25
Dawson felt uneasy as he hung up. He didn’t have any good options when it came to stopping Sly Harris. That meant he had to at least try to go about it the “right” way. But he’d be giving up the element of surprise, and for what? He had no trust for the local authorities, wasn’t sure sacrificing that advantage would do any good in the end, especially because asking for their help included the expectation that they would act against one of their own.
He’d already lost so much. He didn’t want to lose any more. But he couldn’t figure out a better way to go.
He was just about to give in and call Chief Thomas when his phone rang. The number wasn’t one he recognized—there was no name attached to it—but he was glad he answered.
“This is Oscar Hunt.” The caller spoke in a loud, gruff voice. “Big Red told me to give you a jingle.”
Oscar. At last. The possibility this man represented set off a riot of butterflies in Dawson’s stomach. “Yes, thank you. I appreciate you getting back to me.”
“No problem. Red said you’re calling about that vagrant I met in Silver Springs a year ago, when your folks were killed. But I’m not sure I’m going to be able to help you. I mean...what more can I do? I went to the police, gave them a full report.”
Somehow Dawson’s defense attorneys had never been made aware of that report. Otherwise, they would’ve tracked this guy down and asked him to testify. “Do you remember who you talked to?”
“No. It’s been too long. But I’m pretty sure it was the detective investigating the case. I remember, because they had me wait at the station until he could come in even though he’d left for the day.”
“John Garbo.”
“That sounds right.”
“Would you recognize him if you saw him?”
“Certainly. I’ve never given a statement before, so it was memorable. The detective was a strange-looking fella. Built like a cannonball. Bald. Funny little triangle of hair below his bottom lip.”
That was John Garbo, all right. He had to be the only man in Silver Springs who was over forty sporting a soul patch on his chin. So what’d happened to that report? Had he deep-sixed it? Stuck it in with a pile of papers no one would ever go through? Maybe he’d put it in the file and just hadn’t mentioned it to anyone. From the beginning he’d been so sure that Dawson was his man he hadn’t been willing to take a close look at anything that didn’t fit the case he was building—just like Dawson’s attorneys had said. “What’d you tell him?”
“Just what I saw, man. That there was a tall, skinny dude trying to bum a ride to Santa Barbara at the station right there as you come out of town.”
The memory of that night, the fight that had ensued when the dude wouldn’t get out of his truck and the creepy sense that he wasn’t right in the head made Dawson slightly queasy to this day. By the time he’d gotten rid of his belligerent passenger, he’d had such a terrible feeling about him—as if he’d been lucky to get away. And then he’d found his parents dead. “When did you see this ‘tall, skinny’ dude?”
“Night before Valentine’s Day, around ten-thirty.”
That was the night his parents were killed, all right. “How can you be so specific? It’s been over a year.” Dawson didn’t want to get suckered in by one of those strange people who fed off the excitement surrounding a high-profile case and tried to insert himself in it. Hard as it was to believe, he knew there were such people.
“Easy. I worked fifteen hours that day so that I could finish the bunker I was building in time to head home to my family. Still didn’t get done, had to go back two times after because I’d screwed up and needed to fix what I’d done wrong, but I wanted to be there for Valentine’s Day. My wife had just received a call from her doctor, saying she was cancer-free. We were going to celebrate.”
“Congratulations,” Dawson said. “I hope your wife is still in remission...”
“Sure is. Just had her annual checkup.”
“That’s wonderful. So...you were returning to Santa Barbara?”
“Yeah. I would’ve given the guy a ride, but I had so much equipment in the back of my truck that I’d had to put my luggage in front. Wasn’t room.”
Too bad Dawson hadn’t also refused. But he’d felt confident he could handle himself, if necessary, and he’d never dreamed he’d need to fear for his family. “He spoke to you? Asked you for a ride?”
“He did. I was sort of tempted to figure out a way to make it work, like I said. But I was too loaded.”
“When did you go to the police to let them know you’d seen this person?”
