Leeanne added, “For one thing, they took little Becky Lewis in for questioning. They held her at the station for a whole day, poor thing.”
“Becky Lewis was Suzanne’s best friend,” Donnie stated, holding a pillow in his lap.
“That’s right.” Bennie took a big swallow of his drink. “Becky and Trina Kierra. The three were cheerleaders and inseparable. And I’ll have you know, neither of those girls would hurt a fly.”
“Becky never recovered from it. Her mother and I had a falling out because of it, but I kept tabs on her through friends for many years.” Leeanne held her wine glass in a shaky hand.
Morgan wrote, “Trina Kierra,” in her notebook, as the name wasn’t listed on the report. “Do you have a picture of them? Becky and Trina?” she asked. She hoped one of them had blond hair.
“Yes, of course.” Seeming relieved to have something to do, Leeanne set her glass on a nearby table and skipped out of the room.
Uncomfortable, Donnie leaned forward over the pillow in his lap. On either side of him, more pillows toppled toward him, encroaching on his space. He shifted one of them to under his arm.
“I tell you, they weren’t the ones the police should have been targeting. I would have questioned those Klein kids if it had been up to me.” Bennie finished his drink and stood up. “You sure I can’t get you something?”
Both detectives shook their heads.
“Who were they? The Kleins.” Morgan spun around on the sofa to look at Bennie behind her at the bar.
“Ekhard Klein and his little sister, Caryn. Like Karen, only pronounced weird. Caryn was a creepy kid.”
“I read the files. Ekhard was Suzanne’s boyfriend, wasn’t he?” Morgan asked. She wrote, “Creepy Caryn,” in her book.
“Suzanne did that to get back at us.” Leeanne had reentered with a thick photo album. “You know how teenagers love to act out their frustrations. Dating Ekhard was Suzanne’s rebellion against us.” Sitting down on the sofa next to Morgan, she opened the book on her lap.
“Tell us about him,” Morgan said.
“Ekhard wasn’t a bad kid,” Bennie answered. “He was kind of a dope, though. His dad didn’t help them out either. Theo was an alcoholic, and in fact he died the following year.” Bennie asked his wife, “Did Ekhard go to college, sweetie?”
“He went to college for a year.” Leeanne picked up her glass, finished what was left, then handed the empty glass to her husband.
“After Theo died, the kids sold the house. I don’t know what became of them after that,” Bennie continued.
“They sold everything, the house and their dad’s warehousing business, and moved across town to an apartment,” Leeanne explained.
Bennie stood behind his wife, looking at the album. “That’s right. I dealt with Theo as a business associate for a few years.”
“Ten. It was ten years, Bennie, and we knew their mother, too, before she left them. Her name was Anna.”
“Their mother left them?” Morgan asked.
Donnie mouthed to Morgan, “Write that down.”
“It was so sad,” Leeanne said. “After that, Theo went to the doghouse.”
“The liquor store, you mean,” her husband corrected.
“What kind of business did you do together?” Morgan asked Bennie.
“Theo owned a small warehouse just outside of town. At times, I had large shipments of furniture coming from the West Coast. He stored our overflow.”
Morgan lit up. “You own that furniture store near the mall.”
Bennie burst into song, “We treat you like family,” and handed a refilled glass to his wife.
“Now’s not the time, Ben.” Leeanne sipped again.
“So back to Ekhard and his sister,” Donnie said. He pushed aside the pillows, now piled up on his right side.
“Ekhard had an alibi. His sister vouched for him,” Bennie said.
“But Suzy spent lots of time with him. He picked her up in his car and she came home at all hours.” Leeanne pointed to a photo of three young girls in cheerleading outfits. “Here are Becky and Trina with our Suzy.”
Donnie half-stood to look, then leaned back on a pillow. He stood up again and shifted three pillows that had fallen back into his seat.
The girls looked like every American high school cheerleader. Becky had black hair, and Trina’s was brown and long, down to her elbows.
“Do you think Ekhard had something to do with her disappearance?” Morgan asked.
“Yes,” Bennie said.
“No,” Leeanne said. “Ekhard didn’t have a wicked bone in his body. I think it was his sister. If anyone should be investigated, it’s her. Caryn Klein was a scary kid.”
