My mother came by after showing a house in my neighborhood.
“You shouldn’t have gone to that press conference,” she said. “Roe, you look awful.”
“Maybe I should have stayed home,” I said listlessly. I wanted to tell her I’d talked to Phillip, but after my recent experiences, I was obediently keeping my mouth shut. “All I seem to be able to do is sit here.”
“You and Robin need to go out and be around people,” she said firmly. “Is your Christmas shopping done?”
“There doesn’t seem to be any point,” I said. I’d been telling myself to go to my laptop and at least order some things, but that hadn’t happened. In the back of the linen closet, I’d stashed two pairs of jeans for Phillip, two shirts, and a coat (he needed everything), and a couple of shirts for Robin, some books he’d been wanting, and a leather jacket, plus some gift cards. That might constitute our Christmas gift exchange.
“If nothing happens by Christmas,” Mother said, and paused to pick her next words. “If nothing is discovered, please come to our house for Christmas dinner.”
“Can I tell you later?” I said. “I’m really grateful for the invitation. Right now, I just don’t think I’m up to it.”
“For goodness’ sake, just go ride around,” Mother advised. “You need to look at something besides these four walls, honey.”
My mother wasn’t much one for endearments, so I made the effort to smile. “I’ll try, but I’m not promising.”
“I saw your father,” she said.
“Where?”
“At the Piggly Wiggly,” she said. “I don’t go there often, but I had to get some of that granola I like so much, and it’s the only store carrying it. And there he was, buying some TV dinners. I assume his hotel room has a microwave in it.”
“I guess. I don’t know where he’s staying.”
This really shocked her. “You don’t?”
“No, I got really mad and I’m shunning him,” I said, trying to smile.
“My gosh, what’s he doing in town, then?” She was genuinely bewildered. “With his wife missing, too, you’d think he’d be back in California.”
“Dad said she was with another man. I don’t know whether to believe him or not.”
“If she is I certainly don’t blame her,” my mother said with some asperity. “But with his son missing and his wife missing, I’m surprised he’s not sitting in a jail cell somewhere being interrogated. That’s a lot of missing family … two-thirds!”
I hadn’t put it that way to myself. I started to tell her about the gambling, but it seemed like too much trouble to open my mouth. When Mom got up to leave, she said, “I’m going to just say hello to Robin,” and walked back to his office without waiting for a yea or nay.
I don’t know what she said to my husband, but we got out that day. Robin made sure I was bundled up, and we just drove around and looked at Christmas decorations. We walked through the town park behind the courthouse. We went through the drive-through at a fast food restaurant.
It did make me feel better.
I felt sharper. I regained my curiosity.
Late that afternoon, I ran into Levon Suit inside the post office, where I’d gone to buy some stamps. Robin was waiting outside. Levon was wearing his off-duty clothes and he smiled when he saw me, so I stopped to speak.
“Good to see you out and about,” he said.
“How are things at SPACOLEC?” I said.
“Keeping busy. Of course, the missing kids. I’m so sorry, Roe. But lots of other stuff, too. Crime doesn’t stop for the holidays. In fact, sometimes it seems it picks up. Family quarrels sure do.” He shook his head.
“I know there must not be any news,” I said. “You would have told me.”
“The FBI agents are lighting a fire under everyone,” Levon said. “Now that we know about the ransom being paid, the Harrisons not getting Clayton back … that has us all worried.” Then he looked chagrined. Okay, maybe that hadn’t been the most tactful thing to say, but I had other fish to fry.
“There’s no doubt the Harrisons actually paid ransom?” I asked, as casually as you can ask a question like that.
“The money is missing from their account,” Levon told me. “Dan came into the bank and drew it out himself. The bank president was pretty worried, letting Dan walk out with that much cash in a duffel bag, but Dan insisted.”
“Ooooh,” I said. Frankly, I was stunned. I’d wondered if the whole thing had been staged. “How much cash?”
