Before We Were Strangers

by Brenda Novak

  “Apparently so. Anyway, I didn’t call to complain. I wanted to tell you that Detective Ramos has found a connection between my father and Sammy Smoot, the man who shot my grandparents and uncle.”

  Although Micah had barely left the station, he pulled to the side of the road. “Are you kidding me?”

  “Definitely not. In my father’s original statement to police, he said he’d never been to the Whiskey River Bar & Tavern, and no one claimed otherwise.”

  “That’s what Ramos told me when I talked to him, too.”

  “Well, he’s found a picture showing both my father and Sam standing in the bar with the band that was playing that night.”

  Micah smacked the steering wheel. “Holy shit! Your father’s a psychopath and yet he wields all kinds of power here in Millcreek. He’s essentially running this town.”

  “He’s formidable. He must be guilty of killing his parents and my mother. There are too many unanswered questions, too many coincidences, and he’s the one common element. Don’t you think?”

  As suspicious as Micah was, he hated to agree too readily. In this case, there wasn’t any DNA evidence, fingerprints, a documented trail showing Sam received money from her father or anything like that. There wasn’t any forensic evidence at all. Even the picture wasn’t exactly a smoking gun. Ed and Sam were both about the same age, they were both hanging out in a college town and that had been a popular bar. It wasn’t entirely out of the realm of possibility that their paths had crossed and they didn’t know it. It could be that Ed had stopped by that place so briefly he hadn’t really catalogued it in his brain, that he’d been too drunk to remember or he was too scared—or too smart—to admit he’d been there for fear he’d go to prison for a crime he didn’t commit.

  “That’s a great start, a step in the right direction. But I wish Ramos had something solid, something that proved your father’s involvement without a doubt.”

  “I do, too, but at least we have more now than we did before.”

  “That’s true,” he said. “Have you packed up?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Why don’t you do that now? I’ll be right over to take you to my house. You can shower there. I don’t like you being anywhere your father or brother can find you.”

  “My father or brother could easily find me at your place.”

  “Neither of them would expect you to be there, not if you’re still registered at the motel and your car is in the lot. Word that we’re seeing each other again hasn’t gotten out yet. So maybe you shouldn’t tell Paige. We might be better off keeping it to ourselves for a while.”

  “I have to tell her, Micah. Secretly staying with you when she’s crying on my shoulder over how badly she wants you back would destroy our friendship for good. I might already have crossed that line with what happened today.”

  He couldn’t regret today. He’d wanted to be with Sloane ever since he’d been with her the last time, and it had been a long, long wait. “You can’t trust her. She’ll tell your father where you are. She’s no friend to you, or she’d care more about your happiness and less about her own.”

  “Maybe with all the modeling success, she feels I’ve had enough sunshine in life, and she should be allowed the one thing she needs to be happy.”

  “Problem is, even if you weren’t in the picture, I wouldn’t go back to her. I left her before I ever knew you were coming back.”

  “I know. It’s just... God, this is so hard. It’s been a long time since she and I were close, but the bonds we forged when we were young are hard to break. In order to be the kind of friend I want to be, I have to be honest with her.”

  He dropped his head into his hand and rubbed his forehead. “I wish I could convince you not to do it.”

  “Trevor might already have told her.”

  “I doubt he’s said anything. He wouldn’t do it on purpose, and it’s far too soon for him to slip up.”

  “Still. This is a small town. If I’m staying with you, we won’t be able to keep it a secret for long.”

  “If Ramos has found the connection between your father and the shooter, we may not need long,” he said. “Is he going to arrest him?”

  “Not yet. The DA has advised him to keep working on the case, to try to strengthen it. You said yourself that what he has isn’t as incriminating as we need it to be.”

  “Some detectives are more bullish than others. I thought maybe he’d give it a shot, since he isn’t likely to get a lot more. If your father wasn’t at the crime scene, it’s not as though he can go back and test any evidence that was saved for DNA, which is how so many cold cases get solved these days.”

  “He said there are a couple of loose threads that might yield something.”

  “Like...”

  “Someone paid for Sam’s sister to have a liver transplant not long after Smoot hung himself in jail. They’ve never been able to trace that money. The family claims it came from anonymous ‘donations.’ But now that Ramos has proof my father and Smoot likely knew each other, he’s planning to press the family, to see if he can’t get one of them to talk about how they got the money.”

  Micah adjusted his bulletproof vest. Not only was it heavy, it could be so damn uncomfortable, especially when it was warm outside. “That’s why Smoot did it? To save his sister?”

  “That’s what Ramos believes. But why would he kill himself before the transplant?”

  “Maybe he hated himself for having to do what he did. Maybe he feared he wouldn’t be able to take the pressure, was afraid he’d give up your father and his sister would never get the transplant he was trying to give her. Maybe he couldn’t tolerate the abuse he was getting in prison or had psychological problems to begin with. Who can say? But if that’s what he did, it’s sort of beautiful—in a very dark and twisted way. He sacrificed himself for her.”

  “He also sacrificed three others who didn’t have a choice!” she said.

