Dark Truth (14 page)

S
ixteen

Nina sat on her living room sofa with the worn cardboard box on her lap, the lid partially open, and asked herself for the hundredth time why it was so difficult to open the letter her father had left for her. What was she afraid of?

That she’d learn something about him she didn’t want to know?

Too late. She’d lived for sixteen years with the belief that he was a serial killer and an adulterer. What could be worse than that?

That maybe after all these years of telling herself that none of it mattered, that he’d taken her in after her mother died because he had to, that maybe she’d discover that it did matter after all?

Getting close.

That maybe after having convinced herself that she had no real feelings for him, she’d discover that she had cared for him, and him for her?

Or that he hadn’t cared at all? And that she cared more than she’d wanted to admit?

Bingo.

This is silly,
she told herself.
Stop making excuses and just open the damned envelope.

She reached into the box. She found the envelope under one of the shoes, and she opened it as soon as she removed it from the box.
No more excuses. Just do it. Get it over with.

My dear Nina,

Well, what a sorry state of affairs this is.

I can only begin to imagine what a nightmare this has been for you. I saw you in the lobby the day I was arrested, and I have never felt such humiliation in my life. I can’t imagine anything worse than being led away in handcuffs, accused of the most vile crimes, with your only child watching. The others standing around—my colleagues—barely mattered. But my child. My daughter.

There are no words to tell you how I ached for you. How humiliated you, too, must have felt.

I was relieved when I’d heard you’d left Stone River, and prayed that you would not come back for the trial. My greatest fear, going into the courtroom, was not that I’d be convicted as much as that you would be there to witness my shame, and, therefore, feel ashamed yourself.

My greatest remorse was for what you went through because of me. Even if I’d been guilty of all the things they accused me of, I doubt I could have brought you greater pain. It seems that my entire life has been spent bringing pain to those I loved the most. Your mother. You. Olivia. I suppose in the afterlife that will be judged to have been my greatest sin. That I caused such pain to those who loved me.

Regardless of what you may have heard, please believe that I am innocent of killing those girls. Guilty of having toyed with them, guilty of breaking my promises to Olivia, guilty of not being able to control my passions. Perhaps my sins led others to commit those terrible crimes, but you must believe that I did not kill them. I swear on your mother’s life that I did not murder those four girls.

Someday, if you can find it in your heart, please remember me in your prayers.

I am, and will always be,
Your loving father

Nina blew out a long-held breath and wiped the tears from her face as she read the letter through again. She still wasn’t sure how she felt about her father, but she felt consoled, somehow, by his words.

He claimed to have loved her. She’d never permitted herself to think that he had. All these years she’d believed she’d been no more than a peripheral part of his life, some loose little tangent, and now here he claimed to have loved her. You don’t love loose threads.

Even now, in her mid-thirties, it was heady stuff.

She read the letter through two more times, then folded it carefully and returned it to its envelope. Stephen Madden may not have been a very good father—and God knew he’d been a lousy husband to both of his wives—but by his own admission, he’d loved his child. What did she owe him in return for this late gift?

She stayed on the sofa for almost an hour, thinking back over her childhood, the times when he was gone, the times when he came back. The summers after the divorce, when she’d stay with him for a few weeks in the summer—weekends during the school year—they’d been so awkward with each other. He didn’t seem to understand children at all.

And then, the summer she turned twelve, he’d taken her with him to London. It had been the best two weeks of her life, but later she’d blocked out the trip as if it had never occurred. It had been too good to be true, and as with so many such things, had been too painful to remember after he’d fallen from grace in her eyes.

For those two weeks, her father had taken her everywhere—she needed to see London, he’d told her, it was the most beautiful city in the world.
When you’re in college,
he’d promised,
you can take a semester here, or a year, if you like.
She’d believed him.

