Page 66 of Welcome to Murder Week

Wyatt has a glint in his eye like he’s moving in for the kill.

“But then Tracy threatened to tell your wife herself, didn’t she?”

“Threatened? Yes, yes. She did.”

“And you believed she would go through with it.”

“Formidable woman that Tracy. A tiger.” For a moment he looks like he’s forgotten his shame and is remembering more exciting times with Tracy. Black-negligee times. “Argh,” he roars, bares his teeth, and laughs. “A wild woman.”

“And you had to stop her,” Wyatt says.

Amity is standing beside me now, I can feel how excited she is. We’re about to get a confession. We’re going to win this thing!

“That’s right. I had to stop her.” He looks up, almost pleading, like he wants us to understand why he did it.

“And how did you do that?” Wyatt asks softly. This is the last thing we need. We know whodunit. We know whydunit. And now Stanley Grange is going to tell us howdunit.

“I woke her up.”

“Yes?” Amity says.

“Middle of the night.”

“Go on,” Wyatt says.

“And I told her how terrible I felt.” Stanley sits on the leather bench, puts his head in his hands.

“Yes,” Wyatt says, sitting beside him. “You felt bad about what you were about to do, but you couldn’t stop.”

“No, I couldn’t stop. Once I had started, I just…”

“You struck her?”

Stanley looks up. “Why would I strike her?”

“To protect your secret,” Wyatt says.

“No, I, I felt so wretched,” Stanley says. “I told her everything. I told her about Tracy and me.”

“Told who?” Amity says.

“What?” I say.

Stanley stands.

“Pippa.”

“I’m confused,” I say.

“I told Pippa everything.”

“Wait, weren’t you at Tracy’s salon?”

“Why would I be at Tracy’s salon? I was upstairs, in our bedroom.”

Wyatt gets up and asks Stanley to explain again.

“In complete sentences, tell us what happened,” he says.

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