by Joyce Lavene
“That’s right, Ms. Tucker. It got to all of us that we couldn’t find anything, no clue where they’d gone. There was some talk of aliens abducting them. That’s how weird it was. George Burris is a writer from the local newspaper. He said something to that effect. I think he’s retired now, but he might have a few answers.”
Was he really referring her to a newspaper writer for answers?
“I was at the farm today and met a man who claimed to have been there since they disappeared. He said his name was Jack. Did you question him?”
“Jack. Sure, I know him. He wasn’t a person of interest, if that’s what you mean. He was just a boy at the time. We had no reason to suspect him.”
In other words, no.
“I’d like to see the file you have on the investigation,” she told him in clipped tones. “Can you have that ready for me tomorrow?”
“I can, Ms. Tucker, but I have to charge you thirty-five dollars for the copies. I’m sorry as I can be. The county needs to be reimbursed for their paper and such.”
“That’s fine. I’ll be down at ten to pick it up.” She thanked him and hung up. Her hands were shaking.
Sheriff Morgan wasn’t much help. She’d known the case was old and probably hadn’t even been looked at in years. But maybe fresh eyes would help. Maybe she could make a difference and finally know what happened to the two people who’d been so important in her life.
Sarah stared out of the hotel window. Suffolk was a nice city. She had good memories of growing up here. Her parents had moved to Richmond within six months of her grandparents’ disappearance. It was as though the whole world had changed at that point, at least for her. Nothing had ever been the same.
She and her family had never gone back to Misty River. Sarah had assumed her mother had been in contact with the sheriff, but there were never updates that she’d shared.
With a plan in mind to change that veil of silence about that day, Sarah got ready for dinner and met Hunter at the car. She explained as much as she could to her friend. It wasn’t an easy conversation.
They were having dinner at Al Forno Pizzeria. Sarah had already eaten there once and had recommended it for that night. Hunter introduced her friends when they arrived.
Dr. Peggy Lee, a forensic botanist, had bright red hair shot through with white. She was average height and weight and had inquisitive green eyes. Hunter told Sarah that Sam had given up on going to medical school to work with Peggy in her garden shop.
“Don’t let her fool you,” Peggy said with a smile. “Sam is only at The Potting Shed when he has to be. He’d spend all his time outside on the landscaping side of the business if he could.”
Peggy introduced her husband, Steve Newsome, who worked for the FBI. He was a bit on the ordinary side—brown hair and eyes. Not someone you’d notice in a crowd. Sarah thought this might be part of his job working for the federal agency—being invisible in the shadows.
“I’m so glad you called, Hunter,” Peggy said when they were seated at a table. “You wouldn’t believe the crazy things that happened to us in Duck while we were there on vacation. Everyone went mermaid crazy. They even thought a man was murdered by mermaids!”
“Sounds crazy,” Hunter said. “Did you see a mermaid?”
“No,” Steve explained. “But other people did. When we left, there were people who’d just come to search for mermaids.”
They all laughed as they enjoyed some wine.
“Maybe Steve can help you find out what happened to your grandparents,” Hunter suggested. “Peggy and Steve are good at solving mysteries.”
“I’m sure Steve doesn’t want to talk shop while he’s on vacation,” Sarah uncomfortably demurred.
“Don’t worry about it. I could use some shop talk after talking about sea turtles and mermaids all week.” Steve smiled at her. “Tell me about your grandparents.”
“It’s a real thriller.” Hunter nudged an elbow into Sarah’s side. “She should option the movie rights to it.”
The words came slowly at first then they poured out with all the emotion she’d felt at the time. When she was finished, she felt drained, but it was good to have said it out loud.
“You were very young at the time,” Steve said when she’d finished. “Why this sudden interest?”
“I don’t know. I can’t explain why it hit me so hard today. I was just supposed to come down and sign some papers to sell the place. But I never got to ask questions about it. I’d like to know. Maybe it’s time.”
“I can understand that,” he agreed. “I can’t do anything formally, but I’ll be happy to take a look at your information, if you like.”
They planned a time to meet at the farm the next day so Steve could take a look around.
Sarah told them stories of spending time with her grandparents at the pumpkin patch. Once she’d started letting her memories out, it was like she couldn’t stop. “I was there when a dozen baby goats were born one spring,” she said. “Later that year, every time I talked to my grandmother, those goats were into everything. They ate all the beans and rampaged through the corn. One even got his head stuck inside a pumpkin.”
They laughed and enjoyed their dinner. Steve wasn’t as open and charming as Peggy, but Sarah was glad she’d met him anyway. She might never had said everything if he hadn’t encouraged her.
Had her family stayed away from the subject because they all felt guilty for not finding out what happened? Sarah believed that was part of it for her and her mother. Maybe it was that feeling of paralysis that came with the sheriff and others telling them there was nothing they could do. If officials whose job it was to deal with these things couldn’t help, what chance did they have?
Dinner lasted much longer than Sarah had anticipated. She and Hunter weren’t back to the hotel until almost ten-thirty. Hunter was planning to leave by seven the next morning. But they sat and talked until one a.m. anyway. It was great catching up with her old friend. Hunter had recently broken up with a Charlotte police officer so they could commiserate with each other’s love lives too.
