by Debra Webb
“Oh. My. God.”
Another photo showed a middle-aged couple. The woman had long blond hair; her features were familiar—too familiar. Her heart started to race. The man was taller, lanky with darker features—the murdered Mulligans.
This was the couple in the photo from Burt’s house.
“How did you find them?” she murmured.
Rowan printed the article and the photo. After folding both, she tucked them into the journal. She grabbed a bag larger than the one she usually carried and stuck her gun, her phone and the journal inside. She changed her sweatshirt for a pullover sweater and swapped her house shoes for a pair of sneakers.
She gave Freud a treat and a hug. “I’ll be back, buddy.”
On the way down the stairs she called Charlotte.
“I’m just pulling into the parking lot,” her assistant said.
“I’ll talk to you outside.”
Rowan disarmed and unlocked the door and hurried out to meet Charlotte.
“I’m so sorry to do this to you again,” she said in a rush. “But I have to make a quick trip into Jackson County.”
“No problem,” Charlotte assured her. “Everything’s done. Take your time. I won’t let Burt down. I’ll make sure it’s the best viewing ever.”
Rowan grabbed Charlotte and hugged her. “Thank you so much for all you do.”
Charlotte returned the hug and then drew back. “Now I’m worried.”
Rowan laughed. “It’s okay. And don’t worry, I’m not going alone. I’m calling Billy right now.”
Charlotte took Rowan’s bag. “Call him before you go. I’ll feel better.”
Rowan made the call to Billy. She told him about the woman who’d visited her and who the people in the photo from Burt’s home office were. She explained that the house was where her mother grew up. He told her to sit tight; he was on his way.
For the next five minutes Rowan fought the need to cry. Was it possible her mother was not the awful person she had believed? Was she, too, a victim of Julian’s?
Rowan decided right then that she would not stop until she had the truth, and somehow she would see that Julian paid for what he had done to her family...and to all the other families he had damaged by murdering a loved one.
Every instinct warned she was getting closer.
Twelve
The drive to the destination took forty-five minutes. Rowan spent the first several minutes of that time filling Billy in on the Solomon woman’s visit and the information she had relayed. Then she’d explained what she’d found during her internet search. By the time they had reached ground zero, both she and Billy felt certain everything was about to change.
The house was relatively easy to find. The village of Princeton, Alabama, was more a ghost town. According to the man they’d asked for directions, at one time there were several stores, in addition to the post office and a school. Other than the post office, it was all gone now. The buildings were falling into disrepair. Even the school had been closed. Many of the residents had moved away to find jobs. The vast acres of mountain land had been overtaken by hunting clubs.
As the man had instructed they’d driven past the now closed school and into the area known as Lick Fork. The driveway to the old Mulligan place was the final one before reaching a fruit jar curve. Not that any of these were marked by road signs, but they had figured it out easily enough.
The Mulligan house in the background of the newspaper photo of Rowan’s mother still stood. The white clapboard siding could use a coat of paint. The front porch leaned a little to the right. And the metal roof was on the rusty side. A long, narrow drive cut through the woods until it reached the small clearing where the house stood. The yard might have been bigger at one time, but the woods had begun reclaiming it decades ago.
Several yards from the end of the driveway a gate extended across it. A length of chain and a padlock prevented opening the gate and driving beyond that point.
“The house is most likely locked, too,” Billy pointed out.
“Most likely,” Rowan agreed.
“We can call the number listed there.” He nodded to the metal sign attached to the gate. A maintenance company and telephone number were stamped into the metal.
Rowan dragged her cell from her back pocket and checked the screen. “We’ll have to go back out to the main road to get service.”
Billy glanced back down the drive. “Let’s do it.”
The drive was far too narrow to attempt turning around and there wasn’t a single spot for doing so along the way. Billy put his truck in Reverse and rolled out tailgate first.
“I’m glad you could do that,” she said with a laugh. “There would be no paint left on the sides of the truck if I was the one driving. I would be scrubbing trees on one side or the other the entire distance.”
“That’s because all your crime scenes were in the city.” He flashed her a smile. “You never had to go after a meth operation or a hunting incident in the middle of nowhere like this.”
“You have me there.”
Back on the main road she placed the call the instant a bar or two of service appeared on the screen. The voice that answered was female. Rowan explained she was interested in viewing the property.
“The property isn’t for sale,” the woman who turned out to be a real estate agent stated, her attention clearly somewhere besides this phone conversation. It sounded as if another conversation or conference were going on in the background.
“I don’t want to buy it,” Rowan explained. She looked at Billy as she embellished the rest. “I’m here with the chief of police from Winchester, Tennessee, and we’d like to see the property as part of an ongoing investigation.”
An impatient sign whispered across the line. “Are you suggesting that some aspect of a crime in Winchester, Tennessee, involved this property?”
“We’re only trying to rule it out,” Rowan assured her.
A pause, then, “I’m going to need to see a warrant.”
