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

by Lisa Regan

  “Don’t know what you ever did to her, little JoJo.”

  Her heart seized in her chest. She turned back to him. “What did you say?”

  “She said you’d find me. I said no you wouldn’t, you’d never know I was involved. But she was right. You got me. You even recognized me.”

  “Who said I’d find you?” Josie asked, frozen in the doorway. “What are you talking about?”

  He met her eyes. “She wanted me to give you a message. She said she’ll destroy everything you love.”

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  “Boss,” Noah said as she fled past him down the hallway. The distance from the interrogation room to her office seemed endless, like she was in one of those nightmares where no matter how fast you ran, you never moved, and the end was always just out of reach. Breath came in short gasps, her palm clammy as it closed around the door handle at last.

  Noah was only a few feet behind; she heard the sound of his feet slowing on the tiles behind her. “Boss,” he called again. “What the hell was that about?”

  She slammed the door in his face, locked it, slumped against it, and slid down to the floor. Her heartbeat thundered in her chest. Too fast—it was going too fast. Dizziness assailed her. Noah called to her from the other side of the door, but she couldn’t answer. She looked around her office, but all she saw were flashes from her childhood—her mother stalking the darkness of the trailer, waiting for Josie’s dad to return, muttering words Josie would never forget:

  I’ll destroy everything you love.

  It was her all along. How long had she been back? What had brought her back after all these years? Where was she? The memories of the things Belinda—no, Lila—had done to her awoke and screamed into Josie’s mind, black and cloying. She squeezed her eyes shut, but that only made it worse. Clambering to her feet, she moved behind her desk, hands searching for the framed photo of her and Ray as nine-year-olds. She focused on his face, remembering all the ways he had helped her face the monsters in her head. She was suddenly glad Ray was dead—it meant her mother couldn’t hurt him.

  She looked up to the corkboard above her desk where she had pinned several photos—Josie and her predecessor, Chief Harris, at one of her promotion ceremonies years earlier. Photos of people she’d never met—victims whose grateful families had written her letters after she’d solved their cases. A photo of Josie and Lisette from Lisette’s last birthday. The most recent photo was a candid shot of little Harris Quinn, giggling with smashed baby peas all over his face.

  “Oh Jesus,” Josie mumbled to herself.

  She sprang up and opened the door to her office to find Noah still there, his arms folded across his chest, his eyes piercing.

  “I need a detail on Misty Derossi and my grandmother,” she said.

  “What was that guy talking about, Boss?” Noah asked.

  “He’s talking about my mother. She’s back. She’s here, or somewhere nearby. She’s behind all of this—the ads, the robbery. She’s coming after me and the people I love; no one is safe. You need to get someone over to Rockview. I’d bring Gram home with me, but it’s not safe. And Misty and Harris—she’ll find out about them. I can’t let anything happen to them. Not because of me.”

  Noah’s arms dropped to his sides as she spoke. “Let me go at this guy. He must know where she is. We’ll get to her first.”

  “No,” Josie said. “He doesn’t know where she is. Not that he would tell you anyway. She’s smarter than that. She would have come to him. If she knew that I was going to find him, she wouldn’t make it that easy.”

  Behind Noah, Gretchen approached, a piece of paper in her hand. She reached past Noah and handed it to Josie. “Found that boyfriend. Fraley told me his name. Dexter McMann lives in Fairfield now.”

  It was a little over an hour away. Josie could get there in half that time.

  “There’s a phone number there,” Gretchen said.

  “I don’t need it,” Josie told her. She went to her desk and found her car keys. “I’ll be back in a few hours.”

  “I’m going with you,” Noah said.

  “No, you’re not. I need you to stay here, make sure Zeke gets properly booked, get someone out to Misty’s place and Rockview.”

  Her phone buzzed in her pocket. She pulled it out and saw another text from Trinity reminding her she had agreed to meet that day.

  Something came up at work, Josie shot back. I’ll try to stop by tonight, but it will probably have to wait till tomorrow.

