Page 64 of All the Little Truths

18

Harpeth Hall

Hobbs Road, Nashville, Noon

Since Finley couldn’t reach her father—a good thing, considering she needed to cool down before confronting him—she moved on to the next item on her list: interviewing Lucy Cagle’s other two known friends. If their statements changed to the degree Ian’s friends’ had, Finley was going to start to wonder about the detective who led the original investigation.

Gwyneth Garrison was a counselor at her and Lucy’s alma mater. Garrison had agreed to meet Finley at the school’s Alumnae Relations building. There was an empty office, she’d said, since the coordinator position had not been refilled. She suggested they would have more privacy there.

Finley suspected the woman primarily preferred to keep the meeting away from any place where she might be seen during their appointment. Finley had no issue with that.

She had attended an elite private school as well, but this one took prestige to a whole new level. All girls, and totally focused on grooming young women to reach their maximum potential. Many celebrities had attended the prominent school. Reese Witherspoon, for one. Whowouldn’t want to attend this school—as long as parents had somewhere in the neighborhood of forty thousand a year to contribute.

Louise Cagle had graduated from Harpeth Hall, and she’d intended for her only child to do the same. Lucy had almost made it. With honors, no less.

Gwyneth Garrison had been one of Lucy’s closest friends, according to the case file. This information was confirmed by both Maureen and Jessica Downey. The other close friend, Natalie Williams, had not yet returned Finley’s call.

Since she was employed by the school, Garrison could not have avoided Finley if she wanted to, though she had tried. She hadn’t answered her home phone or her cell, but she was unable to evade a call to the school when it was transferred directly to her office and the aforementioned celebrity alum’s name was used.

“How do you know Reese?” Gwyneth asked as they settled into the plush chairs that made up a conversation corner in the large office.

“Our parents belong to the same country club.” This was true ... once. Finley had no idea if it was still true.

She forced a tight smile. “I’m glad you weren’t simply using her name to reach me. I would have called you back when I had time.”

Finley held up her hands. “Absolutely not.” This wasn’t entirely true, of course, but neither was the other woman’s statement.

“So, how can I help you, Ms.O’Sullivan?”

“The Lucy Cagle homicide case has been reopened, and I’m plowing through all those thirteen-year-old details.”

Garrison nodded slowly. “I see.” She took a breath. “Lucy and I were friends. Good friends, I would say. Like all the girls in our class, we were very competitive. As I told the detectives after her murder, Lucy was working on her senior thesis. She would not tell me what it was about.” She shrugged, shook her head. “I suppose I didn’t deserve her trust when it came to schoolwork. I had stolen her ideas a couple oftimes. I’m not proud of it, but there it is. I’m sure you read where her mother told the detectives as much.”

There had been no mention in any of the statements Finley had seen, but she appreciated the woman’s honesty, however it came about, and said as much.

“Did Lucy have a crush, a special guy or girl in her life?” What eighteen-year-old didn’t? And yet the info in that area of the victim’s life was sparse.

“No girl crushes for sure,” Gwyneth said. “She dated a guy pretty steadily over the summer before senior year. Eric something.” She made an “aha” face. “Houser. He’s a police detective now.”

“Why did she and Eric break up?”

“I think because things got too serious ... too heavy. She really wanted to focus on her education.” Gwyneth rolled her eyes. “Unlike the rest of us.”

Garrison was married with three kids. She had gone straight from college to marriage and motherhood, not taking on a career until her kids were in school—private school, of course.

“Around the time of the murder, was she seeing anyone at all?” Finley pressed.

“She mentioned a guy a couple of times. She never told me his name, but she kind of went all gooey and sweet when she mentioned him. I asked her, but she would never talk about specifics. I’m sorry. I really don’t know any more than that. Lucy was a wonderful person. A good student, a caring friend. My goodness, she was always volunteering to help others. And I’m not just saying that because she’s dead. You can ask anyone from our class. They will all tell you the same—Lucy is the last person we expected to meet with a tragic ending. She was as close to an angel as you’d find.”

“No trouble with anyone, ever?” Finley didn’t doubt Lucy had been all the things everyone said, but even the best human messed up sometimes. Said the wrong thing. Made a mistake. Something.

“Never.” She shook her head. “In fact, I recall when one of the custodians was ill. He’d lost his wife. My goodness, Mr.Brewer has been here as long as I can remember. He must be the oldest working custodian in Tennessee.” Garrison made a face as if remembering something, then shook it off. “Anyway, Lucy set up a chain of helpers to take dinner to him at home each evening. To help out with anything he needed, like laundry. It was incredible. She made sure he was taken care of for a whole month. It was December of our junior year. She even made sure that she and the other girls, including me, who had joined in to help went to see him on Christmas Day, bearing gifts. Mr.Brewer had no children or other family, so he would have been alone otherwise.”

Finley jotted down his name on her notepad. “Do you have his home address? Phone number?”

“I can get that information for you.” She made a quick call to the administrative office. When she’d passed along the information, she offered, “Would you like me to introduce you to Mr.Brewer? I have a few more minutes before my next appointment.”

“That would be great.”

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