by Jane Suen
Chapter 24
I SET OUT to see Lacey’s mom after the funeral. My GPS led me to a modest cottage on the outskirts of town, not far from the church. It was painted light blue, and the lawn was trimmed.
I folded my sunglasses and left them on the dashboard of my car. I straightened my dress, opened the door, and slid out.
Mrs. Walken was sitting on her porch chair, waiting for me. I could only hope Amos had put in a good word for me. She wore a thin cotton dress. Her gray-streaked hair was twirled and caught up in a loose bun. Something about the way she sat, or perhaps it was the way she held her head high, her blue eyes fixed on me, that spoke volumes of her poise and no-nonsense attitude.
I reached out to shake her hand. “Mrs. Walken,” I said. “I’m delighted to meet you. I mean, Amos said to come and see you.”
She grinned. “Amos, he’s a good boy.” She paused. “Family, you know. All the family I got left.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said politely as she waved for me to take a seat.
“I hear you’ve been asking questions about Lacey.”
I could see traces of her beauty from a long time ago. Faded now, and she knew it. I knew it because she hadn’t taken care of herself or bothered to apply makeup. She didn’t seem to care that I saw her face, scrubbed and bare. “I’d like to talk to you about Lacey. First, what was she like?”
Mrs. Walken sat back in her chair and closed her eyes. I could hear the birds rustling the leaves in the treetops. It sounded so far away. It was peaceful here. I sensed her life was lonely, even sad.
She seemed to read my thoughts. “You don’t have to worry about me. I still miss her, you know, my Lacey.” Her fingers traced the pattern of the wood on the armrest of her chair. “That child, from the day she was born, had the loudest cry. She never slept through the night like some babies do. Kept me awake.” Her eyes peered into mine. “But you know, Lacey was strong. She knew what she wanted.” She paused, shaking her head. “Stubborn too. I tried to talk her out of wearing that yellow dress one time, and she wouldn’t hear of it.”
I was all attention, hearing firsthand what Lacey was like.
“Lacey was beautiful, and she realized the power of her beauty from the time she was young.”
I remembered the photos of Lacey in the newspapers. It took my breath away. I could imagine it was evident, even at that early age.
“Did she … have any enemies?”
“Girls envied her, guys fought over her. But not enemies like that.”
“Why would anyone want to hurt her?”
She fixed her eyes on me, narrowing as if she had a shrewd thought. “My baby had no enemies.”
“Would she tell you if she did?”
She paused. “She had already moved out and got a job at the pizza joint. I didn’t hear from her as often after that. She lived with Sally.”
“I spoke to Sally, went to her place. Is that where she lived with Lacey?”
“Oh, that place, I thought they would have torn it down by now,” said Mrs. Walken. “We didn’t talk as much later. I’d call and asked how she was doing. Or she’d call, usually on Sunday, and chat with me for a few minutes.”
“And she never said she was afraid of anyone?”
She frowned. “Not exactly. But one time she asked …”
“Ask what?”
“If she could move in here for a while,” she whispered.
“And when did she say that?”
Mrs. Walken folded her hands in her lap and raised her head. “A couple of days before she disappeared.”
Chapter 25
I RUSHED BACK to the motel to change. Suddenly, I felt uncomfortable in my black dress and spike heels. Maybe it was the funeral, the stuffiness of the church, or what Lacey’s mother confided in me. I shimmied out of my clothes and pulled on a T-shirt, a pair of comfortable, familiar blue jeans and well-worn shoes. I tied my hair back in a ponytail and splashed warm water on my face. I used a towel to dry it and held it close, smelling the chlorine on it.
On my way out, I stopped by the motel front desk. The same clerk was there.
“I just got back from the funeral,” I said, making conversation.
He grunted.
I poured coffee from the carafe, not caring if it was fresh. My head screamed for caffeine. “Did you know him?”
“Everyone did, the old dinosaur. But I didn’t know him that well. He didn’t exactly run in my circle.” He smirked, spitting out a coarse laugh.
