Drex crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back in his chair. “You and Jasper talked at length about Marian last night. My ‘excessive’ interest in Key West had you both skittish.”
“Did you bring up Key West only to bait me?”
“Yes. And guess what? You bit.”
He turned to the detectives. “During her conversation with her husband about it, Talia admitted to getting upset over any mention of Key West and/or Marian Harris.” He recapped what he’d overheard.
“This is a direct quote that refers to me. Jasper asks, ‘Do you think he knows something about Marian?’ Talia replies, ‘No. Maybe, Jasper. I don’t know.’ Jasper, anxious and insistent. ‘He’s living next door, Talia. I should have known about this immediately.’
“They go on like that for about ten minutes. Neither confessed to nailing her inside a shipping crate, but it was a telling discussion. On the heels of it, they made plans to leave town. It’s recorded. You can listen if you want.”
Talia was looking at him with horror. “Jasper thought you were on a fishing expedition, that you might have nailed Marian inside that shipping crate.” She turned to the other men. “Jasper didn’t completely trust him from the start. He thought he was a phony.
“He became even more suspicious when Drex expressed his interest—which was excessive—in Key West. Out of the bug’s range, Jasper theorized that the discovery of Marian’s body might have made the culprit nervous, that he was going around to former acquaintances of hers and testing their reactions to any mention of her or Key West.” Looking back at Drex, she said, “If he sounded skittish, it was because he didn’t want happening to me what had happened to Marian.”
She had grown heated. Drex remained cool. “The culprit did get nervous, all right. Because he feared I knew that he had bilked Marian, then killed her.”
“Jasper didn’t even know her!”
Drex lunged forward, almost coming out of his chair. “You two met through her.”
“No, we didn’t. I told you how we met.”
He sat back. “Share with the detectives. Mike and Gif already know the story.”
Talking rapidly, in stops and starts, she told Locke and Menundez a condensed version.
When she finished, Drex said, “It’s awfully sweet, but it’s a lie.”
Mike addressed the two detectives. “Our guy had hooked his other ladies using online match-up services.”
“That’s not how he and I met,” Talia said.
“Right enough,” Drex said. “You were introduced by Marian Harris.”
“Jasper and I didn’t meet until months after Marian’s disappearance.”
Drex motioned to Mike, who withdrew the party photo from a file he’d brought in with him. Drex got up and walked over to the sofa, where Talia had changed her mind about sitting down. He held the picture out to her. “Ever seen this?”
“Yes. It was the last known picture taken of Marian. After her disappearance, the police interviewed everyone who was at that party, me included.”
He looked at the photograph as though giving it a fresh assessment. “You’re not exactly in on the merriment. How come you’re out there on the fringes all by yourself?”
“I didn’t know any of the other guests.”
He cocked his head to one side, indicating doubt.
She said, “I went to Key West to check out a hotel. Marian was a good client. I called her to see if she and I could have lunch. She said what good fortune it was that I was in town. She was hosting a party that night and insisted that I attend.”
“You didn’t know anyone else there?”
“I just said that.”
“You didn’t mix and mingle?”
“Since I was the outsider, Marian introduced me to several people.”
“What about him?” He pointed out the blurred figure silhouetted against the sunset. “Did she introduce you to him?”
She squinted. “Possibly.”
“What’s his name?”
“I don’t know.”
“Daniel Knolls.”
“If we were introduced, I don’t remember him.”
He leaned down to her and whispered, “You’re sleeping with him.”
She recoiled. “That’s not Jasper!”
He passed the picture to Locke, who looked at it and passed it to his partner. It made its way back to Mike, who replaced it in the file. Drex returned to his chair and gave Talia a long look. She stared back with defiance and hostility. “Say you’re as honest as Abe, telling the truth—”
“I am.”
“Haven’t you been struck by the similarities between Elaine Conner and Marian Harris?”
He could tell by the wariness in her eyes that she had. He let that question simmer, then said, “You told the detectives that you and Jasper parted company in the