Dreadful

by Jana DeLeon

  Her heart was beating so rapidly, she was dizzy, and for a moment she thought she would pass out. Her mother ran in after her and immediately grabbed a glass of water and shoved it at her.

  “Take a drink,” Virginia said. “Long deep breaths. In as slow as you can, then out.”

  Jenny did as her mother had instructed and finally managed a sip of water to wet her dry mouth and throat. She looked up at her mother and managed to get out a “thank you.”

  “What happened?” Virginia asked.

  “Someone shot at me,” Jenny said. “I heard someone when I was on the trail. He must have been following me. I started to hurry but when I left the woods, I heard the shot and started running.”

  Virginia frowned. “Probably some idiot poaching deer. I’ve seen a herd a time or two just outside of the tree line. I’ve already told you to be careful walking in there. People don’t obey the law. You ought to stick to the road and stay out of the woods.”

  Jenny knew her mother was right—the woods were full of deer and the fact that it was private property and well past deer season didn’t stop people from taking a shot at a nice buck if they could get it. But Jenny hadn’t seen any deer or heard them. For that matter, she hadn’t heard anything at all except for the person who’d fired the gun.

  Still, there was no point in arguing with her mother. Jenny wouldn’t be able to make her understand that she knew that he was after her. Everything about it felt off—not at all like a local poaching deer. And it was all her fault. She’d opened this can of worms by hiring Shaye to look into Caitlyn’s disappearance. Of that, she had no doubt. Shaye had even warned her that she might be in danger, but she’d dismissed the investigator’s worries as being overly cautious.

  She wasn’t dismissing them now.

  But she wouldn’t make a decision while she was frightened. She’d head upstairs and take a shower, then lie down and rest. When she was calm, she’d think it all through and decide what she should do, but of one thing, she was certain.

  She wouldn’t be walking in the woods again.

  15

  MARISA WALKED into the antiques store she managed a couple minutes past opening time. The clerk, an older woman named Janice, gave her a concerned look.

  “Are you all right?” she asked. “You’re a bit flushed. And those eye bags have been smaller. Maya not sleeping well again?”

  They’d gone through a spell when Maya had turned two where she decided that she didn’t want to sleep. And despite being so young and obviously needing to sleep, her daughter had managed to keep them up more hours every night than they’d gotten shut-eye.

  “No. She’s sleeping fine now,” Marisa said as she stuck her purse under the counter and logged onto QuickBooks so she could update the sales information for the previous week. “I’m just worried about Jenny.”

  “Is something wrong with her? I mean, aside from the usual?”

  “She’s been having dreams—nightmares really—about Caitlyn. She says Caitlyn is calling to her in them because she’s all alone.”

  “Oh my God. That poor girl. That must be horrifying.”

  Marisa nodded. “I’m sure it is. That’s why I took her to New Orleans to hire a private detective.”

  Janice gave her a skeptical look.

  “Don’t get me wrong,” Marisa said. “I don’t think the detective will be able to find anything beyond what the police did, but I thought if someone else reviewed everything and came to the same conclusions, then maybe Jenny would be able to accept it and move on.”

  “Do you really think Jenny’s going to just accept the word of some detective? She hasn’t listened to the police or her parents or you and Rick. What difference is one more person going to make?”

  Marisa sighed. “Maybe none. Maybe a lot. I took her to Shaye Archer. You know her story. I figured if Jenny was going to take anyone’s word, it would be hers.”

  Janice nodded. “I suppose if that route is going to make a difference, the Archer girl would be the one to do it. She’s sharp and after all she’s been through, she’s got instincts. If she doesn’t come up with something, then my guess is no one ever will.”

  Janice patted Marisa’s hand. “You’re a good friend. Maybe this will be the thing that works. I’ll say a special prayer for Jenny and Ms. Archer tonight when I make my usual rounds.”

  “Thank you.”

