50
Laurie was waiting in Kendra’s driveway when she returned to the carriage house. She had watched the bag handoff from the west side of Greene Street, so she’d had a block-long head start on Kendra.
Kendra flinched when she saw her, clearly startled. “What are you doing here?”
“Something came up today during an interview with one of our other witnesses. I wanted to ask you about it in person.”
“You couldn’t call first?” Kendra asked.
“Honestly, I didn’t want to give you time to come up with a lie. There was some talk of showing up with cameras, but that seemed unnecessary.”
Kendra raised a hand to her mouth. “What is it?”
“Your state of mind after your children were born—it wasn’t just postpartum, was it? You were taking drugs. Drugs that Martin gave to you.” Laurie had put the pieces together when George Naughten had described his mother’s condition prior to her overdose. “You said he had moved on without you. He was drugging you, wasn’t he?”
Kendra nodded her head, pressing her lips together for composure.
“But then he stopped giving you the pills,” Laurie said. “The lawsuits were filed, and he knew he’d have lawyers scrutinizing his drug-dispensing habits. He couldn’t just hand the stuff out like candy anymore.”
Kendra’s gaze drifted to her front door, but the house was silent. They were alone. “I did have postpartum depression, just as I told you. But Martin had no sympathy. He just kept telling me to get my act together. He said it wasn’t natural for me to be so helpless when I had children to care for. Instead of helping me get proper treatment, he told me he could take care of me himself—and that meant pills. I didn’t know what they were. I just trusted him. After all, he was the Miracle Doctor. Days would go by, and I wouldn’t even know what happened until Caroline helped me fill in the blanks. Then, all of a sudden, it was cold turkey. When I found out about the lawsuits after he died, I made the connection. But at the time, he wouldn’t even tell me why he couldn’t keep giving me the pills. He just yelled at me and called me an addict and a junkie.”
“Because that’s what you were,” Laurie said. “That’s what he turned you into.”
She nodded again, wincing at the memory. “Please, you can’t tell anyone. I’m clean now. If the Bells find out—” Her face went ashen.
I came here thinking I had it all figured out, Laurie thought. “You weren’t spending that cash on shoes and spending sprees, but you also weren’t hiring a hit man. You were buying drugs on the street to feed your addiction.”
“Don’t you see why I couldn’t tell the police that? I had no way of proving it, and I knew Martin’s parents would fight me for my children. I did everything right since Martin died. I got myself clean and sober. I work hard, and I’m a good mother.”
“The only thing I couldn’t figure out, Kendra, is why you still hoard large amounts of cash.”
As Laurie suspected, Caroline must have told Kendra that she had shared that particular piece of information, because the question did not seem to catch Kendra by surprise. “Most of my money comes from a family trust. I keep cash on the side so the executors—including my in-laws—don’t monitor every dime I spend.”
“So who was the man you just gave a bag to on the corner of Greene and Houston?”
Kendra’s entire body lurched as if she had been punched in the stomach. She placed both of her hands on top of her head and began saying, “No, no, no, no, no.” For a second, Laurie wondered if she was in a trance.
“Kendra, I believe you’re a changed woman, but I also think it’s possible you made a horrible mistake in your impaired condition. I can try to help you as much as possible, but I can’t keep this to myself.” Kendra looked up at her with pleading eyes, but Laurie continued to confront her with the reality of the situation. “If you don’t tell me what’s going on, I’m going to go on air and tell a national television audience what I saw tonight. I’ll inform the police as well. They’ll fill in the blanks. You hired a hit man to kill your husband. That will be the entire story.”
“Please,” she whispered, “please don’t make me do this. I can’t. You’ll get them killed. They’re still innocent babies.”
Laurie reached out tentatively and placed her hands gently on Kendra’s shoulders, trying to calm her down. “Who? Who are you talking about?”
“Bobby and Mindy,” she said, tears beginning to stream down her face. “That man. That awful man. He said he’d . . . hurt my children if I told anyone.”
Laurie immediately looked around for someone who might be watching them, but saw no one. “Kendra, I’m not going to let that happen. We have resources. I can try to help you, but we should get out of the street.”
Kendra’s eyes darted around wildly. She pushed past Laurie and headed for the garage door on the ground floor of the carriage house. She entered six digits into a security keypad, and the door began to rise. There was no car inside, just a few stacks of cardboard boxes. “Follow me.”
Once they were inside, she looked Laurie directly in the eye: “You have to believe me. I have no idea who killed Martin.”