Chapter 33
Kaine
We don’t have those records, ma’am.” Small eyes blinked back at Kaine through glasses at least a half inch thick. Kaine shot a glance at Grant. No. She would not accept another dead end. With Jason Fullgate behind bars, and Gabriella’s written prayers replaying in Kaine’s mind like a broken record of unseen hope, Kaine wanted to fight. Only this time for herself, not because she owed something to Danny.
Kaine rested her palms on the countertop at the County Records Office. The older woman blinked again, unyielding. “How do you not have the property records for a house that was the home of a founding family of Oakwood?”
The woman tipped her head to the side, and her glasses tilted. The red turtleneck she wore made Kaine’s neck claustrophobic. As if whoever was following her had their hands around Kaine’s throat and was squeezing.
“Well, there was a fire.” The records keeper was as intimidating and unreadable as Gandalf the wizard.
“Of course there was a fire,” Kaine said, lifting her eyes to the ceiling. Could she not catch a break? She turned to Grant, whose mouth was pulled into an ironic smile.
Grant leaned against the counter that separated them from the female Gandalf. “How far back do your records go?”
“Well . . .” The woman ran her finger around her turtleneck. Maybe she was tired of her clothes strangling her. “The last deed was filed in 1978 by the Davidson family. They owned Foster Hill House until the bank foreclosed nine years later. They weren’t able to resell the place. That’s why it’s been abandoned ever since.”
“Wonder of wonders.” Kaine turned her back to the woman, but Grant shot her a warning look.
“Your records only go back to the seventies?”
“No. They go as far back as the sixties. The fire burned down the courthouse in 1958 and took everything with it. But there’s no record of Foster Hill House between the sixties and 1978. It went abandoned for a time. It seems to be a thing with that house.”
“Then who sold the place to Kaine?” Grant reached for a pad of paper, and the woman handed him a pen.
“The city.” She pushed her glasses up her nose. “Oakwood took possession of it after the bank shut its doors in the nineties. Recession and all that, you know. Anyway, they put it on the market and it didn’t sell. The county just reviewed futile properties this year and decided to try again—short sale. Find someone impulsive and willing to mess with the place. The land was worth nothing to the county as it stood, and they couldn’t use it for bartering with anyone for property more conducive to road expansion or county buildings.”
“So Kaine purchased it from Oakwood.”
“Yes.”
Kaine grimaced. No wonder the sale had been so sketchy. Throw it online, have a realtor take amateur pictures of the rooms where repairs were more cosmetic, a few creative angles from the outside avoiding the worst sections, and voilà, a not-so-bad historical home. One an “impulsive” person would buy.
Grant set the pen down. His paper was blank. Kaine knew he was as frustrated as she was, only he showed it by jamming his hands in jeans pockets and heaving a huge sigh. “Well, I guess that’s that.”
The courthouse records keeper blinked. She blinked a lot. Kaine would have wanted to buy her some eye drops—if she’d liked her. Which she didn’t.
“You might try the museum,” the woman suggested. “Mr. Mason has much of Foster Hill House’s history recorded there. Not the deeds, mind you, but genealogies and the like.” She sniffed and glowered at Kaine. “It is a place of historical significance.”
“Then why didn’t Oakwood register it as a historical landmark?” Kaine couldn’t help one last question.
The woman raised a thin eyebrow and stared at Kaine from beneath half-lidded eyes. “I don’t know. Ask the city. No one likes Foster Hill House.”
“Thank you.” Grant offered a charming smile, and the woman’s eyes brightened. She returned the smile, and Kaine tried not to chuckle at the subtle flirtation from the older woman.
As they passed through the doorway onto the open street, Kaine leveled a look of derision on Grant. “A fire? Really. What more can happen in this town’s history? The place is a cesspool of circumstantial factors. I’m beginning to think there was some big cover-up.”
“Maybe there was.” Grant took her hand as they crossed the street toward his pickup. “It’s worth investigating.” Olive’s nose poked through the four-inch gap where they’d left the window rolled down. When Grant opened the driver’s-side door, the lab licked him in greeting.
Kaine pulled her hand from Grant’s and circled the truck, opening the door to climb up into the cab. She settled into the seat as Grant turned the key in the ignition.
“So.”
“So.”
They spoke in unison. Grant chuckled and reached for Kaine’s hand again. Kaine contemplated drawing back. She probably should, but she didn’t want to.
“All right.” Grant cleared his throat. “We have a few options.”
“Really? I only heard one. And have you seen that museum? The man doesn’t even own a desktop computer, let alone a tablet and digital archives.”
“Kaine, don’t give up hope. Remember Gabriella’s words? C’mon, hon.”
Grant’s endearment appeared to surprise him as much as it did Kaine. He looked away and watched a white Suburban drive past them.
Kaine tried to relieve his discomfort by responding as if she hadn’t noticed. “I am hoping. I’m hoping to put this whole thing to bed and shut the door on it. Before I have to return to San Diego for the hearing against my husband’s killer, and before whatever nutcase here in Wisconsin decides to make good on his bloody handprints.”
Grant’s thumb moved back and forth over her fingers. Kaine didn’t think he even realized he was doing it.
“That call from the detective in San Diego didn’t bring you any resolution, did it?” Grant was too perceptive. That was the problem with collaborating with a psychologist.
“How could it? Not too many women can claim being stalked by two psychos in her lifetime.” Kaine turned her face to Olive, who nosed her from the back seat.
“Do you think this is somehow your fault, Kaine?”
She turned and stared out the window. The grocery store parking lot wasn’t much to look at, but it beat Grant’s discerning gaze.
“Kaine?”
He didn’t let up, did he?
“No. I mean, not the circumstances. But, the guilt. I pushed Danny away. All the time. I wasn’t the wife he needed. I feel as if I owe it to him, to live out his dream and fix up an old house and do the things he had on his bucket list, because he didn’t get a chance to. Because my job, which I was so dedicated to, cost him his life.”
Grant was so casual yet so strategic in how he dug into her emotions. It was unfair. She had no defense against him.