“Three hundred thousand,” Levon said.
That was a lot of money. And yet, in another way, it wasn’t. By my standards, that was a huge chunk of change. But in today’s world, where the rich were getting richer, I was astonished the kidnapper hadn’t asked for more.
“Keep up the good work, Levon,” I said. “We’re all counting on our law enforcement people.”
“We were all wearing out, but we’re getting reenergized. If anyone can help us find your brother, the FBI can. The whole situation is something we’ve never faced before, in this county.”
“I haven’t ever faced anything like it myself,” I agreed.
“Oh, there is something else I can tell you,” Levon said. “The Fibbies tracked down your dad’s wife.”
“Great!” I hadn’t really been worried about Betty Jo, but it was something of a relief to hear she was living and breathing. “Was she really living with another man?” I asked belatedly.
“No.” He looked surprised. “She’s living in a commune in Northern California. She said she figured Phillip was safe with you now, and she had to get away from your dad or kill him. Or be killed. She told us a pretty frightening story on the phone. I’m sure she’ll share it with you.”
I hardly knew which part of this to respond to first. “A commune! I didn’t know there were any still around.” I gave him the surprise and amazement he deserved.
“Me either.”
“She always seemed so down-to-earth, that’s hard to picture.” I had an image of prosaic Betty Jo in her polyester pants, planting seeds and making bread.
“My oath on it.” Levon was tickled. “She had given up watching the news or reading the papers because she wanted to cleanse herself of negative feelings.”
“I wish her good luck with that,” I said darkly.
“Your dad was some kind of relieved to hear where she really is, because the FBI had been asking him lots of questions about her whereabouts. Some pretty bad people are mad at your dad.”
“I’m not really talking to him right now, so thanks for letting me know,” I told him.
He looked interested. “Any reason you can share with me?”
“I don’t like what I’ve learned about him lately,” I said. “And despite his massive life screwups, he was trying to make me feel responsible for Phillip’s disappearance. I would do anything, anything, to find my brother.”
“I believe that,” Levon said hastily, because he could see the tears welling up in my eyes.
“Thanks, Levon. At least I know for sure Betty Jo is okay. Is she coming here? She knows about Phillip?”
“She said she was sending positive energy his way, according to the woman who interviewed her. But I bet she’ll be on the road, after she’s had time to absorb it.”
I couldn’t think of anything to say to that. “I hope so,” I said finally. Betty Jo seemed to have reinvented herself. Levon patted me on the shoulder awkwardly before he left. I bought my stamps, dropped Robin off downtown for a haircut. Instead of bringing a book into the shop and reading while he was being shorn, once again I returned to the alley behind the hair salon. If I could only get these walls to speak to me, I would know what had happened. I sat there and moved cars and people around in my head, trying to create a scenario that made sense. It seemed like I’d been playing mental chess with all these pieces forever.
In my imagination, Josh’s car came to a stop in the alley. His sister had texted Tammy to tell her she had arr
ived. But something might have happened to prevent Joss from going right into the shop. So Tammy walked out the back door of the salon to check on her. What if Josh had had a car malfunction—maybe his foot slipped from the brake to the accelerator—and the car surged forward, killing Tammy? In a panic, all the kids in the car decided to run away. Somewhere. Towing an eleven-year-old.
But I remembered Josh’s car had no traces of having collided with a human being, or of receiving any more of a collision than bumping a tree in the grove where it had been found.
Okay, another possibility. As Josh’s car pulls in, an unnamed person gets into a car in the little parking lot. Maybe a hairdresser, running late to pick up a kid. She doesn’t realize Tammy is behind her, and she backs into the girl, killing her. She snaps and forces all the kids to … do what? Vanish themselves? And of course the other employees would have told the police that someone had left at the crucial time.
Try again. Tammy is out in the parking lot before Josh and company arrive. An unknown enemy, or a careless driver, speeds down the alley and hits her. When the kids get there, they see Tammy’s body and … don’t get out to check on her or call an ambulance. I discarded that idea right away. That just wouldn’t happen.
