Her Final Confession: An absolutely addictive crime fiction novel

by Lisa Regan

  Josie pulled out her phone and dialed. A woman answered on the third ring. Josie said, “Ms. Weber? Caroline Weber?”

  “Yes?” the woman said. Her voice sounded younger than Josie expected.

  “This is Detective Josie Quinn with the Denton Police Department. I’m calling about your cousin, Gretchen Palmer.”

  “Gretchen?” the woman echoed, sounding surprised. “Is everything okay?”

  “To be honest, we’re not entirely sure. There was a shooting at Gretchen’s home earlier this evening, and we haven’t been able to locate Gretchen since then. She listed you as her emergency contact. We were wondering if you or anyone else in your family has heard from her.”

  There was a silence so long, Josie thought the call had dropped. “Ms. Weber?”

  She cleared her throat. “Dr. Weber.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “It’s Dr. Weber. I’m completing my residency at University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.”

  Josie wasn’t sure what that had to do with Gretchen being missing, but she didn’t push. Instead she said, “I’m sorry. Dr. Weber, have you heard from Gretchen recently?”

  A sigh. “Listen, Detective…”

  “Quinn,” Josie supplied.

  “Detective Quinn, I know why Gretchen put me as her emergency contact. I’m only a few hours away. I’m a doctor, so making medical decisions for her in the event she was incapacitated wouldn’t be an issue—but Gretchen and I aren’t close. I haven’t heard from her in years. She sends me holiday cards. That’s about it.”

  “So she hasn’t been in contact with you today,” Josie pressed.

  “No. I mean, I can take down your number, and if I do hear from her, I’ll call you, but I can’t help you.”

  Josie could understand why Gretchen wasn’t close to the woman. She was as cold as a winter day. She hadn’t expressed even a small degree of concern for Gretchen’s safety or well-being, hadn’t asked a single question about the shooting. Briefly, Josie wondered if that was because she already knew what she needed to know from Gretchen, and she was simply lying about not hearing from her.

  “Is there anyone else in your family that Gretchen might contact if she was in trouble or needed help?” Josie asked.

  “No, not since our grandparents died a few years ago. I mean, I was probably the closest to her, and that’s not saying much. My mom and Gretchen’s dad were siblings. Gretchen’s dad passed on. I have an older sister, but she lives in Ohio. Gretchen had some aunts and uncles on her mother’s side, but I’m pretty sure she doesn’t keep in touch with them. Especially because of—” She broke off suddenly, and the line went silent.

  “It’s okay, Dr. Weber. I know about her mother,” Josie said. “Gretchen told me. You wouldn’t happen to have any of their contact information, would you?”

  “I wouldn’t, but my mom would. I can get it from her and text it to you if you give me your number,” she offered.

  “That would be a big help. Thank you. One last thing—would it be okay with you if I texted you a photograph of a young boy? We found it on Gretchen’s property. We’re trying to figure out who the boy is.”

  “Sure, send it over. I’ll let you know if I recognize him.”

  Chapter Twelve

  JULY 1993

  Seattle, Washington

  * * *

  Mary lay in bed, body tense as she listened. There it was again. A noise. Almost like glasses clinking except, not exactly. It sounded more musical. She nudged her husband with an elbow and was rewarded with a grunt. She clamped a hand on his shoulder.

  “Tim,” she whispered. “Wake up. I hear something.”

  It took several tries to rouse him. He had always slept like someone had drugged him. Finally, a hearty slap against his upper back woke him, and his head shot up from the pillow. Beneath a spike of brown hair, two angry eyes glared at her.

  “Chrissake, Mare. What is it now?”

  She put a finger to her lips to shush him. He rolled his eyes but listened anyway. The tinkling sound came again.

  “It’s the neighbors throwing bottles in their recycling bin,” he dismissed, burying his face back in the pillow.

  Mary gave his arm a hard pinch.

  “Owww, dammit, Mare.” But he was up out of bed, mumbling under his breath. Something about bullshit.

