exposed (Twisted Cedar Mysteries Book 3) (13 page)

The album began with a single photograph taken at Charlotte’s paternal grandparents’ wedding. The newlyweds looked at the camera a little anxiously. Under the photo Grandmother Hammond had written
John and me on our wedding day.

“Don’t you just love old photo albums? Isn’t it amazing to think of your grandmother writing these words almost a hundred years ago?”

Charlotte considered the question. A curious byproduct of being adopted was that while she’d loved the Hammonds as much as if they were her real parents, she didn’t feel the same connection with the Hammond ancestors.

“I never knew any of my grandparents that well. My parents were older when they had Daisy and they adopted me four years later when Dad was forty-five and Mom forty-three.”

“That does seem old. Especially in those days.”

A few self-conscious poses of the honeymoon couple in New York City were followed with pictures of them standing on the front porch of their first, and only home, the very house Charlotte lived in today.

There had been improvements to the house since then, of course, including new siding and a cedar shake roof, but it did give Charlotte a shiver to think of all the family history and secrets this house must hold.

By the time the Hammonds had their first child, Shirley, the photographs were in color. There was a professional portrait, large enough to cover one entire page, of Shirley at age two.

“What an angel. Look at those blonde curls and blue eyes!” Jamie tilted her head. “Your sister looked a lot like her, didn’t she?”

“She did.” There was no question Daisy, like Shirley, had been lovely to look at, and at times it hadn’t been easy being the plainer, younger,
adopted
sibling. To her credit, Charlotte’s mother had always done her best to bolster her youngest daughter’s self-esteem.

Charlotte remembered once her mother had actually said, “There can be such a thing as being too pretty. You end up attracting the wrong sort of attention.”

It had seemed a strange opinion at the time. Now Charlotte wondered if something specific had been behind it.

They flipped through pages documenting the birth of the Hammond’s son Jonathon, John for short, after his father. This was followed by pictures of the children’s grade school years, which all seemed perfectly normal. As Shirley matured they began to study the pictures more closely.

Shirley had grown even more beautiful in her teenaged years. She had a willowy figure and stood a little taller than most of her friends at her birthday parties. There was a noticeable gap in photographs after Shirley turned fifteen. The next photo taken was of her and her date the night of her high school graduation. It was the first time any boy had been included in a photo with Shirley—in this case a tall, nerdy fellow with horned-rimmed glasses and protruding front teeth.

“She would have been eighteen here,” Jamie observed, after exclaiming over Shirley’s pink tulle dress. “A few years after she had the baby.”

Charlotte tried to peer into the eyes of the girl in the photograph, but the poor resolution made it impossible to guess at any hidden depths. Shirley had been through so much by this point, but here she looked like just another happy, pretty, teenaged girl.

“I suppose it’s possible this boy was the father of her baby.”

“It’s the only clue we have,” Jamie agreed.

Carefully Charlotte moved the photograph from the album. She found a protective envelope in one of the desk drawers and placed it carefully inside. “Next time I see Stella, I’ll ask her if she knows who he is.”

“I could show it to her tonight, if you’re okay lending me the photo. I’m having her over for dinner. She wanted to see my new place.”

Charlotte passed her the envelope. “How are you liking your new house?”

Jamie shrugged. “The place is great, but I still feel like a mess. I’d hoped a new environment would help me make a fresh start.” She glanced down at her left hand, more specifically the finger that for a short time had sported an engagement ring, and for an even shorter period of time, a wedding band. “But it isn’t that easy. And with Chester missing, nothing feels right.”

“I’m sorry.” She wished she could think of something more helpful to say.

“I didn’t mean to complain. Especially since this is just as hard for you, if not harder.” Jamie’s gaze went to the photo of Daisy on the bookshelves.

Charlotte smiled. “That’s one of my favorites of Daisy.” She had taken the picture, actually, on a day, about a year before her sister’s marriage to Kyle, when their parents had been away. Daisy hadn’t wanted to cook, so they’d ordered pizza and watched movies until very late. It had been one of a very few occasions when the two of them had had fun together.