They’d walked in Hyde Park and listened as a woman dressed in men’s clothing stood on Speakers’ Corner and talked about her plan for universal salvation, and he’d taken her photograph standing beside the statue of Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens. They’d strolled Portobello Road, and he’d bought her a tiny ring in one of the antiques stalls. They visited the Tower of London and Madame Tussaud’s, and St. Marylebone Church, where Elizabeth Barrett married Robert Browning. He’d taken her to the Sherlock Holmes Museum and the Victoria and Albert and the British Museum, whose treasures had inspired a keen interest in archaeology that she’d never lost. They’d had high tea at Harrad’s and shopped for books on Charing Cross Road. That summer had been the first time in her life that she’d felt as if she had a father, and he was wonderful.

He’d stayed in London to teach a semester, and he’d sent her back home wondering how her mother could have left such a glorious man, how could she have kept Nina from knowing her incredible father for all those years, allowing her only brief bits of time with him. She’d anxiously awaited his return at the end of the summer, certain there’d be more adventures for them in the fall.

And then, shortly after he’d returned to the States and to St. Ansel’s, he’d called to tell her he was getting married. She’d never forgotten the feeling that had spread through her. She’d felt as if he was abandoning her all over again, and she’d known instinctively that she’d never feel close to him again. She never got her semester in London, and she’d never returned to the city.

And she’d never quite forgiven Olivia, or him.

It had been years since she’d permitted herself to look back on that summer, but once she did, the memories washed through her in a flood.

Damn,
but it hurt.

She got up and went into her bedroom in search of a tissue with which to dry her face. She brought a handful back to the living room, blew her nose in one and took it into the kitchen to toss into the trash. She took a cold bottle of spring water from the refrigerator and drank half of it standing up near the window that overlooked the fire escape. By the time she’d returned to the sofa, her emotions were under control and her focus clear.

First thing in the morning she’d call Detective Powell and assure him that there was nothing in the letter from her father that would be of interest to the police, other than his denial of having been involved in the murders.

She looked into the box and saw the brown leather shoes her father had been wearing at the time he was imprisoned. His shoes, his white shirt, his tan cashmere sweater to which a faint trace of cologne still clung. A fat brown envelope lay in the bottom under a Bible with a worn brown leather cover. Several personal items—the tortoiseshell comb he’d always carried in the pocket of his sport jacket, a small phone book with a black cover, a handful of change—were scattered through the box.

She opened the brown envelope and was surprised to find photographs of her and her mother among the pictures of Olivia and her father on their wedding day. The envelope had been sealed, and it occurred to her that perhaps he’d had memories that he’d found too raw to face, too, memories he’d had to hide away in dark denial. She picked up the envelope to slide the photos back in, and felt something in the bottom. She reached in and pulled out the small gold ring he’d bought her in London. How had it gotten into the envelope?

She’d sent it back to him, after his marriage to Olivia had caused her so much confusion and hurt. It was the only thing she could think of—as a twelve-year-old with an overactive sense of the dramatic—to express her rejection of his affection after he’d sprung this new wife on her out of the blue.

Nina slid the ring onto her pinky and admired the tiny amethysts set in the center of the little golden rose. It fit, so she kept it on.

So, that’s done,
she told herself as she closed the box and returned it to the closet shelf. She’d faced what she’d feared, and she was fine. Better than fine. There’d be more to think about, more to digest, but she’d had her fill of emotion for one night, and needed to put it aside.

When she went to sleep that night, for the first time in her adult life, it was with the thought that perhaps her father had loved her after all.

S
eventeen

Wes stood on the sidewalk in front of the Tudor-style stucco home for several minutes before approaching the front door. He wanted to get a feel for the place, to understand the layout of the property. To the right was the driveway, at the end of which was a two-car garage that mimicked the architectural style of the house. The house and garage were connected by a brick path, and the front and back yards were separated by a white lattice fence with a gate. Rosebushes climbed high and stretched from the house to the roof of the garage. At either side of the property was a stand of very large evergreens. A low hedge ran across the front of the house, and large holly bushes obscured the windows on both sides of the front door. The house and garage were set back a bit from the street, so that the overall impression was of a tidy house that fit snugly in its seclusion.

