Her Mother’s Grave_Absolutely gripping crime fiction with unputdownable mystery and suspense

by Lisa Regan

  Damon smiled sheepishly as he motioned to it. “Sorry. I’ve got three teenage boys and they all play sports—and now I’ve got Lloyd’s boys as well. The foyer is kind of the dumping ground when they come in.”

  To the left of the foyer was the living room. The hardwood floors were dominated by a gray microfiber U-shaped sectional that faced a large television. Josie counted three different video game systems on the entertainment center beneath the television. The sleek, dark coffee table with matching pedestal tables on either side of the room boasted faux floral arrangements. Between those and the heavy, gray, pleated drapes, it was obvious that the messy, sports-loving Todd men still had a woman in their lives. Josie knew from the research that Gretchen had done that Damon was now a physical therapist who worked closely with the student athletes on Denton University’s campus.

  “So,” Damon said, taking a seat on one side of the sectional. “You’re here to talk about Belinda Rose. I always wondered what happened to her.”

  “I’m sorry to tell you that she was murdered,” Gretchen said, taking a seat across from him. Josie remained standing.

  Beneath the tan, Damon’s skin paled. “What? When… How?”

  “We believe she was killed sometime on or after the night she disappeared,” Josie cut in. “April 26, 1984.”

  His brow furrowed. “Disappeared? Word at school was she met someone, and they ran off to Philadelphia together. How do you know she was murdered?”

  “We recently found her remains in the woods out behind the trailer park,” Josie answered.

  He hung his head. “My God. I don’t know what to say.” They gave him a moment. He took in a few breaths, and when he looked back up at them, he said, “What does this have to do with me?”

  Gretchen said, “We’re trying to get a picture of Belinda’s life before she died—who she hung around with, what she was like, places she went, that sort of thing.”

  “Oh, well, we didn’t know each other that well.”

  “Her foster mother said she dated your brother, Lloyd,” Josie said. “Your brother gave a statement to a police officer after she disappeared stating he was her boyfriend, and you confirmed it.”

  “I wouldn’t have said that, and neither would Lloyd. Maybe that’s what the police inferred. That’s what everyone inferred. I mean, people just assumed that.”

  Gretchen asked, “Why would people assume that Belinda and Lloyd were dating?”

  “And why would Lloyd let them?” Josie added.

  He clasped his large hands together and pressed them between his knees. “Well, she spent a lot of time at our house junior year.”

  “But she and Lloyd weren’t an item?” Gretchen said.

  “No, not the two of them.”

  “Then who? You and Belinda?”

  His mouth twisted. “I guess it doesn’t matter now,” he mumbled, almost to himself.

  “What doesn’t matter, Mr. Todd?” Josie asked.

  “Belinda was seeing our dad,” he blurted. The effort of pushing the words out seemed to make him short of breath.

  Josie and Gretchen looked at one another. Then Josie said, “Your dad?”

  “He’s dead now,” Damon said. “Died a few years back of pancreatic cancer. He was an algebra teacher at the high school. Back then, my mom had left us right before my freshman year, so it was just the three of us—me, Lloyd, and Dad. He was tutoring Belinda after school, and things… progressed.”

  “That’s one way of putting it,” Gretchen said. Her notebook was out, and she began frantically making notes. “When did the affair start?”

  “Right before the summer after sophomore year.”

  “1983?” Gretchen asked.

  “Yeah. That’s right. It was the summer before she disappeared.”

  “Did you or Lloyd ever talk to her or your dad about what was going on?” Josie asked.

  “We tried. We were both pretty disgusted with him. I mean, we weren’t ready for him to date at all, let alone carry on an affair with someone we went to school with. Lloyd was furious. I thought him and my dad were going to come to blows over it, but my dad made it clear he wasn’t going to stop seeing her, and finally Lloyd just gave up. They didn’t speak for a long while. I tried reasoning with Dad, but he said it was something I couldn’t understand until I was older. He said we could be mad at him all we wanted, but he only asked that we not tell anyone, because it would ruin his career and he could go to jail.”

