Page 25 of No Safe Place

Colleen’s surprise visitor was tallish and blonde and around fifty. Her salon-textured bob had platinum highlights and her middle-aged pear-like shape was expertly hidden in a well-tailored captain’s blazer, silk blouse and linen pants. Even without the designer crocodile shoulder bag, everything about her—her hair, her natural yet glowed up makeup, her nails, the self-assured yet serene expression on her face—exuded wealth.

“Okay,” Colleen said to her where she had sat her at the desk. “Go over it again a little slower this time, Ms. Cushing.”

“Please call me Jodi,” she said.

“Okay, Jodi, so you’re the wife of the Beckford College president, Martin Cushing?”

“Yes,” she said. “And you’re here to find out about Olivia, right?”

“Yes, I am,” Colleen said.

“And you work for the law firm Alston Brantwood?”

“That’s right.”

“They’re good,” Jodi Cushing said as if to herself. “National tier one. I looked them up. I need you to get me a meeting with your top people. Because I’m going to need help, a lot of legal help. Maybe a safe house. I will definitely need security.”

Colleen felt the hair on the back of her neck go up.

“Whoa, slow down, Jodi. Why would you need security?”

Jodi’s self-assured expression suddenly vanished. Her face went white as she stared down at the carpet. A moment later she lifted the shoulder bag into her lap and snapped open the Yves Saint Laurent logo clasp and produced an iPhone. When she handed it over, Colleen could see that a video was queued up on the screen. It was a grainy black-and-white video. The image showed the driveway of a house. The date line in the top right corner Colleen noticed immediately was October 11, the night of Olivia’s death.

“That’s the exterior of my house,” she said. “Press Play.”

Colleen watched as out from the front door came some people. There were four men walking with Olivia Ramos. Two of them seemed to be holding her up. Olivia was covering her face with her hands. Blood was dripping out from between her fingers, dripping off her chin.

“Wait. That’s—”

“The director of campus security, Roy Travers. And with him is the Beckford Town police chief, Phillip Garner. The other two men are bodyguards.”

“Bodyguards?” Colleen said as she looked on wide-eyed and gobsmacked as the four men put the injured Olivia into an enormous SUV.

“Oh, my goodness,” Coleen whispered as she played the video a second time.

The college incident report as well as the local news stories covering the death said that Olivia had spent some time that night at a local college bar and then at around 11 p.m. had gone back to her dorm where she OD’d on fentanyl.

Colleen couldn’t stop shaking her head.

No wonder they were giving her the runaround! No wonder!

“Olivia was at your house the night she died?” Colleen said.

Jodi’s eyes were just as wide as she stared back at Colleen and nodded.

“Why? Why was she there?”

“I’m not positive,” Jodi said. “I was staying over at my daughter’s house, babysitting that night. But I know one thing. It has something to do with my husband’s friend, Frank Stone. Those men are his bodyguards and that Rolls-Royce is Frank Stone’s car. He’s the one who got my husband the job here at the college ten years ago. They were roommates in college, at the University of Virginia Law School. They’re very close friends.”

“Frank Stone?” Colleen said. “He’s a billionaire, right? The Wall Street guy?”

Jodi nodded.

“Yes, he’s one of the richest men in Connecticut if not the world. He’s the founder of a Greenwich hedge fund that is connected with the big defense firms and the intelligence services. He’s incredibly connected. A very powerful and dangerous man. He scares the hell out of me. Always has.”

“What involvement did Olivia have with him?”

Jodi shook her head.

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