  In reply, Trinity sent her a pouty-face emoji. Josie rolled her eyes, pocketed her phone, and left the building.

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  JOSIE – FOURTEEN YEARS OLD

  There were other instances that caused cracks in the tenuous peace inside the trailer since Dex had moved in. One evening her mother had come home early from work and found them sitting side by side on the couch, laughing at a movie on television. She had flown at Josie, raining down open-hand slaps onto her head until Dex pulled her away. Josie had fled to her room and stayed there until the arguing died down. That night Dex did leave, and he didn’t come back for a week.

  There was the time it was raining—pouring in sheets—and Dex left her mother at the trailer to pick Josie up from school so she wouldn’t have to walk home through it. At first, her mother hadn’t made much of it, but when Dex was asleep she had burst into Josie’s bedroom, pouring a bucket of cold water over her as she slept. Startled awake, Josie found herself on the wrong end of an expletive-laced tirade. If Dex had noticed how tired Josie was the next few days while her mattress dried out and she slept on the floor, he didn’t comment.

  The forensic science books that Dex had found at a thrift shop for Josie were burned in the metal barrel outside of the trailer while he was at work. When he asked if she was enjoying them, she didn’t have the heart to tell him what her mother had done. Maybe she should have. Maybe he would have left. Or maybe he would have simply followed her mother into her room and banged her some more. Josie never understood their strange relationship. She never understood anyone’s relationship with her mother. Except Lisette’s—her gram hated her mother fiercely.

  The death knell of that mostly bright year was all Josie’s fault. Perhaps having someone there to talk to her, to care about her, to show interest in her, had made her bolder. Or perhaps it had simply made her just as stupid as Dex. There was a freshman dance coming up—a formal dance—and Ray had asked her to go with him. His father had been gone for a year, and he was finally feeling his freedom—he wanted them to be normal and go to a dance like boyfriend and girlfriend. Josie figured she could do her own hair and makeup, like she’d seen a few of the other girls at school doing theirs in the bathroom. But she knew she needed a dress, and she didn’t have much money.

  She had asked Dex if he would drive her to the thrift store and then, later that evening, drive her and Ray to the dance. But Dex, being Dex, had gone above and beyond, dropping her outside a dress shop and telling her there was a deposit behind the counter for whatever dress she wanted. Her heart sang as she chose a slinky but fairly modest blue dress that the saleswoman said brought out her eyes. Dex also had a cousin who owned a salon, and he’d arranged an appointment for her there once she was done.

  Josie barely recognized herself in the mirror as Dex picked her up to take her back home so she could change before the dance. “Ray won’t know what hit him,” he told her, smiling.

  Josie couldn’t wait to see Ray’s face when they picked him up. In her bedroom, she put on her dress and twirled in front of her mirror, feeling pretty for the first time in her life. Her bedside clock showed that she only had a few minutes before Dex would take her to get Ray. Her mother would be at work all night, and Josie hoped she would never find out about the dance, or the dress, or the makeup, or the way Ray had made her feel when he asked her to be his date.

  Dex’s eyes lit up when he saw her. “Wow,” he said. “You look amazing.”

  “Thanks
,” Josie replied.

  They were standing by the front door, ready to leave, when Dex stopped her. “Wait,” he said. He took her shoulders and peered into her face. For a moment, a bolt of fear shot through her, and she flinched as he lifted a hand, licked the pad of his thumb, and rubbed at a spot just below her left eye. “Mascara,” he said.

  Josie laughed nervously. The palm that remained on her one shoulder was warm. She hadn’t ever been this close to Dex. The proximity—mixed with her anticipation of going to the dance—was dizzying. He grinned at her. “JoJo,” he said softly. “You make sure you have a good time tonight, okay?”

  She nodded.

  “Ray’s a lucky guy, kiddo.”