  “I heard that,” Mary hissed as Tim fumbled on his nightstand for his glasses and disappeared into the dark hallway.

  Clutching the comforter to her chest, she listened to the sounds of him moving through the house. The telltale squeal of the front door sounded, and then a moment later, she heard it again. Then more of his footsteps. She heard him struggle with the back door. The humid weather had made it swell in its frame. She had been after him to shave it down so they could get it open and closed more easily. Then came a loud clanking, like he was fighting whatever it was that was making the noise. It didn’t sound like a recycling bin full of beer bottles. There was a racket that made her wince, something landing on what she guessed was the kitchen table, then the back door slamming.

  Even in the low moonlight streaming through the bedroom window, Mary could see that her husband was furious.

  “Goddamn wind chimes,” he said, climbing back into bed. He tossed his glasses onto his bedside table. “What were you thinking? If someone farts three blocks away, it wakes you up. You, of all people, do not need wind chimes.”

  Mary felt a slice of fear cut through her chest. “Wind chimes? I didn’t buy wind chimes.”

  He rested his cheek on his pillow and closed his eyes. “Then who the hell hung them up out back, Mare? The tooth fairy?”

  He was already drifting back to sleep when she threw the covers off and jumped out of bed. Muscle memory carried her feet to the kitchen in the dark, where outdoor streetlights revealed a set of wind chimes lying crumpled on her kitchen table. Drawing closer, she saw they were in the shape of a hot air balloon.

  She scurried back to the bedroom. “Tim,” she said as she crossed the threshold, “I did not buy those. Someone else—” Her words lodged in her throat as the beam of a flashlight caught her eyes. She threw a hand up to shield herself from the glare. Beyond the circle of light, she thought she saw Tim’s eyes, large and afraid. He was sitting up in bed, the barrel of a gun pressed into his temple.

  “Run!” he said.

  Then another voice came. Male. Unfamiliar. “Oh, Mary isn’t going anywhere. We were just about to begin.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  PRESENT DAY

  Denton, Pennsylvania

  * * *

  Caroline Weber didn’t recognize the young boy in the photo from 2004 that had been pinned to James Omar’s body. Josie asked her to forward it to her mother and sister to see if they recognized the boy, but neither of them did. They did, however, get the names and phone numbers of Gretchen’s other family members to Josie fairly quickly. She and Noah split up the list and started making calls. None of the family members had heard from Gretchen; all agreed to accept a text message with the photo of the boy from 2004, but none recognized him.

  It was nearly eleven at night, and they had hit a dead end.

  Noah leaned back in his chair, stretching his arms up in the air and then lacing his fingers behind his head. “We should call it a night.”

  “Her mother is still alive,” Josie said, ignoring his suggestion as she made notes in the file on her desk.

  Without missing a beat, Noah said, “Her mother is in prison.”

  “I can call the warden,” Josie said. “Ask that she be shown the photo. I don’t have to go there.”

  “Yeah,” Noah said. “I don’t think going there would be the best idea.”

  Gretchen’s mother was an inmate in the same prison that currently held Josie’s mother—or the woman who had kidnapped Josie from her real family and posed as her mother for her entire life. Lila Jensen was as evil and toxic as they came. Even advanced ovarian cancer couldn’t kill her. When she had been inc
arcerated after taking a plea deal on the multiple charges facing her, the doctors had given her three months to live. That was six months ago, and the bitch lived on. Josie wouldn’t have to see Lila Jensen if she went to visit Gretchen’s mother at the Muncy prison, but still, she didn’t want to be anywhere near her.

  “Besides,” Noah added, “wouldn’t Gretchen’s mother have been incarcerated in 2004?”

  Josie said, “There’s always the possibility that other members of her family kept in touch with her. The correctional facility would have a log of visitors and know how much correspondence she was getting and from whom. I know it’s a long shot, but I don’t think we should discount her so easily.”

