Losing Leah Holloway (A Claire Fletcher and Detective Parks Mystery Book 2)
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She didn’t know, but until the time came to confront him, she would put it out of her head. She had to. She simply couldn’t deal with it. Her mind was too full and her body was too tired. Working full-time, taking care of her children every second she wasn’t at work, and managing the household was enough.
Now there was D.J.
Rachel’s heavy sigh brought Leah out of her jumbled thoughts. “Well,” Rachel said, taking a sip of her coffee, “you look tired.”
Leah racked her brain, searching for something to cover, something Rachel would believe. “Work!” she said too loudly, the word coming out more as excitement than as a complaint. Leah swallowed and adjusted her tone. “I meant it was the worst week of my life at work,” she said more quietly. “A big contract fell through.”
“Want to talk about it?”
Leah shook her head. “No, no. It’s just work. I shouldn’t have brought it up.”
But it had slipped out.
She was fraying at the edges, her mental compartments opening unexpectedly like the drawers were spring-loaded, scattering her unwanted thoughts all over the floor of her brain. She tried picking them up, stuffing them back into place, but it wasn’t working. The more she tried not to think about what had happened with D.J., the more vivid and all-consuming the memory became. The entire week she was convinced people could see it on her face—all the conflicting emotions raging inside her. Above all, anger—at him, but mostly at herself. Men were essentially primitive creatures. They’d always do just whatever the hell you let them get away with. It was her job to set boundaries and to stand firm.
“Tell me to stop.”
Her face burned.
Rachel waved a hand at her. “Did you hear me?”
“N-no. I—” Leah stammered.
Rachel leaned forward, resting both elbows on the table. She lowered her voice even though it was only the two of them in the kitchen. “I said, ‘Talk about the worst week of your life. Glory Rohrbach got caught cheating on her husband.’”
So scattered were Leah’s thoughts that it took her a moment to pull up their neighbor’s face in her mental Rolodex. Glory was notoriously snobby. They often joked that she thought she was a Real Housewife of Pocket.
“Really?” Leah said, hoping she sounded interested. For once, she didn’t care at all about Glory’s antics, especially where it concerned infidelity.
“Oh my God,” Rachel said. “Wait till you hear this. She was screwing the kid who cuts her lawn! You know, the kid who always looks like he’s all strung out on something? What is he? Twenty-five? Twenty-six?”
“I—I don’t know,” Leah mumbled.
Rachel thought of a man in his midtwenties as a kid. My God, what did that make D.J.? Leah’s cheeks flamed. The skin at her throat itched. Luckily, Rachel was so enthralled by the story of how Glory’s husband caught her that she didn’t notice.
There was a time when Leah surely would have reveled in Glory’s downfall, but now she only felt her own guilt, her own shame, like a coarse, heavy coat, making her sweat and her skin itch.
How could she? She had betrayed her husband and her children, broken her vows, and defiled their family home. She’d thrown away years of careful, steadfast fidelity, a thing she valued, a thing she expected of Jim.
For what?
A single sexual encounter with a boy who was wildly inappropriate for her?
An orgasm? She could give herself those. God knew, she usually did. Jim liked sex, but like most things in their relationship, it was about what he got out of it and not so much about pleasing Leah. But she hadn’t married him for sex. She never cared about physical pleasure, had never enjoyed sex any more than she enjoyed a cup of coffee or a chocolate bar. It was fine but not necessary. She’d married Jim because he was a man who would never cheat on her and never leave her.
“Can you believe that?” Rachel was saying. “Her poor husband. He gave her everything. He works so hard to support her and their kids, and this is what she does? Cheats on him with a druggie landscaper?”
Leah made a noise of agreement, taking a long sip of coffee. Jim had never been as attentive as Glory Rohrbach’s husband, but it was his short attention span that precluded cheating. He barely managed to spread his attention among his own wife and children. No way could he handle a mistress. Leah had always counted herself lucky. She would never be that woman. Humiliated, duped, left behind. She had a good husband.
But she had cheated.
Which made her the other kind of woman. The kind she’d always judged so harshly. Like Glory Rohrbach.
“I heard she would invite him in, and she’d have sex with him in exchange for OxyContins,” Rachel went on. “Remember how we always used to see her kids sitting out in the driveway?”
Leah had always felt immediate and unforgiving hatred for cheaters. No exceptions.
“She was locking the kids out while she did this guy for some pills. Can you believe that? What a bitch. I mean really. I hope he leaves her with nothing. She shouldn’t even be allowed to see her kids, don’t you think?”
Leah blinked, Rachel’s earnest face coming into focus. “What?”
The vise around her torso tightened. My kids. Oh God. My kids.
Rachel looked at her strangely, one brow raised just a little. “Don’t you think she should lose custody of her kids?”
In front of her, Rachel was eclipsed by an image of D.J.’s face, smiling suggestively at her in the kitchen. She heard his words in her ear again. “Tell me to stop.”
Why hadn’t she stopped him?
Leah blinked again and Rachel reappeared, frowning now. “Leah?”