“Not until a few weeks later. I learned of the murders when everyone else did. It was all over the news. But I didn’t think I had any information—not until after they arrested you and I saw a clip where the anchor gave your version of the night’s events. Then I realized that I’d seen the same guy.”
“You don’t happen to know where that hitchhiker is now...” Dawson held his breath, but the crushing response came anyway.
“No clue. Could be anywhere.”
Dawson let his breath go as he struggled to cope with the bitter disappointment. But then Oscar spoke again.
“I can tell you what he was doing in town, though.”
“You can?” Dawson’s hope skyrocketed again, almost giving him an emotional whiplash.
“Yep. Told me he came to see his little brother at the boys ranch you folks got out there.”
“New Horizons.”
“That’s it. I remember because he was royally pissed that they made him leave at lights-out, wouldn’t let him stay on campus even though he had no way to get back to Santa Barbara, where he had friends.”
Dawson clenched his fist. There was the connection he’d been looking for, and what a hopeful connection it was! His heart began to race as he considered the implications. Because of privacy laws, Aiyana wouldn’t be able to give him a list of all the students she had a year ago, but she had to have access to such a list, and he felt certain she’d be willing to call them all herself, if need be.
Dropping his head in his free hand, he had to blink several times to overcome a sudden upwelling of emotion. At last, he had a small break that could lead to the one thing he craved more than anything else: justice. “Thank God.”
“You don’t think what I’ve told you will do any good, though, do you?” Oscar asked. “I mean it didn’t do any good when I reported it last year.”
Filled with a new sense of resolve, Dawson lifted his head. “I didn’t know about it last year.”
* * *
Chief Thomas had asked Sadie to call him when the arson investigator was done. He wanted to meet him, to speak with him. She’d just texted Dawson that he was leaving soon and was about to let Chief Thomas know as well when Damian Steele said he was going to swing by the police station on his way out of town, anyway. Figuring that would take care of it, she asked if he’d found anything.
He explained that he needed to do some more research and run a few tests before answering that question, but he left her with the promise that he’d be in touch as soon as he had any news.
“Something has to go my way eventually,” she muttered as she walked around to the back.
A flood of nervous energy made her feel slightly shaky as she opened the door and saw all of her belongings from the living room, bedroom and bathroom piled up and crammed into the small kitchen. She wouldn’t be able to get through to the living room from here even if she wanted to go in there. The firefighters had blocked it off. But, after taking a cursory glance at the towels, one nightstand, a side table, two lamps and a couple of boxes of storage items from the coat closet, she realized that there were no surprises here. The couch must’ve been destroyed. The mattress she’d used as a bed and a second rickety nightstand were gone, too. So were a lot of Jayden’s clothes and toys and her own clothes. Everything that had been against or near the wall that went up in flames would need to be replaced.
Thankfully, none of those items held any sentimental value. But neither did any of the stuff in here. She went through the boxes carefully, just in case someone had put her photographs inside without making a note of the fact that they’d found the one thing she’d been asking for. But there were no pictures.
Her hands felt clammy and she had a tension headache by the time she finished. She’d been told to stay out of the other side of the house, but she’d watched Damian Steele go in there and come out unscathed, and she wasn’t about to wait another day before launching a full-fledged search for her photos. She needed some resolution, some peace of mind there, at least.
She went outside and around to the front, where she made sure no one was watching before letting herself into the living room.
The sun poured through large holes between the burned studs of the left wall. Almost everything below that was scorched black and looked ready to disintegrate. She didn’t want that to happen while she was there. With her luck, the roof would collapse. But she needed only a few minutes, just enough time to look in places the firefighters and police might not have thought to check.
Problem was, her house was so small that there weren’t a lot of places her pictures could be. She might’ve taken them out and left them on the couch. She’d been doing a little scrapbooking to pass the time. But she didn’t think that was the case. Dawson had been on the couch one of the nights before the fire, and she was pretty sure she’d remember if she’d had to move the plastic container she kept them in.
