have been heading out to a garden party or a lunch at a nice restaurant.
“Where’s Myron?” said Pine.
“Back where he is supposed to be,” she said calmly.
“In the pool?”
“Where he’s supposed to be.”
“Then he’s dead?”
“I certainly hope so. A terrible accident. It happens when nonswimmers fall off their float when no one is around, especially when they’ve been drinking. When they test him at the autopsy, he will be found to have a very high blood alcohol level. You panic, your lungs fill with water, and it’s over very quickly.”
Pine looked at the woman somewhat in awe. This was a very different person from the seemingly frightened and out-of-her-depth wife that she and Laredo had recently interviewed.
“You really put on a show for us at your house,” said Pine. “You had me convinced you knew nothing and were genuinely worried about Myron.”
“I was worried, only not about Myron.”
“You wanted us to find the porn videos,” observed Pine.
When Britta didn’t respond, she said, “Is this all about revenge? I saw the video of Mary. And your son’s accident was really a suicide, right?”
Britta looked down at the gun in her hand as though she had just noticed it.
She started speaking slowly and quietly. “Can you imagine a man who had a daughter who got into porn because some bastards convinced her it would be wonderful, and these same bastards got her hooked on drugs, and then he decides that producing porn films is obviously so lucrative that he jumps into the business? And this after his only surviving child discovers his sister’s body and blows his head off. Does that man even deserve to live? My answer to that was no.”
Pine sat up a bit. Britta had not bothered to bind her. Pine hoped that might turn out to be a big mistake for Britta and a way out for her.
“I get your anger at Myron. But why the other murders?”
“I was a mother, Lee. I had two beautiful children. I thought I had a wonderful husband. A bit quirky, a bit less empathetic than I wanted, but a brilliant man who provided a wonderful life.”
“Until you decided that wasn’t a good enough trade-off?”
Britta leaned forward. “Until he started to make the same trash and work with the same people who killed my beautiful daughter and caused my son to take his own life.”
“Frankie Gomez wasn’t part of that world. He was just a kid.”
Britta sat back, her lips pursed. She didn’t answer right away. “As soon as I saw that boy, I knew what kind of life he would have. He was probably an illegal. He’d grow up in poverty and die before he was out of high school in some gang-related thing. I just saved him a world of trouble.”
“And who gave you the right to decide that for him?”
“I’m not going to argue with you.”
“And the veil and old tux and dressing Frankie up like that? Was that your doing or your accomplice’s?”
“Accomplice?”
“There’s no way you could have carried Layne Gillespie that far. And you weren’t the one impersonating Cy Tanner when he was seen talking to Frankie.”
“It’s of no importance.”
“So why did you pick the porn actors to kill?”
“Layne Gillespie met Mary at a bar. He apparently liked how she looked. He told her what he did for a living. How much money she could make. He targeted her and recruited her for this foulness.” Britta’s mouth curled in disgust.
“And Hanna Rebane?”
“She ‘starred’ in movies with my lovely, innocent daughter. They had sex together. And then they introduced her to the world of drugs. And my daughter became unrecognizable. They stole her from me.”
“And Beth Clemmons?”
Britta waved this off. “Again, not important.”
“How do you know all this?” asked Pine.
“My children died. So I made it my business to know,” she said fiercely. In a quieter tone she added, “This has been very hard for me.”
“It hasn’t been nearly as hard for you as it was for the people who died.”
“I thought you would be more sympathetic. You lost your sister.”
Pine barked, “Don’t you dare try to equate what happened to my sister with the murder spree you’ve engaged in. And if you’d told the police the truth back then maybe they would have been able to find my sister.”
Britta rubbed her forehead. “Well, I can see I’ll get no understanding from you.”
Pine thought quickly. “You had a son and daughter. Only the ‘son’ has been killed. The daughter? Who is it?”