Erica Spindler (6 page)

But why hide the truth? Why make her feelings out to be different than they were?

Avery shook her head. Always looking for the story, she thought. Always looking for the angle, the hidden motive, the elusive piece of the puzzle, the one that broke the story wide open.

Geez, Avery. Give it a rest. Stop worrying about other people's issues and get busy on your own
.

She certainly had enough of them, she acknowledged, shifting her gaze to the stairs. After all, if she got herself wrapped up in others' lives and problems, she didn't have to face her own. If she was busy analyzing other people's lives, she wouldn't have time to analyze her own.

She wouldn't have to face her father's suicide. Or her part in it.

Avery glanced up the stairway to the second floor. She visualized climbing it. Reaching the top. Turning right. Walking to the end of the hall. Her parents' bedroom door was closed. She had noticed that the night before. Growing up, it had always been open. It being shut felt wrong, final.

Do it, Avery. Face it
.

Squaring her shoulders, she started toward the stairs, climbed them slowly, resolutely. She propelled herself forward with sheer determination.

She reached her parents' bedroom door and stopped. Taking a deep breath, she reached out, grasped the knob and twisted. The door eased open. The bed, she saw, was unmade. The top of her mother's dressing table was bare. Avery remembered it adorned with an assortment of bottles, jars and tubes, with her mother's hairbrush and comb, with a small velveteen box where she had kept her favorite pieces of jewelry.

It looked so naked. So empty.

She moved her gaze. Her father had removed all traces of his wife. With them had gone the feeling of warmth, of being a family.

Avery pressed her lips together, realizing how it must have hurt, removing her things. Facing this empty room night after night. She'd asked him if he needed help. She had offered to come and help him clean out her mother's things. Looking back, she wondered if he had sensed how halfhearted that offer had been. If he had sensed how much she hadn't wanted to come home.

“I've got it taken care of, sweetheart. Don't you worry about a thing.”

So, she hadn't. That hurt. It made her feel small and selfish. She should have been here. Avery shifted her gaze to the double dresser. Would her mother's side be empty? Had he been able to do what she was attempting to do now?

She hung back a moment more, then forced herself through the doorway, into the bedroom. There she stopped, took a deep breath. The room smelled like him, she thought. Like the spicy aftershave he had always favored. She remembered being a little girl, snuggled on his lap, and pressing her face into his sweater. And being inundated with that smell—and the knowledge that she was loved.

The womb from her nightmare. Warm, content and protected.

Sometimes, while snuggled there, he had rubbed his stubbly cheek against hers. She would squeal and squirm—then beg for more when he stopped.

Whisker kisses, Daddy. More whisker kisses
.

She shook her head, working to dispel the memory. To clear her mind. Remembering would make this more difficult than it already was. She crossed to the closet, opened it. Few garments hung there. Two suits, three sports coats. A half-dozen dress shirts. Knit golf shirts. A tie and belt rack graced the back of the door; a shoe rack the floor. She stood on tiptoe to take inventory of the shelf above. Two hats—summer and winter. A cardboard storage box, taped shut.

Her mom's clothes were gone.

Avery removed the box, set it on the floor, then turned and crossed to the dresser. On the dresser top sat her dad's coin tray. On it rested his wedding ring. And her mother's. Side by side.

The implications of that swept over her in a breath-stealing wave. He had wanted them to be together. He had placed his band beside hers before he—

Blinded by tears, Avery swung away from the image of those two gold bands. She scooped up the cardboard box and hurried from the room. She made the stairs, ran down them. She reached the foyer, dropped the box and darted to the front door. She yanked it open and stepped out into the fresh air.

Avery breathed deeply through her nose, using the pull of oxygen to steady herself. She had known this wouldn't be easy.

But she hadn't realized it would be so hard. Or hurt so much.

The toot of a horn interrupted her thoughts. She glanced toward the road. Mary Dupre, she saw. Another longtime neighbor. The woman waved, pulled her car over and climbed out. She hurried up the driveway, short gray curls bouncing.

She reached Avery and hugged her. “I'm so sorry, sweetie.”

Avery hugged her back. “Thank you, Mary.”