The phone in her hotel room ringing woke her the next morning. She glanced at her cell phone, the normal means that her family or friends would have tried to get in touch with her. There were no messages or missed calls.
“Hello?” She cradled the hotel phone as she tried to pry her eyes open. It was only five a.m.
“Is this Sarah Tucker?” a husky, male voice asked.
“Yes. Who’s this?”
“My name is George Burris. I used to work for the newspaper that served Misty River.”
“How did you know where to find me, Mr. Burris?”
“I still have my sources in the community. I’d like to meet with you. I have ten years of information that I’ve gathered about your grandparents’ disappearance. I think you should have it.”
“All right. Where can I meet you?”
“It’s not safe for me to meet you out in the open. Can you come to the pumpkin patch now?”
Not safe? “It’s kind of late . . . early.”
Sarah had an uneasy feeling about the call. The sheriff had mentioned Burris to her, but he was still a stranger. Yet if he really had more information about her grandparents, how could she say no? She felt like this was it—either she’d find out what had happened to them or she’d go home always wondering.
“It’s important. I know you had the sheriff make copies of his file about them. That’s how I knew you were in town and looking for answers. Believe me, my information is a hundred times more in depth than anything he has.”
She glanced at her watch again, torn between wanting to meet with him and feeling vulnerable doing it alone. She didn’t want to wake Hunter since she had a long drive ahead of her. “What about later in the morning?”
“It’s now or never.” He seemed to repeat her thoughts back at her. “You don’t realize how much I’m putting my life on the line to help you. Do you want the answers or not?”
“Okay. I want the answers.”
“I’ll meet you there in thirty minutes. If you’re not there, the answers leave with me.”
He hung up abruptly. Sarah looked at the phone, trying to figure out if what he was talking about was worth the risk. Maybe he was as crazy as the squatter. Sheriff Morgan had said Burris had suggested alien abduction.
But she had to take the chance.
“And this time I won’t be fooled into letting go of my gun,” she promised herself as she reloaded the bullets. She wasn’t completely sure she could shoot someone, but she could at least scare him and run away.
After changing clothes into jeans, boots, and a T-shirt, she left her room.
It was dark and quiet outside. She could see the lights on a boat as it cruised down the river. This is crazy. I should turn around and go back inside.
But she knew she was going.
She wanted someone to know where she’d gone. She left a message at the front desk for Hunter in case she came to say goodbye. Her parents would know where to look for her, too, if something happened.
Once she was behind the wheel and on her way back out to Misty River, she continued to berate herself for agreeing to meet this man before dawn at what was left of the farm. The property was a mile off the main road that ran through the middle of town. If the squatter was there, and dangerous, despite Sheriff Morgan’s opinion of him, she was out of luck.
“And definitely out of your element,” she told herself in the rearview mirror as her heart pumped nervously. “You’re not even a criminal attorney. You know this is stupid. But here you are.”
Knowing it could be dangerous didn’t stop her from turning the rental car off the main road toward the farm. The sign for the pumpkin patch that she and her grandmother had drawn had been amusing and nostalgic during the day. In the dim five-thirty morning light, it just looked creepy.
She hoped George Burris might be in a car waiting in the driveway for her with his headlights on. They’d meet, and he’d hand her a package through the window without her ever leaving the relative safety of her car. It would be like a TV movie with a happy ending—there was a terrible mix-up but her grandparents were alive and well.
There was a car in the driveway. It was backed in, but there were no headlights and no one inside as she drove up to it.
“Now what?” She was parked but still gripping the steering wheel.
She rolled open a window and called his name, but there was no reply. She wanted to hit herself in the head for not getting his cell phone number. She didn’t want to walk through a hundred and eighty acres in the middle of the night looking for him.
That’s when she noticed a moving light inside the house. Maybe it was a candle or a flashlight. He had to be in there. Holding her gun in a savage grip, she locked the car and crept warily up to the house.
There was no moon in the clear sky above her. There had been outdoor lights in various spots around the farm when her grandparents had lived here. Now everything was dark. She wished she had a flashlight, but she’d left her cell phone in the car. She started to go back and get it but was afraid she’d lose her nerve and leave.
She followed the old, cracked sidewalk that led to the front door. She hoped the light in the house was George Burris and not Jack the crazy squatter.
It doesn’t matter. She was ready to confront either of them. She was having a hard time breathing, but she tried to stay focused on the house and the light.
Sarah was near the gazebo where her grandparents had always displayed whatever seasonal produce was available for sale. Her grandmother had liked to dress it up for each time of year—holly and a fir tree for Christmas, pumpkins and skeletons for Halloween. She knew the stairs to the front porch were nearby. She could almost see them in the dim starlight.
Then something large and dark jumped in front of her. She stopped breathing for a moment and almost forgot to bring the gun up in front of her.
“Back so soon?” Jack’s voice was soft. “I see you’re armed again. You’re stubborn, aren’t you?”