  Josie and Gretchen stared at him.

  He spread his hands in a plaintive gesture. “Look, I know it sounds terrible. Looking back, I realize how bad it was, but Lloyd and I were kids. All we had was my dad. If he went to prison, we’d be on our own. I think that’s why Lloyd stopped fighting with him over it. He kept saying it would fizzle out eventually and that as upsetting as it was, it wasn’t worth our dad going to jail, so I just kind of… fell in line.”

  “What about Belinda?” Gretchen asked. “Did you ever talk to her about their relationship?”

  “Yeah, a couple times. She said she wouldn’t stop seeing my dad and asked me not to tell anyone. She said Lloyd had already agreed to do the same. Like I said, ultimately, Lloyd didn’t want our dad to go to jail. He was in the same year as Belinda, so when people assumed that she was coming over here to see him all the time, we let them think that. She told people at school she and Lloyd were a thing, and he didn’t deny it. She followed him around, and even though he barely gave her the time of day, people saw them together and just assumed they were an item. You know, she had… this is going to sound strange, but she had fangs. Only on the top. They weren’t even really noticeable, but by high school, almost everyone knew she had them.”

  “It was noted in the autopsy,” Josie said. “Supernumerary teeth.”

  “Is that what they’re called? Sorry. No disrespect intended. I only bring it up because she got made fun of a lot in school for them. She didn’t have a lot of friends—none, really—and when Lloyd didn’t deny that they were together and let her follow him around, all of the teasing stopped. I think sometimes she didn’t want to bother with guys her own age because all they ever did was pick on her. She never said that. That’s just my take on it. I mean, I told her she should be dating someone her own age, but she said—” he broke off and looked away from them.

  “She said what?” Josie prompted.

  “She said she liked older men—that they were nicer to her and more sophisticated and treated her better. She made it sound like she’d been with older men before.”

  Gretchen’s pen hovered over her notepad. “Did she name anyone?”

  Damon shook his head. “No. I thought she was making it up, trying to make herself seem more mature.”

  “Did your father ever give Belinda any gifts? Jewelry or anything like that?” Josie asked.

  “No. He wouldn’t have. He was pretty paranoid about being caught. People knew he was single, so if he bought jewelry, the town would have been talking. She always wore this locket ’round her neck, but it wasn’t from him.”

  Josie narrowed her eyes. “Really? Did she ever say who gave it to her?”

  “I never asked her, and she never talked about it. Lloyd didn’t care enough about her to ask her. The other girls at school would bring it up sometimes, but she just said it was from someone special, and that’s all she would say. I used to think maybe she bought it herself. Belinda was a nice person, but she liked attention, and the more mystery she could surround herself with, the more attention she drew.”

  “Mr. Todd,” Josie said. “Did Belinda ever mention being pregnant or having had a baby?”

  His eyes widened. “What? No. Never.”

  Josie knew that Belinda’s affair with Damon Todd’s father would have started four or five months after she’d given birth, but it was worth a try to see if perhaps she had mentioned it to Damon. Josie wondered if Belinda had hidden the pregnancy from everyone. Had she had even one friend to confide in? Would anyone out there
know what had happened to the baby?

  “So, what happened between Belinda and your father?” Gretchen asked, picking up the line of questioning once more.

  “Oh, it didn’t last. By the time the new year came around, they were finished.”

  “Who broke it off?” Gretchen asked.

  “She did. My dad was crushed. I think he really liked her. She would have been eighteen that fall. They could have been together for real—at least that’s what my dad kept saying. Took him months to stop talking about her. Then that fall there were rumors around town that she had met some guy in Philadelphia and was getting married. I never saw my dad so depressed—well, except for when my mom left.”

  “Where did these rumors come from?” Josie asked.

  “One of the girls who’d lived at the care home with her was in her senior year, and after their foster mom got a postcard from Belinda, it was all the girls at the home could talk about. Word spread from there. Eventually my dad overheard some of the kids talking about it in class.”

  “Do you remember any of the names of the girls she lived with at the care home?” Josie asked.

