She Wore Mourning

by P. D. Workman

  Isabella got off the stool and motioned briskly for Zachary to follow her. He fell into step with her. It didn’t look like she was the type to hang around waiting. She led him to the bedroom.

  “Here.”

  It was a combination of their styles. Mostly Spencer’s minimalist, fussily tidy look. There were elements of Isabella as well. Her paintings were on the walls. A row of frivolous throw pillows across the head of the bed. The closet was clearly divided into his and hers.

  Spencer’s shirts and suits marched in neat rows across the rod, all carefully ordered, facing the same direction, looking crisp and starched. Isabella’s side of the closet was a chaos like her studio. There was no apparent order to the clothing, skirts and pants mixed in with shirts and jackets and sweaters. Fancy dresses with sequins squashed in with hoodies with silly sayings. Hangers were hooked haphazardly from the front and the back. The shoes were in a jumble, not in pairs. Scarves and belts and jewelry hung on a handmade pegboard in no apparent order.

  Zachary looked around. The room had big windows, like Spencer’s office, and had a good view of the back yard. It was a broad expanse of unbroken white snow. No one building snowmen or forts.

  “You were watching from…?” Zachary made a wide motion to indicate the room.

  “Right here,” Isabella positioned herself in front of the window, a couple of feet away.

  “Tell me about that. You were standing there watching him? Putting laundry away?” He felt his face flush as it occurred to him that Spencer probably did the laundry and put it away. His own, anyway. “Reading a book, maybe?”

  “No, painting.”

  He tried to envision the set-up. It didn’t fit his idea of a good place for painting. The room was carpeted. There were no painting materials out. Maybe she didn’t paint there anymore because of what had happened.

  “Your easel would have been here…?” Zachary blocked out the area in front of the window with his hands. “That might have obscured your view.”

  “No, here.” Isabella swiveled to indicate the area behind her. “To make the most of the natural light coming in through the window. If I had been facing into it while painting, I would have been dazzled.”

  “Right here. So, the light was behind you.”

  “Angled a little, so my shadow wouldn’t fall on the canvas. Yes. Like that.”

  “Your back was to the window?”

  “No.” Isabella looked at the imaginary easel and then at the window, frowning. “Well, yes, some of the time. I would look out at him and watch him, and then paint. Then look again.”

  “You were checking on him occasionally. Not strictly supervising him. He was five and in his own yard. Perfectly safe.”

  She nodded, her face relaxing. She had been expecting him to criticize her for not watching Declan the whole time. Was that what Spencer had said? What about her mother? It had been in the news, so there were probably all kinds of people, friends and strangers, who had opinions about what had happened and her parenting skills or lack of them.

  “Yes, he was perfectly safe,” she agreed. “You can see. It’s fenced. Gated. He couldn’t get out on his own.”

  “Then how did he get out that day?”

  “We found the back gate open,” Isabella said, staring across the yard at it. “I don’t know who opened it. Deck couldn’t have opened it on his own. A neighbor? A stranger? Spencer when he took out the garbage?” Isabella shook her head. “It couldn’t have been Spencer. He’s so careful about everything. He would never have left it unlatched.”

  “But it isn’t locked in any way. Anyone walking by could have unlatched it.”

  She nodded. “It never occurred to me to put a lock on it. Do people lock their gates? It doesn’t seem… it doesn’t seem like something people living in houses like this would do, does it? I can understand someone who lives in a rough neighborhood. Or someone who lives in a mansion with a swimming pool. But our little house?” She shook her head, eyes shiny with tears. “I don’t think people here lock their gates.”

  “I don’t know.” Zachary shook his head. “I don’t know what your neighbors do or don’t do. I’m just trying to get a good picture of what happened that day.”

  Isabella sat on the end of the bed and sighed. “He loved to play outside. He’d play for hours. Take his toys out with him. Ask if he could sleep outside at night. Neither Spencer nor I are into camping; I bet he would have loved it if we were.”

