Page 80 of The Anniversary Party

“Why would he do that?” Brian wondered.

“Thatis an excellent question. Let’s continue,” Sasha said. “Chance claims he hit Rex over the head, returned the fireplace poker to the stand, grabbed a candlestick, then ran upstairs and stashed it in Grady’s room to frame him. I think the second part of that story is true. Chance probably did take the candlestick up to Grady’s room. Remember, he said from the beginning that he went to Grady’s room, ostensibly to talk to Grady about his marital problems. But he didn’t go there to ask a confirmed bachelor for relationship advice—he wanted to frame Grady to protect the actual killer.”

“Who is he protecting?” Tessa asked.

Sasha went on as if she hadn’t heard her. “Chance also said he saw Paul coming through the front door covered in snow and that they went together to the kitchen to open some beers.”

Leo took up the thread. “Sometimes liars, especially inexperienced ones, think that the more detail their story has, the more believable it will be. So Chance adds the vivid detail of Paul looking like the Yeti because he thinks it lends an aura of authenticity to his story. But his story is a mess. It doesn’t match anyone else’s, and it casts suspicion on everyone from Tessa to Grady to Joy to Paul. He didn’t care who took the fall. He just didn’t want the evidence to point to the real killer.”

“And it wasn’t Chance? You’re sure?” Brian sought clarity.

“We’re sure,” Sasha told him. “He’s protecting someone else.”

“The question,” Leo said, “is who? Which of the other guests is Chance protecting? Plenty of people had a reason to be upset with Rex this weekend and could have had a conversation with him that ended poorly.”

Sasha ticked them off on her fingers. “There’s Joy, whom Rex threatened to expose to Grady. There’s Tessa, who was furious because Rex thought she’d be his friend with benefits this weekend. There’s Paul, who owes Rex a lot of money. And then there’s Leeza, who knew about the gambling debt and despised the way Rex treated Paul. But there’s one more person who wanted to talk to Rex.”

“Grady,” Annette guessed.

“Well, technically, yes. But Grady didn’t commit suicide, so unless we’re looking at two killers, it’s not Grady,” Sasha told her.

Officer Duncan threw Leo a look.

“We arenotlooking at two killers,” Leo hurried to assure him.

“Well, Bethany wanted to talk to Rex, but she said she didn’t get a chance to before he … you know,” Leeza chimed in.

“That’s what Bethany said,” Leo agreed.

Bethany gritted her teeth but maintained her silence.

“Chance told us that he argued with Rex because Rex was unwilling to buy Bethany out of the company. There are a few problems with that story. For one, even Chance probably isn’t dumb enough to go behind his wife’s back and talk to her former business partner while he’s still in the doghouse from going behind her back to bank their baby’s stem cell cord blood,” Leo said. “I mean, there’s stupid and then there’s too stupid to live.”

Sasha tagged in. “The other problem is when Bethany told us about her desire to sell her interest in the company, it was news to Chance. He didn’t know that’s what she wanted from Rex until she told all of us. Right here. In this room. After both Rex and Grady were killed. That means Chance would have to be both monumentally stupid and psychic to have had that conversation with Rex.”

“Who was he protecting?” Leeza wondered.

“Bethany.”

“Bethany? Bethany killed Rex? And how did Chance know?” Annette asked.

Leo said, “Given the timing and where people were, it could only have happened like this: Bethany overhead Grady and Rex talking. After Grady left, she confronted Rex. The conversation went poorly, and she stormed out. Still enraged, she grabbed the fireplace poker, rushed back into the dining room, and took a swing at Rex. She returned the fireplace poker to the stand and, I imagine, was probably going to go upstairs. But then there was a knock at the door.”

“She answered the door to find John and Hatty. Meanwhile, Chance had seen his wife return the fireplace poker and rush off,” Sasha added. “Curious why she was wandering around the house with a fireplace poker, he probably took a closer look and noticed the smeared blood on the stand. I’m betting that at that point, he opened the door to the dining room. While Bethany, cool as could be, was chatting with the Carlisles, he saw Rex on the floor and realized what she’d done. So he grabbed the candlestick and ran upstairs to Grady’s room.”

“But why would Bethany kill Rex?” Tessa asked.

“The question isn’t why Bethany killed Rex. It’s why she killed Rextoday,” Leo answered.

* * *

When Leo said, “The question isn’t why Bethany killed Rex. It’s why she killed Rextoday,”Sasha sensed Bethany stiffen beside her. She kept her eyes turned toward her husband while he broke down the crime, but her attention was laser-focused on the woman to her right.

Leo went on, “Bethany came here intending to kill Rex. She brought the poisoned lemon peels and added them to the order in the kitchen. Paul can confirm that there were no lemon peels on the invoice from the shop. Someone in this group brought them here. Paul also insists that there’s no way Rex would have used them this weekend without first trying them out. Does everyone agree with that?”

“Oh, yeah,” Tessa said instantly. “He was super particular about that drink. He would have taken them home and experimented before he ever served them to anyone. There’s no doubt.”

A chorus of agreement rose from the table. Only Bethany and Chance remained silent.

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