The Darkest Corners (8 page)

“So let's look her up and call her,” Callie says.

“I tried,” I say. “She's using a different name. I might have found her, though. I think she lives in Allentown.”

Callie is quiet.

“I'm not saying let's go to Allentown,” I find myself rambling. “But it's worth talking to her.”

“It's not that.” Callie pauses, the one being choosy about her words now. “It's just, no offense, but your sister totally bailed on you. Even if she could help us…she may not want to.”

I can't argue with that—my sister changed her name, for Christ's sake—so I shut up and stare out the window. On the other side of the highway, there's a giant sign lit up in orange.
ROADWORK: DETOUR
. A quick stab of panic. We'll have to take a different way home, and we won't pass the prison.

My rehearsed lines go out the window:
Hey, since it's on the way, maybe I should see if they have Joslin's number at the prison.
Callie's already made her feelings about my sister clear.

I don't have time to sell her on tracking Jos down. There's the sign.
FAYETTE COUNTY PENITENTIARY—NEXT RIGHT.

“Um,” I blurt. “Do you mind if we stop there? I'm supposed to pick up stuff. My dad's stuff.”

“Oh.” Callie chews her lip. “They didn't give it to you the other day?”

“I didn't ask,” I say, which isn't a lie. “Just thought it would be nice to have it.”

Callie shrugs. “Okay. But you have to put the address into the GPS.”

Ten minutes later, we're in the prison parking lot. I already have my seat belt undone by the time Callie puts the van in park.

“I'll just be a couple minutes,” I say. “You don't have to come in.”

I slam the door before she can protest. I know it'll be an empty one, anyway. I don't blame her; I wouldn't want to follow me into a prison either. Especially not a prison where Wyatt Stokes is being held.

The lobby is a ghost town compared to how it was on Saturday. The guard, Wanda, recognizes me. Sets her pen down. She looks ready to be on the defensive, probably thinking that I'm here to give her crap about my father dying ahead of schedule, like Maggie did. We do a bizarre stare-down thing, each waiting for the other one to say something first. Little does she know that I can do this all day if I have to. I've had a lifetime of practice when it comes to making people uncomfortable with my presence.

She finally cracks, her more charitable side winning out. “What's your name, hon?”

“Tessa,” I say.

Wanda folds her arms across her chest, tilts back in her chair. “What is that you need, Tessa?”

“My sister visited the other night,” I say, trying to figure out exactly how to phrase this. “I'm trying to find her. Did she maybe leave a phone number, or—”

“We can't give out that information.” Wanda shakes her head to drive home the point.

Desperation claws at me. “She's my
sister.
I just need a phone number or something.”

Wanda's face softens a bit. No doubt she remembers that I didn't get to say goodbye to my father. If she feels bad for me, I can work with that.

“Please,” I say, playing the sad orphan. “I haven't seen her in ten years.”

Wanda kicks off, rolls away in her chair. She maintains eye contact with me until she enters something into her computer. I stand, digging a nail into my jiggling leg. I hear the whirr of a printer, and then Wanda comes back with a piece of paper that she pushes toward me.

It's a scan of Brandy Butler's driver's license.

I make a fist to stop myself from touching the photo of her face. Even though it's not a color photo, I can tell that Joslin's hair is bleached blond. She didn't do her eyebrows to match. They're still thick, and dark—
like Brooke Shields,
Lori used to say.

Her expression is what gives her away. Her eyes are wide—too wide. Jos always blinked when the flash went off, so whenever she had to pose for a photo, she'd force her eyes open real wide in a way that always made me nearly pee myself laughing.

We never owned a camera, so my parents didn't have any baby pictures of us. My mom kept us home on picture day to avoid the embarrassment of sending us to school without a check to hand to the photographer.

But I don't need photos to know that Brandy Butler is, without a doubt, my sister.

Wanda hands me a Post-it to copy down the address. I reach for the pen attached to the desk on a chain and scribble it down:
34 E Federal Street, Allentown, PA.