“I wish I'd gone to Buddy or Pastor Dastugue, but I…didn't. And then it was too late.”

“Go to Buddy or Pastor about what?”

“How odd your daddy was acting. Not leaving the house, letting his yard go. I tried to pay a visit, bring him some of my chicken and andouille gumbo, but he wouldn't come to the door. I knew he was home, too. I thought maybe he was sleeping, but I glanced back on my way down the driveway and saw him peeking out the window.”

Avery swallowed hard at the bizarre image. It didn't fit the father she had known. “I don't know what to say, Mary. I had no…idea. We spoke often, but he didn't…he never said…anything.”

“Poor baby.” The woman hugged her again. “I'm bringing some food by later.”

“There's no need—”

“There is,” she said firmly. “You'll need to eat and I'll not have you worrying about preparing anything.”

Avery acquiesced, grateful. “I appreciate your thoughtfulness.”

“I see I'm not the first.”

“Pardon?”

The woman pointed. Avery glanced in that direction. A basket sat on the stoop by the door.

Avery retrieved it. It contained homemade raisin bread and a note of condolence. She read the brief, warmly worded note, tears stinging her eyes.

“Laura Jenkins, I'll bet,” Mary Dupre said, referring to the woman who lived next door. “She makes the best raisin bread in the parish.”

Avery nodded and returned the note to its envelope.

“You're planning a service?”

“I'm meeting with Danny Gallagher this afternoon.”

“He does good work. You need help with anything, anything at all, you call me.”

Avery promised she would, knowing that the woman meant it. Finding comfort in her generosity. And the kindness she seemed to encounter at every turn.

She watched the woman scurry down the driveway, a bright bird in her purple and orange warm-up suit, waved goodbye, then collected Laura Jenkins's basket and carried it to the kitchen.

The last thing she needed was more food, but she sliced off a piece of the bread anyway, set it on a napkin and placed it on the kitchen table. While she reheated the last of the coffee, she retrieved the cardboard box from the foyer.

She had figured the box would contain photos, cards or other family mementos. Instead, she found it filled with newspaper clippings.

Curious, Avery began sifting through them. They all concerned the same event, one that had occurred the summer of 1988, her fifteenth summer.

She vaguely remembered the story: a Cypress Springs woman named Sallie Waguespack had been stabbed to death in her apartment. The perpetrators had turned out to be a couple of local teenagers, high on drugs. The crime had caused a citizen uproar and sent the town on a crusade to clean up its act.

Avery drew her eyebrows together, confused. Why had her father collected these? she wondered. She picked up one of the clippings and gazed at the grainy, yellowed image of Sallie Waguespack. She'd been a pretty woman. And young. Only twenty-two when she died.

So, why had her father collected the clippings, keeping them all these years? Had he been friends with the woman? She didn't recall having ever met her or heard her name, before the murder anyway. Perhaps he had been her physician?

Perhaps, she thought, the articles themselves would provide the answer.

Avery dug all the clippings out of the box, arranging them by date, oldest to most recent. They spanned, she saw, four months—June through September 1988.

Bread and coffee forgotten, she began to read.

As she did, fuzzy memories became sharp. On June 18, 1988, Sallie Waguespack, a twenty-two-year-old waitress, had been brutally murdered in her apartment. Stabbed to death by a couple of doped-up teenagers.

The Pruitt brothers, she remembered. They had been older, but she had seen them around the high school, before they'd dropped out to work at the canning factory.

They'd been killed that same night in a shoot-out with the police.

How could she have forgotten? It had been the talk of the school for months after. She remembered being shocked, horrified. Then…saddened. The Pruitt brothers had come from the wrong side of the tracks—actually the wrong side of what the locals called The Creek. Truth was, The Creek was nothing more than a two-mile-long drainage ditch that had been created to keep low areas along the stretch from flooding but ultimately had served as the dividing line between the good side of town and the bad.

They'd been wild boys. They'd gone with fast girls.
They'd drunk beer and smoked pot. She'd stayed as far away from them as possible.

Even so, the tragedy of it all hadn't been lost on her, a sheltered fifteen-year-old. All involved had been so young. How had the boys' lives gone so terribly askew? How could such a thing happen in the safe haven of Cypress Springs?

