Hard Truth (17 page)

“Our blankets are still here,” she said. “We used to spread them out on the floor and lie on them to read or have picnics or whatever. Sometimes, in winter, it would be cold, so we’d wrap up in them to keep the chill off.”

She stood with her blanket in her hands, then opened it up.

“Hard to believe I was small enough to wrap this around me and still have plenty left to make a little bed out of it.” She held the blanket up for T.J. to see, then refolded it. “We would sneak matches and candles so that we didn’t have to use the electric lights. For some reason, we thought no one passing through the barn would see the candlelight, but the lightbulbs would shine like beacons.” She laughed. “So much for the logic of a couple of nine-year-olds.”

Lorna paused, then walked around the room, her eyes on the floor.

“What are you looking for?” T.J. asked.

“Melinda’s blanket. It doesn’t seem to be here.”

“Where should it be?”

“It should have been over there, with mine. We used to fold them up as small as we could, and hide them in the back corner, so no one would find them.”

“When was the last time you were down here?”

“When I was nine. I was never too keen on being down here alone, and we—Melinda and I—had sworn to never tell anyone else about our secret place. I never did. I guess I always thought someday she’d come back, and I didn’t want to have to tell her I’d shared our secret.”

“So no one else knows this place is here?”

“Oh, sure, my sister knows. My brother. Probably some of his friends knew it was here, though they all seemed to spend more time over at the home of one of the other boys, who had horses. They all liked to play cowboys when they were younger. So much more authentic when you had a horse to ride.”

“And your sister?”

“Wouldn’t have been caught dead down here.” Lorna laughed. “Spiders, other crawly things. Maybe some with fur and tails. Not Andrea’s cup of tea.”

“You didn’t mention it to the police? Or to your parents?”

“No. I didn’t,” she said somewhat sheepishly. “I should have. As an adult, I know that. But as a child, I couldn’t have broken that promise.”

She wandered around and peered in all the corners.

“Still looking for the blanket?” T.J. asked.

“Strange that it’s not here.”

“Maybe she took it,” he suggested.

“Took it where? It was here the day before she disappeared. We were down here, practicing lines for the school play. We had the blankets on the floor, right there.” She pointed to the middle of the room.

“If she needed a place to hide, would she have come here?”

“What are you getting at?” Lorna asked. “What are you thinking?”

“The theory all along seems to be that Melinda was abducted from the field that night. Maybe she wasn’t taken away by someone else. Maybe she ran away. What do you think?”

“I can’t imagine where she would have gone.” Lorna frowned.

“Maybe she came in here to hide, then left when the excitement died down out in the field.”

“But hide from what?”

“That’s a good question.” T.J. stood in the doorway, his hands on his hips. “Would she have had any reason to hide from her mother that night?”

Lorna shook her head. “No. I already told you, my mother washed her dress so that no one could tell it had gotten dirty. She would have been able to smuggle it into the house, it wouldn’t have been difficult. She wasn’t afraid to go home.”

“Maybe something happened between your house and hers that night, something that made her want to hide.”

“Jason might have known. But of course, we can’t ask him.”

“Fritz didn’t mention anything out of the ordinary that night,” T.J. reminded her.

“I think we need to talk with the others who were there with him. Matt, Dustin . . . Fritz’s brother, Mike. He was around later.”

“Well, let’s go back into the house and look up some phone numbers, make a few calls,” he suggested. “I want to speak with all of them as soon as possible.”

Lorna looked at her watch.

“How about we grab the phone book and I make the calls from the car? We’re due at Danielle Porter’s in less than a half hour.”

“That will work.”

She walked through the arch and into the wine cellar. T.J. blew out the candle and left it on the floor inside the door.

“Next time we bring lightbulbs.”

Danielle Porter lived in a double-wide trailer on an acre lot surrounded by apple trees and a big flower garden. There was a two-car garage and a child’s playhouse in the backyard, and a mailbox surrounded by weeds at the foot of the driveway. T.J. parked the Crossfire in front of the garage, and he and Lorna walked across new macadam to the worn path through the grass to the front door.

Danielle stepped out of the house to meet them before they could ring the bell.

“You’re T. J. Dawson?” she asked.

He nodded and offered her a business card.

“And you are?” Danielle stared at Lorna.

“Lorna Stiles.”