Rowan closed her eyes and went for broke. “My name is Rowan DuPont. My primary reason for the visit is that my mother grew up there. I just want to see the house. If you could call the owner and ask permission to show it to me, I would really appreciate it.” If the woman refused, she and Billy would have to track down the owner themselves.
“So there’s no criminal investigation?” The woman sounded annoyed now.
“There is,” Rowan said, “and we’re trying to retrace the history of one of the people involved.”
“Your mother?”
“Yes.”
Another extended pause. “Though it goes against my better judgment, I’ll make the call. Should I call you back at this number?”
“Yes. Thank you. I’ll be waiting to hear back from you.”
The connection ended. “I should have let you talk to her,” she said to Billy. “I’m sure you would have charmed her into an immediate yes.”
Mere psychology couldn’t compete with cowboy charm.
Billy laughed. “She didn’t sound like the type easily charmed.”
Silence settled between them. Rowan felt as if a rug had been pulled from under her feet. It wasn’t like it was the first time she’d learned some shocking secret about her mother. This was different, though. This meant that her mother’s entire past had been a lie.
“All this time—” Rowan shook her head “—I believed my mother’s parents lived in Memphis and died while she was in college.”
“The parents who adopted her did live in Memphis and both had passed away by the time she was in college. Maybe she didn’t see the people who lived here as her parents,” Billy suggested, ever the optimist when it came to her family. He wanted to believe the best.
Rowan had given up on that months ago.
“Why wouldn’t she want us to know
about her childhood? I wonder if my father knew.” She shook her head. “This is like a bad movie. All the secrets and lies...the darkness. I knew my family was dysfunctional, but I had no idea I didn’t even know them.”
Billy reached out and squeezed her arm. “I’m sure we’ll find a good reason for why Norah didn’t want you to know any of this.”
Rowan understood that it was possible her mother’s history was too painful. She may not have been able to bear sharing it. Except in her writing. A chill sliced through Rowan at the memory of what she had read about the little girl named Nina.
“What she wrote in her journal was considerably different from the article that ran in the local papers.” Rowan wasn’t sure which to believe.
“If she hoped to turn her childhood into a book she might have added to the truth to make it more interesting. More shocking.”
He was right. Rowan had no way of knowing what was truth and what was fiction. The newspaper article had basically hit the highlights of what appeared to be a family tragedy—a double homicide. Nina Mulligan’s parents had been murdered with an ax. Both had suffered dozens of blows. The ax had been found at the scene but it had been wiped clean of prints. The girl, Nina, had been missing and presumed kidnapped by the murderer or murderers. Two days later she’d been found wandering and nearly frozen to death in the woods. The girl had remembered little of that night. Only that she had been told to run—presumably by one or both parents or perhaps her brother. She’d gotten lost in the woods and would have died if she hadn’t been found by the search team. There was an older brother, Richard, but he was never found. The case remained unsolved but the prevailing theory was that the brother had killed the parents and then run away.
The brother could be the reason the girl was taken to another state and her name changed when she went into foster care. Maybe she had been afraid he would find her and chop her to pieces the way he had their parents.
“The weirdest part,” Billy said, “is that Burt somehow figured this out.”
Rowan agreed. “This must be what he was going to share with me.”
Her phone vibrated with an incoming call and she jumped. It was the Realtor. “Rowan DuPont.”
“Ms. DuPont, the owner has agreed to allow you to see the property. I’ve sent the caretaker to unlock the gate and the house. He’ll be there shortly. He lives in the area.”
“Thank you.”
“Good luck with whatever it is you expect to find.” The Realtor severed the connection.
Rowan hadn’t bothered asking her the owner’s name. Not that she would have provided any personal information without a warrant. Didn’t matter since according to the property records it was owned by a company based in Birmingham.
The caretaker arrived and instructed them to follow him. Rowan sat in the passenger seat and tried to calm the racing in her chest. The questions buzzed around in her head like flies around a rotting carcass and she couldn’t help wondering if she would finally learn some portion of the answers she sought or if she would only uncover more questions.
Every layer she peeled back exposed more darkness. She shivered.
The caretaker stopped at the gate, unlocked and pushed it open. Then he drove on through. Billy followed. The driveway ended abruptly in the front yard. There was no garage or carport. Beyond the house was an old barn that looked ready to fall in on itself. When she’d climbed out of the truck, Rowan stood very still and listened. What was that sound? A distant, dull roar.
“The river,” the caretaker said, noting her expression. “It cuts through the back of this property.”
Now one of the articles she had read in the newspaper made sense. “That’s why they were looking for those children in the water.”
The caretaker held her gaze a moment and then he moved on to the front door. Judging by the look he’d shot Rowan, he didn’t want to talk about the home’s history.
After unlocking the door he stepped off the porch and strode toward them. “Just lock the door when you’re done. I’ll come back over later this evening and make sure everything is secure.”