Which was the question the rest of the citizenry had wondered as well, Avery realized as she shuffled through the articles. They fell into two categories: ones detailing the actual crime and investigation, and the lion's share, editorials written by the outraged citizens of Cypress Springs. They'd demanded change. Accountability. A return to the traditional values that had made Cypress Springs a good place to raise a family.

Then, it seemed, things had quieted down. The articles became less heated, then stopped. Or, Avery wondered, had her father simply stopped collecting them?

Avery sat back. She reached for the cup of coffee and sipped. Cold and bitter. She grimaced and set the cup down. Nothing in the articles answered the question why her father had collected them.

She had lived through these times. Yes, her parents had discussed the crime. Everyone had. But not to excess. She had never sensed her father being unduly interested in it.

But he had been. Obviously.

She glanced at her watch, saw that it was nearly noon already. Perhaps Buddy would know the why, she thought. If she hurried, she should have plenty of time to stop by the CSPD before her two o'clock appointment with Danny Gallagher.

C
ypress Springs' police headquarters hadn't changed in the years she had been gone. Located in an old storefront downtown, a block off Main in back of the courthouse, it resembled a hardware store or feed and seed more than a modern law enforcement center.

Avery entered the building. The whirling ceiling fans kicked up fifty years of dust. The sun streaming through the front window illuminated the millions of particles. The officer on desk duty looked up. He was so young, he still sported a severe case of adolescent acne.

She stopped at the desk and smiled. “Is Buddy in?”

“Sure is. You here to see him?”

“Nope, just wanted to see if he was here.”

The kid's face went slack for a moment, then he laughed. “You're teasing me, right?”

“Yes. Sorry.”

“That's okay. Are you Avery Chauvin?”

She nodded. “Do I know you?”

“You used to baby-sit me. I'm Sammy Martin. Del and Marge's boy.”

She thought a moment, then smiled. As a kid, he had been an absolute terror. Interesting that he had decided to go into law enforcement. “I never would have known it
was you, Sammy. Last time I saw you, you were what? Eight or nine?”

“Eight.” His smile slipped. “Sorry about your dad. None of us could believe it.”

“Thanks.” She cleared her throat, furious with herself for the tears that sprang to her eyes. “You said Buddy was in?”

“Oh, yeah. I'll tell him you're here.” He turned. “Buddy! Got a visitor!”

Buddy shouted he'd be out in a “jiffy” and Avery grinned. “Fancy intercom system, Sammy.”

He laughed. “Isn't it, though. But we make do.”

His phone rang and she wandered away from the desk. She crossed to the community bulletin board, located to the right of the front door. Another one just like it was located in the library, the post office and the Piggly Wiggly. Cypress Springs' communications center, she thought. That hadn't changed, either.

She scanned the items tacked to the board, a conglomeration of community information flyers, Most Wanted and Missing posters and For-Sale-by-Owner ads.

“Baby girl,” Buddy boomed. She turned. He came around Sammy's desk, striding toward her, boots thundering against the scuffed wooden floors.

“I was afraid you'd be at lunch.”

“Just got back.” He hugged her. “This is a nice surprise.”

She returned the hug. “Do you have a minute to talk?”

“Sure.” He searched her expression. “Is everything okay?”

“Fine. I wanted to ask you about something I found in my dad's closet.”

“I'll try. Come on.” He led her to his office. Cluttered shelves, battered furniture and walls covered with honorary plaques and awards spoke of a lifetime of service to the community.

Avery sat in one of the two chairs facing his desk. She dug out the couple of clipped articles she had stuffed into
her purse and handed them to him. “I found a box of clippings like these in Dad's bedroom closet. I hoped you'd be able to tell me why he'd kept them.”

He scanned the two clippings, eyebrows drawing together. He met her eyes. “Are you certain your dad collected them and not your mom?”

She hesitated, then shook her head. “Not one hundred percent. But Dad had removed everything else of Mom's from the closet, so why keep these?”

“Gotcha.” He handed the two back. “To answer your question, I don't know why he saved them. Even considering the nature of the case, it seems an odd thing for him to do.”

