A stranger, with contempt in her gaze hurling insults and accusations. Making demands he never should have met.
He wondered if other parents who’d lost a child had this hole inside them where all their regrets lived. Every cross word uttered. Every moment they’d let their child’s chatter slide over them, by them, without really listening. All the wrong decisions made. Each failure that could never be undone. Sometimes at night they rushed forth to swamp him, strangling him with remorse.
His step faltered on the final tread when he noticed Mark seated in the living room. He’d almost forgotten the man had followed him into the house. Helped him get Claire’s near-comatose body upstairs. The agent looked up at his approach. Put away the cell he’d been texting on as he rose.
“How’s your wife?”
David flushed. It hadn’t been just Claire that had kept him upstairs, but the single frantic phone call he’d made to his attorney. “She’ll sleep for several hours. That’s probably best.” Best. As if that were a word that could be applied to either of them right now. “Thanks for helping with her. I have to tell Janie . . .” A boulder lodged in his throat at the thought. He took a breath and tried again. “She’s at work until seven. I don’t know if I should call and have her come home sooner . . . but what’s the point of that, right? Why ruin her world before I have to?” A sudden thought occurred. “Unless . . . there’s no way this news would get out, is there? I don’t want to chance her hearing about it because someone leaked the information.”
Mark regarded him somberly. “I’m not claiming a leak couldn’t happen. I don’t think it will, but if I were you, I’d have your daughter come home as soon as possible, just in case.”
Nodding jerkily, David realized the horror of the day wasn’t over. Not nearly. “I’ll do that.”
“I want to offer my sympathy again, Mr. Willard. Is there anything else I can do for you?”
David grimaced. “Not unless you can undo the last forty-eight hours.”
“I wish I could. I’ll talk to you soon, when I have updates.”
He nodded wearily. They always promised that. But the updates wouldn’t change anything. They wouldn’t bring Kelsey back.
“God, David, I’m sorry. I replayed our conversation in my head all the way over here.” Brant Strickland unbuttoned his coat, sat down on the leather recliner in the family room. “What a shitty, shitty day. I’d always hoped, like you and Claire did, that Kelsey would be found safely. What can I do? How can I help?”
Funny, Mark had made a similar offer minutes ago. But the attorney was in a much better position to assist him than the law was. “You can advise me on how to proceed from here.” David pulled a canister of Scotch from a cabinet in the entertainment center and took out two glasses. Poured a healthy splash into both of them. Crossing to where the other man sat, he handed him one. “I can get ice.”
“This is fine.” Brant took the glass, watching him carefully.
David took a gulp, his eyes watering. Then another. “Janie’s on her way home, so I have to make this quick. I told you that the body . . .” His eyes filled, and he choked on the word. “Kelsey’s body was found in the basement of that empty lake house.”
“On Fuller Road, yes. I can’t wrap my head around it. To have her so near all this time.” Brant shook his head and raised the glass to his lips.
“They’ll tear the place apart. Do their forensic testing. Dust for fingerprints.” He saw the arrested look on the other man’s face. Met his gaze squarely. “My prints are going to be there, Brant. I mean, I assume so. I don’t know how long they last, but . . .” He finished the Scotch. Wished the liquor could erase the heart-crushing trauma of the day. “I was there a few times about seven years ago.”
“It’s been empty for ten.” The other man frowned. “No way to get inside.”
“The woman I was meeting had access. She was the Realtor.”
“She . . . ah.” Brant mulled that over for a moment. “Well, a Realtor sells properties. Maybe you were interested in buying it. Doesn’t hurt to take a look at things, does it? Hell, I’ve driven by that place a thousand times thinking what a waste it is, sitting empty like that.”
David stared into his empty glass. “My prints will be only in the bedroom. And I know they have them on file. The police took elimination prints when Kelsey was taken. It’s only a matter of time until they start asking questions.”
“Questions you don’t have to answer.” Brant was firmly in attorney mode now. “I’m not saying you can’t talk to them. There will be details flowing in as the forensic tests are completed. But if they broach this subject, you call me.”
“I don’t want to become their focus.” He heard a sound on the street. Was Janie home? He walked across the room. Hooked a finger in the curtain to pull it back so he could look out. No. Relief filled him. He had a few more minutes, anyway. Turning back to the other man, he continued. “They’ve got a new suspect in the case. I’d just be a distraction.”
“Is this Realtor still around? In case they start asking questions?”
“No.” And he and Tiffany had been careful. That had been part of the thrill at first. The clandestine meetings. The isolated surroundings.
“So she showed you the property. Just because they don’t find prints in other rooms doesn’t mean you weren’t in them. Maybe you didn’t touch anything anywhere else. Prints get smudged. We could argue they could be all over; they just failed to find other clear matches. Hell, we don’t know that they’ll get a clear set in the bedroom.”
David had a mental picture of his body pressing against Tiffany’s, hands on the wall on either side of her head, while he pounded himself into her. Leaning over the fireplace to build a fire with wood she’d bought downtown. Shutting the door with one palm as he gazed at her naked body stretched out on the air mattress she’d carried in the trunk of her car. He didn’t respond to Brant’s words. There’d be a match. It was more than guilty conscience that made him certain of that.
“But the more I think about it, the more I think you’d be better off not to play the lawyer card if they ask about the house. Just tell them what you told me. That you looked at it a couple of times, decided not to make an offer. That should put an end to things.”
A measure of relief worked through him. “Thanks.”
“No problem.” Brant drained his glass and set it on the end table next to the chair. “Does Janie know?”
David shook his head. “I have to figure out how to tell her—” His mouth clamped shut. Where the hell would he find the words?
“I could stay, if you want.”
David shook his head. “I need to do this myself. Somehow I have to find the words to explain to my daughter that her sister is dead.”
Special Agent Mark Foster
November 15
5:58 p.m.