“You never saw this,” Wanda says gently. I meet her gaze and nod.

“Um.” I struggle to find the words. “What about Annette? Glenn's wife. Did she come to say goodbye?”

The sympathy etched on Wanda's face morphs to full-blown pity. Of course my mother didn't come.

“Annette is still listed as his next of kin,” she says. “Far as I know, she hasn't been around in years. Number we tried reaching her at was a work line. Apparently, she hasn't been there in a while either.”

I nod, nod, nod. I won't let on to this stranger that this is the most information I've been given about my mother in years.

My mom never talked about Gram when I was young, obviously, since she'd led us all to believe her parents were dead. When Gram heard about me, she didn't seem surprised that I existed. Or that my mother had lied.

“I'll tell you what I told your sister.” Wanda leans forward. “I'm not allowed to give out details about inmates' families, but the number for Black Rock Tavern is public and all, so I can't stop you from calling yourself and asking about a former employee.”

What I told your sister.
My knees wobble; I picture someone coming up behind me, smacking me behind the knees with a baseball bat.

“My sister…asked how to find my mother?” I ask.

Wanda blinks, as if it would be the most normal thing in the world for my sister to want to see her mother. In any other family, it would be.

“You okay?” Wanda frowns at me.

“Yeah, it's just that—” Just that I'm going to vomit all over myself. “Never mind. Thanks.”

It's just that Joslin hated our mother, yet she still found time to look her up. It's just that my sister knew exactly where I'd be if I came back, and she hasn't made so much as a phone call.

At the door, I remember the reason I convinced Callie I needed to stop in here. I turn around, rolling my ankle. I'm shaking. Callie was right to think my sister would only disappoint me.

“Did my dad leave anything behind?” I ask Wanda. “Like any personal effects?”

She frowns. “Mostly we just throw that stuff out unless family comes to claim it. Let me put in a call to the officer on his block.”

I stuff my hands into the pockets of my hoodie to warm them. The AC is making the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. I think of Callie in the car, the midday sun beating through her windshield.

I feel bad. But not bad enough to leave here without something of my dad's, which would make her suspicious.

Wanda hangs up the phone and tells me to take a seat, the warden's coming. I reach for the cell phone in my back pocket, thinking it might be nice to text Callie and tell her I'll be a few more minutes. Then I realize I don't have Callie's number.

I turn my attention to the tiny box of a television protruding from the corner of the ceiling. The local news station is on.

It's only because I'm ignoring the vapid segment on the upcoming heat wave that I catch it, a brief headline on the news ticker across the bottom of the screen.

Federal Court of Appeals to hear new evidence in case of Wyatt Stokes, convicted serial killer, in October. If not granted a new trial, Stokes could be executed as early as next year.

I zip my sweatshirt up as far as the zipper will go.
October.
That's only a few months away.

What new evidence do his lawyers have? What aren't they revealing?

A buzz at the gate interrupts my thoughts, and a stocky man with a thick beard and wearing a guard's uniform steps into the waiting area. “Lowell?”

I stand, legs shaky. He's holding a clear trash bag.

“This is all of it.” He gives me a thin-lipped smile. People in prison shouldn't be this nice. I grab the bag and leave without thanking him, because apparently I'm sapped of gratitude for people who feel sorry for me today.

When I get outside, I press my back to the brick wall. Squeeze my eyes shut. I don't want any of his shit. I don't want any physical reminders of the man who left us when the money ran out and called once a year from prison to beg for more.

I look down at the bag. Through the plastic I can make out its contents. There's a Bible, which is hilarious, and papers. Lots and lots of papers, with sketches on them.

So my father took up drawing in jail. Better than his old hobbies, I guess, which largely consisted of abusing pills and stealing money.

I've convinced myself I don't care what's in the bag, and that it's sheer curiosity that makes me fish out the envelope pressed up against the side.

There's a name scrawled in his uneven block writing.

TESSA.