She scratched the skin at her throat. “I don’t know. That seems harsh to me. People make mistakes. Sometimes things just happen.”
Rachel erupted into loud laughter. She slapped the table. “Oh my God. Who are you?” She raised her voice, her tone mocking. “‘People make mistakes.’ Please. Not those kinds of mistakes. You’re the one who’s always saying how inexcusable cheating is. What’s going on with you today?”
Her expression remained jovial but Leah knew she was really asking. Leah leaned back in her chair, licked her dry lips. She could never tell a soul what had happened. Not anyone. Especially not Rachel—the boy’s aunt! She had to lock it away. It was done, and she couldn’t undo it. She could only move forward and act as though it hadn’t happened. She had to pull herself together. She gave a wan smile. “I’m fine. Really. Just tired and the thing at work—I’m just stressed. That’s all.”
Rachel didn’t look convinced, but before she could interrogate Leah further, the phone rang. Rachel stood and answered it, the corners of her mouth drawing downward. She held out the receiver to Leah. “It’s Jim. Can’t find his own ass to wipe it, probably.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
Rachel answered the door wearing jeans, a tank top, and a burgundy bolero sweater. Connor was shocked to see her in something besides yoga pants. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail but one side hung loose over her cheek, which Connor swore looked red. Had they wakened her from a nap?
“The girls aren’t home,” she said without preamble. “Mike took them to his parents. They’re really bored here, and with all the commotion—the police and media—it was just too stressful.”
Too much of an explanation, Connor thought. Offering too much too soon. “We’re not here to talk to the girls,” he said.
Rachel put a hand to her chest. With her other hand she tucked the loose hair behind her ear. “Oh,” she said. “Okay, well, I—”
“Can we come in?” Stryker asked.
Connor expected hesitation, but she flung the door open and let them into the formal sitting room to the right of the foyer.
“Who’s D.J.?” Stryker asked, going right for it.
Her whole face dropped. The color drained from her skin. Then she looked around the room. Looking for a life preserver, Connor thought.
“I—uh—I don’t—”
She looked around the room once more. Then her shoulders slumped. Her hand went to her “#1 Mom” charm. “He’s my … nephew.”
Connor’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out and looked at the display. Lena Stark. “Excuse me,” he said. “I need to take this.” To Stryker, he added, “Stark.”
CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT
Claire dozed fitfully after Connor left. When it became apparent that restful sleep was going to be impossible without Connor there, she got up and called Tom, who was still at the hospital. Nothing had changed. Brianna remained comatose. Tom urged her to go back to bed, get some more sleep before she relieved him at the hospital, but Claire knew it was a lost cause. Instead, she showered, rummaged through Connor’s near-empty refrigerator for anything edible, and decided to take Wilson for a nice long walk to make up for the day before.
She hesitated before putting Wilson’s leash on him. Connor had been overprotective and on edge since Brianna was attacked. He had explained to her that there was a possibility that the man they’d met in the bagel shop, Brianna’s attacker, was the Strangler. He had also shared his theory that the Strangler had tracked Brianna to the home she shared with Claire and then followed them to Sammy’s. She knew he didn’t want her going anywhere alone. But Claire had been prisoner to a psychopath before, and she was not doing it again. She refused to give up something as basic and mundane as walking her dog.
Besides, she reasoned, she was at Connor’s house, in Connor’s neighborhood. If the Strangler decided to come after her, how would he find her here? How would he even know to look? And why would he look for Claire in the first place? Brianna had been the one on the news. Brianna had taken credit for saving the Holloway and Irving children—and the blame for leaving Leah in the river.
Guilt on that score was a heavy stone on Claire’s chest. Stryker and Jade had been right when they warned about lying to the press. It had done a lot more than bite them in the ass. Brianna had almost paid for the decision with her life—and it was Claire’s fault. She felt tears forming behind her eyes and quickly grabbed Wilson’s leash from Connor’s kitchen counter. Tugging Wilson along, she plunged outside, as though getting out of the house would get her away from her feelings.
They meandered through the streets of Pocket. The neighborhood was quiet. Claire tried to keep track of the turns they made and how far they went so she could find their way back to Connor’s easily. Wilson sniffed this new territory with intense vigor, finding every blade of grass endlessly fascinating. He kept looking back at her like he expected her to abruptly end the newfound fun at any second. She smiled at him. This was what she loved about dogs. There was no grudge for having been left alone for over twelve hours. Wilson was just happy to be with her and be on a walk. She had, of course, met rescues who had been abused and had triggers just like she did, but much of the time dogs were able to live gloriously in the present.
She was thinking about that, watching Wilson’s tail wag happily, when she rounded a corner and saw little Peyton Holloway playing in the front yard of a brown-and-white two-story home. She sat in the grass wearing shorts, a tank top, and a pair of flip-flops. Her blonde hair looked as if someone had brushed it hastily and missed the back where a tangle of knotted hair peeked from the girl’s collar. She had what looked like Barbies in each hand, making them talk to one another. In front of her sat a purple Barbie car. Claire watched as she positioned each doll inside and pulled it back out again. She talked so softly, Claire could not make out her words. As Claire and Wilson got closer, Claire noticed a very familiar vehicle in the driveway of the neighboring house. She wondered if Connor and Stryker were there. Claire looked back at the Holloway’s front yard. As if sensing her presence, Peyton looked up. Her eyes widened in recognition and Claire smiled, giving her a small wave.
