Page 60 of Promise Me Never

“Yesterday. He’s not suspicious of Bennett at all. He thinks someone else took her. I need to talk to someone in Angela’s family. She had an Instagram and Facebook page, but I couldn’t find any of her relatives.”

“Yeah, I met her several times.”

“Do you know any of her family?”

“Not really. I wasn’t exactly friends with her. Bennett invited me to their engagement party. She was also with him at one of his annual Labor Day parties in the Hamptons.”

“Where was she from? I thought we could try to track someone down, see if they’ve heard from her.”

“He met her in the city, but her family lived in Maine. Her mother was at the engagement party. After Angela texted Bennett and broke up with him, she called to say she hadn’t heard from her daughter. She said she filed a missing-person report too, and I remember Bennett checking in with her every few weeks. Nothing ever came of it, and Bennett told me the mother died a couple of years ago.”

“How did he and Angela meet?”

“She moderated a talk he gave. She was working at the bookstore.”

Their waiter came over and took her drink request, and she ordered an iced tea.

Savannah shook her head. “Why would he kill them? If he didn’t want to be with them anymore, why wouldn’t he just break up with them?”

“I don’t think it’s possible to understand the rationale of someone who would do something like that. I loved Poppy. I don’t know you, but you seem like a nice woman. I don’t want to see something happen to you. The facts are the facts.” She tented her hands, shaking her head. “At the time I thought it was weird. Both these women ghosting him. Especially because he’s Bennett. He’s the total package. Why would they leave him?”

“Maybe they didn’t like how he immerses himself in his work. It can be hard.” Savannah was having a difficult time with how much time he spent in his office herself, not that she’d ever think of leaving him.

“I’m not going to sugarcoat it. He has a bad temper. Maybe you haven’t seen it yet. I loved him, so I didn’t want to believe it. But, Savannah, I really think he killed those women, and Poppy found out.” She was quiet for a beat. “And then he killed her.”

Savannah leveled a look at her. “You’re accusing him of being a cold-blooded killer!”

“You’ve known him how long?”

“Okay, but don’t you think he would have messed up somehow? There must be some explanation.” But she couldn’t think of one. And if Isabel was right, that would mean she was in terrible danger. She couldn’t be stupid. As much as she loved being married to Bennett, she wasn’t about to become another victim.

“Were you able to find anything in the house?”

“I don’t even know what to look for.”

Isabel tapped her finger on the table, thinking. “Anything that might have belonged to those women. Things they left. I don’t know.”

“If he’s hiding anything, it would probably be in his office.”

“Can you try to get in there?”

Savannah shook her head. “It’s deadbolted. He’d know. What if we’re wrong? I’m not going to betray his trust by breaking into his office.”

“Well, look in his closet, then, or his drawers. See what you can find.”

“Isabel, I was wondering. Did you know Louisa Matthison?”

“I see you’ve done your research. Yeah, I knew her.”

“Were you there the night she disappeared?”

“Yes. His parents were out of town. His football team had just won the championship and he had a party. His parents had no idea, of course. I was spending the night with his sister so we weren’t technically invited, but we snuck downstairs.”

“The article I found said she drowned in a nearby stream. Some kind of head injury.”

Isabel nodded. “She ran off. They had a fight. I overheard.”

Savannah leaned toward her.