The Secrets on Forest Bend Read online

  She found another list in the file cabinet. “Here’s a list of the students. This lady, Lydia Cox,”—she pointed to a name halfway down the list—“came in to buy a small gun safe, so I opened the store. I think I can find the receipt.” She looked in another file and handed it to him. “It shows the time.”

  Adam took off his glasses and cleaned them before studying the receipt. Near the top was a time stamp which read 8:32 P.M. It would take a minute or two for her to sign it and get the package, then another couple of minutes to reach her car. Good, that should be easy to check.

  “What about the second date? It’s back in December, so it might be a little more difficult. Do you have anything on it?” Standing so close to her while maintaining a professional demeanor was tough. If she bent over to get anything out of the file cabinet again all bets were off.

  When she looked at the date, she let out a short bark of a laugh. “As a matter of fact, I think I have that one covered as well.” She opened a drawer and pulled out last year’s calendar. “Billy closed the store that day, but Gordon left the firing range at three. I worked the firing range until it closed at six.” She thumbed through the time sheets and gave him Billy’s and Gordon’s.

  “It was a customer’s birthday, and his friends rented the firing range for the evening from eight till midnight. A party company delivered a tank of helium right at six, and then I had to get over to The Woodlands before the bakery closed at seven. There’s this tiny bakery that advertises it will make a cake in any design you want.” She wrote the name and address in his notebook. “They’ll remember me. I doubt they get many calls for a cake in the shape of an AK-47. I had to hurry back to get everything set up.”

  She scribbled another address in the notebook. “This is Snake-Eye. His real name is Marion DeShaun, but don’t ever call him that. He and his friends have a place in the country, down a long dirt road. They don’t have a phone, but I’ve got his cell number.”

  She added it to the list in Adam’s notebook. “It would be best if you just called him. They don’t like visitors, and will know immediately if you start down that road.”

  Adam put his palms on the desk and leaned forward, his voice almost as cold as Jillian’s. “I’ve been a police officer almost half my life. I’m used to interviewing people who aren’t too happy about it. Are you insinuating I’m not up to the job?”

  He took a slow breath. What right did he have to be irritated with her for questioning his competence when he was questioning her innocence? A little touch of guilt rearing its head?

  “No, but these guys are weirder than shit, so be careful. They hate cops with a pure passion. Keep your hands in sight and don’t make any sudden moves. You don’t want them to think you’re pulling anything sneaky.” She smiled and it softened her words.

  “Did Billy or Gordon help you with either the party or the lesson?” Billy couldn’t be a witness, but this Gordon guy could, and the more witnesses, the better.

  Jillian shook her head and closed the file drawer. “Gordon’s in school at night and he takes off as soon as possible. Billy doesn’t like the firing range. To tell the truth, I think he’s afraid of guns, and I know he’s afraid of Snake-Eye. That’s why it shocked me so when he shot himself. Drugs I could understand, but never a gun.”

  She still spoke of Billy in the present tense, Adam noticed. “This may sound crazy, but do you think he was afraid of guns because he felt drawn to them? Like he was trying to resist the pull of what finally happened.”

  Jillian looked up, her eyes big. “That’s it. That’s what’s been floating around in the back of my mind that I couldn’t put into words. Do you think working here made it worse?”

  “No. I think working here helped keep it at bay. Until it couldn’t anymore.”

  Lydia Cox wouldn’t be home until after six, and Adam wanted to interview her first. If her story checked out, it changed the intensity of the interview with Snake-Eye. It was a little early for supper, but he’d learned the hard way to eat and relieve himself whenever he had the chance. Once things got moving, he might not have another opportunity.

  He stopped at the first place he saw, an IHop on the feeder road. The windows were open and one section was closed off with a “Wet Floor” sign. What was with all the cleaning today? Weren’t businesses supposed to clean after they close? Of course, IHop specialized in pancakes, so the floor might always be sticky. They probably had to mop several times a day.

