Torn - Cynthia Eden Page 0,67
then I want my lawyer in here. This is bullshit. I haven’t hurt anyone and—”
“Are you familiar with Jeremiah Jennings?”
“Who? What?”
“Jeremiah owns a cottage on Jekyll Island.”
Matthew yanked a hand through his already tousled hair. “Great. Wonderful for him, but—”
“According to Mr. Jennings, you’ve been renting his cottage on Jekyll Island for the last five years.”
Matthew’s jaw dropped. Then he scrambled, saying, “The hell I have! I don’t know any Jeremiah Jones—”
“Jennings,” the detective corrected quietly.
“Jennings. Jones. Who-the-hell-ever. I don’t know him, and I certainly haven’t been renting a cottage from the guy! I haven’t even been to Jekyll Island in years!”
Detective Black stared back at him. He really didn’t like the way the detective was eying him.
Like he thinks I’m guilty.
“Melissa Hastings was killed on Jekyll Island. She was abducted and held prisoner in your cottage . . .”
It was hard to breathe. “Not my cottage!” He nearly yelled. “I don’t care what BS that guy told you, I haven’t been renting from him.”
Detective Black placed a manila file on the small table that rested in the middle of the interrogation room. He flipped open the file. “Then why is your name signed on the rental agreement?”
Impossible. Matthew inched closer and saw—“That’s my name.” Shock ripped through him. “But that is not my signature!” His gaze flew up to the cop. “I don’t know—someone is setting me up! That’s what’s happening. Because that is not my signature!”
The detective’s face remained impassive. “Jennings has been receiving monthly cash payments from his tenant for the last five years. First of the month, just like clockwork. The guy lives in the middle of fucking nowhere, and the payments just show up on his doorstep. He deposits the payment into his bank account—and Jennings gave us his bank records to prove those transactions occurred.”
“Who the fuck pays in cash?” Matthew swiped his hand over his face. “Someone trying to frame me, that’s who! Someone who wanted me to look guilty—some jerk who was trying not to leave a paper trail.” His breath heaved out and he started to sweat. “This can’t be happening.”
Detective Black pulled out a chair at the table and sat down, as if he didn’t have a care in the world.
He doesn’t. He isn’t being set up!
“Jennings said he saw a black Jag leave his house one day, after a drop-off payment was made.” Detective Black made that statement, then waited a beat and asked. “Do you own a black Jag?”
He already knows I do. I bet the guy pulled my tag and registration. “Yes,” Matthew gritted out. “But I wasn’t making any payments for a place on Jekyll! That’s bull!”
“Did you know the victim?”
Matthew backed up a step. “You . . . you already know that I did.” What was up with these questions—questions the detective already knew the answers to? Was the guy trying to trip him up?
“She was in one of your classes. No . . . two of them, correct?”
Was the room getting hotter? It felt as if it was. “Melissa was a . . . a very bright student.”
“Is that all she was?”
He knows. “I didn’t abduct Melissa! Okay? I didn’t—”
“It’s an odd coincidence, you see . . . a bouncer at Vintage—that’s the club Melissa was at right before she vanished—he remembered seeing Melissa get into a black Jag.”
Oh, hell. “I wasn’t at Vintage.” His voice had gone hollow.
“Ummm . . .”
What in the hell was ummm supposed to mean?
“You began teaching at Worthington University just over five years ago.” Detective Black nodded. “Two weeks after your employment began, Kennedy Lane went missing . . . and then, what a twist of fate . . . you were the one to find her body—what was left of it—on the same trail that she vanished from so long ago.”
It was hotter in there. Had the detective turned off the air? Was that some kind of interrogation trick? Matthew licked his lips. “I didn’t know Kennedy.”
“Didn’t you?”
Matthew started pacing. “I didn’t know her.” He threw a glance toward the mirror. How many cops were watching him right then?
“Did you . . . want to know her? Is that why you abducted her? Why you kept her?”
“Kept her?” Matthew repeated. “Hell, no! I didn’t do this! Not any of it!” He gave a frantic shake of his head. “Someone is setting me up! Don’t you see that? I didn’t rent the cottage! I didn’t hurt those women!”
“But you did have a relationship with Melissa, didn’t you? Because