The Girl Next Door (Emma Griffin FBI Mystery Book 4)

by A J Rivers

  He walks out of the house, and I start toward the laundry room. My phone rings, and I go back to answer it, assuming it's Sam calling with a warning to stop thinking about Ruby. Instead, I see Bellamy's name across the screen.

  "Hey, B," I answer as I carry the phone with me and start the washer for a load of towels. "How is your research going?”

  “I’ve actually made some good progress. I was doing some more poking and prodding and found the house you and your parents apparently lived in down in Florida."

  "You did?" I ask. I wish I could remember more about the house. Even its address. But like so much of my childhood, it's been blurred and blotted away by all the piled-up memories and conflicting stories. "Wait… house? Just one? I thought there were a couple different places."

  "As far as I've been able to track, there's only one. There might be another one I haven't found yet, but according to the daughter of the man who owned it then, your family lived here on and off for years. He did a lot of vacation rentals before short term vacation rentals were super popular. Your father would call and tell him when you were going to be around and book it for as long as you'd be there," she says.

  "I'm surprised he remembers us that well. Someone who rents a house as a vacation rental has to see a lot of people. It can't be that all that unusual for the same family to come regularly," I point out.

  "Well, he’s gone now. He died several years ago. But his daughter Christina manages the house now even though she lives in Virginia.”

  “She lives in Virginia?” I ask, surprised.

  “Yes. She wasn’t able to give me any details, but I got the feeling they knew each other from something different than just him renting the house in Florida to them. She told me the whole family used to spend half the year in Virginia and half in Florida.”

  “Wait, did you go to see her?” I ask.

  “Of course I did. You think I would find out she was less than two hours away and I wouldn’t go talk to her?”

  “I would think you would let me know so I could go with you,” I say.

  “Honestly, I didn’t know what she was going to tell me. I didn’t want you to get your hopes up and have it be a dead end. What I can tell you is that this man was someone important to them. Christina still has letters and postcards your parents sent to her father. One was from your mother wishing him a happy Easter, but you were in Vermont, so it was a snowman bunny holding a basket of eggs. It was really cute," she chuckles.

  "Easter in Vermont?" I frown. "I don't remember that. When was that?"

  “April 17, 2003.”

  I can't speak. My throat tightens, and no matter how hard I try, I can't force any sounds out of my throat.

  "Emma?" she tries a few seconds later.

  I close my eyes hard and shake my head to get myself out of my thoughts and back into reality.

  "That can't be right," I finally manage, shaky but trying to keep my voice steady.

  "It is. I wasn't going to tell you because I wanted it to be a surprise, but she gave them to me to bring back to you. She heard about your father and after your mother… she thought you might like them," she explains.

  "Yes. That's exactly why that can't be the date on the postcard."

  "I don't understand. There's one from your father, too. It's kind of generic. Just a landscape. But it has the same date. April 17th. The Thursday before Easter. Then there's a letter from the 23rd, just a few days after Easter. Christina told me there was a picture in it of the three of you dressed up for Easter. She's going to try to find it so she can send it to you, too."

  "Bellamy, my mother couldn't have sent him a postcard from Vermont on April 17th of that year. And there can't be a picture of the three of us on Easter. That's the year I turned twelve. My mother was murdered the Thursday before Easter. In Florida."

  I abandon the towels and rush into my bedroom. I clatter down to my knees beside the bed, yanking out the firebox from under it. My hand shakes as I try to put in the combination. It takes me three tries before I manage it. The door pops open, and I reach in for the envelope full of important documents. It's where I keep the deeds to the two houses, insurance information, the letter my father left me, bank account information, and other critical documents.

  Including my mother's death certificate.

  "Emma, what's going on?" Bellamy asks.

  "I'm going to send you a picture. Hold on."

  I put the certificate on the bed and snap a picture, making sure all the information on it is clear. I send it through to Bellamy and wait a few seconds.