  “His family might view it differently. It’s possible they won’t dishonor his memory by talking to the police.”

  “Then there will be nothing more Ramos can do. He said he has to be careful. He can’t arrest someone like my father—a high profile figure with the money and temperament to sue—unless he’s fairly certain the DA can make the charges stick.”

  Micah swore under his breath. “If Ramos can’t get the family to talk, or find something else, that picture won’t make a damn bit of difference in the end. The case will go cold again.”

  “And I’ll only be more afraid of my own father than I was before. We have to do something, Micah.”

  “What?” Chief Adler had told him, in no uncertain terms, to leave it alone.

  “We have to prove he killed my mother.”

  “I’m not sure that’s possible. He’s had twenty-three years to hide his connection to the crime, and he has the police chief in his back pocket. Adler won’t let me investigate.”

  “That would have to change if we brought him proof.”

  “It would take a body.”

  “Then that’s what we’ll look for. I’ve been thinking...”

  “About...”

  “When Vickie told me my dad took the boat out that night, I automatically assumed he’d gone to the river. It’s close. It would be so easy to back up, dump a corpse and then get out of there. But you said a corpse would likely have washed ashore.”

  “With that fast-moving water, yes.”

  “And my mother never did. So what if he didn’t dump her in the river? What if he took her up to Lake Granbury, where he’d have more privacy and could weight the body so it would stay submerged?”

  “You had a cabin up there,” he said, remembering. “We drove up once, during our senior year.”

  “And my dad pitched a fit about it when he found out.”

  “Because we went without asking
. He said we wouldn’t be allowed to see each other again if we ever went back.”

  “Which I found odd even at the time. As long as he was free to live his life, he didn’t care much about what Randy and I did. He liked you, and the fact that we were always together meant he didn’t have to spend time with me himself. So I was super surprised that he had a problem with us visiting the cabin for a day to lay out by the water.”

  “You’re saying he didn’t want us there for a different reason than the lack of parental supervision.”

  “Could be. I have no way of knowing for sure, but if he hasn’t sold the property, it might be worth going up to look around. It’s not as if the police ever searched our house here in Millcreek, let alone the cabin at the lake.”

  “But the lake’s an hour away. And you were only five years old at the time. Would he have left you alone for that long? You could’ve gotten up, wandered around in the street looking for him or your mother and been hit by a car. Or been grabbed by a stranger. Or wound up in the river, which is only a short distance away.”

  “If he’d just committed murder, I doubt he’d hesitate to leave me for several hours, especially if it was in the middle of the night. Someone came in and checked on me to make sure I was sleeping. So there’s that. And he looked as though he’d been up all night when I saw him in the morning.”

  Micah watched as various cars, trucks and vans rolled past him on the street. The drivers probably assumed he was trying to catch speeders. They invariably slowed the moment they noticed him. But he wasn’t interested in writing any tickets. He didn’t enjoy that part of his job even when he had to do it. “I can’t imagine we’ll find anything. After so long, there wouldn’t be much of her left.” He winced as he said those words, hoping they weren’t too graphic. They were talking about her mother, after all. But Sloane was too focused on the goal to notice his choice of words.

  She was strong and determined, he realized. In those areas, she reminded him of her father more now than she ever did ten years ago.

  “There’d be bones,” she insisted. “Maybe even clothes, bindings or the weights he used. We could dive down and take a look.”

  “Except I don’t know how to scuba dive.”

  “Then I’ll go alone. I’m certified. I say we get my suit and tank from my storage unit in Dallas and go up there tomorrow. If he dumped her in the lake, I’m guessing he would’ve gone to an area he’s familiar with. That’s what most killers do.”

  Micah was taken aback by the authority in her voice. “How do you know?”

  “I’ve been watching true crime shows for years, marveling at the cases that get solved, watching how they do it and hoping mine will someday be solved, too. Sometimes, it’s the smallest thing that brings the truth to light. That’s what I’ve learned.”

  “Sloane, I’m afraid for you to get your hopes up too high.”

  “I know that we’re searching for a needle in a haystack, Micah. But I have to look, for my own peace of mind. I have to do all I can. You understand, don’t you?”

  “I do,” he admitted.

  “So... I bet he would’ve used the boat launch next to the cabin. He’d feel most comfortable there. And if he was in a hurry, was afraid he’d be seen, he may not have gone that far out on the water, especially in the dark, where he’d have to use a light and could be easily spotted from the vantage point of the other cabins. Plus, he’d want to make the drive home before it started to get light.”

  “In case you woke up early?”

  “Again, so that he wouldn’t be seen.”

  He found it sad that she didn’t believe she figured into her father’s thinking at all, that she didn’t matter. “Do you remember how to get to the cabin?”

  “Of course.”

  “Good, because I was there only that one time. I doubt I could find it on my own. We should search the inside, too, while we’re there.”

  “We will.”

  “Can you get the key? Will it be under that rock where we found it the last time?”

  “It’s a possibility. People are creatures of habit and routine. If we can’t find it, we’ll have to break in.”