“That's what I thought. So, he wasn't involved with the investigation in any way?”

“Nope.”

“Was he Sallie's physician?”

“Could have been, though I don't know for sure. I'd guess yes, just because for a number of years he was Cypress Springs' only general practitioner. And even after Bobby Townesend opened his practice, then Leon White, your daddy remained the town's primary doctor. People around here are loyal and they certainly don't like change.”

She pursed her lips. “Do you remember this event?”

“Like it was yesterday.” He paused, passed a hand over his forehead. “In my entire career, I've only investigated a handful of murders. Sallie Waguespack's was the first. And the worst.”

He hesitated a moment, as if gathering his thoughts. “But the trouble started before her murder. From the moment we learned that Old Dixie Foods was considering opening a factory just south of here. The community divided over the issue. Some called it progress. A chance to financially prosper. A chance for businesses that had always fought just to survive to finally have the opportunity to grow, maybe even turn a profit.

“Others predicted doom. They predicted the ruination of a way of life that had stood for a century. A way of life disappearing all over the South. They cited other Southern communities that had been changed for the worse by the influx of big business.”

He laid his hands flat on the desk. She noticed their enormous size. “The topic became a hot button. Friendships were strained. Working relationships, too. Some families were divided on the issue.

“I admit I was one of those blinded by the idea of progress, financial growth. I didn't buy the downside.”

“Which was?”

“The influx of five hundred minimum-wage workers, many of them unmarried males. The housing and commercial support system that would have to be created to accommodate them. How they would alter the social and moral structure of the community.”

“I'm not certain I understand what you mean.”

“This is a community devoted to God and family. We're a bit of an anachronism in this modern world. Family comes first. Sunday is for worship. We live by the Lord's commandments and the Golden Rule. Put a couple hundred single guys on the street on a Friday night, money in their pockets and what do you think is going to happen?”

She had a pretty good idea—and none of it had to do with the Golden Rule. “And my father?” she asked. “Where did he stand on the issue?”

Buddy met her eyes. His brow furrowed. “I don't remember for sure. I'm thinking he saw the downside all along. He was a smart man. Smarter than me, that's for certain.”

After a moment, he continued. “In the end, of course, the town had little recourse. The factory was built. Money began pouring into Cypress Springs. The town grew. And people's worst predictions came true.”

He stood and turned toward the window behind his desk. He gazed out, though Avery knew there was little to see—just a dead-end alley and the shadow of the courthouse.

“I love this town,” he said without looking at her. “Grew up here, raised my family here. I'll die here, I suspect. Those four months in 1988 were the only time I considered leaving.”

He turned and met her eyes. “The crime rate began to climb. We're talking the serious stuff, the kind of crimes we'd never seen in Cypress Springs. Rape. Armed robbery. Prostitution, for God's sake.”

He released a weary-sounding breath. “It didn't happen overnight, of course. It sneaked up on us. An isolated crime here, another there. I called them flukes. Pretty soon, I couldn't call them that anymore. Same with some of the other changes occurring in the community. Teenage pregnancies began to rise. As did the divorce rate. Suddenly, we were having the kind of trouble at the high school they had at big-city schools—alcohol, drugs, fighting.”

She vaguely recalled fights, and somebody getting caught smoking pot in the bathroom of the high school. She had been insulated from it all, she realized. In her warm, protected womb.

“It must have been difficult for you,” she said.

“Folks were scared. And angry. Real angry. The town was turning into a place they didn't like. Naturally they turned their anger on me.”

“They felt you weren't doing enough.”

It wasn't a question but he nodded anyway. “I was in over my head, no doubt about it. Didn't have the manpower or the experience to deal with the increased crime rate. Hell, our specialty had been traffic violations, the occasional barroom brawl and sticky-fingered kids shoplifting bubble gum from the five-and-dime. Then Sallie Waguespack was killed.”

He returned to his chair and sank heavily onto it. “This town went ballistic. The murder was grisly. She was young, pretty and had her whole life ahead of her. Her killers were high on drugs. There's just nothing easy about that scenario.”

“Why'd they kill her, Buddy?”

“We don't know. We suspect the motive was robbery but—”

“But,” she prodded.