He wasn’t really sure that this wasn’t a waste of his time. On the drive over from the police station, he’d asked himself what he wanted to accomplish by coming here, to the house Stephen Madden had shared with his wife and his daughter. The best answer Wes had been able to come up with was that he wanted to get a feel for the three men who had been close to Olivia. Somehow, her relationships with them—and with Stephen—felt pivotal to the case, and his gut told him it would be wise of him to get to know her, too.

He walked to the door and was raising his hand to ring the doorbell when it opened. A man who appeared to be in his late thirties or so stood in the doorway. He wore a light green crewneck sweater and olive Dockers and a cautious expression.

“Mr. Stillman?” Wes inquired.

“Yes. Detective Powell?” The man’s voice was smooth and steady.

“Right.”

“Come on in.” Kyle Stillman stepped aside to permit Wes to enter the house. “I was just about to come out to get you. You looked as if you weren’t sure this was the right house.”

“I wasn’t certain at first. I had a hard time finding the house number.”

They stood in the foyer, which, like the living room, appeared to have been freshly painted. Wes commented on that.

“Oh, yes, I’ve been busy,” Kyle told him. “Just sprucing up the place, since I’m thinking about selling it. I guess you spoke with my stepsister. I imagine she told you about the deal with the house.”

“I don’t know that she mentioned it.”

“Come on in the kitchen.” Kyle gestured toward the arched passage behind him. “We can sit and talk in there. I just finished the last of the coffee, but I’d be happy to make a fresh pot, if you’d like some.”

“No, thanks. I’ve had my two-cup-per-day limit already.” Wes went directly to the table and took the chair facing out from the corner. There was something about Kyle Stillman that made him uneasy, something that made him want to not sit with his back to the room. “So what was the deal with the house and your stepsister?”

“Nina’s father owned this place before he married my mother, but after they were married, he never put Mom’s name on the deed. Turns out he made provisions for Mom to livre in the event he died before she did, but upon her death, the house was supposed to pass directly to Nina.” Kyle sat down across from Wes.

“So you’re telling me that Nina owns the house.”

“Nina did own the house. She signed it over to me. You believe that? She
gave
me the house. Said she’d never been happy here, it only held bad memories, that it should have belonged to my mother, and if it had, the house would now belong to me. So she signed it over. You ever hear of anyone doing something like that?”

“No, actually, I haven’t. That was very generous of her.”

“It just shows you the type of person she is.”

Before Wes could respond, Kyle said, “So, you said on the phone you wanted to talk about the letter Stephen wrote to my mother shortly before he died. I’m assuming you read it. What did you think of it?”

“Strange idea he had.”

“Strange? It’s ludicrous.” Kyle laughed. Wes thought it had a hollow ring. “How someone as smart as Nina could take that seriously . . . I just can’t fathom it. It’s a crazy idea.”

“Well, no doubt Dr. Madden’s affairs had to have hurt your mother terribly.”

“You have no idea what she went through on his account. He just . . . “ Kyle looked away. “She was just destroyed by him.”

“Wouldn’t she have wanted to destroy him in return?”

“Mother?” He shook his head. “She wasn’t the murderous type. She was really a very good, very sweet woman. Everybody loved her.”

“But she had to have been angry with her husband.”

“I’m sure she was for a while, those first few years they were married especially.” He shrugged. “But after a while, I think she accepted that that was the way he was and he was never going to change.”

“Well, just to set your mind at ease, I agree that it’s not likely that your mother was the killer. But I am interested in his claims to have found the weapon.” Wes kept his eyes on Kyle’s face. “If Dr. Madden had found the murder weapon here, in or around this house, I would imagine that he’d have immediately suspected she’d been the one who’d hidden it. No one else had access to the house, except for her. Who else could have hidden it?”

“You’re not taking this seriously, are you?” Kyle asked.

