The Silent Sister




26.

Riley

“There were definitely two sets of footprints in the area the night Lisa supposedly killed herself,” Danny said the moment I walked into his trailer. He sat barefoot on his bed, his back against the wall and his computer on his lap.

“How do you know?” I sat down on the bench seat by the table.

He lit a cigarette and inhaled, his gaze never leaving my face. “I hacked into their data system.”

“Whose data system?” I asked, perplexed. “The Kyles’?”

“The state police of ol’ Virginny.” He smiled. “They need much better security.”

“Danny! Tell me you’re kidding. How did you do that?”

“Do you literally want me to tell you how or would you rather just know what I found out?”

“Can they catch you?” That thought wiped all others from my mind. The last thing Danny needed was time in prison.

He shook his head. “Very doubtful. I’m sure no one up there is looking at records from 1990.”

“They were using computers back then?”

He nodded. “At least partly. I got the feeling they were just starting to digitize. I’m sure they had more on the case than I could get my hands on.”

“You’re amazing.” I laughed. I couldn’t help it; I felt proud of his skill, even if he’d used it for something illegal. “What did you find out?”

He took a pull on his cigarette. “It snowed pretty heavily that night,” he said through a stream of smoke, “and that apparently screwed up the investigation. But there were definitely signs of two people being there. Here’s the weird thing, though.” He moved his computer from his lap to the bed and leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees. “That second set of footprints? They withheld that tidbit from the media. There’s no way Tom Kyle could have read about them anywhere.”

“How could he know, then?”

“That’s a really good question, isn’t it?” He blew a smoke ring toward the ceiling. “They’re sure the second set of prints was from a man’s boots, but—”

“Matty,” I wondered out loud. “Remember I told you about him? They were really close friends, and we have pictures of—”

“Matthew Harrison,” Danny said. “Assuming it’s the same guy as the one mentioned in the police report, that’s his full name. They questioned him because he was there the night she killed her teacher, so—”

“He was?”

“Yes, but they don’t think he had anything to do with it. He didn’t get there till after the guy was shot. But since he was already on their radar, they questioned him about the suicide. Turned out he was out of town the night she supposedly killed herself.”

“Oh, my God!” I said, excited now. “Supposedly? Did the police think she—”

“Don’t get your hopes up,” he said. “Most likely, she did it, but—and don’t freak out about this—one of the theories they were looking at was that the second set of prints might have belonged to someone who killed her and made it look like suicide.”

“But she left a note, remember?”

“Could have been faked. And the other set of tracks could have been from before she was in the area, or it could have been someone who saw her abandoned car and was checking it out.” He stubbed out his cigarette in the glass ashtray on his bed. “Like I said, the snow made checking out the scene a challenge. Anyhow, it seems they stopped looking into it, so it’s a cold case at this point.”

“If she’s alive, I want to find her,” I said.

“Well, good luck with that wild-goose chase,” he said, “but if you do happen to track her down, let me know, so I can give Harry a call. He loves a cold case.”

“Danny.” I stared at him and he stared right back. “You’re teasing me, right?”

“When have you ever known me to tease?”

As a boy, he’d teased me relentlessly and good-naturedly, but the grown-up Danny had lost that playful side. “I know you didn’t like her,” I said. “I know you blame her for everything that’s ever gone wrong with our family. But you were only six when she died … or disappeared. You never really knew her.”

“You need to accept the fact that she’s a murderer, Riley.” He shook another cigarette from the pack on his bed.

“She never got to have a trial,” I said.

“And whose fault was that?” he asked as he lit the cigarette.

I stood up. “If I find her,” I said, “I just won’t tell you.”

He leaned back against the wall again, his face momentarily clouded by a puff of smoke. “That’s probably a good idea,” he said.



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