  He rattled off a few of them, mostly first names that were so common they’d be impossible to track down with any accuracy. But within a few days, they’d have the list of former care home girls from the Department of Human Services, and they’d be able to match those names with the names Damon remembered.

  “I know you said she didn’t have many friends, but do you remember if she had any close friends that she hung around with? Most teenage girls have at least one.”

  “I’m sorry, but no, I can’t think of anyone. She wasn’t popular, and she didn’t really have friends at school—other than the girls who lived at the care home. I mean, if she had friends outside of school, I don’t know. She had a job at the courthouse—she might have made friends there that I didn’t know about. Like I said, she was seeing my dad. It was weird. We covered for them, but it wasn’t like her and I were friends, you know? You could always check the yearbooks. All the girls from the foster home went to Bellewood High.”

  Josie wanted to kick herself for not thinking of it. “The yearbooks,” she said. “Does the school keep copies that far back?”

  “I don’t know, but if you want, you can have my dad’s. He kept one for every year he taught. They’re in the garage with a bunch of his other stuff. I didn’t know what to do with them. Seemed wrong to throw them away.”

  Gretchen stood up. “That would be great, Mr. Todd. We would certainly appreciate it.”

  “Sure. My wife will be happy to be rid of them.”

  Chapter Thirty

  JOSIE – NINE YEARS OLD

  Josie dragged a piece of blue chalk across the sidewalk outside of her grandmother’s home. A series of squares stretched from one end of the pavement to the other in a pattern: two squares, then one, then two, then one, and so on. They played hopscotch at school all the time, but Josie had never drawn the boxes before. She’d squealed with delight when her grandmother presented her with a pack of colored sidewalk chalk. There were four colors: blue, pink, yellow, and green. Josie liked blue best of all, so that’s what she started with. Once the boxes were all complete, she went to one end and started jumping. One foot, two feet, one foot, two feet—all the way to the end.

  “Josie,” her grandmother called from the front door. “Time to get ready.”

  Carefully, she put her chalk back inside its cardboard box and skipped up the front walk and inside.

  “Wash your hands,” Lisette told her.

  Josie ran to the kitchen and did as she was told. “Do you think I’ll fall, Gram?” she asked.

  Lisette smiled as she pulled their jackets from the closet in the front hallway. “Probably. Everyone falls their first time roller skating. It’s unavoidable.”

  Josie dried her hands on the dish towel and ran to Lisette so she could slide her jacket on. “How long does it take to get to the skating rink?”

  “Oh, not long,” Lisette told her, picking up her purse and keys. “Maybe ten minutes.”

  “Did you remember the present?” Josie asked.

  Lisette picked up a brightly wrapped birthday present from the foyer table. “Of course, dear.”

  “I can’t wait!” Josie exclaimed. “I never got invited to anyone’s birthday before. Especially not at a skating rink!”

  A bright smile stretched across Lisette’s face. She knew Josie had been looking forward to this for two whole weeks. It was all they talked about. Lisette had even said that she might put skates on.

  Her smile died the moment she opened the front door. Josie’s mother stood on the stoop in a pair of torn jeans and a dirty blue T-shirt that hung off one shoulder. A cigarette smoldered in one hand. Her cheeks were sunken, and her long, black hair looked dull. She smiled a mirthless smile that sent a chill all the way down Josie’s spine.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Josie and Gretchen lugged several boxes of Bellewood High School yearbooks back to Josie’s office at the station house. While Gretchen went to check on the warrants, Josie pored over the yearbooks from 1981 through 1985, looking for her mother’s face among the hundreds of photos.

  “There’s nothing here,” she said when Noah appeared.

  He sat across from her. “So, she didn’t go to school with Belinda Rose. We still have the care home girls, and I set up an interview tomorrow with a lady from the courthouse who worked there at the same time as Belinda.”

  With a sigh, Josie pushed the last yearbook away and spun her chair to look out the window behind her desk. Night had fallen, which meant it was time for her to go home, alone, to her empty house, a bottle of Wild Turkey, and the now stirred-up memories of a mother whose greatest kindness to her had been to leave.