“Just dotting the
i
’s and crossing the
t
’s. We do have these new allegations . . . and the mention of finding the murder weapon. Which as you probably know, we never did find.”

“I seem to recall that.” Kyle nodded.

“Well, here’s the important part, Kyle. Yesterday morning, a young woman named Allison Mulroney was found dead in her apartment on campus. She’d been stabbed to death.”

“I saw that on the news. Kind of like déjà vu all over again.”

“Here’s something you didn’t hear on the news, Kyle. The wounds on this girl are identical to the wounds on those girls who were killed sixteen years ago. Same width, some length, same depth. One would venture to guess, same knife in the same hand.”

“How could that be?” Kyle frowned. “Stephen Madden’s been dead for almost fifteen years now.”

“That’s what I’m going to find out. You think of any likely suspects, anyone you recall having spent a lot of time around the house back then, you be sure to give me a call . . .”

“Well, you know, Father Whelan spent quite a bit of time here. I don’t think a day passed when he did not stop by to see my mother. And then, of course, there was Dr. Overbeck.”

“Dr. Overbeck?” Wes asked with a straight face, as if he hadn’t already heard the story. “Who is Dr. Overbeck?”

“He was—still is—a professor of English at the college. My understanding was that he was a bit of a rival of Stephen’s.”

“A rival for what?”

“For the top position in the department. Stephen definitely had the inside track there. Or at least he did until he was arrested.” Kyle stared at Wes for a moment, then said, “And there was also my mother.”

“What about your mother?”

“She and Dr. Overbeck had an affair.”

“Really?” Wes raised his eyebrows and tried to look surprised. “When was that?”

“I believe Mom said it started about a year or two before Stephen was arrested. She ended it after Stephen died.”

“Was he married?”

“He wasn’t at the time. I think he may have married since, but I’m not sure about that.”

“So you’re saying that Dr. Overbeck would have had access to the house because he was here occasionally with your mother?”

“It was more than occasionally.
Quite frequently
is more accurate.”

“Would he have been here often enough to find a good hiding place if he’d had something to hide?”

“Sure.”

“What do you suppose his motive could have been for killing Dr. Madden’s girlfriends?”

Kyle shrugged. “Hey, it’s just a guess on my part, but maybe he thought, with Stephen out of the way, he could just skate right into his life. You know, the job, my mother . . .”

“Why not just kill Dr. Madden, then? Surely if he was smart enough to kill four girls and get away with it for—what was it, eighteen months or so?—he’d have been smart enough to have killed one man and gotten away with it.”

“Who knows what he was thinking?”

“You think it could have been him?”

“If it wasn’t Stephen, then, sure. It could have been him.”

“How about Father Whelan?”

“I don’t see him as having a motive. Oh, yeah, he was in love with my mom, I guess Nina told you that. But it’s too easy, you know? I just don’t see it.”

“Who else might have had a motive, Kyle? Can you think of anyone else?”

“No, really, I can’t. But if I think of someone, I’d be happy to give you a call.”

“You do that.” Wes stood to leave. “Say, do you mind if I ask what you do for a living?”

“I’m a security guard. I’m on disability right now, damaged the tendons in my shooting hand, can’t use my gun anymore.” Kyle shrugged. “Can’t send a one-handed man out on the street with a gun, and my company does almost all armed work, so they put me out on disability.”

“You having any therapy for that?”

“Oh, I was, for several months. They said I’d reached, what did they call it?”

“Maximum medical improvement?”

“Yeah, something like that. So unless they can find something for me to do that doesn’t require me to use my right hand too much, I’m pretty much at home these days.”

“Sorry to hear it.”

“Yeah. I miss the job.” Kyle stood and walked partway to the door. “Anything else I can do for you?”

“No, I think we’re okay for now.” Wes rose and followed him.

The two men walked outside together.

“What’s the name of the company you work for?” Wes asked.

“White Shepherd. Why?”

“I was just thinking, I know a few guys who own guard services. If I hear anything you might be interested in, I can give you a call.”