  “How long was he outside? What was he playing with that day?”

  “He was outside for a couple of hours. I don’t know what he was playing. He was an only child. A bit lonely. He made games up to entertain himself.”

  “Are you and Spencer both only children? Or did you have siblings?”

  “Spencer has a couple of brothers. I… don’t have anyone. Just Mom. I know how lonely it can be, not having any brothers or sisters. I was alone a lot too.”

  For a moment, Zachary was awash with memories. He too had been alone. Being taken away from his brothers and sisters had been such a shock for him. It was one thing growing up as an only child, not knowing any difference, but Zachary knew the difference. He had been part of a family, and then he didn’t have anyone. He was old enough that much of the time he wasn’t with a foster family. It would be a group home or residential care. Surrounded by other kids, but all by himself.

  He had been lonely for so long. Did that loneliness stretch out as far ahead of him as it did behind? He couldn’t face that.

  Zachary shook off the memories and faced the problem at hand.

  “Tell me about… when you realized Declan wasn’t in the yard anymore.”

  Isabella put her face in her hands. Zachary waited for her to brace up and tell him the story. She probably wanted to. People avoided asking about tragedy, asking about exactly what had happened and how it felt. They pretended that nothing had happened and all was well, leaving people like Isabella to grieve alone, unable to let it all out.

  “I was painting. Deck was outside. I was turning to look at him, to make sure he wasn’t getting overheated or tired. Or bored. All those things you’re supposed to watch out for. But he wasn’t. He was happy. Then I looked once, and I couldn’t see him. I thought maybe he was somewhere I couldn’t see him. Beside the house,” she gestured, “or up against it,” she indicated the angles. “I waited for him to come back to where I could see him. He didn’t. I opened the window and called him.” Isabella paused as if waiting for him to answer, but they both knew he would never answer. “I went outside. He wasn’t there. I panicked. I was so scared. I looked everywhere in the yard. In the front. In the house. I looked everywhere, top to bottom, and he wasn’t here. I went and got Spencer, and we looked together.”

  She started to sob. Zachary thought he should show her sympathy, but he froze in place with no idea what to do about her tears. In his experience, trying to calm a crying woman just made her cry more, or made her angry. He didn’t want to do either one. So, he waited.

  “Then we called the police. They got here pretty quickly. They took our statements. They started a search. They made announcements and called for volunteers to help canvass the streets around the house before it got dark.”

  “Do you think one of your neighbors had something to do with this?”

  That was one of the problems with bringing volunteers in too soon. The police had contaminated the crime scene. Too many people had gone tramping through the neighborhood looking for him. Had someone drowned him in the pond, or had it been an accident?

  Isabella was shaking her head. “No one would do that to us. Who would do that? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “People who harm little children rarely make sense. To anyone but themselves. Children aren’t killed out of jealousy or greed, like adults. It’s completely different.”

  “I don’t see how anyone we knew could have had anything to do with it. I don’t think it was one of our neighbors.”

  “You believe it was
an accident?”

  Isabella wiped away tears and sat there on the end of the bed, her eyes red and puffy, staring into the desolate back yard.

  “Yes. It was an accident. Just… one of those things.”

  Zachary nodded. “Okay. All right. Is there anything else you think I should know?”

  “I can’t think of anything.”

  “Can I see Declan’s room before I go? Or have you redecorated it?”

  Her eyes widened. “Redecorated? Why would we do that? I don’t think it could ever be anything but Declan’s room. Ever.”

  “May I…?”

  “It’s just next door.” She motioned. “So, when he was a baby, I could hear him if he cried.”

  Zachary took this as his invitation to see for himself. He went down the hall to Declan’s bedroom.