  “Black coffee, please,” he told the waitress as he settled into a booth. By the time the coffee had arrived, he knew Snake-Eye’s birthday matched the date of the party and that he had been questioned about numerous offenses, but never charged. His only record was a minor traffic violation and one ticket for disturbing the peace. The party company remembered delivering the helium tank and three dozen black balloons to J. R.’s. They’d never delivered to a firing range before.

  “My driver’s still talking about it,” the owner said. “He’d been setting up Christmas themed birthday parties all week. When he pulled into the parking lot of the gun store, he called me to see if he had the wrong address. Said he’d like to be a fly on the wall at that party. I’ve got the time and date stamp right here on the ticket, so there’s no question.”

  When his food came, Adam put away his phone and concentrated on the meal. When he finished, he’d look for the bakery. Maybe he could get some type of pastry for tomorrow’s breakfast while he was there. Or a pie. He wasn’t big on cake, but he loved pie.

  The Woodlands wasn’t far from J. R.’s in miles, but it was on another planet in atmosphere. The residential community had deeply wooded lots and deed restrictions that prohibited signage. He always managed to get lost on streets that had similar names. It was nice if you lived there, but tough if you were looking for someplace. His GPS kept telling him to turn right onto streets that only went left. The woman’s voice said Recalculating so many times Adam wanted to strangle her. When she said, “Take the next legal U-turn” for the third time, he growled at the machine.

  “Lady, I’m a police officer, I can U-turn any damn place I please.” What was going on? The GPS had never given him problems before, and where was his nice Australian lady? This one sounded like someone’s idea of a Southern belle. He could almost smell the magnolia blossoms.

  When the next set of instructions nearly ran him into a ditch, he switched off the GPS and tossed it to the back seat.

  He finally found the bakery hidden in a small shopping center completely camouflaged by towering trees. How did these stores stay in business, hidden away from view? Most stores tried to catch your eye, and even then, half of them failed.

  The aroma enveloped him the minute he opened the door, and he had to rethink his bias against cake.

  “Good afternoon, sir.” A chubby, smiling woman stood behind the counter, smudges of flour on her face. “May I help you?”

  “I understand you bake specialty cakes.” As he looked around, he saw a cake shaped like a racecar and another like a clown. The woman placed the finishing touches on a cake shaped like a gift, complete with ribbons, bows, and a to/from name tag.

  “I certainly do. What did you have in mind?”

  He pulled out his badge. “This would have been several months ago, but you might remember the cake. It was shaped like a gun. An AK-47. Do you have any record of that?”

  “I remember it. It’s hard to make gray icing. Let me look in the back, and I can get you the exact date. It was around Christmas, I know, because we were busy making trees and Santas, and all of the sudden I had to come up with a gun. It seemed so alien.”

  While the woman checked her records, he browsed the goodies. There weren’t any pies, but there were cookies of all types. He decided to splurge and get a dozen of the chocolate brownie cookies.

  “Here we are.” The woman held out an order form. “It was December 23rd. Ordered by J. R. Whitmeyer. She picked it up about six-forty-five. I remember because it was getting close
to closing and I didn’t want to be stuck with it. An attractive woman, but she didn’t fit in any better than the cake. My other customers were wearing reindeer sweaters and jingle-bell earrings. She was all in black with spiky hair. I actually kind of liked the hair, wished I had enough nerve to try it.”

  Perfect. Paperwork was always better than someone’s word. If the other interviews went this well, he’d have Jillian cleared by the time he got home. Could he stop by her place on the way? No, that would be pushing his luck, but he could sure call her.

  He studied the form, then looked back at the woman. “Is there any way you can make a copy of this?”

  “Sure.” She took the paper and was back immediately with a copy.

  “I just need one more thing.”

  “The brownie cookies?”

  “How’d you know?”

  “Your eyes were drooling. I’ve never met a man who could resist those cookies.”