“Lorna Stiles,” Danielle repeated thoughtfully. “You’re from around here. I know your name. But I don’t have a clear memory of you.”

“I was a friend of Melinda Eagan’s,” Lorna told her.

“Who?” Danielle placed a hand on her hip and cocked her head slightly to the left.

“Melinda Eagan,” Lorna repeated.

“Am I supposed to know the name?”

“You were friends with her, back in grade school.” Lorna’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. Was it possible Danielle had really forgotten someone she’d been friends with years ago? “She used to stay at your house quite often. Until she disappeared one night and was never seen again.”

“Oh, the girl who disappeared.” Danielle’s expression never changed. “What about her?”

“I’m looking into her disappearance,” T.J. said, stepping into the conversation.

“So why do you want to talk to me? I wasn’t there that night, I don’t know nothing about it.”

“I was hoping you’d be able to give us some information we don’t already have. You spent some time with her back then, maybe you’d remember if she ever told you that someone was giving her a hard time, or frightening her in some way.”

“Only her mother.” Danielle shrugged. “She used to beat up on her something bad, I remember that.”

“Did she ever say anything to you about maybe wanting to run away?” T.J. asked.

“No.” She shook her head and looked down. “We really weren’t that close.”

“She used to spend a lot of time at your house,” Lorna reminded her. “What did you do? What did you talk about?”

“It was a long time ago.” Danielle shrugged. “I don’t remember what we did, or what we talked about. I guess she just didn’t make that big an impression on me.”

She looked from Lorna to T.J. “Was there something else?”

T.J. handed her his card. “If you think of anything, if you happen to remember something about Melinda, give me a call.”

“Sure.” Danielle stepped back into the house and closed the door.

Lorna and T.J. returned to his car.

“That was a waste of time,” Lorna said.

“Not really. We learned something.”

“What, that she was lying?”

“That could be important.” T.J. started to back the car slowly down the drive. “Why would she lie about knowing Melinda?”

“I don’t know, but apparently she can’t wait to tell someone.” Lorna stared at the open window as they went past. “She grabbed that phone and started dialing before we reached the car. Wouldn’t you love to be a fly on the wall right now?”

“Nah. But I would like to know whose number she just dialed.” He reached into his pants pocket and took out his phone, then dialed a number. “Mitch, it’s T.J. How quickly can you get phone records?”

S
ixteen

“Cannon Road is the next left, so you’ll want to turn there,” Lorna told T.J.

“It will be interesting to see how Mike Keeler’s version of things stacks up against his brother’s,” T.J. noted.

“Mike was fourteen, remember. Two years younger than Fritz. He might have seen things differently.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Fourteen, you’re still a kid. Sixteen, you’re a little more mature. I think the older you are, the more you’re likely to remember the little things.”

“Two years isn’t so great a difference.”

“I just remember Fritz as being the more serious of the two. Mike was always clowning around. Nothing ever seemed to affect him. Fritz was more intense about things.”

“Interesting observation.”

“And that’s all it is. Just an observation.” She ran a hand through her hair to get it out of her face. She could only imagine what it looked like by now. T.J. had pulled to the side of the road to put the top down after they’d left Danielle’s, and had taken Lorna on a zippy ride through the countryside. “Slow down so I can read the numbers on the mailboxes.”

He eased up on the gas.

“It must be two houses up from here.” Lorna pointed to the bright yellow mailbox at the top of the slight rise in the road. T.J. slowed even more so she could read the name on the side of the box. “Yes, that’s it.”

T.J. turned into the drive just as a young child in white shorts and a bright red T-shirt ran around the corner of the garage, which, like the ranch-style house attached to it, was pale gray siding with black shutters. She stopped next to a bright red crape myrtle and stared at the little car with the big man behind the wheel.

T.J. turned off the engine and got out.

“Hi,” he called to the little girl. “What’s your name?”

“I can’t tell you,” she replied. “You’re a stranger and I can’t talk to you.”

T.J. nodded. “Good answer.”

A man in khaki shorts emerged from the garage. “You must be Mr. Dawson. And hey, Lorna Stiles. Good to see you again.”

Mike Keeler gave Lorna a quick hug and offered his hand to T.J.

“Good to see you, too, Mike,” Lorna replied.

