“What happened that night, Boon?”
He moistens his lips and hesitates as he seems to struggle with where to start. Or how much to tell.
“I don’t know. All I do know is . . . she’d ‘borrowed’ blood bags and other equipment from our friend who’s an EMT and who volunteers at a blood clinic. She took her own blood on three occasions over the months from July, I think. She stored it in the fridge at the Glass House because she knew the owners would be away for a period of time.”
Mal’s heart begins to beat hard and steady. “Kit Darling was planning a false scene?”
Boon swipes a tear from his cheek, nods. “She was setting the Rittenbergs up to be investigated for murder. Except it backfired. Jon Rittenberg returned to the house. And—” His voice breaks, and he drops his head into his hands and sobs.
Mal leaves the room to fetch Boon some water. While in the bullpen, she tells the others to watch the feed from the interview cam. She returns to the room and offers Boon a glass of water and more tissues.
Boon blows his nose, sips water, and composes himself.
“Go on, Boon,” Mal says. “Take your time.”
“Kit wanted it to appear as though she’d lost enough blood for police to believe she was dead. She also planted her own blood on shoes in Jon’s closet, and in his car. She pulled out strands of her hair and put them in the back of his car, too. She’d already scoped out the ADMAC site and collected a bucket of soil there one evening. She made mud and put some under Jon’s shoes. She later used this mud to plaster over his car registration plates. She accessed his and Daisy’s vehicles with spare keys from Rose Cottage. Kit returned his shoes, placed them at the back of his closet. She bought an identical pair to make prints in blood at the Glass House. She also took Daisy’s necklace from Rose Cottage to leave in the Glass House.”
“She was planning this for months?”
“I was never really sure exactly what she was up to. It was like her plan kept evolving and growing in scope the deeper she got into the Rittenbergs’ affairs, and the more she learned about them. And you must remember, Sergeant, we all played games. It was our thing. Our group was always up for a game, for imaginative role-playing. We are tricksters and clowns and pranksters and proud of it. And if you also find Jon’s blood on scene, it’s because Kit took some of Jon’s blood herself, after she lured him up to an Airbnb as Mia. It’s one of the places she cleans. She drugged him. And before you ask me what drug she used and where she got it, I don’t know. Probably from someone she knows who deals in black-market stuff like ketamine, cocaine, and GHB.” Boon takes another long sip of water. His hands tremble as he wipes his mouth.
“A while back Kit asked me in great detail about a scene I staged for a TV show I’m working on. About a coroner. I set up aspirated blood spatter, arterial spatter. Spatter arcing the walls. I—I suspect she was inspired by this to do something similar at the Glass House.”
“Boon, were you present at the Glass House on Halloween night?”
“No.”
“She did this alone—met with the Rittenbergs alone?”
He swallows. “She . . . Kit asked me to do some things that night without asking questions. I did. I told you, Detective, I owe her. I owed myself. I promised her on the beach that day I would do anything to make it up to her, and she said nothing would be illegal, exactly.”
“What did she ask you to do?”
“Kit had rented a dark-gray Audi S6 sedan. Like Jon’s. She parked it near her apartment that afternoon, and she also plastered those plates with mud so the registration would not be picked up by the road cams.”
“So the vehicle could be confused with Jon Rittenberg’s?”
“Yes. She knew there were cameras at the ADMAC site, too. She got the idea when she saw the jumpers camera on the bridge when she was stuck in traffic. She looked down and saw how it might also capture footage of the area near the silos. She drove out to the ADMAC site one weekend, late in the evening when it was dark, to check it out, and she saw the dock.”
“Where she decided to dump her own car?”
He nods. “She asked me to fetch and drive the Audi from her apartment to the Glass House at a certain time on Halloween night. She told me to dress in dark rain gear and a cap. Incognito-style. She asked that I park behind her Subaru and enter the Glass House property via the yard gate, quietly, and to come around to the glass sliding doors by the pool. When I arrived and saw inside, I was shocked. Blood everywhere, upturned furniture. Broken glasses. Kit was impatient. Edgy. She was also dressed in rain gear, oversize, with a hood. She had her silicone belly underneath.”
“So she looked pregnant? Like she could be Daisy, and you could be Jon?”
“I realized in hindsight, yes. She was standing by a bloodied and rolled-up rug. It had one of her sneakers inside. She asked me to help her drag the rug along the pool deck, out to the driveway, and to help her put it into the Audi’s back seat. She said I had to heft it like there was a heavy body inside. I asked her what the hell game she was playing, and all she said was, ‘You promised, Boon.’” He clears his throat.
“So, just before we begin dragging the rug, she throws a bloody carving knife into the pool, and she lets out a bloodcurdling scream. We lugged the rug to the cars and loaded it into the back seat of the rented Audi. She got into the Audi, dressed as pregnant Daisy. I got into her Subaru. Then we sped away to the ADMAC site in both cars. We dumped the carpet into the Burrard in view of the ADMAC cameras. She was betting, I guess, that you guys would eventually locate the CCTV footage. Then we pushed her Subaru off the dock with her ID and wallet and phone and everything inside. Including her diary. Which she sealed in a ziplock bag so you guys—the police—would find it and read it. I don’t know what’s in it. I’m assuming it’s something that sets Jon up. I have no idea if there is truth in there, or some totally unreliable version.”
“So there was no body in the rug?” Mal’s brain is racing—police divers have definitely located a female body underwater, down current from where the Subaru went in.
“No.”
“Are you being truthful, Boon?”
“I am.”
“What happened next?”
“She asked to be dropped off several houses down from the Glass House. She said she’d forgotten something at the house. I then returned the Audi to the rental place.”
“And you left her there? Near the Glass House?”
His eyes fill with tears again. “I did. It was the biggest mistake of my life. Because as I drove off, I thought I saw another Audi parked farther down the street. I didn’t think much of it at the time, because I was reeling from the fact we’d just submerged Kit’s car. And now I am sure it was him. He came back. He could have followed us to the dump site.”
“Jon?”
He nods.
“It doesn’t make sense, Boon, that Kit would want to return to the scene. She screamed. Presumably to alert the neighbors. First responders would likely have been on their way—”
“She insisted. She said she’d left something important behind, and since we’d just drowned her credit cards and phone and ID and everything with her car, I could only presume it was a burner phone or a passport or something. From where I dropped her off, she had access to the sea walk that runs along the ocean in front of the houses. I imagined that if she saw someone like first responders inside the Glass House, she wouldn’t go in. She said we were done. She said goodbye. I—I never saw her again.”