See Her Die

by Leigh, Melinda

  “Damn,” Bree said. “Anything else?”

  “I owe Mrs. Whitney an update,” Matt said.

  Bree shoved her phone back into her pocket. “I need to talk to Mrs. Whitney too.”

  “I can do that tonight,” Matt said. “I already know her.”

  “I feel like I should see her personally.” Bree’s mouth pursed.

  Frustration ran through Matt. “I understand your dedication and commitment, but if you still feel the need to control all aspects of the investigation, then why did you hire me?”

  “I hired you because I trust you.” Bree sighed and pressed a palm to her forehead.

  “Then you also need to have faith in my ability to do the job.”

  “I do, and you’re right. I need to delegate.” She pulled out her phone. “I can still make it home to have dinner with the kids, but I am available later this evening if you need me.”

  “I could go with Matt,” Todd volunteered.

  “Are you sure?” Bree assessed him. “You’ve been working almost nonstop since yesterday morning.”

  “I’m sure. Those months I served as acting sheriff, I felt like I was in over my head. I need the investigative experience.” Todd seemed determined to prove himself.

  “OK. That would be helpful since Matt has no credentials yet, but make sure you eat and sleep. I need you in top form tomorrow.”

  Todd looked pleased. “Yes, ma’am.”

  Bree headed for her office, and Todd and Matt left the station.

  “I’ll drive,” Todd said. “Best to have all the bells and whistles with us in case we need them.”

  “OK.” Matt slid into the passenger seat of the patrol cruiser. The car was fitted out for a lone driver, and the space was tight. The dashboard computer intruded on Matt’s side.

  Todd drove to Mrs. Whitney’s address. She lived in a one-story house near the train station in Grey’s Hollow. Todd parked, and they stepped out of the vehicle.

  Matt stopped on the sidewalk. “You like dogs, right?”

  “Sure. I used to have a Lab.”

  Matt led the way to the front door. “These are little dogs.”

  “Ugh.”

  He rang the bell and yapping exploded on the other side of the door. A minute later, the door cracked an inch, and Mrs. Whitney peered out through the gap. “Matt.”

  “Mrs. Whitney.” Matt raised his voice over the high-pitched barking and gestured to Todd. “This is Chief Deputy Todd Harvey. We’d like to give you an update and ask you a few questions.”

  “Yes. Of course. Hugo, move back. Larry, stop that growling.” Mrs. Whitney leaned down and picked up a bristling, one-eyed pug mix. As she opened the door, she pushed a Chihuahua back with her foot. Her black slacks were coated in dog fur. She wore a cardigan layered over a sweater, and reading glasses on a chain around her neck.

  Matt and Todd slid inside. Hugo the Chihuahua sniffed at their shoes. Each time they took a step, he sprang backward and barked. Larry continued to grumble from Mrs. Whitney’s arms. “Let me put these two in the other room. Then we can talk.”

  The house was crammed full of furniture and dog beds. Several held elderly white-muzzled mutts. Toys littered the carpet. Framed snapshots covered every surface. Ninety percent of them were pictures of Eli from his infancy to the present. She took both dogs with her into a back bedroom and returned a minute later. Matt counted six dogs, including Hugo and Larry. The house smelled faintly of old dog, urine, and carpet cleaner.

  “Sit down.” She perched on a faded wing chair and motioned to a couch covered with blankets. “Do you have any news about Eli?” Mrs. Whitney asked.

  “I’m sorry. Not yet, ma’am,” Matt said. “Tell me more about Eli’s friends.”

  She picked at a loose thread on her chair. “He has his roommates.”

  “Did he ever mention having arguments with them?” Matt asked.

  “Not really,” she said. “Nothing important anyway. He gets annoyed if Christian eats his leftovers, that sort of thing.”

  Matt wondered how much he didn’t tell his grandmother. “Did he have any other friends?”

  “His roommates are the main ones.” She dropped the thread and folded her hands in her lap.

  Todd shifted forward. “How about a girl?”

