“And what way is that? Honest?”
“The bodies are here, Steph. You’ll see.”
She passed a hand over her face, suddenly exhausted. “What are you doing out here, Billy Ray?”
“Pardon?”
“Why are you here? At Henry’s place?”
He slipped his hands into his pockets. “To take down the crime scene tape.”
“I thought the sheriff’s office put it up?”
“I offered to take it down. Scene was cleared. Days ago.”
“And you’ve done that?”
“Yes.”
“Then I want you to go.”
“Steph—”
“I came out here to be alone with my memories of Uncle Henry. I won’t allow you to take that away from me.”
He had already taken so much.
His face puckered with regret. “Sure. Sorry, I—I hope we can be friends.”
“Friends? You’re not serious?” She laughed at his earnest expression, the sound hard. “No, we can’t be friends. Not ever.”
“At least now … I hope you see. That you understand.”
“Understand what, Billy Ray? That you never loved me? I got that a long time ago.”
“I did love you. Just not—”
“The way you loved True.”
“Enough,” he finished. “But it was still real.”
He reached out a hand; she jerked away and he dropped it. “Please leave.”
He complied, walking to his vehicle, opening the door. “I just want you to understand why I couldn’t let this go. I knew I was right, Steph.”
He drove off and she headed into the cabin. It took all her energy to keep moving. To not give in to exhaustion and grief. Henry wouldn’t have. He didn’t when Elisabeth Abbott drowned or when Roane hung himself. And she wouldn’t now.
Stephanie switched on the table lamp. A circle of warm light fell over the living room and she crossed to Henry’s favorite chair, a battered recliner, and sank into it.
It smelled of him. She burrowed deeper into it and pulled his afghan over her. It, too, smelled of him.
The cabin had been Henry’s for life, now it reverted back to the Abbott family. Some folks might’ve been pissed about that; she got it. This was Abbott family land, a piece offered to her uncle out of goodwill mixed with guilt.
She didn’t want it anyway.
She moved her gaze over the room. Things never changed here. Just became more worn. The same old afghan and throw pillows, the same photographs, all arranged in exactly the same way. His simple mind had seemed to find comfort in the familiar.
Stephanie’s gaze landed on some photographs on the mantel and she frowned. One was missing. As long as she could remember, it had sat in the very same spot. True, standing on Henry’s front porch, smiling at the camera.
She stood and crossed to the mantel. Her imagination wasn’t playing tricks on her; the photograph was gone. Recently, judging by the frame’s silhouette left in the dust.
Billy Ray. That’s why he’d been here. The lying son of a bitch, he’d had no right.
What else had he taken? She spun away from the mantel and made her way through the three-room cabin. Another photograph had been lifted, but more troubling, the closet door stood open. She crossed to it, took a quick inventory, then shut the door. She turned. Her gaze landed on the dresser. Several of the drawers hadn’t been pushed all the way in. She strode over, pulled one after another out. They had been rummaged through.
What had he been looking for?
She closed the drawers and returned to the living room. Maybe she was losing it. Imagining it all? Any one of the Abbotts could have been through, maybe even the sheriff’s office had conducted a search.
But the missing photos of True had Billy Ray written all over them.
She brought the heels of her hands to her eyes. When she drove up, he’d been slamming the trunk. He’d put something in it. A couple of framed photos? Crime scene tape? Or something more?
She dropped her hands, any thought of reliving fond memories long gone. Frustrated, she turned off the lamp and headed out into the evening, careful to lock the door behind her. She didn’t know if Billy Ray had been up to something, telling the truth or lying, and she didn’t care. His craziness was no longer part of her life.
But as she drove away, she couldn’t help but wonder what Billy Ray—or someone else—had been searching for.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR
Wednesday, April 23
9:50 P.M.
Bailey sat at the kitchen table. She’d fixed herself a bowl of chicken soup. The last thing she felt like doing was eating, but she had to. For the baby’s health. And her own.
She brought a spoonful of soup to her mouth, then another and another. Forcing herself. She’d spoken to the lawyer three times. The first, he’d simply been reporting in. He’d arrived at the parish jail and had spoken with Logan, who he said was doing as well as could be expected. The second had been troubling. They had a witness who claimed that, early Saturday morning, during the time Logan had left the hospital, he had seen Dixie Jenkins climb into a black Ford F-150 truck.
It’d made her sick to her stomach, that they could even think he would leave her side to go do … that.
The third had been illuminating. The lawyer shared that the detectives had grilled Logan about True and the other missing women. About where he had been and what he had been doing, all those years ago when they’d disappeared. If he had known them. Surprisingly, Billy Ray had not been one of the interrogating officers.
Bailey got what they were up to. They figured they had an ironclad connection to Dixie Jenkins, now they were going for a link to the other women.
Terry King hadn’t been impressed with their “evidence.” It wouldn’t hold up, he’d promised her. If they had nothing else, her husband might even be coming home.
If they had nothing else. She had the feeling they did. And she knew what it was.
The box of trophies.