  She pulled up the warden’s number on her desktop computer and then picked up the phone. Noah stood, came around the desk, and placed a hand gently over hers. “I think you’re forgetting that it’s eleven o’clock at night.”

  Josie looked up at him and opened her mouth to protest, but Noah spoke first. “I know. I already know that you don’t want to stop, but there’s nothing more we can do right this second. There’s already a BOLO out for Gretchen and her vehicle. If either one is located during the night, we’ll get a call. The warrants are out to the cell phone providers for both Gretchen and Omar’s phones. I did one for Gretchen’s bank account and credit cards too, so we can see if there’s been any activity. We’ll likely hear from them tomorrow, but not sooner than that. We can’t talk to the warden at Muncy or to James Omar’s family until tomorrow. We’ll start first thing in the morning. Now, let’s go get some disgusting minimarket sandwiches and go home.”

  Noah, always the practical one.

  Josie stood, a small smile playing on her lips.

  Noah lowered his voice. “Why don’t you come home with me?”

  His touch felt electric. Josie would love nothing more than to spend a couple of hours distracting them both from whatever was going on with Gretchen. She would love nothing more than to finish what they had started so many times in the last few months. As she opened her mouth to accept his invitation, her cell phone chirped on the table with a text message from Trinity.

  We brought home some cake from the restaurant. Are you coming home?

  Then came a photo of all four Paynes in Josie’s kitchen crowding around a birthday cake. They were all smiling. Her family. The family she’d always wished for growing up. The family she would have died to have during all those dark hours locked in the closet of Lila Jensen’s trailer. A pang in her chest set off a feeling of longing that vibrated like a tuning fork within her. She turned the phone to Noah so he could see the photo.

  “I can’t tonight,” she murmured.

  He looked only mildly disappointed, and the sentiment only registered for a split second. Then he smiled down at her. “You should be with them. We’ll have plenty of nights, you and I.”

  Josie resisted the urge to kiss him. Not here, not in front of everyone. Instead, she simply said, “Thank you.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  In spite of having celebrated with the Paynes well past 2 a.m., Josie was up at six, showered and padding around her kitchen, waiting for her coffee to brew. Her phone chirped. A text from Noah. He was on his way to the station. Be there in ten, she responded.

  Hurriedly, she fished her travel mug out of the cabinet, dislodging a tower of Tupperware containers. She tried to stop them from clattering to the floor, but only managed to catch two of them. She gathered them all up and tossed them into her sink, then listened to see if the ruckus had wakened any of her guests. When she didn’t hear anyone stirring, she fixed her coffee and snapped the lid down on her mug.

  Her thoughts turned to Gretchen—her empty home, her list of relatives who barely had contact with her, and the photos of her beloved grandparents who now only existed in Gretchen’s life as a collection of boxed-up possessions. She wondered if Gretchen had ever had a house guest while she’d lived in Denton. What would that be like for someone who booby-trapped her own windows, Josie wondered.

  At first, Josie thought she would go mad with so many people around all the time; it was quite an adjustment after living alone for so long, but eventually she came to enjoy it. When her house was empty and silent she had too much time to think about all that had happened in the last few months and all that Lila Jensen had taken from her. Then the dark thoughts and cloying anxiety set in. She used to numb her pain with sex and booze. Now she tried to do it with the company of the people she cherished most—the Paynes, her grandmother, Misty, baby Harris, and Noah.

  If she didn’t know any better, she might think she was growing as a person.

  Josie grabbed a piece of day-old birthday cake and ate it in two bites as she left the house, her mind moving back to James Omar. Had he been Gretchen’s house guest? How did they know one another? Did they know each other?

  Noah was already seated at his desk when she arrived at the station, the landline receiver pressed to his ear. She settled into her chair as he finished up the call. “The warden will be in at eight, and he’ll see to it that Gretchen’s mother looks at our photo. He told me that Gretchen has never visited her in all the years that she’s been incarcerated, so I doubt that she has any idea where Gretchen might have gone. But evidently she has two cousins of her own who have visited and written over the years, so you were right. It’s worth at least having her look at the photo.”