  “He doesn’t have a girlfriend—wait.” She brightened. “There was a girl he brought to dinner about three weeks ago. What was her name?” she asked herself. “It sounded biblical. She didn’t talk much. Samantha. No. Sariah, that’s it.”

  Todd took a small notepad from his pocket and wrote the name down. “Can you describe Sariah?”

  Mrs. Whitney’s face turned thoughtful. “She’s tall for a girl, and slim. She has dark hair. I have a picture. Let me find it.” She stood and went to a secretary’s desk against the wall and selected a framed photo. “Here she is.” She showed it to Matt and Todd.

  The young woman sat next to Eli on that same couch. She had dark hair pulled back into a ponytail. Eli had his arm slung around her shoulders, but she was leaning slightly away. This was the girl Eli and Brian had argued over.

  “May I take this picture?” Matt tapped on the frame with one finger. “I promise to return it.”

  “You can have that one. I can print another.” Mrs. Whitney pointed to a small, snapshot-size printer on the desk. “Eli bought that for me a couple of Christmases ago. I can print right from my phone. He knows how much I love pictures,” she said with pride. She opened the frame, took out the photo, and handed it to Matt.

  “Did you ever see her again?” Matt held the photo by the edges.

  “No.” She set the empty frame on the desk. “He only brought her once. He mentioned her a few more times, but I suspect she dumped him. Not a big loss, in my opinion. She didn’t like dogs.”

  “Is there anything else you can tell us about Eli’s life?” Todd asked. “Is he struggling in school? Did he seem normal last time you saw him?”

  “He seemed perfectly normal.” She traced the desk’s edge with a finger. “He ate a pound of pot roast.” Her voice choked up just a little.

  Empathy swelled in Matt’s chest. “I’ll keep looking for him.”

  “I know you will.” She sniffed back a tear.

  “If you think of anything, give one of us a call.” Todd handed her his business card.

  She stuffed the card in the pocket of her cardigan and showed them to the door.

  Matt and Todd went outside. The air smelled fresh after the old-dog smell in Mrs. Whitney’s house. They climbed into the patrol car.

  “What now?” Todd asked as he started the engine.

  “I’d like to drive through the neighborhood where Eli was last seen again. Someone might have a security or doorbell camera.”

  “Good idea. We can knock on doors too. Sometimes the old-fashioned legwork gets the job done.” Todd drove to the university campus.

  As they cruised through the neighborhood, Matt checked the house numbers. A few students walked down the sidewalk, carrying backpacks.

  Matt pointed to a big, beaten old Colonial. “This is the house that hosted the party. Stella said the street was clogged. Drive around the block.”

  Todd cruised around two corners. “This is where he requested his ride.” He parked at the curb. “Look for security cameras. These houses are very close to the sidewalk. A camera on the porch might show the street.”

  They got out of the vehicle.

  “Divide and conquer?” Todd asked.

  “Yep.”

  Todd walked up the sidewalk, while Matt crossed the blacktop diagonally to start at the first house on the opposite side. Students occupied most of the housing in this area, so he doubted they were in bed at eight o’clock in the evening. There was no response to his knock at the first three houses. At house four, he pressed the doorbell, and a male student in sweatpants and a university zip-up jacket answered. His feet were bare.

  “Hey. I’m Matt Flynn. I’m assisting the sheriff’s departme
nt in an investigation.” He pointed to Todd across the street.

  “I’m Brandon Stone.” Brandon was average height and build, with overgrown dark hair, a scruffy beard, and skin the color of someone who spent no time outside.

  “Brandon, were you home last Saturday night?”

  “Sorry. I went to a party.” He blew long bangs out of his eyes.

  “The one around the block?”

  “Yeah. How’d you know?”

  “I heard it was big. Did you see this guy?” Matt showed him a picture of Eli.

  Brandon leaned in. “Yeah. He was at the party. I don’t know his name, though.”

  “What time did you leave?”

  “I dunno. One, two. Something like that.” Brandon pointed to Matt’s phone. “He left before me.”

  “Was he drunk?”

  “Wasted.” Brandon shuffled his bare feet. “I’m not judging or anything. I’ve had my nights.” He grinned.