Fourth attempt. Josh’s car arrives, but right behind it is Clayton’s car, with Clayton driving and Connie as passenger. Maybe Marlea is in the Trans Am, too? Clayton hops out and comes forward to confront the kids in the first car. I didn’t know what their offense could have been, but I had to assume there was one. Maybe they’d cut him off in traffic, or insulted Connie in some way. Clayton yells at them.
And at this point, I had to assume that someone who wanted to kidnap Clayton had followed them there. He was armed. Had to be. Otherwise, they could have overcome him.
This individual forces Josh to drive away, and somehow gets the Trans Am to follow. The only way I could think of for the kidnapper to do that was to tell the kids in Car 1 that a kid in Car 2 would be killed if they drove off. Tammy comes out of Shear Delight, sees what is happening, rushes to rescue her friends, and is hit by the Trans Am, either on purpose, to eliminate a witness, or by accident in the heat of the moment. And this haunts Connie so much that she kills herself.
Okay. So why had Connie remained free? Why had she been left, and who had come to get her? She could have revealed everything to the police.
I ran over that several times in my head. There were huge gaps in this scenario. But it was the only sequence of events covering the few facts that we knew.
I knew I was hardly the smartest or most crime-savvy of the people investigating this case. Surely the police and the FBI had reached some version of the same conclusion. In that case, what would they be doing about it?
Searching for the place the kids were being held prisoner, of course. Like everyone else. They were all over it. What could I do any better?
I didn’t know, but I had to do something.
After I’d picked up Robin at the barber’s and we’d stopped at our mailbox, Robin sat at the kitchen table to sort the mail while I sorted dinner. I put in a chicken casserole to heat, and I sat in the chair opposite Robin.
“Here’s what I’ve been thinking,” I said, and outlined it all for him.
He took a while to mull all that over. “One of those pretty much has to be correct,” he said.
I relaxed a little. I hadn’t known I was so tense waiting for his opinion.
“Why can’t they find the kids?” I said. “They have to be here, right? Can you construct a narrative in which they aren’t in Lawrenceton?”
“Or in this immediate area,” he said cautiously. “No, I can’t. If it had been just Josh, or Josh and Joss, I could understand it. But not three able-bodied teenagers. And why would anyone sane take the chance of abducting Liza? She’s hardly self-sufficient. Any time a child that young is snatched, the press coverage ratchets up a notch.”
“Liza asked the wrong person for a ride,” I said sadly. “If only she had been willing to wait in the parking lot for her mom. But not with those three little savages there.”
“Why were they there?” Robin asked.
“What?”
“Why were they there? I understand that Joss had been giving Liza a private lesson. Why were the tween girls there? The last day of school before Christmas break? They should have been home planning what they were going to be doing over the holidays. Or helping their mothers make cookies. Or texting all their other friends to find out where a party was. Something. And we have to know if Marlea was with her brother, or not.”
“How can we find out the answers?”
“Ask ’em.”
I screwed up my nerve to call the Windhams’ house. I knew Kesha’s mother better than the other two. “Hi, Sandra,” I said when she picked up the phone. “This is Aurora. How are you?”
“I’ve been better,” she said. “And I know you must be feeling terrible. I’m so sorry.”
“About that. Would you mind very much if I came over and asked Kesha a few questions?”
“Listen, Roe, I know she’s done a bad thing, and she’s getting punished. But I hate to keep drumming her badness into her. She’s ashamed of what she did.”
“I don’t want to accuse her,” I said. “And I’m relieved to hear she’s standing up to it. You and your husband are good parents. I just want to hear from Kesha’s own lips what happened at the soccer field that afternoon.”
There was a long silence. Then an audible sigh. “Okay,” Sandra said. “I guess that would be all right. But just you. And you can’t try to tell her how bad she is for being a bully. We’ve been all through that, believe me.”