The side table had a sliding door. Maybe she’d stuck them in there and the firefighters hadn’t noticed that it opened...
She found some pictures Jayden had colored or drawn at Petra’s that she’d saved. Surprisingly enough, they were okay. The table had protected them. She was happy to find something that held sentimental value, but those hand-drawn pictures couldn’t replace the photographs she’d had a professional take of him as a baby, or the photographs of her parents.
Where could she have put that plastic case? It had to have been in the closet, under the couch or in this side table.
Unless she’d shoved it in the bottom of the painted armoire in her bedroom. She’d had more clothes before the fire, but still not a great deal. There’d always been plenty of room in that armoire. She’d put various odds and ends in there...
The bedroom had suffered more damage than the living room. A lot of the floor was gone, showing the crawl space underneath. She tested each step to make sure it wasn’t going to give beneath her weight as she moved gingerly to the charred armoire near the devoured mattress where she and Jayden had slept for the year she’d been separated from Sly. The sight of it frightened her. Had she not been sufficiently awakened and capable of getting them out...
If Sly set that fire, he really had lost his mind, she decided.
She couldn’t get the armoire open. It was too damaged. Filled with renewed hope—because a jammed armoire door could easily explain why the firefighters hadn’t found the plastic container she’d requested—she used a crowbar from the Clevengers’ garage to break open the door.
That was where her hope died. Although she had some books, various notes, bills and checking account information in there, stacked on the small shelves to one side, the pictures she most wanted weren’t to be found.
This was the last place they could be. She wouldn’t have put them in the attic or crawl space. She was afraid of spiders, avoided those places entirely—and had no need to use them. She hadn’t had enough belongings to worry about the extra storage space.
Standing back, she stared glumly at the odds and ends she’d discovered. There were a few loose pictures of Jayden, but they weren’t the ones she loved the most. The ones taken when he was nine months, that had best captured his sweet little smile and spirit at the time, were gone. So were the only pictures she had of her parents.
Sadie had never felt more alone in the world than at this very moment. She was standing in a house she believed her ex-husband had torched, most of her stuff was damaged or destroyed and everything that really mattered to her was gone. Not only that, if she couldn’t figure out some way to tie Sly to what he’d done, she’d be facing the daunting prospect of moving to a completely new place, where she wouldn’t know a soul, in order to be rid of him for good. How would she start over without so much as a babysitter she felt she could trust to watch Jayden while she worked? Where would she go? What would she do?
She wished she could talk to her mother, wished she hadn’t lost her so soon. Her father had done a good job in her mother’s absence, but then she’d lost him, too. She’d had only Sly in her life from that point forward, dominating and controlling everything and making her doubt her own abilities—sometimes even her sanity.
She didn’t try to stop the tears that rolled down her cheeks. Crying was self-indulgent. She was feeling sorry for herself and she shouldn’t, but she didn’t care. The sense of loss was too overwhelming. Pictures were only pictures, but the people those pictures represented were gone, and the pictures were all she’d had left.
She didn’t hear the door. She’d sunk to the floor, buried her face in her arms, which rested on her knees, and was sobbing like a child when she heard her name.
Startled, she looked up to see Dawson crouched beside her.
“Everything’s going to be okay,” he said as he drew her to her feet and pulled her into his arms.
“They’re gone,” she said, her voice muffled by his shirt. “All of my pictures. I feel like I can’t even remember what my mother looked like without them.”
He didn’t say anything, just held her close.
“I hate him,” she said after gulping for breath. “I hate him and I hate love. Love is what got me into this. I don’t ever want to love anyone again.”
She was essentially telling him she didn’t want to love him, either, but that didn’t seem to upset him. Maybe he knew it was too late, that love had already made a joke of her words, because his hands were gentle as they moved in a comforting fashion over her back. “Love isn’t the problem, Sadie,” he said, his voice soothing. “Love is the answer. That’s what makes life worth living.”
