The Piper

FIFTY-TWO




Olivia was halfway home when she took a random exit to fill the Jeep up with gas. She pulled into a new Weigels, set the gas nozzle running, and went to the ladies’ room. Caught sight of her swollen eyes and blotchy face when she looked into the bathroom mirror while she washed her hands.

She got a cup of coffee, which she secretly found cheaper and better tasting than Starbucks, wondering, as she always did, if there was something wrong with her coffee palate. She truly did love Starbucks, God knows the ambiance was better. But the coffee just wasn’t as good.

Olivia remembered to turn her phone back on as she belted herself back in the Jeep. There were three missed calls and two messages, both from McTavish. Olivia’s stomach dropped, and her heart began to pound. It had to be Teddy. It had to be. Alive or dead? Her fingers shook so hard she could barely manage the phone, and she bounced her leg up and down waiting for McTavish to pick up. Which he did, on the second ring.

‘Olivia? Where are you?’

‘I’m at a gas station about an hour south of Knoxville, why? What’s going on, McTavish, have you found her? Do you have Teddy?’

‘No, no. It’s not that.’

‘It’s not that. It’s not that? What the hell else is there?’

‘Olivia, did you go and see Bennington this morning?’

‘Yes, I told you that’s where I was going.’

‘Was he home when you got there?’

‘Of course he was home, we had a twelve o’clock appointment.’

‘Olivia, listen to me. I made some calls after you left this morning. Something strange is going on. Bennington’s wife just started a new teaching job, took over from a colleague on maternity leave. But she hasn’t shown up for the last four days, and she hasn’t called in. I got in touch with her sister, who said she was getting worried, because the two of them talk several times a week. She thought her sister was just busy, with the new job and all, but she was surprised because normally they’d be talking about it. But she hasn’t been able to get her sister on the phone. And both of Bennington’s sons have been absent from school for—’

‘It’s daughters, McTavish. He has two little girls.’

‘No, he doesn’t. He has two sons, seven and nine.’

‘McTavish, I just talked to the guy, and he told me about his two little girls.’

‘He was there? At the house?’

‘I just spent two hours talking to the guy. Over a cup of Oolong tea.’

‘Hang on a minute, let me pull up the description on his driver’s license. Okay, big guy, six two, weight two sixty, black hair, brown eyes.’

‘No. Blond hair. Blue eyes. Your description is wrong.’

‘I don’t know who you talked to, Olivia, but it wasn’t Bennington Murphy. Look, give me a description of the guy you talked to. I’m heading down there to have a look, but I need to call this in to the local police.’

‘But—’

‘A description. Come on, Livie. We need to move fast.’

‘Right.’ Olivia took a breath. Gave McTavish everything she knew.

‘Look, Livie, is there any chance you’d go back down there?’

‘What, back to Bennington’s house? But what should I say?’

‘No, no, don’t you dare go back to the house. Just go to the front of the subdivision and wait for me. If something happened to these people, this might be the guy that did it, okay? In which case, you need to be on hand to talk to the local police.’

‘Sure. Sure I will.’

‘But you’ll be smart? You won’t go near the house. You promise.’

‘I promise,’ Olivia said. It was hard to talk, her mouth felt like cotton. ‘What do you think is going on, McTavish?’

‘I don’t know yet. But something is off about this. I’ll be heading down there after I talk to the local guys and give Donnie Withers a heads up. In the meantime, you stay smart and you stay safe. Keep your phone on. I’ll find you. I don’t know who you talked to in that house, but I don’t like the sound of this.’

McTavish hung up first and Olivia stared at the phone. She would go back, just as McTavish asked, she would stay safe, she would not go alone to the house.