The Liar

Because they’d only been seeing each other a couple of months, she reminded herself. She’d been right to slow things down; she’d been right to take a step or two back.

Then she pressed her face into the towel.

He’d said he was in love with her. And that just filled her up and emptied her out again. It made her want to shake, it made her want to weep. It made her want to hold onto him as if her life depended on it.

She couldn’t think about that now, just couldn’t. She was too worked up to think about that. And he was too mad to think straight anyway.

She’d go for a walk, that’s what she’d do. Go for a walk and clear her hot head. And she’d talk to Emma Kate. She really needed to talk to Emma Kate.

She started downstairs again, a little desperate to get out of the house. When she saw the front door open, she all but ran.

“Now you listen,” she began, then stopped dead when she saw Forrest, and the two black-suited men behind him.

“Somebody got your red up,” he said easily. And since he’d seen Griff’s truck heading into town from this direction, he could deduce who’d gotten her red up.

“I was just . . . going for a walk.”

“That’s going to have to wait. What we have here is the FBI special agents Boxwood and Landry. They need a conversation.”

“Oh. All right. I—”

“Could use something cold,” Forrest continued.

“Of course. Y’all go ahead and sit down. I’ll be right back.”

He’d sent her off to give her a chance to compose herself, so she did her best to follow through. It had to be bad, she thought while she filled glasses with ice and tea, added out of habit sprigs of her mother’s mint. It had to be bad to bring the FBI to the house. She set the glasses on a tray, added the little pale blue napkins, started to get out a plate for the frosted cookies her mother served to unexpected company.

The FBI wasn’t company, she thought, and picked up the tray as it was.

She heard Forrest talking, something about white-water rafting and how his brother Clay would give them a hell of a ride if they had time for one.

The tall agent rose when she came in, took the tray from her.

“Appreciate it,” he said, and she heard Georgia in his voice.

Tall, she noted, lean to the point of gangly, dark skin and eyes, and dark hair cropped close to the scalp.

He set the tray down, held out a hand. “Special Agent Martin Landry. My partner Special Agent Roland Boxwood. We appreciate you speaking with us.”

“It’s about Richard. It has to be about Richard.” She looked from Landry to the other agent.

Boxwood had more girth, more muscle. He was as light as Landry was dark, with Scandinavian blond hair, blue-ice eyes.

“Sit down, Shelby.” Forrest took her hand, drew her down on the couch with him. “Our federal friends here flew in from Atlanta today.”

“Atlanta,” she murmured.

“They’ve given me the go-ahead to bring you up to date.” He gave her leg a quick rub. “I sent what you put together, what Griff put together, what I put together. I boiled that all down and sent it to the police in Miami, in Atlanta, in Philadelphia—and so on. And as the so-ons made a lot of sending, I sent the boiled-down to the FBI.”

“You said you were . . . you said that’s what you’d do.”

“That’s right. Now, their boss sent these agents down to talk to you directly.”

When she nodded, Landry leaned forward. “Ms. Foxworth—”

“I wasn’t ever, I only thought . . . It’s Pomeroy. Please.”

“Ms. Pomeroy, you sold some watches last February. To Easterfield on Liberty, in Philadelphia.”

“Yes. Richard had several watches, so I . . .” She closed her eyes. “They were stolen, weren’t they? I should’ve known, I should’ve realized. The man who helped me, at the store, he wouldn’t have known. He was just helping me. I’ll pay back the money. I don’t . . .” She didn’t have the money. Even if she wiped out the savings she’d kept—the house fund—she didn’t have enough. “If I could have a little time, I’ll pay back the money.”

“Don’t worry about that, Shelby.”

Fiercely, she shook her head at Forrest. “He stole them, and I sold them. I used the money. It’s not right.”

“There are other items.” Boxwood spoke. He had a gravelly voice that struck Shelby as threatening. “Cuff links, earrings, an antique hair clip.”

“I have the hair clip! I didn’t think it was worth anything, so I didn’t try to sell it. I’ll get it.”

“Just sit, Shelby.” Forrest pressed a hand on her leg. “Just sit for now.”

“All of these items—the ones you sold in Pennsylvania,” Boxwood continued, “match items reported stolen in burglaries in the Atlanta area from May of 2011 to September of 2014.”

“More than one,” she said softly. “More than one burglary.”

“Numerous other items were reported stolen from these cases. We’d like you to look at photographs.”

“Yes, I’ll look. Of course. We didn’t move to Atlanta until the fall of 2011. We didn’t live there in May, but . . . He took trips. I don’t know . . .”

“You lived there in April of 2012,” Boxwood added.

“Yes. We lived there.”

“Can you tell us where you were on April thirteenth of that year?”