  A sudden impulse made Josie rock up onto her toes and plant a kiss on Dex’s cheek. Surprise lit his face, and they stood frozen in time for a moment—Josie’s lipstick on his cheek, his hand on her shoulder—smiling stupidly at one another. And that’s when the door opened; her mother stood there, a six-pack of beer in her arms. She stared at them for a long time, taking everything in: Josie’s dress, makeup, and hair, the way they stood close to one another, Dex’s car keys now dangling from his free hand.

  Josie’s heart stopped, and she counted two long seconds before it thundered back to life like an angry beast trying to claw its way out of her chest. She waited for her mother’s fury, for her to throw the beer cans at Josie’s head, or to fly at her, tearing at her dress and hair until Josie was too unkempt to be seen in public.

  But her mother did nothing. She simply stood there. Then she asked, “What’s going on here?”

  Dex said, “JoJo has a school dance. She’s going with Ray. I told them I’d drop them off.”

  Her mother turned her gaze to Josie. “Your grandmother sneak you that stuff? That interfering bitch.”

  Josie would have let it go. That would have been best. But Dex jumped in before she had a chance to formulate her response. “No, I did, and I didn’t sneak it. JoJo needed a dress for the dance, and my cousin does hair and makeup, so I asked her to help out.”

  Her mother narrowed her eyes at him. “You did this?”

  “Come on, Belinda. You never went to a school dance? Give the kid a break. You won’t let her see her grandmother. Her dad’s dead. The only person she ever sees is that scrawny little Ray. So she wants to go to a dance; let her have some fun.”

  Josie braced herself for the attack she knew was inevitable. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, waiting for the blows, the tearing of her beautiful dress, the bruises on her face that would render her makeup useless.

  But it didn’t come. She felt something brush by her, and when she opened her eyes, her mother was seated on the couch, popping a can of beer. Both Josie and Dex stared at her in shock, but she simply sipped her beer, picked up the remote control, and turned on the television. When she realized they were both still looking at her, she said, “Well, you better get going then.”

  They walked outside, letting the trailer door flap closed behind them, a fizz in the air like they had narrowly escaped something huge. They didn’t speak or look at one another the entire route to Ray’s house.

  Ray seemed oblivious, possibly mistaking her nervous energy for jitters about the dance. She tried to have a good time, to focus on Ray and the way he kept looking at her like buried treasure, but her mind kept returning to the terrifying calm of her mother, sitting placidly on the sofa, drinking beer.

  When Dex brought Josie home from the dance later that night, her mother looked as though she hadn’t moved an inch, except for the bottle of vodka in front of her. Dex said, “I’m going to bed. You coming?”

  “No,” she said. “I think I’ll stay up awhile. Might sleep out here by the TV.”

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  Anxiety gnawed at Josie’s insides as she drove alone to the address Gretchen had given her for Dexter McMann. Before she had made it to her car, Noah had redoubled his efforts to come along, but ultimately he did as he was told, staying behind and sending patrol cars to monitor Rockview Ridge and Misty Derossi’s house. From the car, Josie called Misty and awkwardly explained that some people had been harassing her lately because of her job, and that she wanted to make sure that harassment didn’t extend to those around her. Luckily for Josie, Misty was too ill and too exhausted from dealing with a sick baby to ask many questions. Josie had a similar conversation with the administrator of Rockview, who promised to tighten up their security measures. Gretchen was busy finishing up the paperwork on Needle’s arrest. They would have their hands full until Josie returned.

  Fairfield was a tiny town in Lenore County, which was south of Alcott County. Most of Lenore County was made up of farms and state gameland. The Escape hugged the curves of the winding mountain roads until they gave way to rolling one-lane roads snaking across miles of farmland. If the thought of seeing Dex again wasn’t making her sick to her stomach, Josie would have enjoyed the idyllic scenery.

  The address Gretchen gave her brought her to a one-story house with dingy white siding and several poorly constructed additions built onto the side. It sat two acres back from the road at the end of a gravel driveway. An old red pickup truck sat outside the front porch. Josie saw several cut tree trunks standing like sentries in the grass in front of the house. As she got closer, she saw that several of them had been carved into the shapes of animals—a bear, an eagle, and a large owl. One trunk had a man’s face carved into it, with a long flowing beard that reached the ground. They were stunning. She parked her Escape and walked over to where they stood. There were several smaller ones in the long grass at her feet—a duck and a sleeping coyote.