  “But not last weekend?”

  “I had a big paper to work on. I can’t fuck up. I’m a senior.” Brandon sounded depressed.

  “Did you see him on the street when you left?”

  “Nope,” Brandon said.

  “How about your roommates? Are they around?”

  “They’re not here, but they both went home for the weekend. It was just me here.”

  Matt was about to thank him and leave when he looked closer at the doorbell. “Is that one of those camera doorbells?”

  “Yeah.” Brandon pointed to it. “We had some packages stolen last month, so we installed that.”

  “Does it work?”

  Brandon shook hair out of his eyes. “It’s OK. It’s a little too sensitive. It picks up everybody who walks down the sidewalk. I shut off my motion notifications. It was going off all day while I was in class.”

  “Doesn’t turning it off defeat the purpose of having it?” Matt asked.

  “I left the ringer notifications on. So, my phone rings if someone actually presses the doorbell. The app still tracks motion events. If we’re missing a package, we can review the history. But the app just doesn’t go off on my phone every time someone walks by.”

  This house was right in the middle of the block, and in the general area where Eli had summoned his rideshare.

  Matt crossed his fingers. “Would you check your app and see if you had any reported motion on Saturday night, say between midnight and two a.m.?”

  “Sure.” He stepped back. “Hold on. Let me get my phone.” He left the door ajar and returned a minute later, already scrolling on his screen. “I have a bunch of events recorded around that time.”

  He opened the first, and they watched three girls giggling as they walked past the house. The second video showed a couple walking arm in arm. The third was a sole young man. The clip was only about twenty seconds long. In the dark, it looked black and white, but Matt recognized Eli. He was dressed in jeans and a coat, but he wasn’t wearing a hat. He stopped right in front of the house. Shoving his hands into his pockets, he turned his back to the camera and waited.

  “He’s waiting for his ride,” Matt said.

  A car pulled to the curb ten seconds later. On the dashboard, a lighted sign in bright purple letters announced the rideshare. The front license plate light was dark, but Matt recognized the vehicle make and model as a Dodge Charger.

  “That’s him,” Matt said. “Can I have a copy of that?”

  “Yeah.” Brandon tapped on his screen. “I can text it to you. Give me your number.”

  A few seconds later, Matt’s phone vibrated. “Got it. Thanks!”

  Matt took Brandon’s contact information. “The police might want a statement and access to your doorbell online account.”

  “No problem.” Brandon rubbed his arms. “The online event history is only stored for sixty days.”

  “Great. Thanks.” Matt turned and hurried down the walk. He finished knocking on doors on his side of the street. Two other residents were home. One young woman mentioned the party with an annoyed eye roll. But neither had seen Eli. Matt caught up with Todd and showed him the video.

  “That’s him all right.” Todd gestured to his side of the street. “I got nothing. Should I text the sheriff?”

  Matt thought of Bree home with the kids. “I don’t want to bother her until we have something more concrete. Let’s run a list of Dodge Chargers registered in the area first. That might give us a real lead.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Bree parked her SUV next to her brother’s ancient Bronco and turned off the engine. Adam was here. She stared at the house for a couple of minutes, decompressing, shifting gears from sheriffing to parenting. She was more comfortable with the former than the latter.

  When Todd spoke of being in over his head as acting sheriff, Bree understood. That’s exactly how she felt as the kids’ guardian. Almost as if someone should have checked her references and denied her the job based on lack of experience.

  Lights blazed in the kitchen windows, and Bree could see Dana at the stove. Kayla was setting the table for dinner, while Adam brought glasses down from an upper cabinet. Where was Luke? Bree glanced at the barn. The lights were on. Luke would be feeding the horses.

  Two months after moving here, the house still felt more like Erin’s than Bree’s. She’d brought her own modern, sleek bedroom set from her apartment in Philly. She’d needed to make at least a small area of the house hers. But the rest of the house was all Erin—from her obsession with cows to family photos. Her sister’s bedroom set had gone to a storage unit, and her clothes had been donated, except for a few pieces Kayla had asked to keep. Bree was afraid to get rid of anything in case the kids might want it someday. She didn’t know what had become of her mother’s things. No one had ever asked her if she wanted any of them. Bree’s entire theory on child-rearing was based on knowing what didn’t work.

