr.and Mrs.Carlson’s Christmas card list, and Amie told them where you moved after the fire.Saige helped to address the envelopes.”
“Damn.Is she still breathing?”Justin asked.
“Of course.She still has to repay all the other poor fuckers she stole from.Which she will; we’ll make sure of it.And on her salary, that’ll take years.”
Jerry stiffened as I hugged her, and so did I when I felt the gun hidden under her jacket.But Jerry wasn’t the enemy.She’d saved Shiro’s life, and she’d fought for Justin alongside the rest of us.
“Thank you,” I whispered.“You’re a good friend.”
“Let’s not go that far.”
“You are.Even if sometimes you don’t believe it.”
CHAPTER49
JERRY
Forget Occam’s razor.This was Occam’s spiderweb.
Jez hadn’t come to Greenway Park to bring passwords.Well, she had, but that was just an excuse.She needed to speak with Justin and find out how the fuck his DNA had gotten inside Amie Carlson.She also needed to bleach her eyeballs after catching Saige Carlson in bed with Tucker Levins, but that would have to wait.
While Jessalyn, Violet, and Jessalyn’s ride-or-die bestie carried on planning recipe videos and a cremation—chestnuts roasted on a flaming corpse, anyone?—Jez beckoned Justin into the living room.
“I’m going to ask a question, and I need a straight answer.Did you fuck Amie Carlson?”
“No, I did not.”
“Not even a quickie at the office?”
“Which part of ‘no’ don’t you understand?”
“The part where the autopsy report said the semen found inside her belonged to you.”At least the baby wasn’t his.Amie had been telling the truth when she said Brett was the daddy.
His eyes saucered.“What?”
“Now you understand why we reacquired the body?”
Justin had been pissed about that, kept saying that Amie deserved a proper funeral and her parents needed closure.Which was valid.But Sin, the resident conspiracy theorist, had bet Jez five bucks that they’d find Justin’s cum inside Amie, so they’d picked her up from the morgue, and Jez lost the bet because she’d believed him when he said he hadn’t slept with the woman.And at that point, she hadn’t realised how big a clusterfuck they were dealing with.