“That’d be great. Thanks. And if anything else comes up, or you have any other questions about my mom or whatever, give me a call.”

“I’ll be sure to do that.” Wes shook Kyle’s hand and got into his car.

Wes glanced in his rearview mirror as he drove toward the stop sign at the end of the street. He could see Kyle still standing on the sidewalk, where Wes had left him, watching the car drive away.

Odd duck
were the two words that came to Wes’s mind as he made his left onto Locust Drive.

He was early for his appointment with Dr. Overbeck, so Wes took the opportunity to take a walk around St. Ansel’s campus. Even two weeks earlier, there’d have been leaves on the trees, but with the cold snap they’d had, there was little color left clinging to the branches of the maples that lined the campus walks. Groups of students passed by, all seeming to chat at the same time. He saw few girls walking alone, and wondered if the news about Allison Mulroney had put the fear of God into them. He hoped it did. He hoped, too, that they’d be doubling up at night. The chief had held a press conference earlier that morning, and had suggested that any girls living alone should get together or stay with friends until the killer was caught, but Wes figured most of these girls had probably missed the broadcast. When he returned to the station, he’d suggest that flyers be printed up and passed around the campus, just to make sure everyone got the message: There’s safety in numbers.

He wandered back toward Celestine Hall, and thought about the approach he’d take with the professor. He was still thinking about it when he knocked on Overbeck’s office door.

“Hey, come on in,” Dr. Overbeck greeted him from behind his desk. In seconds he was at the door, his hand extended, shaking Wes’s hand enthusiastically. “You’re Detective Powell, right?”

“Right. It’s good of you to make time to meet with me.”

“Hey, whatever we can do here on campus to help you out.” He gestured for Wes to take a seat in one of the dark green leather chairs that stood on the opposite side of the desk. He was tall and wiry, with blond hair that had grayed and small dark eyes. He was dressed casually in jeans and a sweater vest over a shirt with a button-down collar. He stood behind his chair for a moment before sitting. “Terrible tragedy, that poor Mulroney girl, isn’t it?”

Dr. Overbeck made a
tsk-tsk
sound and shook his head.

“She was just a lovely girl. Good student. Friendly. A little on the quiet side, but not overly shy. Terrible tragedy,” he repeated. “I suppose you want to know if I’ve noticed anyone following her from class, or if anyone seemed to hang around her, but honestly, I never noticed. I mean, if there was someone bothering her, or following her, she never mentioned it. But then again, why would she? I mean, I only have her for that one class. And as for her social life, I’m afraid I can’t help you there. I did hear that she dated one of the boys on the basketball team, but I don’t know who.”

The professor stopped and looked at Wes, as if waiting for the detective to say something. When he did not, Overbeck said, “Well, that’s what you wanted to know, right? What I knew about Allison Mulroney?”

“While I appreciate the information, actually it was another murder I wanted to discuss with you.”

“Another murder?” Overbeck frowned. “Good God, there’s been another one?”

“I’m referring to the murders sixteen years ago. The ones Dr. Madden was convicted of.” Wes kept his eyes on Overbeck’s face, and watched the surprise register.

“Why would you be interested in those? As you say, there was a conviction in that case.” Overbeck’s face took on a wary expression. “What has that case got to do with this one?”

“There are similarities between the murders.” Wes leaned back in the chair and spoke slowly, drawing it out. Watching Overbeck’s eyes.

“What kind of . . . what are you talking about?” Overbeck drew his hand through his hair. “I’m sorry, Detective, but I’m simply not following you at all. Stephen Madden died years ago. So any similarities between those murders and this one . . .”

“Need to be explored,” Wes interrupted him. “We need to take a look at the big picture here, Dr. Overbeck. Sixteen years ago, we had four young women killed in exactly the same manner. The bodies left in the same position, the clothing handled in the same manner. Obviously someone methodical, right? Now here we have a young woman who’s been killed in the same manner, left in the same position. Clothes folded the same as the others. Makes you think.”