Chapter 3 - Rachel Had Been Sleeping With Jason and Investigating Him at the Same Time

Detective Nolan told me not to answer Rachel until she could preserve the messages.

I wanted to ignore her.

Instead, I handed over my phone.

Grief had become a sequence of people telling me not yet.

Not yet open the card.

Not yet confront Jason.

Not yet decide what the pills meant.

I hated everyone who was correct.

Nolan created a copy, then allowed me to respond under guidance.

Where are you?

Rachel replied almost immediately.

Parking lot behind St. Matthew’s Pharmacy.

Alone.

Nolan drove.

I rode in the passenger seat because she refused to let me go separately.

Rachel sat inside a gray sedan with both hands visible on the steering wheel.

When she saw the detective, she nearly drove away.

Nolan blocked her path.

Not dramatically.

Just enough.

Rachel got out.

Her funeral makeup had streaked beneath her eyes.

“I said don’t tell Jason.”

“I didn’t,” I said.

“She did,” Nolan added, “tell police.”

Rachel closed her eyes.

“Fine.”

We moved to a quiet interview room at the station.

Rachel requested a lawyer.

Nolan approved immediately.

That made me trust the process more.

Two hours later, with counsel present, Rachel began.

“Yes, I had an affair with Jason.”

No excuse.

No claim that he said the marriage was over.

“I knew he was married.”

I stared at her.

She looked back.

“I’m not asking you to forgive that.”

“Good.”

The affair began ten months earlier.

Rachel worked in project accounting at Northpoint Construction.

Jason pursued her.

She liked the attention.

He complained that Lily had become distant during fertility treatments.

Rachel believed enough because believing helped.

Then Lily became pregnant.

Rachel expected Jason to end the affair.

He did not.

Instead, he became more reckless.

“He started putting hotel charges through vendor accounts.”

Nolan asked, “Why did that matter to you?”

“Because I processed the accounts.”

Rachel noticed irregular payments to a subcontractor called Crestline Site Services.

Invoices for excavation work on projects where excavation had already been completed.

Amounts varied.

Forty-two thousand.

Sixty-eight.

Ninety-one.

She checked vendor records.

Crestline existed.

But its listed address was a mailbox.

The bank information changed twice.

“Did you tell Jason?”

“I asked what the invoices were.”

“What did he say?”

“Executive adjustments. He told me to process them.”

Rachel did.

At first.

Then one transfer bounced.

She investigated the receiving account.

The authorized signer was Jason’s college friend, Derek Shaw.

A man who had never worked construction.

“What was Jason doing?” I asked.

Rachel looked at Nolan before answering.

“Moving money out of Northpoint before a loan audit.”

“Stealing?”

“Possibly hiding distributions. Possibly tax fraud. I didn’t know.”

She copied records.

Then she did something I never expected.

She contacted Lily.

“Why?”

Rachel’s face tightened.

“Because Jason told me he was going to leave her with nothing.”

I laughed once.

Cruel sound.

“You helped him betray her, then decided finances were the moral line?”

Rachel accepted that.

“Yes.”

At least she did not defend herself.

She met Lily at a diner and showed one invoice.

Lily initially thought Rachel was trying to destroy the marriage.

Then she checked the home computer.

Found more.

That matched the notebook.

“What happened after?” Nolan asked.

“Lily started gathering evidence.”

“Did Jason know?”

“Eventually.”

“How?”

“I don’t know.”

Rachel’s hands trembled.

“Then he changed.”

“With you?”

“With everyone.”

He demanded passwords.

Started checking Rachel’s phone.

Asked whether Lily had contacted her.

Rachel lied.

Then Jason told her he had a plan.

After Lily had the baby, he would file for divorce.

He would move company ownership into a new holding structure first.

He wanted Rachel to help backdate vendor documents.

She refused.

The affair deteriorated.

“Then why walk into Lily’s funeral on his arm?” I asked.

Rachel looked ashamed.

“Because he told me police had already ruled it an accident.”

“That doesn’t answer.”

“He said if I stayed away, people would think I knew something.”

“So you went to manage appearances.”

“Yes.”

I wanted to hate her.

I did.

But Lily’s note kept interfering.

Rachel is not what you think.

Nolan asked about Lily’s death.

Rachel’s eyes filled.

“Jason called me that night.”

“What time?”

“9:18.”

Lily fell sometime around nine.

According to Jason’s original statement, he found her at the bottom of the stairs at 9:31 and called emergency services at 9:34.

“What did he say?” Nolan asked.

Rachel swallowed.

“He said, ‘It happened.’”

The room went still.

“What did you understand that to mean?”

“I didn’t know.”

“Exact words?”

“It happened. I need you to stay home.”

“Anything else?”

“He said not to call him.”

“Did you?”

“No.”

Rachel produced her phone.

The call log remained.

Nolan took photographs.

I felt cold.

“That sounds like he knew.”

Nolan looked at me.

“It sounds like something we need to investigate.”

Again.

Facts before conclusions.

Then Rachel added one more thing.

Two days before Lily died, Jason asked Rachel whether sertraline could make a pregnant woman dizzy.

“Why would he ask you that?” Nolan said.

“My sister is a pharmacist.”

I thought of the blue pills.

Rachel continued.

“I told him I didn’t know and that he should ask a doctor.”

“Did he?”

“I don’t know.”

Nolan asked whether Rachel knew anyone who might have changed Lily’s medication.

“No.”

Then Rachel looked at me.

“There is something worse.”

My stomach tightened.

“What?”

“The day Lily died, Jason wasn’t the only person at the house.”

“Who?”

“I saw a car on the security app.”

“What security app?”

“Jason gave me access months ago.”

That betrayal barely registered now.

Rachel continued.

“The driveway camera showed his mother arriving at 7:46.”

I stared.

Jason’s mother.

Margaret Reed.

The woman who had sat directly behind the casket crying into a handkerchief.

“She told police she hadn’t seen Lily in three days.”

Rachel nodded.

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“I know.”

And just like that, the circle widened again.