  Janice gave her a nod and headed off to tag some china they’d taken in the day before. Marisa watched her walk away and wished that Janice’s prayers were all they needed. When Jenny had agreed to hire Shaye, Marisa thought there might be an end in sight. That Jenny might finally be able to come to grips with her loss and make a new life for herself.

  But then Cody Reynolds had been murdered. Which changed everything.

  And Marisa didn’t think all the prayers in the world could fix things now.

  Then there was the issue with Rick. He’d lied about where he’d been the day before. She was sure of it. Even worse, the additional mileage on his SUV and the coffee cup both indicated he’d been in New Orleans. But why? They didn’t even know Cody Reynolds. Marisa had seen his name in the police file, but she still hadn’t made the connection until Shaye pointed it out. It bothered her that Caitlyn had been in a relationship with the man, but that still didn’t have anything to do with Rick. So why was he in New Orleans? And why was he keeping it from her?

  Then there was this illness of his. The entire time they’d been married, Rick had never missed a single day of work. Not even when he’d broken his foot. He’d simply loaded up on Vicodin and asked her to drive him to court, then hobbled around on crutches all day even though the pain had to be awful. But now he was in bed complaining about not feeling well.

  Something was up.

  She lifted the store phone and dialed Rick’s cell phone, but it went straight to voice mail. Maybe he’d turned it off so he could sleep. Or maybe he was on the other line with his office. Despite Ponchatoula’s being a small town, Rick had plenty of work. It just didn’t pay him what he could make with the same caseload in a big city. She’d try him again later. And if she never got hold of him, she’d swing by at lunch to check on him.

  Everything was fine.

  She drew in a breath and blew it out. Maybe if she kept telling herself that, she’d start believing it.

  Her cell phone rang and she jumped, then yanked it out of her pocket. She shot Janice an apologetic look for not setting the phone to vibrate as she was supposed to and checked the display. It was Jenny. Despite being a bit emotionally unstable, Jenny rarely called Marisa at work unless something was wrong.

  “I need to take this,” Marisa told Janice, and hurried to the storeroom. “Jenny? Is something wrong?”

  “Someone shot at me,” Jenny said, her voice cracking on the last two words.

  “What?! When? Are you all right? Where are you?”

  “I’m at home and I’m all right. I ran and he missed, but it was so scary.”

  “Okay. Just stay calm and tell me exactly what happened.”

  Marisa heard Jenny take a deep breath, then she began to recount what had happened to her in the woods, then the exchange between Jenny and Virginia in the kitchen. When she finished, Marisa tried to quickly process everything. On the one hand, Virginia was right about the poachers. Every year they managed to put a stray bullet through a home or a windshield, hunting off-season and trespassing to boot.

  On the other hand, Marisa didn’t want to dismiss Jenny’s story as poachers because of what had happened with Cody Reynolds. Maybe someone had shot at Jenny. She certainly seemed to think so, and putting Jenny’s feelings down to her fragile physical and emotional state wasn’t fair and might be detrimental to her safety.

  “Let me come get you,” Marisa said. “You can stay with Rick and me for a while. At least until we figure all of this out.”

  “No! I don’t want to put you at even more risk than I already have. You have Maya to think about. And besides, I
don’t want to leave Mom alone. I’ll be fine here. Mom has the rifle, and I’ll stay inside.”

  Marisa didn’t like it, but she couldn’t argue the logic of what Jenny said. “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Okay. But get some sort of weapon and keep it with you. Do you have a baseball bat?”

  “We’re not exactly a sports kind of family.”

  “Then get a kitchen knife. Something, just in case. And if you change your mind, call me. Anytime. I’ll come get you. I can talk to your mother too, and see if she’ll come with us.” Marisa knew nothing short of the second coming of Christ would get Virginia to move out of her home, but sometimes you had to go through the motions.