I tilt my chin toward the sky, stare at the sun until the pressure behind my eyes goes away. I am not going to get emotional over some deadbeat who thought stealing money for booze and cigarettes was more important than being around to see his children grow up.

They caught him after he robbed the third store—the one where he shot Manuel Gonzalo in the torso. The attorney the state assigned to my father portrayed him as a family man pushed to the brink by the crumbling economy and unemployment. My father used to be a good man, a hardworking man. He never intended to hurt Manuel Gonzalo—my father panicked when he saw the cashier pull a gun from under the counter, so he shot first.

Even as a kid I could smell bullshit. My father went into that store with a gun and a plan. We all have choices, and he made his.

I turn the envelope over, running my thumb across its lip. Someone tore it open.

It's empty.

I stare into the sun again.
You're nothing but flesh and bones now,
I think,
and you've still managed to disappoint me.

I hear the van before I see it—see
her.
Callie's glaring at me through the open passenger window, her palms up in the
What the hell are you doing?
position.

I climb into the van and set the bag at my feet. “Sorry.”

“We have to go home.” Her knuckles are white on the steering wheel. “My mom called. The police want to talk to me about Ari.”

Everything else she says is a dull hum in my ears. I'm still reeling from what Wanda told me, and what it means.

Jos was one step ahead of me the whole time she was in Fayette. She may have seen our mother, or talked to her.

The only lead I have on Jos is my mother—the person who acted like I never even had a sister once she was gone.

Callie is so nervous, she almost forgets to put the van in park when we get back to the house. There's a single patrol car parked at the curb across the street. Through the Greenwoods' living room window, I see the back of a man's head.

“It's Ryan's uncle,” Callie mutters as we climb the steps. “I'm so screwed. There's a giant handle of vodka under my bed.”

“They're homicide detectives,” I say. “I doubt they care about your stash.”

Maggie doesn't smile as we step into the living room. A mug rests on the coffee table in front of Jay Elwood. Another detective sits on the opposite end of the couch from Maggie.

“Tessa, there's sandwiches in the kitchen,” she says. “You're probably hungry.”

Jay is watching me. He's late forties. Clean-shaven. He sips from his mug and sets it back down. Steel-gray eyes locked onto mine. I wonder if he recognizes me as a Lowell.

“Okay,” I say. The kitchen is a stone's throw from the living room, which means as long as they don't whisper, I'll be able to hear the conversation. There's a platter of cold cuts and rolls on the counter. I fold a slice of cheese into my mouth and stand next to the fridge, where I have a partial view of the living room.

“How're you holding up?” Jay asks. No response.

“That's Pete.” Jay again. “Hope it's all right we're here.”

“If this is about Ariel, you should probably talk to her friends,” Callie says.

“We were under the impression you two were close.” Jay takes a pen out of his shirt pocket. Clicks the top once, twice.

Callie hesitates. “A long time ago. We hadn't talked in a while….You'd have better luck with Emily Raymes.”

Click, click.
“What about Nick Snyder?”

I picture Nick, handing Callie the liquor at the vigil. His meltdown before we went inside. I can tell Callie's thinking about it too, because she hesitates. “What about him?”

“He and Ariel dated, right?” Jay says.

“Yeah. For a couple months, but they broke up before graduation.”

Click, click.
“Seems he was pretty angry at her.”

Pete, the officer on the couch, leans forward on his knees. “You know Nick well?”

“We hang out with the same people,” Callie says.

“He get angry a lot?” Pete again.

Callie is quiet. I can tell she's unnerved by how quickly the detectives have steered the conversation toward Nick. Of course they're asking about Ariel's unstable ex-boyfriend.

Callie is murmuring something, and I lean into the doorframe to hear her better.

“You think he did this to Ari?”

The detectives are quiet. Jay is the one who finally speaks.

“We're just getting a sense of who she spent time with.”

“Well, you should start with her dad,” Callie says. “Ari was terrified of him. He ran that house like Nazi Germany, and she was desperate to get out.”