“Thanks.” Billy extended his hand and shook the other man’s. “We appreciate you going to all this trouble. Have you worked for the owner long?”
“About thirty years.” He removed his baseball cap and scratched his head. “My daddy did before that. I took over after he passed away.”
“So you know the owner?” Billy asked.
Rowan held her breath in anticipation of a name.
The caretaker glanced at Rowan before answering. “I work for the real estate agent. She pays the taxes and does all the official stuff. You’d have to ask her for information like that. I just take care of the place. Gotta paint the house this year.”
Disappointment speared Rowan. The man was certainly old enough to have known her mother. “Did you know the Mulligans?”
This question got the man’s attention. His gaze snapped to hers. His expression promptly cleared of any emotion. “I was a kid when they got killed. I didn’t really know them. They kept to themselves. The girl, she was real quiet. Not like her brother. He was kind of a smart aleck.”
“He was older,” Billy commented.
The man nodded. “Yeah. He was always reading and hiding out in the house. Kind of weird. No offense.”
“They say he’s the one who killed his parents,” Rowan said.
The caretaker stared at her a moment, then shrugged. “Who knows? If he didn’t, I guess whoever did took him off and did no telling what to him.”
“What was your name again?” Billy asked. The man hadn’t given his name.
“Eddie Proctor.”
Billy gave him a card. “If you think of anything else about the family who lived here, I hope you’ll give me a call.”
Proctor took the card and tucked it into his shirt pocket. “Happy to.” Before he climbed into his truck, he looked at Rowan again. “You look like her.”
Rowan managed a smile but couldn’t dredge up a response.
When he’d driven away, she walked toward the house. Billy matched her stride, moving beside her. There were two steps up to the porch. The boards creaked as she crossed to the door the caretaker had unlocked. Though she had never been here, the place felt eerily familiar. Was it possible her mother had brought her here as a small child? She and Raven may have played on this porch.
The windows were covered in plastic that had deteriorated with age, shredding it like fringe. Rowan wasn’t sure whether the plastic was covering broken glass or served as a windbreak for a poorly insulated house.
No matter that she couldn’t be sure of what any of this meant, emotions churned inside her. Trepidation. Anticipation. With a little fear tossed in. This was strange territory for Rowan. Not a place she ever expected to be. Her mother was a part of her distant past. Now she was suddenly here in Rowan’s face, in her present, pulling her into a dark past.
The living room was exactly as her mother had described in the Nina Mulligan story. The walls and trim were white. A stone fireplace took up the better part of the far wall. An old sofa upholstered in a faded gold crushed velvet stood in the center of the space. Scarred end tables and a chair covered in a floral textile that had long ago lost its sheen flanked the sofa. The wood floors were worn and the rug gracing them was as faded as the rest. A single bulb metal light fixture hung overhead. A ceramic lamp sat on one of the end tables. Beneath the front window stood a console television.
The room could have been in the home of any family from the mid to latter part of the last century.
“I expected cobwebs and dust,” Rowan admitted.
“I guess the owner wants the place kept in livable condition. Maybe the insurance requires it.” He flipped a light switch. “Power’s on.”
“But no one lives here.” Rowan moved on to the kitchen. A wood heater and flue
stood in one corner. The cabinets and appliances, table and chairs were from the same era as the other furnishings. She opened a cabinet door to find dishes. “Strange.”
The light inside the refrigerator came on when she opened the door but there was nothing inside. The interior was cool but only slightly so.
They wandered back through the living room and to the hall beyond.
“There are no photographs on the walls.” She surveyed the hall. “No personal items at all other than the furniture and not much of that.”
“Maybe it’s a rental property for hunters.” Billy opened the first door on the right to a small bedroom.
A twin-sized bed, small dresser with mirror and a tiny closet that was empty beyond a couple of mothballs in the corner. The walls were a dark gray. Not very feminine.
They passed a bathroom complete with claw-foot tub and pedestal sink. The window over the tub looked straight into the woods that crept almost to the very back of the house.
The next room was like the first. Twin bed. Small dresser with mirror. Tiny closet. No mothballs this time, but this one was a very pale lilac. Could this have been her mother’s room? Another of those bone-deep shivers went through her.
The final room was larger and empty. Another fireplace, this one smaller, stood on the back wall.
Other than the linoleum in the kitchen and bathroom, the same wood floors ran throughout the house. The finish was worn from the wood in places and it squeaked here and there, but in this room it was different. Two large, dark stains were visible in this room. Rowan moved closer and inspected the first one.
Blood. She had viewed far too many homicide scenes not to recognize the deep, dark stain created by pooled blood left to stand on wood for a while.
“The bed would have been here,” Billy said. “The stains are on either side.”
He was right. The article had said the Mulligans had been dragged from their beds and murdered. She studied the stained area again. Hash marks in the wood had her drawing back.
Billy crouched down for a closer look. “He chopped them up right here on the floor in their bedroom.”