Her Sister (Search For Love series)

Her
Sister

by

Karen
Rose Smith

Search
For Love series, Book 7

Published
for Kindle by Karen Rose Smith

Copyright
2013 Karen Rose Smith

No part of this book may be
used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except
in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This is a work of fiction.
 Names, characters and incidents are either the product of the author's
imagination or are used fictitiously.  Any resemblance to actual events or
persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

http://www.karenrosesmith.com

http://www.karenrosesmithmysteries.com

*****

Prologue

Where
is Lynnie?  Where did she go?

In her
mind, five-year-old Clare Thaddeus called to her little sister—
Come back,
Lynnie.  Please come back.

The
huge policeman crouched down in front of Clare's mother at the sofa and said in
a deep, slow voice, "Mrs. Thaddeus, I know you're terribly upset.  But I
need details.  We've got an hour before daylight.  If your daughter wandered
outside—"

Clare's
father, who'd been talking to another man in blue, glanced at her, and Clare huddled
down deeper into the big green armchair.  Her dad didn't come to her but rather
went to her mom, sank down beside her and wrapped his arm around her.  Then he
spoke to the officer.  "Our daughter, Lynnie, is three.  She would never
go outside into the dark on her own."

"Tell
us again where you were last night," the policeman demanded in a
not-so-nice voice.

"I
worked late, preparing a brief."

"Until
five a.m.?"

"Yes,
until five a.m.  As I told you, I always check the girls' rooms before turning
in.  Lynnie wasn't in her bed.  I woke my wife.  We looked through the whole
house and then we called you."

Clare
had been sleeping in her brand new room.  They'd moved in here—she studied her
hand and counted her fingers—five days ago.  Boxes were still stacked down here
and upstairs.  The house was okay.  There were more rooms for her and Lynnie to
play hide and seek.  But she didn't like being alone in her own room at night. 
She'd liked it better when she and Lynnie had slept in the same room.

Earlier
she'd thought she'd heard Lynnie's door open...thought her sister was going to
the bathroom and might come in and crawl into bed with her.  But she'd been
so
sleepy.  She and Lynnie had been running through the hose sprayer all afternoon
in the backyard while Mommy unpacked.  She was supposed to watch her sister. 
She was always supposed to look out for Lynnie.  That's what big sisters did.

Where
had Lynnie gone?

Then
Clare remembered the blue car that had driven down the alley in back of the
yard lots of times.  The man had stopped once and watched them.  But she'd thought
he might be one of their new neighbors who just wanted to say hi.

Should
she tell the policeman?

He was
so big, and he looked mad.  Her dad looked mad, too, as he asked, "Why do
you want to question me and my wife separately?"

"That's
just the way we do it, Mr. Thaddeus."

Although
she was scared of the two big men in blue uniforms, she knew her mommy and
daddy wouldn't let them hurt her.  Policemen helped, didn't they?  They were
going to help find Lynnie.

She slipped
off of the chair, went over to the sofa and tugged on her mother's arm. 
"Mommy, when I was playing—"

The
doorbell rang.

"Are
you expecting someone?" the policeman asked, his brows arched.

Not
sounding at all like herself, her mother answered, "I called a
friend."

"Before
or after you called us?"

Her
mother's face turned red.  "
After
, of course."

"Mommy." 
She tugged on her mother's arm again while one of the policemen went to the
door.

Her
mother took Clare's hand.  "Not now, honey.  Natalie's going to take care
of you for a little while so we can talk to the officers."

"But,
Mommy—"

Her
mom's best friend, Natalie Barlow, rushed into the living room looking as upset
as her mom and dad.  "What can I do?"

Her
father answered quickly.  "Can you take Clare upstairs?  And can you call
our old neighbors?  Maybe they'll help search.  I've got to get out there
looking, but I have to finish answering questions first."

Natalie
gave Clare a weak smile and took her hand.  "Come on, honey.  Let's go
upstairs for a while."

Her mom
kissed her.

Her dad
gave her a nod.

She tried
again.  "When I was playing with Lynnie—"

Tears
fell down her mom's cheeks.  Her dad said, "Not now.  Go upstairs with
Natalie."

What
she had to say wasn't important.  The man in the blue car didn't matter.  Only
Lynnie mattered.

As
Clare followed Natalie upstairs, she got very afraid.  What if the policemen
couldn't find Lynnie?  Is that why her mommy was crying?  Because she didn't
think they could?  Was that why her dad was mad?

Natalie
bent down to her.  "I don't want you to worry.  Everything's going to be
all right."

But
Clare knew better.  If Lynnie didn't come home, nothing would ever be right
again.

****

Chapter
One

"I'm
not taking it back.  I bought it with my own money."  Shara Thaddeus
stared at her mother defiantly, standing her ground.  At sixteen, she was
Clare's payback for the trouble Clare had given her parents when
she
was
sixteen, though certainly not for the same reason.

At
thirty-two and a single parent, Clare didn't know what to do with Shara any
more than her parents had known what to do with her.  She'd rebelled because
she'd wanted their attention. 
Any
of their attention.  All of their
attention.  When Lynnie had been around, Clare had loved her and protected her
and been her big sister.  But after she'd disappeared, it was as if Clare
hadn't existed.  Everything was always about Lynnie.  And Clare had just wanted
her parents to realize that although her sister was gone,
she
was still
there.

Shara,
on the other hand, had always had all of Clare's attention.  What she didn't
have was a father.  She'd been a precocious child, constantly testing her
boundaries.  Sometimes Clare just got weary of being a watchdog.  But yet
wasn't that what parents were supposed to do?