  Jillian sent Cara home fifteen minutes early. Business was slow, and she was still upset over Adam’s visit. She needed to get out of the store.

  After shutting off the lights and setting the alarm, she went out the back door to her car. She had ridden a Harley for several years, but traded it in for a used Volvo after her father was killed. The noise of the Harley had kept Heather away, but seeing her father’s body made safety a bigger concern.

  Two blocks down the feeder road was a large drug store. After only a day and a half, Jillian realized baby Megan needed a better receptacle for dirty diapers than the office trashcan she’d been using. It not only needed to be taller and lined with a disposable plastic bag, but a tight-fitting lid was essential. Some type of pre-moistened wipe would also be a good idea. Paper towels weren’t working out so well.

  How could babies require so much gear? In movies, people put them in an empty dresser drawer and wrapped a dish cloth around them. Of course, in movies aliens rode back to their spaceship on flying bicycles, and Bruce Willis saved the world single-handedly.

  Cara’s suggestion of an air freshener was a good idea, so that was the first thing she grabbed when she reached to store. When she had everything on her list, she snagged a carton of O.J. and a small container of ice cream. She managed to get all her purchases into the back seat of her car, thankful once again she no longer rode a Harley.

  She had just pulled out of the drug store when Heather spoke up.

  “I wish you’d get a convertible. Don’t you want to see and be seen?” Heather glanced at Jillian. “Of course, it might muss your beautiful hair.”

  Jillian ignored the hair comment. She only wore that style to aggravate Heather. “After seeing Daddy, how could you want a convertible?” She patted the dashboard. “Safety is more important.”

  “Haven’t you figured out there’s never any guarantee of safety? Daddy should have taught you that.”

  “He taught me you can avoid dangerous things. Like drinking and driving.”

  “Daddy could drink and drive with no problem. He’d been doing it for twenty years.”

  They were stopped at a red light. Jillian froze. Icy fingers crawled down her spine. She let the light cycle through to red again. Cars swerved past, blowing their horns. “Are you saying Daddy’s accident wasn’t caused by drinking? Did the two of you have a fight that night?”

  She held her breath, waiting to see if Heather took the bait. Heather had brought up the subject, so she might be willing to talk. If she does, am I strong enough to accept the answer?

  “Sometimes you are so ridiculous. How could I have a fight with anyone but you? You’re the only one who sees me.”

  “I’m the only one who sees you, but you’ve told me that other people can hear you. I’ll rephrase my question. Were you angry with him for some reason that night?”

  Heather sat quietly while the light changed to green for the second time. “It was the night of the Miss America Pageant, but Daddy had the TV on a ball game. I kept telling him to change the channel, but he wouldn’t do it.”

  “You could have watched it somewhere else. You could have gone into any home in the country. You could have gone to Atlantic City, or Las Vegas, or wherever they have it now.” She kept her voice neutral, but a rope was wrapped around her chest and someone was pulling it tighter and tighter.

  “I wanted to watch it at home with Daddy. We’d always done that, it was a family tradition. We did it even when he didn’t know I was there. He would make popcorn, and we would watch it together. I know he could hear me telling him to change the channel. I know he could, even if he didn’t want to admit it. He’d been drinking. People can hear me if they’ve been drinking. Daddy always knew I was there, even if he tried to pretend he didn’t.”

  The light turned green for the third time, and Jillian pulled across the intersection and began to accelerate. “So what did you say to him that night?”

  “I told him he was selfish and mean, and that he had forgotten all about me. I said he never really loved me.”

  The speedometer moved from forty to fifty and Jillian began to weave in and out of traffic.

  A frown line creased Heather’s flawless forehead. “Jillie, what are you doing? Slow down.”

  “I’m doing the same thing both our parents did to get away from you once and for all. Are you worried I’ll mess up this body so you can’t drive me out and take it over?”

  “That’s just your imagination. How could I do a thing like that?”