“What about Lacey, did you know her?”
“Yeah, but she was younger.”
“Did you see her in school?”
“Until she quit going, then I hardly saw her much after that.”
“Did she have any enemies?”
“Look,” he said, bending over the counter, up close in my face. “I don’t know what you’re digging at, what you’re trying to do, but I’m not her buddy.”
I was taken aback by his answer and his ferocity. “She disappeared, and no one knows where. Don’t you care?” Maybe there was something he wasn’t telling me, something he was hiding behind the scraggly beard. “But you know something, don’t you?”
“Why don’t you ask your friend?”
I blinked. How did he know I was talking to Mike? He must have seen him outside picking me up. Was Mike holding back on me too?
Holding my paper cup of lukewarm black coffee, I darted out to my car. I just wanted to drive away, to anywhere but here.
Chapter 26
I TORE OUT of the motel parking lot, driving on autopilot. It didn’t take long for the town to disappear from the rearview mirror. I sped across the forest toward the creek. I slowed down as my tires churned up the gravel on the country road and parked. I got out to take a walk. I headed to the tree at the edge of Murder Creek with its branches bowing over the stream. It was so peaceful here, the gentle gurgling of the water, the busy buzz of the insects getting on with their lives.
Flashes of visions popped up. Of men, laughing and joking as they gathered twigs and small branches, started a fire, prepared a meal. I saw the horses behind them, tied to other trees. I saw the day turning to dusk and the flames burning brighter. I saw more men coming closer, strange men in rough, dirty clothes asking for directions. But they weren’t turned away. They sat, joining the group, and food was passed to them.
The snap of a branch jolted me back to the present. I stiffened, my senses raised to the possibility of danger. I thought I was alone.
“Sorry to disturb you,” said a man’s voice. I turned to look. He was dressed in a cotton shirt and slim-fit dark jeans.
James Madison.
“James, right?” I blurted out, although I knew.
“Most people call me Jim.” He took a few steps closer, as if to greet me. “And you are?”
“Eve Sawyer.” I held out my hand. “We met earlier today.”
“Oh yes, I’m sorry. You look different.”
I stood silent for a while. Maybe he wanted to be by himself, to mourn his dad’s passing.
“You come here often?”
“I used to. A long time ago.” He put both of his hands in his pockets. As if he needed to stabilize, to hold his feet firmly on the ground. He scuffed the dirt with his toe.
I felt uncomfortable, like I should be going. I took a step.
“Please stay,” he said. “I wouldn’t mind some company now.”
“I’m sorry about your dad,” I said. “What you said up there was heartfelt. I didn’t know him, but through your words I felt your pain … and your love.”
“We all knew, the family that is, that he was ill and didn’t have long to live. It wasn’t unexpected. My dad was a businessman, and he made plans for it, long before.” He paused and shook his head. “I guess he wanted to spare us the work. Everything was in place. All the paperwork, his will, the legal documents, the funeral, the burial plot.”
“Even the words on his headstone?”
“Even that, he d
idn’t forget anything. He was that kind of man.” Jim choked and a sob escaped from his lips. “I miss him.”
“Did you get to tell him everything before he passed?”
He looked at me, hard, as if debating what I knew, what I had meant. Finally, he said, “No.”
I changed the subject. I didn’t know the man or what to say, really. “Did you know Lacey Walken?”
He straightened. His eyes scrutinized mine, peering suspiciously. “Why do you ask?”
I explained my school project, made it sound bland and nonthreatening. “I thought you might have known her,” I said, adding lamely, “You being around the same age and all.”
He closed his eyes. I wondered if he was trying to concentrate to remember, or to block out something. His eyes were an indeterminable shade of gray with specks of green. His expression pulled me, tugging me like waves, carrying me to the ocean. Then back here to the creek. Was it deep sorrow I detected? Or regret, or something else?
“Do you want to talk about it?” I said.
He wrestled with his emotions, his face twisting one way and another. Then I saw him relaxing, as if he gave up or gave in. Was he a tortured soul? More than just grief-stricken?