  “You okay, Boss?”

  She spun back around and offered him a wan smile. “Fine,” she lied. “What’s up?”

  “Maggie Lane says that Belinda’s locket was not among the personal effects left behind at the care home. She says she doesn’t know who gave it to her, but Belinda started wearing it around Christmas after the first time she ran off. I already had someone go back to the crime scene and take another look. Nothing turned up.”

  “Interesting,” Josie said. “Maybe we’ll find out more when we track down some of the girls who grew up with her.”

  “Hopefully.” He motioned toward the dark window behind her. “It’s pretty late, Boss.”

  “I know.”

  Noah was always looking out for her. She thought about asking him to go for a drink, but decided against it. Two years ago, she’d had an easy answer to this cloying sense of dread and anxiety: sex. Two years ago, she’d been in a committed relationship where sex with her fiancé was readily available, uncomplicated, and—above all—numbing. Her body yearned for the kind of physical sensation that would blot out the blackness creeping into her head. She knew Noah wouldn’t say no, the same way she knew it was a bad idea. She pushed the thought away; she didn’t need to make her life any more complicated. She stood and fished under the piles of yearbooks for her car keys.

  “I’m going home,” she said. “I’ll see you tomorrow? I’d like to be there for the courthouse interview.”

  “You got it.”

  Josie left the station behind, wending her way through Denton’s quiet streets, her mind on the bottle of Wild Turkey waiting on top of her fridge—the next best thing to sex—but she knew something was wrong as soon as she pulled into her driveway. The lights in her bedroom windows glowed bright and gold in the darkness.

  Someone was in her house.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  JOSIE – NINE YEARS OLD

  “Belinda,” Lisette said, her voice sounding odd and stilted. “What are you doing here?”

  “What do you think I’m doing here, Lisette? I came to get my kid.”

  Lisette glanced at Josie, and Josie took a step behind her grandmother. “Just like that? You left her here, Belinda, w
ithout a word. It’s been months. Almost the entire school year!”

  Her mother rolled her eyes. “So what? She’s my kid.” She extended a hand toward Josie. “Let’s go, JoJo.”

  “Belinda, this coming and going, it’s not good for Josie. She needs stability.”

  “Just shut up, Lisette, would you? No one asked you what you think.”

  Lisette’s voice shook with anger. “You don’t need to ask me what I think. You leave this child on my doorstep whenever you get tired of raising her. That means I’m involved. I’m her grandmother. I love her. I want her here.”

  “And I’m her mother. And I’ll do whatever the hell I want. Now come on, JoJo. I said let’s go.”

  Lisette didn’t move. Her body blocked Josie from stepping toward her mother. “She’s doing well here, Belinda. Her grades are up, she’s happy. She’s made friends at school. Just let her stay.”

  “Goddamnit, Lisette. Give me my kid.”

  “Just listen. Just let her finish the school year here with me.”

  Josie’s mother put a hand on her thin hip and narrowed her eyes at Lisette. “I said no. Now I’m taking my daughter and we’re going home.”

  “Belinda, please.”

  “Don’t push me, bitch. I can make sure you never see her again.”

  It was then that Josie realized she wouldn’t get to go to the skating party after all. She had been making calculations in her head as the two women went back and forth. There had been times that her mother agreed to do what her Gram asked, but those times were few and far between. Josie knew that this time, her mother would win. She could tell by the smoldering look in her dark blue eyes and the way she held her whole body stiff like a sharp edge. Josie was headed back to the old, smelly trailer and the dark, lonely closet. To hunger and the sounds of her mother’s special friends moving in and out of the trailer at all hours. She had been silly to think she could do what other kids did. Silly to think she could have real friends. Now everyone in her class would be talking about the skating party but her. Well, her and that boy Ray who was always nice to her. She would be left out again, and she wouldn’t even have her Gram to console her. Tears welled up in her eyes, but she held them back. Lisette put a hand on Josie’s arm, but Josie knew it didn’t matter.