  It wasn’t much smaller than the master bedroom. The walls were painted several shades of blue. He had a kid’s laptop computer or gaming system. Toy boxes and shelves. Clothing neatly arranged in the closet. Zachary could see Spencer’s influence more than Isabella’s. He had expected at least a wall mural for her only child. Zachary walked around the room slowly, looking for anything suspicious or out of place. He wasn’t really expecting to find anything. If it had been a stranger abduction as Molly had suggested, there certainly wouldn’t be any sign of it in Declan’s room. He never knew when he might see something that would become important later in the case.

  “Until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of His hand.”

  Zachary startled and turned to see Isabella standing in the doorway. She wasn’t looking at him and hadn’t been speaking to him. She was just looking at the room, feeling her loss. She ran her fingers over her jewelry as if accounting for each piece. She stared down at the tattoo on her arm.

  “Until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of His hand,” she repeated.

  Zachary walked over to her. He touched her shoulder gently as he stepped back out of the room.

  “I think it’s time for me to get on my way.”

  Isabella nodded. She looked down at her watch. “Just let me feed the cat, and then I’ll walk you out.”

  “Okay.”

  He walked with her into the kitchen. Bright and airy. Zachary watched Isabella as she mechanically picked up a bowl of cat food, dumped it into the garbage, refilled it from a big bin in the closet, and put it back down where it had been. He looked around the house but didn’t see any other sign of a pet. They didn’t seem like the kind of people who would keep a pet.

  “Do you… have a cat?” he asked Isabella, as they walked back to the front door. The food in the dish didn’t appear to have been touched. No cat came running when she filled it. The cats that he had known had always come running and yowled for their food as soon as they heard a food can, box, or bag being rattled.

  Isabella stopped with her hand on the front doorknob.

  “Yes. Mittens.” She didn’t open the door. “It’s been a long time. He wandered off one day and didn’t come back… just like Declan.”

  Zachary suppressed a shudder at her tone. Was there a connection between the two disappearances?

  “When did your cat disappear?” he asked. A long time ago could be months back, when Declan had disappeared. Had the boy followed the cat? Had the cat followed him? Was there some other connection between the two?

  “When we first got married.”

  “Eight years ago?” Zachary demanded, remembering the story of the plate.

  “Yes… that sounds about right. Eight years ago.”

  She turned the doorknob and opened the door for him.

  “Until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of His hand.”

  Eight years, and she was still feeding the cat.

  Molly thought that if Zachary re-investigated Declan’s death, it would bring Isabella some peace.

  But the woman was still feeding her missing cat eight years later.

  Chapter Four

  It was a couple of days before the copy of the medical examiner’s report was ready for him. Zachary kept himself busy in the interim with his other cases. Surveillance on Pastor Hellerman’s wife. A long, tedious review of the accident reconstruction he had done on the Mae Gordon accident. Running background on the interns who had applied to work with Senator Brown. There was plenty to keep him busy.

  Martin Ash was running the security check-in at the police station and gave Zachary a big smile as he approached. He had always been friendly with Zachary, even when Zachary was running an investigation that was not popular with the police force, which happened more often than he liked. It had been a while since he had seen the big, black man. Martin pushed a bin toward Zachary for the contents of his pockets. Zachary put his briefcase down on the conveyor belt behind it and walked through the metal detector.

  “How are you, my friend?” Martin boomed. “And how is Bridget?”

  “I’m good.” Zachary picked up his keys and wallet from the bin after it went through the x-ray. “Bridget is in remission.”

  A look of confusion passed over Martin’s face. His brows drew down. “In remission?” he repeated. “She was sick?”

  Zachary’s heart sank. He had assumed that Martin was part of the grapevine and knew all the details or that they had talked about it at some point already. He was unprepared for Martin’s ignorance. For a moment he was frozen, unable to speak. He swallowed and licked his dry lips.

  “Uh—yes—sorry, I thought you knew. She had ovarian cancer.”

  “Oh.” Martin shook his head, looking shocked. His smile was gone. He tried to meet Zachary’s eyes, though Zachary did his best to avoid connecting. “I’m so sorry, Zachary! I didn’t know.” He patted Zachary on the back.

