Free Promissory Payback by Laurel Dewey Page A

their money back desperately. And the fact that she didn’t care or feel any compassion for their struggles was the reason it had ended up like this. But I looked in her eyes, and I could see that even with death approaching, she had no remorse for what she’d done.”
    â€œHow about you? Do you have remorse for what you did?”
    â€œNone,” Laura offered. “If she’d just . . .”
    â€œJust what?”
    â€œIf she’d just been more grateful in her life for what people did for her . . . I saved her life, Detective. She would have died on that playground slide when we were children. She would have hung herself on her book bag if I hadn’t run up the slide and unhooked her strap and freed her.” Laura cocked her head with a mystified gaze. “She never said ‘thank you.’ Never. ”
    â€œYou killed her because she never said ‘thank you’?” Jane asked.
    â€œIn a nutshell, I guess I did. I figured she was alive only because of me . So, if anyone was going to take her out of this world, it should be me. Completes the circle, so to speak.”
    So to speak, Jane thought. “How did it finally end?”
    â€œShe was unconscious for a while. And I was getting a little sleepy myself. So, I figured I’d just put the tape over her nose. She was dead in a matter of minutes.” Laura stroked the felt belt on her robe. “Remember that program I told you about, Detective? ‘Sharing of the Heart?’ I did
see it somewhere a long time ago. And it always stuck with me. People traveling the world finding what needs to be fixed or changed and making that happen. I could be on that show. I found what needed to be fixed and changed and made it happen.”
    It had been a while since Jane interviewed a criminal that was as cold and calculating as little Laura Abernathy, this fragile, physically weak, rapidly aging woman. Jane stood up and pushed her chair against the table. She glanced at Joe who hadn’t said a word for some time or moved a muscle. “I get it. Really I do. Carolyn was a capital C . A narcissist who only thought of herself and lived off the sweat of others. But you don’t kill those types of people. You turn them in. You get the authorities involved.”
    â€œOh, Jesus! Give me a break,” Joe muttered, ending his self-imposed silence. “Trust me. I looked into it! The authorities aren’t interested in cases like hers unless you can prove she siphoned millions. Ever since Bernie Madoff, they only want the big guns. Not the small-timers like my Aunt Carolyn. And I don’t know for sure, but I think she knew that. Fifty thousand here, fifty there ... stay under the radar—”
    Jane ran her fingers through her hair. “You still don’t kill someone like that—”
    â€œShe was going to the next level, detective,” Laura interjected. “I heard her running her spiel on the phone to a charity in Arizona. They help families with hearing-impaired children who can’t afford the devices they need.”
    â€œShe got the name from my list of charities that she found on the Internet,” Joe added. “She was relentless . She went behind my back and, acting like I approved of it, she asked them for half a million ! These were my people she was fucking with! My people! And they were very close to
giving her the money! Thank God Laura told me about it so I could put a stop to it!”
    Yeah. It was a ponzi scheme, Jane mused. Get half a mil from the next “investor,” pay off the last group and use the rest for . . . ”What was she was going to use the extra two hundred grand for?”
    â€œShe had it all figured out,” Laura replied. “She told me she was going on a long trip. A two-month, first-class, cruise on the Mediterranean. Even though Joe put a stop to her stealing from the charity, I knew she’d find someone else to rob. No one ever