“It is a nice photo,” Jamie agreed. “But I should get going. I have to pick up some groceries before going home to cook. Are you going to be okay?”

“Cory should be home any minute.” Charlotte had been keeping one eye on the time ever since she’d finished lunch. She knew it was best for Cory to keep her usual routines, but she couldn’t help worrying whenever her niece wasn’t under the same roof as her.

“Do you have to pick her up from school?”

“Her best friend’s mother is doing that. Bailey Landax.” Charlotte would have loved an excuse to escape the house for a few minutes. But she needed to be here for Chester. Just in case.

“Bailey’s the Realtor who sold me my house.” Jamie tucked the envelope containing the photo into her purse. “I felt a bit guilty using my—using Kyle’s competitor.”

“You had no choice. Quinpool Realty is probably going to remain closed as long as Kyle is incarcerated. I can’t see his father running it again on his own.”

“Probably not.” Jamie gave her a hug. “You’re sure you’ll be okay?”

“I’m fine. But thanks for dropping in. You’ll let me know if Stella recognizes the boy with Shirley?”

“Right away,” Jamie promised.

Charlotte walked Jamie out the back door in order to avoid the reporters camped out at the front. Fortunately she could usually get a bit a privacy on her back porch and she settled there now in one of the wicker chairs.

The fresh air felt good, and with the warm sun on her body, Charlotte was almost asleep when her cell phone rang. She pulled it out of her jeans pocket frantically.

“Hello?”

“Charlotte this is Bailey.”

She hadn’t expected it to be Chester, but she felt disappointed all the same. “Are you still okay to pick up Cory?”

“I’m at the school right now with Paige. The problem is Cory. She’s not here. You didn’t ask someone else to pick her up, did you?”

“No.
No.
” A voice inside Charlotte’s head started shrieking.
This can’t be happening! God, no, not Cory, too!
She struggled to stay calm and rational. “Have you spoken to her teacher?”

“Yes. Mrs. Young said Cory was definitely in class when the final bell rang. But after that...she just disappeared.”

Tuesday April 6, 1976, Librarian Cottage outside of Twisted Cedars, Oregon

Four years had passed since Shirley Hammond’s illegitimate son had shown up on her doorstep. She never heard from him anymore, except once a year when a few days or weeks after attending the Oregon Library Association Conference, there would be a knock at her door.

She never rushed to open the door, and was always mildly relived to find no one standing on the other side when she did.

By now she’d come to expect the object that would be set out for her on the welcome mat. It would be a snow globe, a tacky souvenir from whatever Oregon city had hosted the conference for that year.

The first one, in 1972, had been from Roseburg, followed by Pendleton in 1973, and Corvallis in 1974.

This year, the snow globe would be from Medford, no doubt, the host city of the 1975 conference.

A few days after receipt of this gift she’d come home to discover another of her red scarves had “disappeared.”

The pattern seemed innocuous enough. But it was baffling.

On this April day of 1976, Shirley stood for a long time on her front porch, alternately examining the snow globe she’d just picked up, and studying the surrounding woods. He always arrived so silently, so he must either walk or ride a bike.

Which meant, he might still be out there. Watching her.

Why, she had no idea and she didn’t like speculating about it, either. Four years ago she made up her mind she wouldn’t let him frighten her. Unfortunately though, that was easier said than accomplished. She couldn’t deny that, over the years, a feeling of dread had been building inside her.

Even now, she felt a sliver of it slide down her back from her neck to her tail bone.

And that made her angry.

“What do you want from me?” she shouted out to the woods.

She waited several minutes for an answer, but none came.

Eventually she returned inside, clicking shut the new deadbolt she’d had installed last year. She hesitated, then added the snow globe to the others on the bottom shelf of her cabinet. She then tried to put the whole thing out of her mind by re-reading one of her favorite Miss Marple mysteries, The Body in the Library.

For once, however, her old friend let her down. She couldn’t sink into the story as she liked to do. And her favorite quote from the book, one that always made her chuckle, this time seemed in bad taste:

“What I feel is that if one has got to have a murder actually happening in one's house, one might as well enjoy it, if you know what I mean.”