  “There’s something else,” Jenny said. “I’m thinking maybe I should stop the investigation. I never wanted this to happen. I just thought she might be able to come up with something—even if it was just a theory—and I would be able to accept it. But there’s no point of any of this if it puts the people I love in danger. Nothing will bring Caitlyn back, and I don’t want to lose any more than I already have.”

  “That’s completely up to you,” Marisa said. “Whatever you want to do is fine with me.”

  “You’re a good friend. You always have been.”

  “Take care of yourself. I’ll keep my phone on me. Call me if you change your mind.”

  “I will.”

  “And Jenny? Be careful. Very careful.”

  SHAYE WAS JUST POLISHING off eggs and toast and a particularly good vanilla latte when she got a call from Jackson. She answered immediately, already tense. A midmorning call was hardly common, so whatever Jackson had to say was important.

  “I’m getting ready to go into an interview, so I only have a minute,” Jackson said. “But I thought you should know this as soon as possible.”

  Shaye clutched the phone. Had something happened to Jenny? Or Marisa and Rick?

  “Remember I said I was going to hunt down that old detective whose dad was a family law attorney? Well, I found him last week, and he said he’d talk to his dad and let me know if he came up with anything. He called me a few minutes ago with a name. You ready to take it down?”

  Shaye’s heart leaped into her throat. For months they’d been trying to locate the attorney who’d brokered the sale of her baby, but everything had been a dead end. Existing family law attorneys weren’t willing to talk about the illegal side of their business that some engaged in, probably because they didn’t want to be implicated for not reporting their suspicions. And because suspicion alone wasn’t enough to put a man’s livelihood on the line. Even the hint of that sort of impropriety could ruin someone’s career, and the last people who were willing to walk straight into a defamation suit were attorneys.

  “Jerry Allard,” Jackson said. “The detective’s father said he suspected Allard was involved in some shady stuff but there was never any way to prove it. It was all rumor mill. Jerry Allard died last year. His wife divorced him decades ago and he never remarried, but his daughter, Brenda, lives in the Garden District. She’s not married, so same last name. We both know Allard wouldn’t have talked to you anyway, but maybe his daughter still has his business records. Maybe she’d let you take a look.”

  “Thanks. I’ll try to get in touch with her today.”

  “If you need anything from me, call.”

  Shaye knew what Jackson was saying. If she found anything in those records that upset her or led her down another investigative path, he wanted to be part of it. She checked her watch. A little after 10:00 a.m. The bar probably wouldn’t be busy enough to warrant much staff until lunchtime, and she hadn’t yet decided where to take the investigation after that, so she accessed the internet to do some research on Jerry Allard.

  There wasn’t much to find—some old listings for legal services of the usual family court sort. Child custody cases, divorce, adoption. Nothing that stood out, but then if Allard was brokering black-market babies, he would hardly advertise that fact. His assets would be a better indication of whether all his work was legitimate or whether he was pocketing the bigger dollars off the books, but she had no way of accessing those except property records.

  She pulled up the property tax database and searched his name. Two properties came up with Allard as the previous owner. One was a house in English Turn valued at a little over a million. The second was a French Quarter penthouse valued at three million. Some attorneys did quite well, but that was a significant amount of real estate. Still, he might have money from other legitimate sources such as inheritance or investment. Or he could be living the American dream and have been mortgaged up to his eyeballs.

  She did a quick search on Brenda, but all she found was a LinkedIn profile listing her as a nurse for a local pediatrician. Shaye frowned. As much as she hated manipulation, Brenda’s profession might give her the angle she needed to get the woman to cough up information. If she worked with children and mothers, she would probably feel more inclined to help Shaye’s search, even if it meant finding out things about her father that she didn’t want to know. In any event, it was something Shaye would hold in reserve if Brenda balked at talking to her.