“Kayla, I want you to go inside and tell Mommy she’s going to have to take you and your sister to the soccer field. I’ll be along later,” Mike told his daughter, then turned back to his visitors. “So, Lorna, Fritz tells me you’re putting the farm up for sale.”

“I will be, yes.”

“You have a Realtor yet?”

“No, but it’s on my list of things to do.”

“I only ask because Sarah, my wife—you remember Sarah, she was Sarah Watts in school . . .”

Lorna nodded. She remembered Sarah Watts, though she hadn’t known her well.

“Anyway, her brother, Jim, is a Realtor, he owns Watts Real Estate out there on Route One. Maybe you could give him a call.”

“I’ll do that. Right now, the police are still all over that back section, and they’re not letting anyone past about mid-field of our land.”

“I guess they’ll be going over the rest of the property, too,” Mike said. “The vineyard, down around the pond, out around the orchard.”

“Maybe, if they keep finding bodies, they’ll expand the search. So far, they haven’t done so. Although they’re being really meticulous, taking their time.”

“Probably afraid of missing something.”

“It pays to be thorough.”

“So tell me what I can do for you.” Mike shoved his hands in his pockets.

“Well, as you know, there’s been a lot of activity out at my place. The FBI is involved now, as I’m sure you’ve heard, and T.J. is working with them,” Lorna told him, stretching the truth a bit. “We’re hoping that once we find Jason’s killer, maybe we’ll be able to figure out what happened to Melinda.”

“You working with the FBI, too?” Mike asked her.

“No.” She shrugged. “But I am an interested party, since the bodies were found on my property. Or my former property, at least.”

“From what I’ve heard, the boys they found buried were all about the same age, all died from the same type of head injury.” Mike was facing into the sun and he squinted, his eyes becoming little slits. “Why would you assume the same thing happened to Melinda? She disappeared first, right? Those FBI profilers you see on TV are saying that whoever killed those boys had a thing for
boys.
Why would a killer who only went after teenage boys kill a nine-year-old girl?”

“No one’s assuming that Melinda was killed by the same person,” T.J. told him. “But we are thinking there’s a connection between the two. We just don’t know what it is yet. And as far as what you’re hearing on TV, you need to keep in mind that profiling is far from being an exact science.”

T.J. paused, then added, “I’m not so sure
science
is even the correct term to use. It’s off as often as it’s on. I wouldn’t put much stock into what you see on television.”

Lorna glanced sideways at T.J., and caught the set of his jaw as he spoke. This was obviously a hot button of his, and probably related to his former stint as a profiler. She wished she knew him well enough to ask him about it. There was a story there, and she was dying to hear it. Maybe another time.

Sarah Keeler came outside the house and waved to Lorna. The two women exchanged pleasantries before Sarah rounded up her daughters and strapped them into the family van to head off to soccer.

“Bring some bottled water when you come to the field,” Sarah called to Mike as she eased past them. “And try not to be too late. We have a double-header tonight, and they might need you to fill in for Kara’s coach in the second game.”

Mike waved to his wife and daughters, then turned his attention to Lorna and T.J.

“Let’s go sit on the deck, it’s cooler and more comfortable out back.” Mike gestured for them to follow him to the backyard. “Sarah just made a pitcher of iced tea. I’ll run in and grab some for us. It’s been another hot one, eh?”

They climbed the three steps up to the deck and took seats around a glass-topped table that appeared brand new. Mike ducked inside the house and returned with three glasses of iced tea. He handed a glass to each of his visitors, then sat in the chair at the head of the table.

“So go ahead and ask away.” Mike settled back in his chair and crossed his legs. “Where do you want to start?”

“Let’s start with the night Melinda disappeared.” T.J. rested both arms on the table. “You were around that night.”

“Right. My mother sent me over to Matt Conrad’s house to get my brother for dinner. She’d been calling him but no one was answering the phone. Matt’s parents hadn’t gotten home from work yet, and I said the guys were probably outside, so my mom told me to go get Fritz and tell him to come home.”

“How far is Matt’s from your house?” T.J. asked.

“Less than half a mile. I rode my bike.”

“Do you remember what time it was when you got there?”

