“So that everyone would believe it was Roland,” I said, heart pounding.
He scratched his jaw again, harder this time. “I needed the distraction. And to be fair, I thought they’d just rule it a suicide or at least look deeper into Melanie’s history, find out about that Calvin guy and pin him before he could say a damn thing, but they never did. They automatically assumed Roland had done something to her since he was the husband and because he was still in proximity when they found her bruised up in her car. It appeared to be an open-and-shut case for the detectives. They couldn’t get in touch with Miley, there were no other witnesses but me, and I wasn’t going to mention Calvin or rat on myself, so all odds were stacked against Roland at that point. He seemed guilty as hell. Shit, even I started to believe he’d done it at one point.” Dylan shrugged. “I guess it all worked out the way it should have anyway. It’s not like Roland didn’t have it coming to him.”
I couldn’t help my reaction to that. I slapped him, and his face turned with my hand. “I can’t believe you! You know I can report this! I can tell Roland everything you just told me—that his life and his career went to shit because of you!”
“Yeah, and what good would come of that?” he demanded, eyes connecting with mine again.
I gave it a thought, staring into his dark eyes, and realized nothing good could come of it at all. Like he said, Calvin was gone, Melanie too, and Miley. All of them were gone . . . but they were gone because of him. All of this was because of something he’d started out of spite.
Now I understood why Melanie hated him so much—why she wanted so badly for him to go down and lose Roland’s love. He was just as awful as she was, ruining people’s lives and getting away with it. He set her up and caused her death. He may not have had the actual blood on his hands, but it was still on him. All of this stemmed from him.
“All of this because of his money,” I breathed. “Yeah, Melanie and Miley are gone. The case is closed, but you can’t just keep stealing from your cousin and getting away with it. Not after what you did to him.”
“I can and I will, because if I got rid of one wife, trust me, I can get rid of another. And this time, they won’t believe Roland had nothing to do with it. Two of his wives going missing?” He made a tsk-tsk noise. “They’ll eat him alive.”
“Wow.” I choked on a breath. “You’re fucking evil. Why would you do that to him? Hasn’t he only ever been good to you?”
“Roland has everything. He’s always had everything. And he was only good to me because he pitied me after my mother died. While my family suffered and we went broke to cover my mother’s prescriptions and hospital bills, he just kept on thriving. Whenever we’d ask him for help, he always acted like he was too busy, or he’d ignore my calls and messages. And Aunt Cathy—that bitch never answered the goddamn phone. It wasn’t until my mother died when he thought it was time to help me, and that never sat well with me. I lied to Melanie when she asked me about moving in. I told her my sister kicked me out to renovate and sell. Truth is, there was no house to sell. I was living with my sister in a one-bedroom apartment that we shared with my mother, but we were always planning on starting up a renovations company. I struggled with her to pay our bills. We asked him for help and he never gave it to us . . . not until it was too late. Not until my mother was dead. Even now, he isn’t exactly giving anything to us. I had to resort to taking that shit because I thought he’d pay me more, offer to take care of my siblings sometimes, and the hospital bill debt. He never did. He just moved me in, let me have a room, made me his errand boy, and thought I would shut up and take it. Fuck that. He gave me access to everything he owned, so I took it. And I still take it. Melanie never canceled that bank account. She was too worried about escaping to do so. Right now, Roland thinks she set up the donations before she died, and because he felt so damn guilty about her death, he continues to make his contributions. To this day, he doesn’t even question it and I know because I see the money hitting that account every month. Eventually, with you around, he might cancel it, but . . .” He shrugged. “I’ll just find another way, I’m sure.”