“That isn’t my responsibility,” I said, though such a conversation would be deeply satisfying.
“With that understood,” Sandra said, after a significant pause. “You can come over.”
Robin wanted to go with me, but I thought any deviation from the guidelines Sandra had chosen might cancel my interview with Kesha.
The Windhams lived in a very nice neighborhood, Fox Creek Hills, not far from the Harrisons’ house, in fact. It was a lovely area, next to open country. The Windham house was at the base of the hill, and the Harrison house farther up; and I believed Dan Harrison’s parents’ was at the top. In Fox Creek Hills, property got more valuable according to the altitude, my mother had told me. The lots were large, the houses very large, the yards well kept. The whole subdivision had been established in the past ten years.
Webster Windham was a dentist, like his father. They were in practice together now. He had an excellent reputation. They were nice people. But I hardened my heart a bit, because I was going to have to make at least one of them uncomfortable.
It was a workday, so I didn’t expect Webster to be home at five o’clock. It was dark, but I could see that there was only one vehicle in the garage. Sandra answered the door. She was wearing jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt with coordinating necklace and earrings. Casual but nice.
“Hi,” she said, trying to give me a welcoming smile, but failing.
“Sandra,” I said. “Sorry about this.”
“I know.” She stood aside to let me in.
I hadn’t realized that Sandra was an antique buff, but most of the pieces of furniture clearly had some history. I’d expected neutral chic, but I got an eclectic blending of ages and designs. “Gosh,” I said. “Sandra, this is so pretty. I bet you decorated it yourself?”
She looked pleased. “Yes, I did,” she said. “I tried to use an interior decorator, but she aggravated me so much that I had to fire her. She kept telling me what I couldn’t do. I disagreed.”
I almost laughed, and only the serious nature of my errand stopped me. “I’d love to have you tell me the history of these pieces sometime,” I said. “When we’re all happier.”
“I’d be glad to.”
“Your house is so sparkly. I haven’t felt like cleaning, and boy, can you tell it.”
“Oh, I use that maid
service. Helping Hands. Just about everyone in this development does. Give them a call. They’re great about trying to work people in.”
We walked together into the huge family room, which had a ceiling extending up through the second floor. Kesha was sitting on the couch, looking like she’d been called to the principal’s office. She was a pretty little girl, with huge brown eyes and toasted-almond skin. Her ears were pierced, but she wasn’t wearing makeup, and her clothes were age-appropriate, at least as far as I could tell—bright aqua slacks and a cream-colored sweater, and UGG boots.
“Kesha,” said Sandra, and Kesha got up and said, “Hello, Ms. Teagarden.”
“Hi,” I said. “Kesha, I’d like to ask you a few questions.”
She nodded glumly and sat down on the couch again. I perched on the matching ottoman so I could sit directly opposite her. Sandra hovered.
“Kesha, can you tell me exactly what you saw the afternoon the kids went missing?” I tried to sound sympathetic and warm, and to my relief, she responded to that.
“We were hanging around at the soccer field,” she said.
“Why?”
“What?”
“Why were you hanging around at the cold soccer field, when school had just let out for Christmas vacation? I remember not being able to get away fast enough.”
Kesha looked sullen. “Because we knew Liza was going to be having her lesson with Joss.”
The words And you wanted to torment her some more were stillborn on my lips. No accusing, her mother had stipulated.
“What happened during the lesson?” I couldn’t help it: my voice was less friendly.
“Well, Liza wasn’t doing too well, and Marlea said something about it.” Kesha smiled. It was much more genuine than her pretense of sorrow.
I did my best not to look at Sandra. My jaw tightened.
“Joss tried to tell us to leave, but we had a right to be there. It’s our school, too. And Marlea told her no big old lesbo was going to tell her what to do.”
I literally had to hold my breath. I could feel my hands shaking. I glanced over Kesha’s head at Sandra, but she’d turned her back and her face was to the wall. I didn’t blame her.