“It’s made my life a living hell.” And she knew it wasn’t going to get easier if she had to leave town, leave him. She lifted her head to peer into his face. “Why’d you take me in? Have you lost your mind? Look at me! I’m in such a mess. I have a little boy to take care of and literally nothing to take care of him with.”
“You have all you need,” he said. “You’ll see.”
She scowled in defiance. “You didn’t answer my question. You should’ve turned me away, especially once you realized my ex is a freaking psychopath. I gave you the chance. Now you’re having to deal with his actions, too.”
A contemplative expression claimed his face as he smoothed the hair out of her eyes. “I don’t know why. I guess if you search hard enough, there’s always a glimmer of sunshine in life. I used to watch for it through the slats of my cell. That was literal sunshine, of course. It’s what kept me hanging on—that little patch of light. Not a lot to cling to, but enough. I see something similar, something hopeful and warm, when I look at you.”
She studied his handsome features. “I make you feel better?”
“You do. I told you before, you make me feel like a man again.”
“Because we have mad, wild sex. We can’t keep our hands off each other,” she said sulkily.
He tucked her hair behind her ears. “It’s more than that. At least it is for me.”
It was a lot more than that for her, too, but she didn’t care to acknowledge the fact.
“I like that I’m needed, wanted and able to help,” he added.
Her heart was beating hard, knocking against her ribs. “That scares me to death.”
He smiled. “What does?”
“What if I fall in love with you? I can’t do that. I can’t trust my own heart. Not after what I’ve been through.”
“Don’t worry about ‘what ifs’. We’re just going to take things one day at a time.”
“But I doubt the investigator will come up with anything. I mean, look at this mess.” She gestured around her. “What can he or anyone else tell from this?” She kicked a burned shoe to one side. “It seems as if Sly always gets away with whatever he does. There’s no justice in the world, Dawson. What happened to you is a perfect example.”
He wiped her tears with his thumbs. “It’s not over yet. For either one of us. But maybe I’m feeling optimistic because I heard from Oscar today.”
She sniffed to stop her nose from running. “You did? What did he say? Does he remember the drifter?”
“He does. He could also tell me why that drifter was in town. He’s the brother of one of the boys who went to New Horizons last year.”
This was encouraging. “Which boy? And is he still at the school?”
“That’s what I need to find out.”
“Aiyana will jump all over that.”
“I’ve already called her. She’s working on it. Could take a couple of days. Shouldn’t be much longer.”
Sadie drew a deep breath. Hearing this news made a difference. So did having Dawson’s support. As much as she didn’t want to lean on him, didn’t want to admit that having him come, even though she told him he didn’t need to, made her feel capable of going on in spite of the despair. “That’s wonderful,” she said.
He frowned as he gazed around at the burned bedroom. “Are you sure your pictures are gone?”
“I’ve looked everywhere. They’re not here. No plastic container. No pictures.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I guess we just have to take the blows life deals us and, when we get knocked down, get back up again, right?” What other choice did she have? She couldn’t give up.
“That’s right. And you can do it. Getting up is hard, but it’s all that counts in the end.”
With a nod, she slipped her hand in his. “Okay. Let’s go. I don’t want to be here anymore.”
“Why don’t you ride with me? We’ll pick up Jayden and take him out for ice cream before coming back to get your car. Ice cream won’t fix everything, but—”
She wiped the last of the wetness from her face. “It’s better than sobbing on the floor,” she finished with a broken laugh. “Thank you. I don’t know what I would’ve done without you the past couple of weeks.”
He squeezed her hand. “Don’t even mention it. You’ve saved me, too.”
That made her smile. She’d grieve over her pictures later, she told herself. When she had the fortitude. Right now she had to soldier on—for Dawson, who could have a chance at proving that the transient he encountered at the gas station was not only real but possibly culpable of his parents’ murder, and Jayden, who was depending on her to be strong.