  A man’s voice called out, “They start at three hundred. The eagle is already sold, I’m afraid. I’ve got more in the back. Just finished my first mermaid.”

  She heard his steps moving toward her. She didn’t want to turn, to face him, but she was here, and there was no running away.

  “I, uh, also have a couple of dragons if you’re into that sort of thing. Lots of people looking for those these days. There’s a big demand for mythical creatures all of a sudden. I was thinking I might try a unicorn, but I don’t—” His words died on his lips as Josie turned to look at him.

  Frozen in place, he stared at her. He’d always been tall, and in the years since she’d last seen him, he’d put on some weight. He looked sturdier now, strong and burly in a pair of stained, torn jeans and a black T-shirt that clung to his chest. He had always been handsome. Until the fire.

  She had hoped that maybe the scars would get better over time, or that he’d find a plastic surgeon who could restore what had been lost, but looking at him now, his face still bore the heavy, indelible marks of her mother’s wrath.

  “Haven’t seen you in almost twenty years, JoJo,” he said, his voice husky.

  “Josie,” she said. “My name is Josie.”

  He smiled, and the side of his face that hadn’t melted lifted. “I know,” he said. “Josie Quinn. Married Ray after all. I was sorry to hear about his death. You were two peas in a pod.”

  “We turned out to be very different people,” Josie said.

  He nodded. “Yeah, well, I guess that’s true, isn’t it? I see you on the news all the time since you solved that case of all those missing girls and became chief. You’ve done well for yourself.”

  Josie took a step closer to him. She ran a finger along the side of the enormous bear sculpture. “Looks like you have too.”

  He shrugged. “I do okay. Beats going to a job every day and dealing with the public.” He motioned to the side of his head. The burns had taken a portion of his hair behind his left temple. “It gets old answering the questions, you know?”

  She didn’t know, but she nodded anyway. “They gave you a glass eye,” she said. “It looks good.”

  His fingers touched just beneath his left eye socket. “Yeah, makes me look more human, I think.”

  An awkward silence unfurled between them. Josie turned and looked back
at the sculptures. “These are amazing, Dex. I had no idea you knew how to do this.”

  “What are you doing here, JoJ—Josie?”

  Josie pointed to his front porch. There were no chairs, but there were a couple of steps they could perch on. “Can we sit?”

  He ushered her over, and they sat side by side on the stoop. For a couple of minutes, they stared at his open front yard, watching the breeze ruffle the tops of the trees lining the road. Then Dex said, “I never told you this—never had the chance to—but it wasn’t your fault.”

  Josie swallowed over the instant lump in her throat. “Bullshit. It was entirely my fault. I’m so, so sorry, Dex.”

  He knocked his thigh against hers. “Stop. We don’t even know that she did it. It was just odd timing.”

  “Someone sets fire to your hair while you’re sleeping? On a night when she just happened to fall asleep on the couch, out of harm’s way? You know as well as I do that she did this to you. And she did it because of me.”

  “You were a kid. Belinda was crazy.”

  “Lila,” Josie said. “Her real name was Lila Jensen.”

  “What? What do you mean by that?”

  She told him everything, and he didn’t speak for a long time after she had finished. Then he said, “Makes you wonder what else she’s gotten away with, doesn’t it?”

  Josie nodded.

  “What do you need from me?”

  “A photograph,” Josie answered. “If you had any—or kept any. I know it’s a long shot. I probably wouldn’t have kept a picture of the woman who disfigured me.”

  He stared out at the road. “I didn’t.”

  Disappointment sat heavy on Josie’s shoulders. Before it could settle into full-blown despair, Dex said, “But I kept a picture of you. And your mother happens to be in it as well. All this time, I thought that was unfortunate.”