“Lacey?” I whispered, prodding him.
“I knew Lacey growing up. We were the same age. She was a skinny tomboy, fearless, braver than the boys she played with.” He paused. “We did sprints at the elementary school. For the annual race. I won the blue ribbon in the boys’ group, and she won in the girls. She had those long skinny legs … then she spurted up in her teens. I mean everywhere. She turned into a woman overnight. A beautiful one, like a goddess.”
I nodded.
“It wasn’t just me that noticed. Everyone did, the young and the old. She changed, too, and became less of a tomboy. We had hung out here a lot. On lazy summer days, the kids all came here to swim in the creek. Nobody minded; we all knew each other.”
“But later?”
“Later we still came here, but it wasn’t all innocent and fun like when we were kids.” He shook his head, brushing his hair back. “Lacey would stand on that rock,” he said, waving to the large flat rock. “She’d do a tease, some kind of dance wiggling her hips.” He noticed the look on my face, and my eyes widening. “No, not like that, it wasn’t a sexy tease. It was still childish, a natural one, something she did on the spur of the moment.”
I could picture Lacey standing there, the wind blowing her long hair, the awkward wiggling of her body, dancing to a new tune.
“We were all changing and dealing with our bodies and minds. We were a group of kids who knew each other, grew up together. Sure, we played pranks on each other. What kids didn’t? But if anyone outside pranked us, or tried to, we’d be together as a group. Looking out for each other.”
I pictured the brothers squabbling and fighting. And still having each other’s back.
“What happened to Lacey?”
Jim opened his mouth, but closed it again before speaking. Then he said, “I should tell you something else, something Lacey and I did.” He struggled, his face contorting again. “I admired Lacey—no, I loved her. For years I watched over her, acted like the brother she never had. We were that way with each other. I grew taller, over six feet, and she had to look up at me.”
“So you were like friends?”
“Yup. But it all changed one day.”
I gripped the edge of my belt, leaning forward to catch his words.
“Lacey and I …” he began. “I mean, she got a job at the pizza joint after her mom gave her a hard time and she moved out.”
“To live with Sally,” I said.
He sighed. “I worried about that. It was a dump of a place by the railroad tracks.” He frowned. “But Lacey was stubborn. I couldn’t talk her out of it.”
“And Sally?”
Jim laughed, a hard, gritty sound. “She was a whore, older than Lacey.”
“How did they meet?”
“They both worked at the pizza joint. Initially, Lacey was going to school full-time and working at the pizza place some evenings and weekends.”
“I heard she quit school,” I said.
“She couldn’t make ends meet on her paltry salary and the tips. So she quit school altogether to work full time.” He pursed his lips, disapprovingly or in disgust, I couldn’t tell. “I couldn’t talk her out of that either.”
I shook my head, knowing where she had ended up.
He clenched his fist. “I tried to get her to come back to school, but she stuck her head in the sand. She wouldn’t listen.”
Chapter 27
“WERE YOU LOVERS?” I asked.
He didn’t seem surprised. He looked at me with a sad expression.
I knew he was in love with her. Still. And he was a man in pain, even after all these years.
I added, “Did you look for her?”
Jim sighed, rubbing his still red-rimmed eyes. “After what happened here, we had search parties going for days. My father, you know he was rich … well, he paid for people to join the search when we didn’t have the local capacity to keep it going.”
“He sounds like a good man,” I said, thinking of the nice things people said at his funeral. No one would ever speak ill of the dead. “What did you do?”
“We followed the creek downstream and searched the banks. It was slow going, covering the distance in the forests and on both sides of the creek. We had teams going around the clock.”
“Why did your dad pay for the search?”
He hesitated. “It was his way of helping.”
“Did you come across anything?”
“No, we found nothing. It was like she’d vanished into thin air.”
I swallowed and asked the question I dreaded. “Do you think she’s dead?”