Tonight Shirley couldn’t see the humor in that, at all.

* * *

After his interview with Kyle Quinpool, Wade picked up lunch at a burger drive-through then immediately started back for Twisted Cedars. The long drive gave him an opportunity that had been rare for him lately. Time to think.

In the back of his mind it had occurred to Wade that Kyle might have organized a friend or cohort to kidnap his son. It was a far-fetched scheme, but one Wade had felt duty bound to check out. It was no secret Kyle hadn’t wanted Charlotte to gain custody of his children. He’d pleaded with his soon-to-be ex-wife Jamie to take them, or at least his father or mother.

But the courts had chosen Charlotte, the sister of the wife who in Kyle’s mind at least, had caused all of his problems.

So, yeah, Wade figured Kyle had motive.

But why take Chester and not Cory?

Besides, Kyle’s concern about Chester today had felt absolutely sincere.

Which meant Wade was no closer to finding out what had happened to the boy.

Or even if he was still alive.

Wade liked to believe an enterprising boy of nine could probably survive on his own for quite a while if he happened to stumble onto a winterized cottage stocked with provisions. Certainly the nice weather was in his favor.

This was, by far, Wade’s most hopeful scenario. If indeed Chester was hiding out somewhere, one of the searchers would eventually find the boy. Chester could have travelled only so far on his bike. In another week or two, he was bound to be discovered.

The other possibilities were far grimmer. If he’d met with an accident—or been murdered—his body would probably turn up eventually. But it might not.

Then there was the third possibility. That he’d been abducted. Possible suspects here included a total stranger, Brad Scott, or Ed Lachlan.

Of them all Ed seemed the more chilling proposition.

Ed had killed his second wife. And if Dougal was to be believed, he’d also killed four librarians—possibly five—as well as Joelle Carruthers and her daughter Josephine. A man like that obviously had little regard for human life.

In fact, if he’d taken Chester, the boy might already be dead.

It was a brutal possibility, but one that had to be considered. Wade didn’t, couldn’t, dwell on it, however. He had to believe that Chester was alive, and that he would be found. Soon.

As Wade drove further away from Salem, radio reception became spotty and he switched from the country music station he’d been listening to, to the CD of Chopin’s nocturnes his mother had given him a long time ago.

The beautiful music was soothing, not because Wade was such a huge classical music buff, but because it brought back the memories and sensation of his childhood, when he and his father would sit on the back porch and listen to his mother play.

So much of what had been good about his childhood—and it mostly had been good—was captured in those early morning concerts. As a boy he’d been proud and impressed with his mother, but he’d also been filled with anticipation for what was to come. A day of fishing with his dad, then home for a big Sunday dinner, and some family time watching television together.

Such simple stuff.

But Wade remembered it all fondly.

Soon he was driving along the coast and the beauty of the September day seemed to belie all the terrible things that had happened in Twisted Cedars this summer. Wade wondered if the pressures of his job would be easier to handle if he had a wife and children. He’d always figured he’d have both by this age.

For years he’d figured Jamie Lachlan was the right woman for him. But then she’d married Kyle, and he’d transferred his affections to Charlotte. That relationship had only lasted until Dougal moved back to town.

Was the universe trying to send him a message? Maybe he was the kind of guy who was better off single?

Wade was only ten minutes from town when a call came in from Marnie.

Normally Marnie opened every conversation—whether in person, or over radio or phone—with a teasing comment or a jibe. Not this time. Her voice was taut as she said, “Charlotte Hammond just called in a 9-1-1. Her niece Cory went missing after school today.”

Adrenaline jolted Wade into high alert. He glanced at the time display on the dash: 3:45.

“What happened?”

“Cory’s best friend’s mother—who happens to be Bailey Landax—was supposed to pick up Cory and her own daughter Paige after school. Several other mothers have already confirmed Bailey was on time, waiting right by the door when the bell sounded. But when the children came out, Cory wasn’t among them.”