CHAPTER 19
MORGAN
Sheets lay across Morgan’s bare body, cooling the heat that lingered between her legs. Rob took care to make her happy. The warm afterglow of satisfying sex filled her with a sense of contentment that she was sure she didn’t deserve. She didn’t mean to lead Rob on. And having promised him nothing yet, she wondered what she’d have to give up if she settled down with him. Lately she’d been thinking about applying to the U.S. Marshals. If she did get the job—and she knew it might take a few years—she couldn’t imagine how married life would fit in with it. But she wasn’t ready to give up the dream.
Ever since Fay’s murder, Morgan had had only one goal in her life. That was to find the killer. Much like Suzanne and Hallie, Fay had been bludgeoned to death. Police never found the killer. The only clue had been a name written in Fay’s journal—Larry Milhouse. Yet Larry Milhouse, like Ekhard Klein, didn’t exist. No one by that name was registered at IU in Bloomington. He didn’t live in the city of Bloomington or anywhere in the state of Indiana.
Morgan had been in such denial that Fay was seeing someone that she thought Fay had made up the name. She even told police she thought so. And until recently, Morgan’s memories from the time of Fay’s death came from photos and diary entries. So much of it had been blocked out. Not forgotten. Just erased.
Her psychiatrist, Dr. Taylor, had said that it was Perpetration-Induced Traumatic stress syndrome. The PITS. Which was the truth. She predicted that the memories would surface again someday. And now … seeing Hallie’s face had triggered the awakening.
Deep in sleep on her bed, Rob snorted and turned onto his belly. Far from ready to join him, Morgan’s mind buzzed with questions. She slid out from under the sheet and felt her way to a pair of jeans on the floor. The rough seams rubbed her inner thighs as she pulled them on. On the foot of the bed, Gretta lifted her head, then rolled over on her back. It took Morgan several minutes’ groping in the dark to locate her tank top that had been tossed on the desk chair. She put it on before realizing it was inside out, then left it that way and padded down to the kitchen.
The coffee pot burbled on the counter next to Morgan’s laptop. Blue light from her computer lit up her hands and the green coffee cup she’d filled. Morgan dragged a stool to the end of the counter and climbed up on it.
At the time of Suzanne’s death, Rebecca Harrington had been attending a private college in Louisville, Kentucky. Due to the precision of the strike patterns on both Hallie and Suzanne, and of Rebecca’s alibi, Morgan removed Rebecca from the list of suspects to focus on the one person she couldn’t find: Ekhard Marcus Klein.
On the screen, his name had bounced back to “No Records Found” in every search she had tried. He didn’t show up in rental records or as a property owner, and there were no arrests or court records. Yet his death wasn’t recorded either. At his last known haunt, Butler University his course load had been heavy in mathematics for one semester, then he had vanished.
Morgan sipped her coffee and made a note to look in public records stacks in the courthouse.
Ekhard’s sister, Caryn Klein, might know something about him. Morgan made a note to connect with her first thing in the morning. Does she know where her brother is? Morgan typed the number into her cell phone and wrote
down her work address. In another search, Morgan found that Trina Kierra had married Randall Tanner in 2010. They had one child, a seven-year-old boy, and lived in Crown Point, Indiana. Her husband worked in Chicago. Perhaps Trina would have some more insights. Morgan wrote her address on a pad of paper and the next one too.
Becky Lewis, who lived in a crappy neighborhood in downtown Indy, had been the one most questioned by police after Suzanne’s disappearance. Now, Becky owned a house in a neighborhood that Morgan wouldn’t visit unless necessary. And it was.
Morgan yawned. The coffee had sustained her for an hour, but now she was tired. She closed her laptop, plunging the room into darkness. Feeling her way back to bed, she found Gretta spread out along the foot and Rob curled up on his side. She loved the way he smelled. Without waking them, she slipped out of her jeans and under the warm covers. For a long while, she lay awake thinking about how she also loved the way Rob looked at her when he wanted to touch her. And how he approached her with such tenderness.