“Everyone assumed that. But I, even now, hold the hope, the slimmest of hope, that one day we’ll find her.” He added in a low soft tone, “May she be in peace.”
Chapter 28
MY STOMACH WAS grumbling again as I drove back to town, my mouth salivating over a home-cooked meal at the diner. The waitress recognized me right away and whisked me to a corner table. Happily ensconced there, she brought me a fresh cup of coffee before I ordered my usual.
I got comfortable and spread out my notes and articles on the table, and the newspaper clipping of Lacey. I somehow wanted Lacey to know that I was just as stubborn as her. Even though they had searched high and low for her, I would not give up. I was determined, now more than ever. Digging for little crumbs as best as I could. Hoping the pieces would come together. But right now, it was still a giant puzzle.
I drew a line down the middle of the page. On the left side, I wrote “Not suspects” and underneath I put: mother, Amos Walken, and Jim Madison. On the right side under “Suspects,” I wrote: Sally? Clint Madden? Unknown male caller? Stranger? And at the top of the page I added “Lacey Walken,” and I drew a circle around the two words.
I chewed the tip of my pencil. Maybe I should just make one big list and cross the names off later? I had to find a motive. If it was Sally, why would she kill Lacey? Was she jealous of her? Did Lacey come between her and a boyfriend of hers? But it didn’t make practical sense for Sally to do this; after all, Lacey was paying half of the rent and everything else.
The next name, Clint Madden, was a mystery. I had come across his name in the articles, and he may have been the last person to see her that night when she left work. I pulled out my laptop and did a search. Several names popped up. I added a few choice words: Clint Madden, pizza, manager, food industry, Carlton, and Murder Creek. I didn’t think I’d find anything this narrow, but what the heck? No harm in trying. I skipped a bunch of discombobulated “Clints” and “Maddens.”
I saw a line in the search list with his name, so I clicked. Out popped a small article. I had assumed a guy this hog-wild over his newfound fame was bound to do it again. And I was right; he even mentioned his previous role in the pizza joint,
as if it was an entrée to his being famous. Was he an idiot, a knucklehead? Or was he a clever criminal mentioning the deed in the open, as if it would assure his innocence in a crime?
I scrolled through the article slowly, so as not to miss anything. This one was about a robbery in front of a store, and Clint provided eyewitness statements. He emerged as a hero, having acted fast, snatching the purse from the thief before the old woman could recover from her shock. There he was, a picture of a smiling Clint with the woman, her purse front and center of the camera. And the unfortunate thug? Well, it seemed he had escaped in all the ruckus. Clint was the good guy, champion of women victims. I came across the next article. The MO was strikingly familiar. Another robbery, inside a diner this time. The thief dashing out and the man chasing him, tackling him and wrestling the backpack from him. The man, Clint, bowing to the applause of the onlookers as he presented the backpack to the young woman. Another little write-up with a picture.
Was Clint in the right place and right time in each robbery? I wondered.
The waitress set my plate on the table as I hurried to clear a spot. She glanced at the photos and papers.
I couldn’t resist asking her, “Did you know Lacey?”
She shook her head. I dug into my food, everything forgotten for now except my dinner.
Chapter 29
SOMETIMES I GET ideas when I’m in the shower, or walking, or when I’m doing anything but thinking about a problem when I’ve run into a brick wall. That’s when unbidden thoughts have snuck in.
What if I was going about this all wrong? Was I missing something right in front of me? I felt I was making progress, but slowly. Perhaps there was another connection to Murder Creek.
I pushed away the growing stack of papers and my scribbled notes. Just pieces of a puzzle. I had to figure it out and piece it together. I could be patient when I wanted to be. Lacey had been missing for years. Could new information surface now? Or was her trail too cold?
I stirred another packet of sugar in my coffee. The clinking of the spoon was a welcome and familiar sound. It was Saturday. I’d been here since Wednesday afternoon. Sooner rather than later, I’d have to go back to the city and work. I needed to talk to Jeremy Madison tomorrow. I got a few leads on where to find Clint Madden, and some numbers to call.