  "Got it," she says.

  "See? She died that April," I point out. I am practically trembling, but I’m trying to keep myself steady. “April 17th.”

  "What do you remember?" she asks softly.

  "Not everything. Flashes. Pieces of that night. But I remember we were in Florida. At least, I think I do. There are just so many questions about that night and everything after. And this is a big one. What could this possibly mean?"

  "I don't know," she admits. “I’m sorry, Emma.”

  "Is anything I remember right? Does this mean that the place my mother died is wrong? Or the date? Or both? How could any of that be possible?"

  "I don't know," she says again. "But I'll keep digging. I'll find out everything I can. I promise, okay?"

  "Thank you," I whisper.

  I hang up the phone and sag down to sit on the bed. My hand rests on my mother's birth certificate, covering her name as if I'm trying to protect her now when I couldn't then.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  I spend most of the night hunched over my computer, poring over the information Bellamy emailed me. The scanned image of the postcard stares back at me, tormenting me. I know the handwriting on it. Even with everything else in my childhood either forgotten or clouded behind questions, that's something I won't forget.

  I can still see it sweeping my name across the front of my lunch bags, and on the bottom of notes, she wrote me to hide in my coat or my backpack when I went to school. I can still see the grocery lists, the letters, even the bills paid.

  My mother definitely wrote out this Easter greeting. But the date doesn't make sense. She couldn't have been in Vermont to send the postcard on that day. She was dead before the sun rose.

  I pull up an image of the house, after looking up the address Bellamy sent me. The address doesn't seem familiar. I toss it around in my head, even say it out loud to feel it on my tongue. It doesn't have any meaning. But when the image comes up on the screen, I can feel myself standing there. I remember the sun on my skin and the blissful relief of the breeze. I can smell the flowers that grew in the flowerbeds along the front of the house. Emotion tightens in my throat as I trace the house with my fingertips.

  The emptiness left by my parents is always with me. It's as much a part of me as the breath in my lungs and the blood in my veins. It's a constant feeling, lurking under every emotion and thought. It's always there, but I live beyond it. I move past it and keep going like it isn't there. Not because it doesn't hurt, but because most of the time, I don't remember what it feels like to not have it.

  But that constant feeling makes the sharp stab of emotion that rushes through me more intense. All the feeling had once been softened and smoothened out by time, but now it rises up and floods over me, crashing like waves of memory to the front of my mind. Those memories shift to thoughts of what could have been, and it's suddenly like I'm drowning.

  I've always been told everything that happens affects something else. Nothing is isolated. Nothing is solitary. Even the breaths people take create something else. Ever since my mother's death, a lingering voice in the back of my head has whispered to me, asking the same question.

  Am I what caused this? Did she die because of something I did? Or didn't do? Or just because I existed? Did my father disappear because of the same?

  I'm an adult now. Questions like that shouldn't impact me anymore. I shouldn't be afraid of what I can't see when
the things I can are so much more threatening. But in the latest hours of the night, when the suffocating tension threatens to break into morning, I can't push the thoughts away.

  Those first bits of light crack on the horizon and creep through the windows while I'm still staring at the computer. I have to find something. Anything that might help me understand. Bellamy's research abilities aren't significantly better than mine, but she sees things differently, comes up with different angles. It's what makes her especially good at her job as a consultant for the Bureau. It's also what led her to the discrepancy about my mother.

  I want to dig deeper. To find out everything I can. My whole life has been overrun with questions. I've never been able to be completely, totally confident in what I remembered. It has always been hazy and jumbled, just out of reach, no matter how I grasp for it. That's not what I want. No matter what the answers are, I need them. I can't live the life ahead of me when the foundation I'm building it on is so unsteady.

  Daylight taunts me mercilessly until I finally push the computer away and force myself to lie down. My eyelids drop down over stinging eyes, and my mind goes blank. It's less sleep than it is my body simply shutting off, but I'll take it.