But now she was sleepy. She didn’t have time to plan her future. She couldn’t fathom what that would look like. In the dark, the only thing she could see was the dead girl Suzanne. She was only a few years younger than Fay had been.
CHAPTER 20
MORGAN: 16 Years Ago
Fay slung her backpack over her shoulder and stood up to go. “See you tomorrow then.”
“What?” Sitting cross-legged on the floor with a small stack of books in her lap, Morgan looked up from the box she’d been packing. “You’re leaving?”
“Yeah.” Fay checked her watch.
“I didn’t know you had to work tonight.” Morgan moved the stack to one side.
Fay checked inside her pack, moved things around, and pulled out her headphones. As she looped them around her neck, Morgan noticed she was blushing.
“Yeah. They called this morning. I’m covering for Dimitri. He’s on vacation or something.”
No. Morgan thought. That’s not right. Fay’s lying. “Dimitri, huh? Well, that sucks.”
“Yeah.” Fay’s voice was entirely too singsong. “Well, gotta go.” Her cheeks had become the color of cranberry juice.
Like a kangaroo, Morgan sprung to her feet. “Fay. Wait.”
Fay moved quickly to Morgan’s bedroom door. Before Morgan could catch up with her, she was down the stairs and putting on her yellow high-tops.
Morgan touched her friend’s arm, trying to make eye contact with her. “Fay. Where are you really going?”
“Work. Like I said.” Fay’s gaze remained lowered and focused on her yellow high-tops. Morgan had a matching pair, only hers were blue.
“I thought your mom didn’t let you work the night shift at The Hamburger Stand.” Morgan didn’t understand why Fay was lying.
“Today she did.” Fay still avoided Morgan’s gaze and opened the front door.
A new tactic was necessary. Morgan let a sly grin cross her lips. “The other day you said you met someone.”
Now Fay looked her in the eye. “I did not! Leave it alone, will you?”
Morgan released Fay’s arm and raised both hands in surrender. “Okay. Don’t get mad. Geez.”
Fay looked at her watch again. “Look, I have to go or I’ll be late.”
“Do you need a ride?” Morgan offered, hoping to get the truth out of her on the way.
Fay thought this over for a moment. Then, irresolutely, she said, “No. I’m taking the bus.” She slipped past Morgan and out the front door. “See you tomorrow.”
“Okay, bye.” Morgan waved.
How weird was that? It was obvious that Fay was lying about something. Work? Or maybe … could Fay have actually met someone? Morgan’s lips sagged at the corners. Who? Where had they met? Who?
CHAPTER 21
MORGAN
As she zipped between semitrucks on I-65 northbound, Morgan’s fingertips grazed the smooth, black-leather steering wheel of the Mazda RX-8. On her way to interview Trina Kierra-Tanner somewhere between cities and surrounded by cornfields, she decided that she loved the car. She loved it right up till lights of a state patrol car flashed behind her, pulling her over. This wouldn’t have happened if Donnie had been driving. Yet Morgan couldn’t blame him for spending the day with his daughters.
Though embarrassing, it had been easy to get out of the ticket by flashing her badge. The officer had caught her going 103 in a 70-mph zone. He recognized her too, because he used to work in Indy with Rob Gibson. Rob will hear about this and I’ll never live it down, Morgan thought.
A half-hour later, in the town of Crown Point, Indiana, she parked the red rental car in front of an old brick Tudor-style home where Trina Kierra-Tanner lived with her husband and son. The heavy front door opened before she could knock, and out of the house ran a blond boy followed by a black puppy. The kid whipped past Morgan, but the floppy-eared dog stopped with tail wagging and tongue lolling. Morgan bent to pet the dog as he sniffed her shoes.
A lithe teenage girl bounded out after them and almost ran Morgan over. She apologized before asking how she could help.
“Is Mrs. Tanner at home?” Morgan asked.
“She’s in the breakfast room. Follow me.” She shouted out to the kid, “Stay in the front yard, Charlie.”
Inside the darkened house, the girl led her to the back room, a sunny, cozy kitchen. “Mrs. Tanner?” She called out. “Someone is here for you.” The girl waved her thin arms in the direction of a room full of potted plants.