After
taking a deep breath for patience then putting her chin-length brown hair
behind her ears, she reached out and took the blouse from Shara's hands.  It
really wasn't a blouse, just a stretch lace concoction that
her
daughter
wasn't going to be caught dead in.  "If you wear this out on the street,
you'll get arrested.  What did you buy to go with it?"  She meant to keep
her tone curious but it sounded judgmental anyway.

Shara
produced a pair of black leather shorts that Clare suspected would fit too
snugly.

"The
outfit goes back.  It's not appropriate for school.  It's not appropriate to
wear to the mall.  It's not appropriate to be caught dusting the house in. 
What were you thinking?"

"I'm
thinking there are a few boys who would think I'm hot."

Counting
to ten had never been a strategy that worked well for Clare, especially when
her daughter was deliberately trying to push her buttons.  But she tried it
again, nonetheless, not meeting with any more success than she'd achieved the
last time.  She prayed for patience, or wisdom or anything that would help deal
with her daughter.

Finally,
in a friendly tone she asked, "Care to give me their names?  Maybe I can
do background checks."

Shara
studied her mother, trying to decide if she was joking or serious.  "Brad
said he likes me in black."

"Brad
doesn't need to like you in anything.  He's a senior.  You're a sophomore. 
We've talked about this, Shara.  He has a reputation and I don't want him
giving
you
a reputation."

"You
are wound
so
tight," Shara mumbled.

Before
Clare could deal with
that
assessment, the telephone rang.  She glanced
at it, thought about letting it ring, letting the answering machine take over. 
But maybe both she and her daughter needed a few minutes to cool down.  She saw
from the Caller ID that it was her mom's home number.  This would probably be a
short conversation.  They never had much to say to each other.

Clare watched
Shara take the new outfit and her other bags to her room.  "They go
back," Clare called after her.

Her
daughter didn't bother to reply.

Clare
greeted her mom with a chipper "hello," wondering what she was going
to put together for supper.  As an X-ray technician at the hospital, she
usually arrived home after Shara.  Today, however, Shara had asked her if she
could stop at the mall for an hour or so after school and Clare had agreed.  It
looked as if they'd both be taking a trip after supper to return Shara's
purchases.  Maybe they should just leave now and grab pizza there.  The mall on
an October Friday night would be busy.

"Clare?"

The
tiny crack in her mother's voice made Clare pull in a breath.  "What's
wrong?  Has something happened to Dad?"

Although
her father and mother had divorced two years after Lynnie had disappeared, Clare
had desperately tried to hold onto bonds with both of them.

"I
haven't heard from your father in weeks.  The last time I saw him was at the
picnic you had Labor Day weekend."

It was
really strange.  Her parents had once had a good marriage until Lynnie was
taken.  Now they were awkward together whenever they had to be in the same
room.  Clare always felt as if she were the cause of that awkwardness, always
felt as if she should do something to make it all better, always felt as if she
was the neutral territory in the middle of a decades-old war.

After a
short pause, her mother explained, "Detective Grove called me.  He already
spoke to your father."

Clare's
heart skipped a beat.  "Detective Grove?"  The picture of a tall lean
man in a rumpled suit flashed in her mind—the man who had taken over Lynnie's
investigation after the patrol officers' first visit.

"Do
you remember him?" her mother asked gently—too gently—and Clare had a
shivery premonition of what could be coming.

"Didn't
he retire?" she asked her mom, her heart racing now.

"Yes,
he did.  But he's not really keen on retirement and he's been...working a few
cold cases."  Her mother's voice was edgier than usual and a little
wobbly, too.

"What
are you trying to tell me, Mom?"  Clare's hands became sweaty as she
thought about all the possibilities.  Lynnie's face at three and a half was
still so vivid in her mind—the face they'd used on posters...the face she'd
envisioned floating in a river...the face on the body in nightmares that had
been buried in a ditch.  The
not
knowing had always been worse than
knowing.  The
not
knowing is what had torn them all apart.  Clare really
believed that if the police had found Lynnie's body somewhere, maybe they could
have gone on as a family.

Maybe.

"He
wants to meet with us tomorrow morning.  You, me and your dad.  He thinks he
has a lead."

Clare's
throat went desert dry.  Even though she'd only been five, she remembered the
hope that had filled her parents' faces whenever a new lead had been phoned in,
whenever the police had gotten a tip from an informer on the street, whenever
there was a chance that Lynnie might have been spotted.  She also remembered
the expression on their faces when all those hopes had been dashed and one day
had turned into the next without teaching them anything new.

Except
that they were losing each other, hour by hour, day by day, week by week.

"What
kind of lead?" Clare asked, trying to control the shakiness in her voice.

"He
wouldn't tell me over the phone.  He's working out of his home, so I offered
the use of my office at
Yesteryear
.  Can you be there tomorrow at
ten?"

Her
father wouldn't like meeting at her mother's shop.  Now and then he'd
complained to Clare that her mother was lost in the past.  He didn't like the
mustiness of the store or what the old furniture represented—a history that
couldn't be changed...a child who would never come home.  Her mother didn't see
it that way at all.  Her mother liked to relive every memory she had.  She
wrapped herself in the reminiscence of what she told Clare were the happiest
years of her life.  More than that,
Yesteryear
had given her a reason to
get up each day, a reason to search for old furniture if not for her daughter,
though Clare suspected she still looked for Lynnie everywhere she went.