  I hear something—familiar yet strange, new yet like I’ve heard it a million times before. A tiny brass bell rings over my head. I’m lying on a red velvet couch in a room I don't recognize. It continues to ring, over and over, but I can't reach it. My mother is there. Her graceful, thin face, her dark hair. No, it’s not my mother. It’s Ruby Baker.

  Why is she here?

  I try to ask her if she’s safe, but before I can open my mouth, the brass bell looms large right in my face. It rings again and again. Her face flashes. It’s my mother again. No, it’s Ruby Baker. She smiles and asks how I liked the cake.

  Her face is covered in blood.

  The bell rings again. Shattering my ears. Finally, the sound breaks through. Dark gives way to light, and I come out of sleep enough to realize it's my phone stuffed under my pillow that I'm hearing.

  “Hello?” I mumble into the phone, rubbing my eyes to wake them the rest of the way up.

  “Emma? Are you okay?” Sam asks.

  “I'm fine. I was just sleeping,” I tell him.

  “Oh, I'm sorry. Go back to sleep. Get some rest.”

  “No, what's going on? What do you need?”

  “It's nothing,” he tells me. “We got a call for a break-in, and one of the guys is out sick today. I thought you might want to get out of the house and come along. But it's fine. Get your sleep while you can.”

  “Are you sure?” I slur through the phone, trying to will myself awake. “I can come.”

  “No, really. You sound tired. It's nothing serious. Just an abandoned building. I'll see you when I get off this evening.”

  "’kay."

  I put my phone back under my pillow, but any grasp I had on sleep is gone. After a few minutes of trying to convince myself to rest a little longer, I give up and force myself out of bed. A shower wakes me up, and I call Bellamy as I make coffee to keep the energy rolling.

  She immediately rushes into a description of her morning and the man at the coffee shop who she thinks is hitting on her but isn't sure. By the way she's talking about it, it's blatantly clear the man is doing everything he possibly can to get her attention, but she's not absorbing it. It's not that Bellamy is dumb or even particularly dense about the attention she gets from men. She's one of those effortlessly beautiful women who can roll out of bed and go to the grocery store, but still manage to look like she's in a magazine. I suspect there's something else behind her confusion in this situation, and that something else goes by the name of Eric. After years of an almost contentious relationship opposite each other in the dual roles of my best friends, they were forced to spend more time together when I went to Feathered Nest. In the year since then, they've been orbiting around each other, simultaneously relying on each other more and pretending they don't notice each other.

  As much as I just want to push them together, I know both of them well enough to know that wouldn't work. They have to figure this out for themselves, one way or the other. When she's finished talking, she lets out a breath, and I know she's had enough of that train of thought. I give her a few vague words of encouragement that don't really mean anything. They don't need to. She just needs to talk things out. Then it's my turn.

  "Have you found out anything else? About, um…" I ask. I don’t need to clarify what about.

  “I haven't been able to confirm anything. There are a couple of things that have popped up, but nothing set in stone,” she tells me.

  “I appreciate you trying,” I say, my voice coming out partially as words and partially as a sigh.

  “You know, I've been considering a vacation to Florida for a while now. It just so happens I have some time available,” she says.

  I brush my fingers back through my hair and shake my head even though she can't see me.

  “I can't ask you to do that, B.”

  “You're not asking. It's an offer. I plan on running away from this almost-winter gloom and absorbing some sunlight. I might as well do some in-person poking around while I'm down there and see if I can confirm anything or get more information.”

  "That would be incredible. Things are a little complicated here right now, but if they straighten out, maybe I'll meet you down there for a few days," I tell her.

  Realizing I haven't had a chance to tell her anything, I fill her in about Ruby. There's a short stretch of silence once I finish the story.

  "And no one else has seen her? No one knows who she could be?" she asks.

  "No. But I need to find out. Wherever she is, she's in danger."