  The speedometer edged to sixty as Jillian flew through a yellow light. “I don’t know how, but you’ve been trying for years. You almost succeeded several times. I can remember what you said to me. ‘Let go, Jillie. You won’t have to worry about things any more. I’ll take care of it for you.’ What exactly did you say to Mother that caused her to check out?” She didn’t need to control her voice any longer.

  “I was just a kid. I was lonely and unhappy. I wanted her to join me so we’d be together.”

  Jillian increased pressure on the accelerator as the needle inched past sixty-five. “That didn’t work out so well, did it? She went someplace else. Why don’t you join her if you’re lonesome? You could cross over.”

  “Cross over. Cross over.” Heather reverted to the sing-song voice she used when aggravated. “You watch too much TV. You don’t even know what that means. There is no crossing over. This is all there is. Don’t you think Mother would have joined me if she could? You’ll find out some day. And you won’t like it much either.”

  By seventy she was weaving through traffic. The same cars that had honked to let her know she wasn’t moving now let her know she was moving too fast. She barely noticed them. Heather’s words were all she could hear. “Well, you weren’t a kid for Daddy or Billy. You weren’t a kid for whatever it is you did to two people recently. Kids don’t go into other people’s bedrooms and watch, making comments and causing trouble.”

  “What do you want me to do? I have to watch. I can’t do it myself. I never got to have a life of my own. You saw to that. No guy ever kissed me or touched me. That’s the only way I can experience it. I want to know what it’s like. You used to tell me all about it, but you won’t anymore.” Heather shrugged. “I get angry when other people are enjoying something I can’t have.”

  At least she was finally admitting to things she had always denied. Are you happy now you that know for sure? Does it make you feel any better? No? Well it’s all you’re going to get.

  The car was edging up to eighty, still on the feeder road.

  “What do you want from me? I promise I won’t do things like that anymore.”

  “Like your promises are worth anything.” She was approaching the end of the road and aimed the car at a bridge abutment. “What I want is to not have to deal with you ever again. Otherwise, there won’t be enough left of this body for you to use.”

  The seat next to Jillian was suddenly empty, only Heather’s perfume remained. She turned the wheel quickly, taking the U-turn lane on two wheels. The north bound
traffic was much heavier with commuters returning home from work. By the time Jillian reached her street, the rope around her chest had started to loosen.

  “I knew you wouldn’t do it,” Heather said from the back seat. Then she was gone before they reached the store parking lot.

  Jillian dropped the baby things at the foot of the stairs and trudged up to her apartment. She put the O.J. in the refrigerator and sat at the table with the carton of ice cream. It was runny, but she ate it anyway.

  Anything to keep her mind off what she’d learned from Heather.

  Adam glanced at his notes. Everything depended on Lydia Cox’s recollection of the time line. The one Jillian had given him was too close, too tight. If he was going to clear her name, there had to be no possible way she could make it from her place to the Montrose overpass in time to shoot Manny.

  By six o’clock, Adam was parked outside the Cox home, waiting for her to return from work.

  The neighborhood was nondescript, with modest homes five to ten years old. Most of the homes were well kept. He wasn’t sure how long the husband had been gone, but the house already showed signs of neglect. The yard had been mowed, but not that week. No fertilizer had been put out, and the flower beds hadn’t been weeded. Buttercups and tiny onion flowers were springing up in the grass. Christmas lights had been taken down, but left in a tangle on the edge of the porch. Stray toys were discarded and forgotten, forming a blockade in front of the garage.

  At ten after, she pulled up. A jumble of kids spilled from the car and ran screaming for the front door. He gave her five minutes to get settled before he rang the bell.

  Mrs. Cox looked frazzled when she answered the door. Five minutes might not have been enough time. She had kicked off her shoes and un-tucked her blouse, but otherwise was still dressed for work. A drink was already clutched in her hand. Backpacks and tennis shoes dotted the entry hall. She might once have been an attractive woman, but her hair was too blond, her nails too long and red, and her breasts too large and pointed. He was certain none of those things were natural.