  Not quite ready to go inside, Bree picked up her phone and pressed a button.

  The sound of her sister’s voice brought tears to the corners of her eyes. “Bree? I’m in trouble. I don’t know what to do. I don’t want to give you the details in a message, but I need your help. Please call me back as soon as you get this.”

  Bree played the message twice more. It had been the last time she’d heard from her sister. Then she curled her fingers around the phone and listened to her own heartbeat in the quiet vehicle. She hadn’t gotten back to Grey’s Hollow in time to help Erin. The pressure in her chest swelled. When she was busy working, she could put her grief out of her mind, but the quiet moments hurt.

  She stepped out of the SUV and went into the barn. The horses were chomping feed. Luke was in Riot’s stall. The big bay gelding bobbed his head at Bree. She rewarded him with a rub on his forehead.

  Then she leaned on the half door. “How was your day?”

  Luke looked up from brushing his horse’s foreleg. Dark circles hovered beneath his eyes. “OK.”

  “I’m always available to talk. You know that, right? About anything.”

  “Yes, Aunt Bree.” Luke sighed, his tone irritated.

  “I don’t want to nag. I just worry.”

  “I know.” He returned to grooming his horse.

  Bree gave up. She remembered enough about being a teenager to know pushing harder might make him less likely to talk.

  “I’ll see you inside.” Bree left the barn and headed for the house.

  The back door opened, and Adam walked onto the back porch. Buttoning his coat, he ambled across the yard. At twenty-eight, he was tall, lanky, and loose-limbed. At a distance, he could pass for a teenager. Only his eyes showed his pain.

  Bree smiled in the dark. Adam was an introvert and artist. He could spend weeks alone with his work and never notice the lack of human companionship. But he’d promised to help with the kids. Bree had had her doubts. He had trouble making emotional connections. But he’d stepped up since Erin died. He hadn’t missed a single weekly family dinner, and here he was, going out to talk t
o Luke, just as Bree had asked.

  As Adam passed her, he greeted her with a one-armed hug and a kiss on the cheek.

  “Thanks for coming to dinner,” she said.

  “Dana bribes me with leftovers. She cooked enough to feed me all week.” He continued to the barn.

  Bree laughed as she jogged up the porch steps and went into the house. The kitchen was bright and busy. Ladybug and Kayla raced to meet Bree. She braced herself for the impact. Kayla hit her waist high with an aggressive hug. The dog slid on the tile and nearly took Bree out at the knees.

  “Ladybug!” Dana called.

  “It’s OK.” Though still nervous, Bree no longer panicked when the large, ungainly animal charged her. “I don’t understand why she does this every single time I enter the house, even if I’ve only been to the mailbox or barn.”

  “It’s a dog thing. She missed you.”

  Bree kissed the child’s head and scratched behind the dog’s ear. The kitchen smelled like garlic.

  Kayla and the dog bounced back to the table. Kayla carefully folded napkins and placed them under forks while the dog watched.

  “What’s for dinner?” Bree toed off her boots, hung up her jacket, and set her phone on the kitchen island.

  “Tortellini primavera.” Dana opened the oven and peered inside. The garlic smell intensified.

  “Dana made garlic bread.” Kayla beamed. “I helped.”

  “Kayla likes butter.” Dana transferred a baking sheet from the oven to the stovetop. “I think we’re ready to eat as soon as Luke and Adam come in.”

  Bree went to the fridge and selected a can of lime seltzer. Dana poured herself a small glass of red wine. Vader jumped onto the island. He tapped Bree’s phone with a paw.

  “Vader,” Bree warned in a low voice. “Don’t do it.”

  She set down the can and moved toward the cat.

  Without blinking or breaking eye contact, he pushed her phone off the edge. Bree jumped as it hit the floor. She picked up the phone and checked for cracks in the screen. None, and it still worked. She stroked the cat. “This is why we can’t have nice things.”