  “Great,” Josie said. “I’m not surprised Gretchen was never in touch with her. I think we’re going about this all wrong. Think about it. Where did Gretchen spend most of the last fifteen years of her life before she came here?”

  “She was Philly PD,” Noah answered. “Homicide. We should be talking to her colleagues.”

  “Exactly,” Josie said. She opened the center drawer of her desk, pulled out the personnel file she’d secured the evening before and flipped through it, looking for Gretchen’s resume and references. The first reference listed was a homicide lieutenant, Steven Boyd.

  Josie used her cell phone to dial Philadelphia’s Homicide Department and ask for Lieutenant Boyd, only to be told he wouldn’t be in until four that afternoon. She would have to call back. With a sigh, she used her desktop computer to log in to Facebook and search for James Omar. She found his account almost immediately. His profile picture was a close-up of his face, curly hair blowing in the wind. Behind him, Josie could make out a beach. She clicked through to the rest of his photos. There weren’t many. It didn’t appear that he spent much time on social media. There were a few of him and a group of guys, and several of him and his parents and someone that Josie guessed was a younger sister, given her resemblance to both James and the older couple in the photos. There they were at an outdoor concert, a college campus tour, sitting down to Thanksgiving dinner, and cutting down their own giant Christmas tree. They looked happy. Josie felt a tug at her heartstrings. Today they would wake up to a world where they were never happy again. At least, never in the way they’d been before.

  She skipped the rest of the photographs and studied his friend list instead. It was lengthy. With a sigh, Josie started working down the list, looking for any connections to Gretchen or Denton.

  Three hours later she had a major crick in her neck and no clues. Most of his friends lived in Idaho. There were a few dozen who lived in or around Philadelphia. The rest were scattered throughout the country. There were no connections to either Gretchen or the city of Denton that Josie could find.

  Why the hell had Omar rented a car and driven to Denton? What was he doing at Gretchen’s house?

  She clicked on his About Me tab. It was no surprise to find that his hometown was Boise, Idaho. He was also listed as single and had attended Purdue for his undergraduate degree. Presently, he was a graduate student at Drexel University in Philadelphia. She had gone right for his photos and friend list when the About Me tab had been there all along. That solved the mystery of why he was in Philadelphia.

  “I was right,” Josie said, looking across
at Noah.

  He came around and studied the computer screen. “Well, that’s two connections to Philadelphia—Gretchen’s old homicide lieutenant and Drexel University.”

  Josie stood up and headed to Chief Chitwood’s office. Over her shoulder, she said, “We’re going to Philadelphia.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  “You two are not going to Philadelphia,” Bob Chitwood said. Standing behind his desk, hands on his hips, he stared at Josie and Noah.

  “Chief,” Josie said, “all the clues lead to Philadelphia. Someone has to go there.”

  “Sure,” Chitwood said. “Someone. Not both of you. You think this department is paying for the two of you to take a romantic getaway? You’re out of your damn minds.”

  Again, Josie saw the muscle in Noah’s jaw tick as his posture stiffened. He opened his mouth to snap back at Chitwood, but Josie spoke first. “Chief, Gretchen lived and worked in Philadelphia for at least fifteen years before she came here. The odds of her having traveled there are good, and we’re pretty short on clues right now. Plus, I need to look into Omar’s life in Philadelphia and see if I can find out why he rented that car and came to Denton. It would only be a day, maybe two.”

  Chitwood sighed. “Fine. One of you goes. I need one of you here. Especially with Palmer AWOL. Quinn, you’re the lead investigator, you go. But your ass better be back here by Wednesday, or I’m writing you up. Now get the hell out of my office.”

  Noah spun on his heel and stalked out of the room. Josie followed him, but their paths diverged when they reached the bullpen. Noah kept walking—to get some air, Josie imagined, before he blew his top—but Josie went to her desk where the phone was ringing. “Detective Quinn,” she answered.