Trina emerged from behind a small palm tree with a watering can in one hand and a pile of dead leaves in the other. “Hello, Detective Jewell. I didn’t expect you so soon.” Her hair, bleached and wispy, gave her an angelic glow. She set the watering can down on the counter and placed the leaves in the trash can under the sink. Then turned to the sink and washed her hands and dried them on a flower-print towel that hung on the stove handle. “Thank you for driving all the way up here.”
“There wasn’t any traffic. Must be because it’s Saturday,” Morgan fibbed. An unexpected yawn opened her jaw wide. She covered her mouth with the back of a hand. “Excuse me.” Sleep hadn’t come easily over the last week. It was catching up with her.
With warm, clean hands, Trina welcomed Morgan as if they were old friends. “Can I get you a cup of coffee?” she asked.
At a small wooden breakfast table with sunlight pouring in on them, Morgan and Trina faced each other, sipping espresso from dainty cups decorated in ornate colorful patterns.
“There were four of us at first. Suzanne and I told Becky and Julia what to do. At the beginning of senior year, Suzanne kicked Julia out of the group. Today they’d say Julia was bullied. She was, you know.” Trina looked at her lap, her hair a halo in the sunlight. The large window behind her was a perfect spot for the numerous indoor plants and potted flowers that covered every surface and hung from the ceiling.
“Was Suzanne the leader of the group?” Morgan asked.
“I guess so. We were terrible people. All of us were bullies. Becky and Suzanne loved to pick on underclassmen. They got off on watching kids die of embarrassment.” Trina toyed nervously with her hair as if she still carried guilt from all those years ago. “I … did too. I wasn’t an innocent bystander, Detective.”
“None of us were, Trina,” Morgan said. The strong taste of coffee lingered on her tongue. She hoped the caffeine buzz wouldn’t affect her driving on the way home as she lifted the delicate cup to her lips and finished it. “What about Ekhard? What was your take on Suzanne’s relationship with him?”
Trina shook her head. “Gosh, I forgot about him. The way I remember it, their relationship was an experiment.”
“In what way?”
“Suzanne planned on dumping him hard. Poor guy. He was a dork. He had no idea what was coming. What would have come, you know, if …”
Charlie burst into the room with the puppy after him. “Mom, Mom! I got him to sit! Watch!”
Drool dripped from the panting dog’s mo
uth. It sat down, needing a rest.
“Sit.” The boy commanded. “See? Can I give him a treat?”
The swift-footed teenager sprung into the room. “There you are!”
“Can I, Mom? Please?” he begged.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Tanner. Charlie wanted treats for Nemo.”
Pointing toward the kitchen, Trina smiled. “That’s fine. Do you know where they are, Jenna?”
“Yes. Come on, Charlie. Nemo, come on.” Charlie and the dog followed the girl into the kitchen.
Trina picked up her cup. “Empty. Would you like a refill?”
“No, thank you. Any more caffeine and I won’t sleep at all tonight,” Morgan said. I might get stopped again for speeding was her thought.
“So, where were we?” Trina stood and cleared the empty cups from the table.
“You were telling me about Suzanne and Ekhard,” Morgan reminded her. “Perhaps Ekhard saw Suzanne’s ulterior motive.”
“Well, if you’re wondering if he could have killed her, I don’t think so.” Trina stepped into the kitchen and returned with a plate of muffins.
“What happened to him anyway? Where did he go after college?” Morgan eyed the sweet snacks hungrily because she hadn’t yet eaten.
“Oh, Ekhard and I weren’t friends. I have no idea.”
Morgan had been burning to ask this next question. “Who do you think killed Suzanne and buried her body in the woods?”
Trina shook her head. Her blue eyes remained fixed on Morgan as she said, “Honestly, it could have been any number of kids. Girls and boys hated her. Suzanne wasn’t nice, and she didn’t care how many enemies she made.”
CHAPTER 22
CARYN
“Oh, Riannda, tell Harry I can’t make it today,” Caryn said in her practiced, puny voice. “I feel so … I just can’t get out of bed.”
“Are you taking any echinacea? It helps your immune system fight off bugs. Is it your stomach again? You probably have a flu virus.”
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