Page 116 of No One Was Supposed to Die at This Wedding

She gives me a look, then punches it in. “There are texts on here.”

“From what number?”

She reads it out.

“That’s Tyler’s number,” Emma says.

“Are you sure?” Officer Anderson asks.

“Yes. If I had my phone, I could show you, but yes.”

“What do the texts say?” I ask.

“He’s asking the owner of the phone to meet him.”

“Where?”

She looks up. “Here.”

A murmur goes through the group.

“So heisthe murderer,” Inspector Tucci says. “It is all clear now. The spurned man, and money! Both are excellent motives, no? And he’s here, right on the spot. He tries to disrupt the wedding, to scare the bride out of going through with it, andwhen that doesn’t work, to cause an accident, and he has, how do you say, the inside man, to help him. But then, the inside man doesn’t want to go along with it anymore. He will tell on Mr. Houston.

“So, Mr. Houston must act. He lures José to this location, kills him in such a way that he can make it look like an accident. He puts him in the climbing harness, cuts the ropes above, then buries him in the brush, and then he leaves the island so he is not here when the body is discovered. If he is lucky, the body won’t be found until today at the earliest, when it is much more difficult to tell how long ago he died. He looks for the phone to take it, but it has slipped from the body and he cannot find it. He is careless, maybe, and does not think to make a call to find it...

“Ah, no. He isnot careless. He does not bring his phone to the scene of the crime so he cannot be tracked here, but now that means he cannot find the phone. So! He is nervous. He leaves, worried. He sees Fred on the dock and makes threats. This is also a distraction. If he has acted, why threaten? And now he is waiting somewhere. But he will have an excuse for these messages, mark my words. Now, is that everything? Yes. Yes. I believe it is.” Inspector Tucci’s eyes come back into focus and a smile breaks out on his face.

“By George, I think he’s solved it,” Allison says with an air of surprise.

“I did, didn’t I?’

Connor and I make eye contact. Neither of us can believe it.

I can tell that we’re both cycling through the facts he recited and double-checking them for accuracy and logic. We complete the task at the same time and nod at each other.

I feel a blush creep up the back of my neck at this familiar feeling.

The attraction of being right with someone.

Of solving a mystery together.

It’s a high. I write about it in my books, funneling that feeling into Connor and Cecilia’s romance.

But I haven’t felt it myself in a long time.

I break eye contact. Connor and I aren’t right together. Not in any way but this.

I feel bad for this moment of weakness. But also: Oliver saw it.

Fuck.

“I...” I stop and turn my face to Officer Anderson. “It all makes sense.”

“We will have to verify everything.”

“I can give you Mr. Houston’s address,” Connor says.

“He shouldn’t be hard to find.”

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