Rachel was forty, dry as unbuttered toast, and the only attorney in Elmdale
who advertised herself as specializing in "community association disputes,"
which Tom had always read as a euphemism for dealing with terrible
neighbors through legal means. She listened to the whole story without
interrupting — the fence, the syringe, the lab, the spreadsheet — and then
she said, "Email me everything. And Tom? Don't confront her. Don't post
about it. Let the process work."
"The process," Tom said, "is currently being run by the woman who planted
a syringe under my towel."
"Not for much longer," Rachel said, and Tom almost laughed, because that
was the second time in a week someone had said it to him, and he was
starting to believe it.
Diane's retaliation arrived on a Friday, in the form of an email with the
subject line "EMERGENCY BOARD SESSION — IMMEDIATE ACTION
REQUIRED," sent to all 180 households at 6:14 in the morning.
40
Tom read it standing in his kitchen with his coffee going cold, Chloe reading
over his shoulder.
"By a vote of the executive board," the email read, "the association has
determined that the extensive surveillance system installed at 14 Larkspur
Lane constitutes an unreasonable invasion of resident privacy. Mr. Beckett is
hereby ordered to remove all exterior cameras within 72 hours. Failure to
comply will result in fines of $200 per day, per camera."
"She's trying to make you delete the evidence," Chloe said.
"She's trying to make me delete the evidence," Tom agreed. He forwarded
the email to Rachel Simmons with no comment.
Rachel's response letter arrived at the HOA's registered address by courier
the next morning, and Tom got a copy, and he read it three times because it
was, in its way, a work of art.
It cited the state statute protecting homeowners' right to record their own
property. It cited the ongoing criminal investigation and the legal term
"spoliation of evidence," with a helpful parenthetical explaining that
destroying evidence in a criminal case was, itself, a crime. It used the word
"retaliation" four times. And it closed with a single dry sentence: "My client
will not be removing his cameras. My client suggests the board consult
independent counsel before its next vote."
The emergency board session happened anyway, on Sunday afternoon, in the
community clubhouse. Tom didn't go — Rachel told him not to give Diane
an audience. But a neighbor texted him updates, and Chloe read them aloud
with mounting glee.
"Diane proposed the camera ban," Chloe narrated. "Mrs. Abernathy asked if
the ban applied to doorbell cameras. Diane said all exterior recording
41
devices. Mr. Kowalski asked if that included his deer camera. Diane said yes.
Then someone asked who would enforce it, and Diane said the board, and
then Mr. Abernathy asked — this is a quote, Dad — 'the same board that's
under criminal investigation?'"
Tom laughed for the first time in two weeks.
"The vote," Chloe continued, reading, "was two in favor, one against, and
two abstentions. It failed. Diane looked — quote — 'like she'd swallowed a
wasp.'"
"Don't," Tom said, but he was grinning.
The break in the criminal case came on a Wednesday, and it came the way
most breaks come: not from brilliance, but from a loyalty card.
Detective Marsh had subpoenaed pharmacy records within a five-mile radius
of Diane's house, looking for syringe purchases. It was Okafor who did the
unglamorous part — three days of calling pharmacies, cross-referencing,
getting nowhere, because most places sold insulin syringes without a
prescription and kept minimal records. He was about to expand the radius
when he thought to check loyalty-program data, the kind of thing criminals
forgot existed. The chain pharmacy two towns over had it: a purchase, two
days before the pool incident, of a box of insulin syringes, paid for with a
debit card, loyalty number attached.
The name on the loyalty account was Diane Holloway.
"She drove two towns over to buy them," Marsh told Tom later. "Didn't want
anyone local to see. But she used her loyalty card for the points." Marsh
shook her head with the weary amusement of a woman who had watched a
thousand criminals outsmart themselves. "The points, Mr. Beckett. She
risked a felony for grocery points."
42
The pharmacy's parking-lot camera showed Diane's car, Diane's face, Diane
carrying the small white bag. Timestamped. Undeniable.
And then there was the pouch.
Chloe had been the one to find it — of course she had. Scrolling through
Diane's public social media one evening, looking for anything, she'd stopped
on a photo from the previous summer: Diane at a lake house, smiling, a blue
waterproof pouch around her waist. The same blue. The same size. The same
brand logo visible in the corner.
"It's hers," Chloe said, turning the laptop toward Tom. "It's the same one."
Marsh subpoenaed the lake-house rental records, matched the purchase
history, and added the pouch to the growing file. When she laid it all out on
the conference table — the pharmacy receipt, the parking-lot stills, the
lake-house photo, the four camera angles, Chloe's video, the lab report —
Okafor looked at the spread and said, "That's a lot of rope," and Marsh said,
"She brought her own."
The arrest happened at dawn, exactly one week after the lab results.
The night before, Marsh had called Tom from her car — he could hear the
engine idling underneath her voice. "I wanted you to hear it from me," she'd
said. "We're picking her up in the morning. Planting of evidence, criminal
trespass, attempted false report. The DA signed off an hour ago."
Tom had stood in his kitchen with the phone pressed to his ear, Chloe frozen
mid-step in the hallway, reading his face. "What about the money?" he'd
asked. "The GreenLine stuff."
"That's next," Marsh said. "The forensic audit is underway. One thing at a
time, Mr. Beckett. Tomorrow we take her off your street."
43
After he hung up, Chloe had said, "Is it over?" and Tom had said, "This part
is," which was the most honest answer he had. That night he'd slept badly