“Stay back.” She tried to keep her voice authoritative. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“I’m not worried about it.” He tapped the gun with a careless finger. “Is that thing even loaded this time?”
“Yes. Get out of my way.”
“I guess you know who’s in the house, huh?”
“I do. Now get out of here. I warned you already. I put the property up for sale. Things are going to be different now. I don’t think the realtor wants you showing up while he’s trying to sell it.”
“I think I was clear that I’m not leaving.”
She couldn’t see his face, but he was obviously certain about his part in all this. Maybe it was time to shake him up. What would it take to get rid of him?
“Sheriff Morgan is interested in talking to you about what happened to my grandparents. You might not want to stick around for a new investigation into their disappearance.”
“It’s about time.” His words were snarky. “Did seeing the old place make you feel guilty, Sarah?”
“I don’t feel guilty. And I don’t have to explain anything to you. But since you were nice enough to tell me that you were here when my grandparents vanished, I can tell you that the sheriff thinks you might be a suspect that was overlooked in the initial investigation.”
It wasn’t true, but it was something she hoped would scare him off. The man really was crazy to stand there arguing with her as she held a loaded gun on him. She longed to ask him if he was the same teenager she remembered from when she was twelve but couldn’t find a way to say it.
He laughed in a slow, non-humorous way. It sounded more like a threat. “Are you scared, Sarah? You should be.”
She was about to go into legal mode, offering arguments about why it was illegal for him to be there, when a loud crack split the morning around them. It was followed rapidly by another loud crack—gunfire—and the sound of shattering glass.
Sarah knew that sound. She’d lived around guns all her life. She’d barely processed the information that someone might be shooting at her when Jack knocked her down to the soft grass and put himself on top of her like a human shield.
“Someone’s shooting.” She was almost as surprised that he would try to protect her as she was about the gunfire.
“Stay down. I don’t think that was meant for you, but let’s not take any chances.”
“Hey!” she complained when he took her gun again. “What am I supposed to use to protect myself?”
“Don’t move. You won’t have to do anything. Let me take a look around.”
“I think the bullet hit the front window.”
But Jack was gone. She argued with herself about listening to him and staying down or going to the house to see what was going on. Why was he so annoyingly arrogant? And why wasn’t he afraid the sheriff might think he was responsible for her grandparents’ disappearance?
The area was quiet again except for the hoot of an owl and a few crickets. Sarah waited impatiently in the dew-damp grass for a minute then got to her knees to look around.
She couldn’t see Jack or any other large shadow that might indicate another human ready to take a shot. The dim light was still in the window. It was probably an off-season hunter whose bullet had travelled farther than he’d expected in the open fields surrounding the house. It wouldn’t be the first time.
Having argued herself into feeling safe, and embarrassed that Jack had pushed her down, Sarah got to her feet and brushed the grass from her jeans and shirt. She kept her head low as she surveyed the yard again. There was only her car and the empty one that had been there when she’d arrived. It seemed safe to her.
“I told you to stay down.” Jack was immediately at her side. “I think whoever fired that shot took off, but there’s no way to know for sure if anyone else is out here besides us.”
“Is that George in the house? How did he get inside?”
�
�Why don’t we go in and ask him? It will be safer for you in there anyway.”
“It was probably just an overzealous hunter,” she told him as he hurried her toward the front door. “Did you find the broken window?”
“I’m afraid so.” He opened the front door. A heavyset man lay on the front room rug. “I guess someone didn’t want you to talk to George.”
Chapter Three
“Someone shot him on purpose?” She gulped as she saw the blood on the thin green carpet in the dim lantern light.
“I’d say so.” He nodded toward the hole in the broken window. “Why was he here, Sarah?”
“He called me at the hotel. He said he knew things about my grandparents that he hadn’t shared with the sheriff. He offered to give me the information.” She didn’t even think not to answer him. There was a dead man on the floor in front of her.
“This must be what he wanted you to have.” Jack scooped a manila folder off the floor and handed it to her. “You’re in luck. Whoever shot George wasn’t worried about you.”
Sarah’s head was spinning. She tried to swallow hard but couldn’t and threw up on the floor next to George Burris. “I’m sorry. This is more than I bargained for.”
Jack led her into the kitchen, using the lantern to find their way. “I suppose so. I can get some water from the hand pump outside. The water in here has been turned off for years. Stay here.”
She wanted to argue with him but literally didn’t have the stomach for it. She stayed where she was in the empty kitchen, staring at the wood floor, until he returned.
“Where’s your phone?” He handed her a wet rag. “You should call this in.”
“In…in the car.”
She wiped the cool rag across her face. Jack had moved the battery-powered lantern to the kitchen table. The glow from it spread around the room. The last time she’d seen this room it had looked as though her grandparents had just stepped away. She still expected it to be the same as when she was twelve—cornbread on the stove and coffee perking.
“Are you okay?” He crouched beside her and looked up into her face. “At least you don’t look like you’re going to faint. You were kind of pale back there. I haven’t caught an unconscious woman in my arms for a while. Not sure I know how anymore.”