  "Let me know if I can help," she says.

  "You're already doing enough. Thank you, though."

  After too long, the combination of the coffee and the sugar rush of a leftover cinnamon roll kicks in, making me feel somewhat human again. I start across the street toward Ruby’s house, intending to take a look around the outside, but I've only made it halfway before my phone alerts me to a new text. It's from Sam.

  I need you. Meet me here.

  A second message comes through with an address. I jog back to my house, quickly change my clothes, and get in the car.

  Following the directions on my GPS, I head toward the outskirts of town.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The GPS brings me further out than I expect it to. It's late in the afternoon, and the main part of town is far behind me. Finally, I see an empty sign ahead, marking the entrance to a parking lot, and I turn in. Veins of grass crack through the old, crumbling pavement. What used to be white paint delineating parking spots across the black expanse are now reduced to flecks of white here and there. It's a small lot, likely made to accommodate no more than ten cars.

  At the end of the parking lot, a cobblestone walkway weaves through an overgrown lawn up to the sagging front porch of a derelict, abandoned hotel, furnished from what used to be an impressive farmhouse. Modern modifications and additions are evident, but for the most part, the building is as it was when it was built as a home so long ago.

  A narrow access road leads around to the back of the building. I assume that's where staff would park, leaving this lot available for guests. The emptiness of the front lot strikes me. I can only guess Sam and the rest of the team have gone back behind the building. I start to drive toward the access road, then hesitate. I take out my phone, pull up his number, and go to call it. Before it can ring, I end the call. If he is inside with a potentially dangerous person, I don't want to alert them to Sam's presence. At the same time, I don't know why he would summon me to a dangerous call without preparation.

  Are you here?

  I send the text and wait. Only seconds later, my phone alerts.

  Yes. Come inside.

  With no other cars in the lot, but also no urgency coming from Sam's messages, I'm not sure what to feel. Going against my initi
al instincts, I call Sam. It rings several times, but he doesn't answer. The back of my neck pricks. I reach under the passenger seat for my stun gun and attach it to my belt with a can of pepper spray. Holding my phone tightly and shining the flashlight from the front, I gingerly walk up the front steps and onto the porch. It feels like it can barely hold my weight. This is dangerous. I know it is, but I can't stop myself from going inside. Sam is here, and I'm not leaving him alone.

  The door to the once-beautiful building opens easily. Either it wasn't properly secured in the first place, just abandoned to crumble the way back into the dirt, or it's been breached several times before. I'm more inclined to think the latter. People tend not to abandon the things that matter to them easily. A hotel like this was someone's dream. It took all their time, energy, and resources, and this was a great source of pride for them at some point. Whether it was wrenched away from them because of financial losses or shuttered because the person who dreamed of it died and the rest of the family didn't want to continue with the legacy, its closure was most likely not an easy thing. Even though it was lost, whoever walked out of the hotel last the final day of its operation felt something for this place. They may have held a deep-seated hope that someone else would scoop it up and bring it back to its glory. Or they just wanted to give it the respect it deserved after so many years. Either way, I don't see them just shutting the door and leaving it behind.

  They would know the big building would appeal to people looking for mischief. They wouldn't want it damaged or to be where something horrible could happen.

  I walk inside. The dank, dusty smell of air trapped within the building for too long nearly chokes me.

  "Sam?" I call out.

  My voice sounds explosively loud in the silent hotel. Above me, I hear heavy footsteps. I move toward them and feel fear starting to crawl up the back of my spine. My hand moves to my stun gun. I'm ready to pull it out if I need it, but I continue forward. I call for Sam again, but there's no response. The main stairwell in the middle of the entryway leads up to a large hallway. I try to orient myself, figuring out where the footsteps might have come from, and turn to the left. I've never been here, but it's eerily familiar. The memories it brings up of the last time I walked through an abandoned, disintegrating home make me queasy and the memory of heat ripples along my skin.