The girl stared for a moment before she abandoned her dolls and walked slowly to where Claire and Wilson stood. Claire looked at the house. She could see through the screen door that the heavier door was open, but no adult stood there or peeked from any of the windows. Rage unfurled inside of her as though she were generating it on a cellular level, her body warming uncomfortably from the inside out. Small beads of sweat popped out along her hairline. She knew stranger abductions were rare. She’d heard the statistics, read all about how the odds of what had happened to her were so slim as to be negligible.
When her case broke, and last year when Jaycee Lee Dugard was recovered after eighteen years in captivity, alive after having borne her abductor two children, Claire got to hear all about how rare stranger abductions were, on the news. In other words, don’t worry about this because it will never happen to your kid. But it did happen. It had happened to Claire when she was much older than Peyton and better able to outsmart an abductor, or fight back, and Claire had not been able to do either of those things. Claire realized that most normal people could not live their lives as though a pedophile lurked around every corner just waiting to snatch their child, but leaving a little girl like Peyton alone, unguarded like this, seemed tantamount to putting her tiny hand in a blender, plugging it in, and then asking every person who passed to please turn it on. Eventually, some sicko would be happy to shred her tiny hand.
Beside Claire, Wilson whimpered.
“I like your dog,” Peyton said. “Can I pet him?”
“Of course,” Claire said, pushing her anger down. “Thank you for asking me first.”
Peyton shrugged and gently stroked Wilson’s back.
“Peyton, where’s your dad?”
“Asleep.”
“Oh. Where are your brothers?”
The girl didn’t look up, just kept running her hand over Wilson’s fur. “Grandma had to take them to the doctor.”
“So you’re alone out here?”
Another shrug. “Daddy’s inside. I used to have a dog.”
Claire swallowed. “Oh yeah?”
Peyton scratched behind Wilson’s ears. “His name was Lucky, but then he died. He ate a bad thing.”
“I’m so sorry, Peyton. That must have been very hard.”
Peyton didn’t look at her. “Yeah,” she said. “I guess Lucky and Mommy are in heaven together.”
A lump formed in Claire’s throat. “Yes,” she croaked. “I’m sure they are.”
Wilson lay on the ground and rolled onto his back so Peyton could scratch his belly.
“My grandma says my mom is burning in hell, and she got what she deserved.”
Peyton’s tone was flat and emotionless, as though she were just relating a fact. Claire felt her rage ripple again. What kind of person said that to a six-year-old who had just lost her mother? Though Claire understood the sentiment: What Leah had done was horrible, shocking, unforgivable. Impossible to comprehend. Leah had killed people, had tried to kill her own children and her friend’s children. What would make a mother do that? People were confused and angry, especially the people closest to Leah, who had had no indication that she had been remotely capable of something like this. Moving forward, it was going to be difficult for her kids to live with what she had done. It was something they would struggle with their entire lives. Demonizing Leah to her young children, though, seemed cruel to Claire.
Claire looked down at Peyton’s feet. Her toes were painted hot pink. “Peyton, what was your mommy like?”
Peyton thought about it for a moment. Then she said, “She was nice.”
“Did she paint your toenails?”
The girl nodded, looking down at her feet. “Yeah. She liked to paint my nails and brush my hair. She said I was pretty.”
Claire smiled. “You are pretty.”
Peyton pursed her lips as if considering something. “She w
as a good mommy,” she said finally, with the proud, simple conviction of a six-year-old.
“I’m sure she was.”
“She wasn’t mean, not like Grandma. She got mad a lot, though, mostly at Daddy.”
“Well, that happens,” Claire said. “Grown-ups get mad at one another sometimes. That’s pretty normal. Haven’t you ever been mad at someone you love?”
Peyton thought about it. “I get mad at my brother a lot ’cause he breaks my toys, and he cries a lot, and he is really annoying.”
Claire laughed. “But you still love him, right?”
“I guess.”
From the corner of her eye, Claire thought she saw movement in the Holloway house, but when she looked up, the door and windows were vacant.
“But one time my daddy said if we were bad, Mommy wouldn’t come back. Do you think I was bad?”
Claire’s heart ached. She wanted to touch the girl but wasn’t sure how she would take it. “No, Peyton. I don’t think you were bad at all. I think you’re very smart and sweet and brave, and what happened to your mommy had nothing to do with you. I think something bad happened to your mommy,” Claire said, thinking of Leah’s terror-stricken eyes. “And it had nothing to do with you at all.”
Peyton looked down at Wilson. She’d stopped rubbing his belly. He turned over and nuzzled her hand gently. She scratched the top of his head again. Then she said, “It was D.J.”