Page 28 of Dirty Liars

Jack went back to the bar and brought the decanter of whiskey back to the table. “Tell me about Chloe.”

“Chloe opened up a little about her background, but she was always very guarded. She never told me for certain, but I think she grew up in some kind of commune. I’m not sure where though. She knew how to do all kinds of weird stuff. Canning and sewing, and she knew a lot about plants and gardening. She even knew what plants were good for medicine.

“But she said as she got older things changed and became dangerous. She said in passing once that she’d witnessed someone die. I didn’t ask her about it. There was something about the look on her face when she said it that told me she hadn’t really meant to tell me that, so I pretended I hadn’t heard. But I knew she was scared, even though she pretended not to be. She was always looking over her shoulder.”

“Did Theo not suspect that the two of you were still involved?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” Dickie said. “I saw Theo at that fundraiser when I introduced him to Chloe and the next time I saw him was at his wedding. He wasn’t demanding or anything of their relationship. She worked for him and took her job seriously. There were times we’d meet up during her lunch break, and there were times she stayed over at my place. Apparently Theo was out of town a lot, and she said she didn’t like being there by herself. Said it felt like a prison. I guess Theo had a whole team of personal security, and whenever he’d leave town he’d make sure that Chloe was protected.”

“So chances are Theo knew the two of you were still hooking up?” Jack asked. “I can’t imagine Theo’s security guards would keep that a secret from him.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right.” Dickie sighed. “Maybe I’m thinking too much into it. Maybe there was nothing between them except his ability to protect her.”

I was keeping my opinions to myself until we’d gathered all the facts.

“Theo offered her the protection she needed, and I understood that,” Dickie said. “When she told me he’d asked her to marry him and that his name and his father’s position would help protect her I was a little shocked, but it was a gut reaction to when someone had run her off the road.”

“Wait,” Jack said. “When was this?”

“Sometime after the New Year,” he said. “They got engaged right after that.”

“What happened?” Jack asked. “No police reports popped when we ran the background check on her.”

“She didn’t want to involve the police,” Dickie said. “She was checking on one of the restaurants up in Arlington, and on her way home a black sedan tried to run her into oncoming traffic. She managed to swerve out of the way and she hit the guardrail. Messed up her car pretty bad. That was when she told me she thought her past was catching up to her.”

Dickie poured another drink. “She told me Theo had offered to marry her and move her to Greece. He’s got dual citizenship.” Dickie stopped and frowned, swirling the amber liquid in his glass. “I think I told you that already.”

“That’s okay,” Jack said. “Keep going.”

“That’s when I told her that I would marry her and we could move wherever she wanted,” he said. “I mean, I’ve got loads of money. Not as much as Theo, but it’s nothing to sneeze at. She seemed excited about the idea, but she told me we had to go along with her engagement to Theo. She said it was safer that way. So I went along with it. I even went to the wedding. I had my bags packed in the car for us to make our getaway. I came to the wedding early.” He rubbed the back of his neck and laughed. “I was nervous. I’ve never really done anything like that before, and I kept thinking that my father would probably disown me.”

“If your father didn’t disown you after your divorce from Candy I don’t think he ever will,” Jack said, trying to lighten the tension.

“Well, you never know with my father,” Dickie said softly.

At that moment he reminded me of the teenager who hadn’t been hardened by the world yet. The boy who was smart and a little nerdy, but who always had a heart to do what was right for others. And a boy who could never live up to his father’s expectations.

“Did she contact you once you arrived at the Briarly?” Jack asked.

“I texted her when I got there,” he said. “And then she told me where I could meet her.”

“What time was that?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe around two o’clock? All of her bridesmaids were all friends or family of Theo’s, so she told them all she needed some time alone to rest. There’s this whole bridal suite wing in the main clubhouse of the Briarly, so Chloe had her own private space and balcony. I snuck up the back stairs and she let me in her room. There was just this…desperation in her.” Slashes of bright red colored his cheeks and he cleared his throat. “And then one thing led to another. She said she loved me.” Dickie shrugged again, looking more defeated than I’d ever seen him. “I tried to get her to leave with me then, but she said it was too soon. That we needed to wait until it was almost time for the wedding. I told her to text me where to meet her and she kissed me goodbye. That’s the last time I saw her.”

“You didn’t stay and try to talk with her?” I asked.

“No,” he said. “I was waiting in the bar of the clubhouse and realized it was time for the wedding to start. I could hear the music and I kept expecting for it to stop and people to start running around looking for Chloe. I kept checking my phone, but there were no messages from her. They got married in the gardens. I could see through the window. She looked beautiful. So I did the only thing I could do. I left.”

“How’d she get the fake ID and papers?” Jack asked.

Dickie shrugged and his eyelids were starting to get heavy and his speech slurred. “I guess Theo pulled some strings and got them for her. When she was working at the restaurant she always paid cash for everything. She had an ID, but I don’t know where she got it from. You can buy the fake ones in the city for a few hundred bucks. Some of them look pretty real. But after she met Theo she had everything from a birth certificate to a passport. I can’t believe she’s dead. I was so angry with her. I could’ve?—”

“Dickie—” Jack interrupted.

“Am I really a suspect?” he asked.

“You’re a person of interest we need to eliminate,” Jack said. “So here’s what you’re going to do. You going to willingly let Jaye take a DNA sample tonight. Then you’re going to go upstairs and sleep this off. And then tomorrow you’re going to come into the station with your attorney and give a voluntary statement. You’re going to tell them everything you told us tonight. Do you understand?”

---