“No. But it was still light out. Matt and Fritz were out back smoking cigarettes. I sat down and smoked one or two with them—that was the big thing back then, cigarettes, about as wild as we got around here—then Jason came along, said he was going to collect his sister and walk her home, but he’d be right back. A little while later, he returned, then his mother started calling him, real loud, so he got up and ran home. A few minutes later, he was back, asking if anyone had seen his sister. No one had, so he asked us to help him look for her. Later the police came and they started looking, too, and me and Fritz went home. Next day in school we heard she was still missing and there was this big search.”

“How long were you at Matt’s before Jason arrived the first time?” T.J. asked.

“Oh, maybe a half hour or so.”

“Then he went to get Melinda, came back, and not long after that his mother called him . . .”

Mike nodded. “Right, and he left again for a couple of minutes. But he came right back.”

“ ‘Right back,’ meaning how long between the time he left to go home and the time he came back and said his sister was missing?”

“No more than five minutes.”

“You sure about that?”

“I’m positive.”

“What time did Dustin arrive?” T.J. asked.

“Dustin?”

“Dustin Lafferty, your brother’s friend.”

“Oh. Hey, I’d forgotten about him. Yeah, he was there, too. I think he got there right after me.”

“So you joined in the search? Did you split up, or go in pairs?”

“We split up, we all went off in different directions, but there was nothing. Not a sign of her anywhere.”

“Where did you look?”

“I took the orchard. I don’t remember where anyone else looked.”

“The orchard’s down near the pond?”

“Yeah. I think Jason took the pond. I went around all the apple and peach trees but there was nothing to be found. Melinda was just gone.”

“Now, the night that Jason died, you were all over at Lafferty’s?” T.J. leaned back in the seat.

“Right. Me, Fritz, Jason, Matt, and Dustin.”

“Drinking beer?”

“Yeah, we all had a few. We stayed till a little after two, then Dustin drove everyone home. He dropped me and Fritz off, then took the others home. The next day, we heard that Jason had disappeared, too.”

“You have any ideas, back then, what might have happened to him?”

“No.” Mike shrugged. “He wasn’t the most popular guy in school, but he was okay, if you know what I mean. I liked him. For a while, the kids were saying that Jason and his sister had both run away, to get away from their mother. She used to be really hard on both of them, he told us that.”

“Can you think of anything else we might need to know?” T.J. put both hands palm-down on the table, ready to push himself out of his seat. The interview was over. He’d gotten what he’d come for.

“Just that back then a lot of people thought Mrs. Eagan had killed both her kids. I’m still not so sure she didn’t.”

“You may have heard I put up her bail,” Lorna said.

“Everyone in Callen’s heard about that.” Mike grinned. “You didn’t make any friends in the local police department with that move.”

Lorna got out of her chair, preparing to leave. “If she’s innocent of Jason’s murder, they should be looking for whoever killed him.”

“Well, I think she’s guilty as sin.” Mike stood, too. “I think they had the right person all along. I think in the end, all this investigation is going to prove is that she killed them both.”

“What about all the other boys they’ve found, Mike? Think she killed them, too?”

“Hey, like those FBI guys said, the killer had a thing for teenage boys. Who knows? Maybe that’s how Mrs. Eagan got off, you know? Doing young boys, then killing ’em.”

Mike stood at the end of the deck and looked down at T.J. and Lorna, who’d already stepped onto the grass at the bottom of the steps.

“Yeah,” he continued, “if I were the investigator, that’s what I’d be looking into. Mrs. Eagan’s sex life.”

“What do you think?” T.J. asked as he drove away.

“I think that was a seriously sick thing to say.” Lorna shook her head. “That man clearly watches too much TV.”

“Or reads too many thrillers.” T.J. gunned the engine. “Or maybe not enough.”

“What do you mean?”

“Either that was all smoke screen, or he and his brother need to get their stories straight. They don’t match up. Fritz said Mike got to Matt Conrad’s house after Jason was called home. That Dustin stopped by after Mike had arrived to tell Fritz it was time to go home.” T.J. eased up to the stop sign at the top of the hill. “Which way?”

Lorna pointed right, and he made the turn.

“Fritz also said that Mike wasn’t with them the night that Jason disappeared, that they were at White Marsh Park till three in the morning. Mike just now said he was with them at Dustin’s—didn’t say a word about White Marsh Park. And he said Dustin drove them home at two. One of them is lying.”

“How do we find out which one?”

“We talk to Dustin Lafferty and see what he remembers.”