  “It’s fine. I’m sorry to spring it on you like that. It seems like everyone knows all of the details, whether I have told them or not, so I just assumed that you knew, and were asking about the cancer treatments…”

  “But she’s in remission. So that’s good. That means she’s clean and they caught it in time.”

  “Yes, exactly.” Zachary tried to force a smile of reassurance. “She’s good. She’s recovering from the chemo and starting to feel back to her old self.”

  “Good, good. So, the two of you…” Martin tried to approach it delicately, but he had no tact to speak of, “…does that mean you won’t be able to have children? Because of the cancer and the radiation?”

  Zachary swore. He should have headed off that inquiry at the same time as he informed Martin that Bridget had had cancer. He should have broken it all at once instead of leaving it open-ended.

  “We aren’t together anymore,” Zachary told Martin gently. “I’m sorry…”

  “You broke up?” Martin shook his head. “How could that happen?”

  There were other people waiting for security clearance, and Zachary made a little motion toward them. “I shouldn’t keep you. You have a job to do.”

  “I can’t believe you guys aren’t together anymore.” Martin moved like a robot to clear the next person in line, not smiling at him or greeting him. “I thought you two were happy together.”

  “For a while.” But even as Zachary said it, he wondered if it was true. Had they really been happy? He had loved her. He’d hoped for a long life together, but the way things had turned out… things had never been perfect. It had always been rocky. “I think the cancer was just too much for us. Too much stress.”

  Martin nodded, the corners of his mouth drawn down in a pronounced frown. Zachary didn’t think he’d ever seen Martin unhappy before.

  “Sorry,” Zachary apologized again, getting on his way and leaving Martin to clear the next visitor.

  After the run-in with Martin, Zachary was anxious and on edge. Not the best side to show to the new girl in the medical examiner’s office. He tried to be pleasant and cordial, but he knew he wasn’t pulling it off. Kenzie kept attempting to make small talk as Zachary looked down at the photocopied report in his
hand, but he couldn’t seem to find the proper responses to keep the conversation going and put her at ease.

  “Is everything okay?” Kenzie asked finally.

  “Yes… it’s fine… I just…” Zachary shook his head, looking for a way to explain. “I just had some news, that’s all.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry to hear that.” Her dark eyes searched his face, and she decided not to ask him for details. She took one of her business cards out of the holder on her desk, scribbled on it, and slid it across to him. “Call me, okay? If there’s anything in that report that you want to run through. Or if you want to talk.”

  Zachary gave her a smile that felt stretched and nodded his head. “Thanks; and I’m sorry for being out of sorts. We’ll talk.”

  Kenzie nodded and smiled. He could feel her eyes on him all the way to the end of the hallway before he turned and was out of her sight.

  Zachary watched the blond woman get out of her yellow VW. She locked it with her remote key lock as she walked away. It gave a little chirp, and she never looked back.

  He knew her routine. Coffee at The Jumping Bean. Not on the terrace because it was too cold and snowy to be open, but inside where it was warm, sitting pleasantly close to the tiny fireplace. Then she would start her errands. The parking zone she was in gave her three hours. She would likely use all of that and then restart the meter.

  Zachary sidled up to the car, looking casual like it was his own car. He looked around carefully before sliding the key into the lock and climbing in. He pulled the door shut and was effectively invisible to the crowds walking by.

  He went directly to the glovebox for her log file. A ledger where she tracked all her mileage for tax purposes, with client codes and odometer readings noted in her precise printing. Kenzie would have approved. He scanned it for any unusual trips, any unaccounted jumps in the odometer. There was also a plastic sleeve containing all her latest expense receipts, and he thumbed through them carefully, his eyes quick. He looked up once to make sure that she wasn’t anywhere in sight. Returning to her car because she’d forgotten something inside. Unexpectedly finding The Jumping Bean closed because a plumbing line had flooded the cafe overnight. Anything could happen.