  Next, she pulled up the pediatrician that Brenda worked for and was happy to see that his office was closed today because he made hospital rounds. That meant Brenda might be at home. Shaye had always had better success getting an inroad when she spoke to people versus asking them for help over the phone. She knew it was because everyone in the area knew her story and they felt sorry for her and couldn’t turn her down to her face, but that didn’t bother her anymore. It had at first, and she’d spent many hours arguing with Eleonore over how to handle it, but ultimately, her friend and therapist had won the argument with practicality. It was her usual stance and often annoying. Mostly because she was always right.

  So Shaye had rolled with it, and if people helped because they felt sorry for her, then so be it. The outcome was the important thing, and it wasn’t as if she were intentionally playing on their sympathy. Just being in the same space with some people had them misting up and apologizing for the things that had happened to her.

  She closed her computer and put some money on the table for the food and tip. Then she headed out the door. It was a reasonable time to make a house call. Maybe she’d get lucky and catch Brenda at home. She punched Brenda’s home address into her GPS and set out for the Garden District. The location of the home was only a couple blocks away from Corrine’s, so Shaye easily drove right to it.

  The house was a small colonial with beautiful flower beds. Either Brenda or her gardener had an incredible green thumb. There was no car parked in the drive, but the house had a one-car garage, so that wasn’t a good indicator. Shaye walked up the drive, trying to think of what she would say. She’d been thinking of nothing else the entire drive over and still hadn’t decided on the best method. When she reached the door, she still didn’t know.

  She blew out a breath and reached for the button, figuring she’d just wing it. All of this was a long shot anyway, because Jerry Allard wasn’t the only attorney in NOLA who’d been suspected of shady dealings. She’d already looked into several whose names had cropped up when she’d spoken to other family law attorneys, but none of them had made her radar perk up. Granted, anyone who could be involved in such a practice probably lacked the emotional depth to give himself away in an interview, but still, Shaye would have expected some reaction when she told them why she was there.

  She pressed the doorbell and waited. Just when she was going to ring it again, the door opened and a middle-aged woman with short black hair and green eyes looked out at her.

  “Brenda Allard?” Shaye asked, although she already recognized the woman from her LinkedIn profile picture.

  “Yes.”

  “My name is Shaye Archer. I’m sorry to interrupt you but if you have a few minutes, I’d like to talk to you.”

  “I know who you are, Ms. Archer, and what you do. I’ve also met
your mother on a couple of occasions as well. I can’t imagine what you want from me, but please come inside. I just finished making fresh lemonade. I know it’s a little early in the season, but I prefer summer and wanted to pretend.”

  She stood back and motioned for Shaye to enter. Shaye stepped inside and followed her through a formal living room that had been decorated as a library, then down a short hallway and into the kitchen. This room was pretty. White walls, green cabinets with glass fronts, and fresh flowers in several vases dotted the countertops. Probably from Brenda’s own beds.

  “Your flowers are beautiful,” Shaye said. “Were all these taken from your beds?”

  Brenda nodded and poured two glasses of lemonade. “I like gardening. It relaxes me. Everyone needs something to help them decompress.”

  “I agree,” Shaye said as Brenda placed a glass onto the bar and indicated for her to sit.

  Brenda slid onto a stool next to her and took a sip of the lemonade. “So tell me what I can do for you. I know from the gossip mill that you don’t have your mother’s interest in charity events, although I’m certain you contribute more than your financial share. I’m guessing it has to do with your work, but I can’t imagine what I might know.”

  “Maybe nothing. But it’s a difficult case and I don’t have anything to go on but rumor and conjecture. It’s actually about your father.”

  Brenda frowned. “My father? What has he done this time?”

  Something in her tone alerted Shaye to the fact that Brenda was already aware of and apparently unhappy with some of the choices her father had made. “My client had a baby eleven years ago, when she was very young. It was an abusive situation, and she was told that the baby died.”

  Shaye deliberately avoided telling people she was both the client and the detective. The last thing she needed was for the birth and sale of her child to become public knowledge. The press wouldn’t stop until they ferreted out the child, and then even more lives would be ruined.