  To the mayor’s cabin...

  Micah considered what Colt had just told him at the station. If he got caught, he’d be kicked off the force.

  “Micah?” she said. “Are you okay with that?”

  He had to be, because he wasn’t going to let her do it alone. “Yeah, I’m okay with that.”

  “So don’t come get me. I’ll head over to my storage unit in Dallas for my scuba stuff.”

  “Stay in touch.”

  “I will.”

  He caught her before she could hang up. “What about Paige?”

  “I’ll keep trying to get hold of her.”

  He wished she didn’t feel the need to do that. She had no idea how vengeful Paige could be. But maybe she was right, and not telling her would only make matters worse when she found out. “Okay. See you later.”

  * * *

  Paige was closing up her shop at five when the bell jingled over the door and Ed came in. “Hey.” She managed a smile but was too upset about Sloane and Micah for that smile to be genuine. She’d thought she was striking back at Sloane by sleeping with Ed, had felt so repentant and apologetic afterward, and why? Sloane had had the last laugh. She always got the last laugh.

  “How are you?” he asked.

  She tucked her hair behind her ears. “It’s been a rough day. What about you?”

  “I’m fine. Just a little upset that my only daughter would malign my name and try to mess up my reelection bid—and that she’d get Micah to help her. I thought Micah and I were friends. How many times have we been golfing together?”

  “That’s what you’re worried about?” she said. “Your reelection?”

  He stiffened. “What else would I be worried about? Her mother left in the middle of the night, and I’ve never seen her again. I haven’t harmed anyone, Paige.”

  Then what’d happened to Clara? Paige wanted to ask but bit her tongue. She was in a bad mood, but she wasn’t going to offend Ed. She had enough problems. “I heard Edith talking to her sister at the drugstore when I went in to get some painkillers for my headache an hour or so ago,” she told him as she put the money from the till in her cash bag so she could make a deposit at the bank on her way home.

  He hesitated. “And?”

  “She was saying something about a detective from Keller coming to town and asking a bunch of questions about you.”

  His scowl deepened. “Edith doesn’t know when to keep her mouth shut. All she does is talk.”

  “I hope you’re not in any trouble, that everything is okay.”

  “It’s fine.”

  “But why would a detective from an outside police department come to Millcreek to investigate Clara’s disappearance? Has something turned up?”

  “No, nothing. Nothing will turn up, either, not after twenty-three years.”

  “That detective must’ve wanted something.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” he said, a hint of irritation in his voice. “I’m telling you it was nothing.”

  The fact that he didn’t explain indicated the opposite, but she couldn’t push him any further. “I’m glad, because Micah and Sloane are already trying to make trouble for you.”

  “That’s why I’m here,” he said. “You were Micah’s wife. I’m thinking you would know if he’s ever misused his power as a police officer.”

  She looked up after slipping her moneybag in her purse. “In what way?”

  “Did he ever let a friend off the hook for speeding or other traffic violations, even though that friend had clearly broken the law? Did he park illegally or use his siren to circumvent traffic lights? Did he do any racial profiling when making traffic stops? Did he ever use his cruiser as his
personal vehicle, or wave his gun around?”

  “No, none of that.”

  He frowned as though he wasn’t pleased with her answer. “Officers have access to all kinds of state and national databases—the National Crime Information Center, the DMV, et cetera. They can even get banking, telephone and credit information. Has he ever accessed a database that’s supposed to be used for official investigations only?”

  “Why would he do that?”

  “Lots of reasons. Maybe he was curious about a friend or neighbor, wanted to see where they used to live or work or if they were in debt, or he wanted to check out a business associate he was interested in investing with. Maybe he even used those databases to try to find Sloane.”

  Or Clara. She could see where he was going and shook her head. “I don’t think so, Ed.”

  “Surely, he’s done one of those things.”

  “Not that I remember.”

  He pulled out a piece of paper that had Complaint written across the top. “Paige, he would have to access one or more of those databases to look for Clara, so we both know he’s done at least that much. If you’ll just sign this, I’ll take it over to Chief Adler, and we can teach Micah a lesson once and for all.”

  “You’re trying to get him fired?” She was appalled by his swift and ruthless revenge even though she’d helped instigate it.

  “I’m not trying. He’s stabbed me in the back, which means he’s no friend of mine. He won’t be on the force much longer, let alone ever make chief.”

  Paige was angry with Micah, too, but she couldn’t bring herself to lie about him when it would mean the loss of his job. She wanted him to love her. That was all.

  She should never have gotten involved with Ed. He was willing to go much further than she was. “No. I don’t feel good about that.”

  Sloane’s father seemed taken aback by her refusal. “He’s never wanted you. He’s made you feel inadequate ever since you got involved with him, made you look like a besotted fool. Signing this will be hitting back, which is what he deserves. Show him he should’ve had more respect.”

  “No,” she said. “He’s my son’s father. If I get him fired, how will he pay his child support?” She laughed weakly, as if that was her real motivation. She thought Ed might understand that reason before any other, but she couldn’t have signed it, regardless.