My Fingerprint Was on the Bottle, but I Wasn’t on the Hook Chapter 08

My Fingerprint Was on the Bottle, but I Wasn’t on the Hook Chapter 08

Three days later, Detective Harris called me in to supplement my statement.

He slid a file across the table. “Derek Foster has confessed.”

I looked at the papers, fingers cold.

“He admits he switched the pills. But he’s claiming—” Detective Harris paused. “He’s claiming the plan wasn’t his idea.”

I looked up. “What does that mean?”

“He’s claiming the whole thing was his mother’s idea.”

My mind went white.

Patricia.

“He says she’d been pressuring him for years to get Grandma to sign the house over, but the old woman kept refusing. Since everything was in both your names, Patricia was terrified she’d get cut out of the estate. So she—”

“So Patricia told Derek to kill Grandma and pin it on me.” I finished the sentence for him. “Grandma dies, Derek inherits. I go to prison and he doesn’t have to split anything in the divorce. Two problems, one stone.”

Detective Harris nodded. “Foster’s statement lines up with the evidence we’ve gathered so far. We’ve brought his mother in for questioning. She’s in the room next door right now.”

—

I sat there, and I felt something cave in at the center of my chest.

Three years of marriage. I called that woman “Mom” for three years. I handed her a Christmas card with cash in it and she smiled and said, “Nothing beats a daughter in law who really cares.”

She used to call and “check in on me” every time I worked late.

The whole time, the warmth in her eyes was just a blade waiting for the right angle.

“There’s something else,” Detective Harris said. “We pulled Derek Foster’s financials. Three months ago, he took out a loan for forty thousand dollars. Listed the purpose as home renovation. The money went straight to a woman named Amber Caldwell.”

Amber Caldwell. The pregnant woman who’d been screaming in the lobby.

“That money was a down payment on a house. It’s in her name, out on the east side.”

Forty thousand dollars. Derek and I had maybe fifty thousand in joint savings. He borrowed forty grand to buy his mistress a house and planned to cover the loan with Grandma’s estate. Meanwhile, I was supposed to be either in prison or left with nothing.

Either way, I’d be eaten alive and spit out.

“Mrs. Foster,” Detective Harris said, “Would you like a referral for legal aid? You’re likely looking at divorce proceedings, division of assets, and potentially a civil suit.”

—

“That won’t be necessary. I’ll hire my own attorney.”

I stood up. My legs felt shaky, but they held.

Outside the station I texted Sophie: [Find me the best divorce lawyer out there. ASAP.]

She hit me back instantly: [Already done. Tomorrow at three. I’m going with you.]

I looked at my phone and took a deep breath.

It was time to end this marriage.