“Like I said, she was young and pretty. And wild. They ran in the same crowd, frequented the same kinds of places. The Pruitt boys knew her. Could have been that one—or both—of them were romantically involved with her. Maybe they fought. Maybe she tried to break it off. Won't know any of that for sure, but what I do know is, the evidence against them was rock solid.”

He fell silent. She thought a moment, going over the things he had told her, trying to find where her father fit in.
If
he fit in. “What happened then, Buddy?”

He blinked. “We closed the case.”

“Not that, I mean with the community. The crime rate.”

“Things quieted down, they always do. Some good came of Sallie's death. People stopped taking the community, their quality of life, for granted. They realized that safety and a community spirit were worth working for. People started watching out for each other. Caring more. Service groups formed to help those in need. Drug awareness began being taught in the schools. As did sex education. Counseling was provided for those in need. Instead of condemning people in crisis, we began to offer help. The citizens voted to increase my budget and I put more officers on the street. The crime rate began to fall.”

“My first thought upon driving into town was how unchanged Cypress Springs seemed.”

“A lot of effort has gone into maintaining that.” He
smiled. “Would you believe, tourism has become our number one industry? Lots of day-trippers, people on their way to and from St. Francisville. They come to see our pretty, old-time town.”

She wondered if that was a hint of cynicism she heard in his voice.

“What about the canning plant?”

“Burned a couple years back. Old Dixie was in financial difficulty and didn't rebuild. Without job opportunities, those without other ties to Cypress Springs moved. If you're looking for an apartment, there're plenty of vacancies.”

Avery smiled. “I'll keep that in mind.”

“Old Dixie went belly-up last year. The burned-out hulk's for sale. Myself, I can't see anyone buying it. It's a stinking eyesore on the countryside. And I mean that literally.”

She arched an eyebrow in question and he laughed without humor. “Just wait. You haven't been here long enough to know what I'm talking about. When conditions are just right—the humidity's high, the temperature's warm and the wind's blowing briskly from the south, the sour smell of the plant inundates Cypress Springs. Folks close their windows and stay inside. Even so, it's damn hard to ignore.”

“Makes it hard to forget, too, I'll bet.” Avery wrinkled her nose. “Does the town have any recourse?”

“Nope, company's Chapter 7.” He leaned toward her. “Can't squeeze blood out of a turnip. Waste of time to try.”

Avery fell silent a moment, then looked at Buddy, returning to the original reason for her visit. “Why did Dad clip and save all these articles, all these years, Buddy?”

“Don't know, baby girl. I just don't know.”

“Am I interrupting?” Matt asked from behind her.

Avery turned. Matt stood in the doorway, looking official in his sheriff's department uniform.

“What're you doing here, son?”

“Do I need a reason to pop in to see my old man?”

“'Course not.” Buddy glanced at his watch. “But it's past lunch and the middle of a workday.”

Matt shifted his gaze to hers. “You see why I chose the sheriff's department over the CSPD? He'd have been all over me, all day.”

Buddy snorted. “Right. Nobody needs to sit on top of you and you know it. You practically breathe that job.” He wagged a finger at his son. “Truth be told, I wouldn't have had you work for me—I'd never have gotten a moment's peace.”

“Slacker.” Matt strode into the room, stopping behind Avery's chair. “You have a woman call in a missing person last week?” he asked his dad.

Buddy's expression tensed. “Yeah. What about it?”

“Just got off the phone with her. She thinks you're not doing anything on the case, asked the sheriff's department to check it out.”

The older man leaned back in his chair. “I don't know what she expects. I've done everything I can do.”

“Figured as much. Had to ask anyway.”

Avery moved her gaze between the two men. “Do I need to go?”

“You're okay.” Matt laid a hand on her shoulder. “In fact, you're an investigative reporter, you give us your take on this. Dad?”

Buddy nodded and took over. “I got a call last week from a woman who said her boyfriend contacted her by cell phone from just outside Cypress Springs. He told her he broke down and was going to call a service station for a tow. She never heard from him again.”

“Where was he heading?” she asked.

“To St. Francisville. Coming from a meeting in Clinton.”

“Why?”

“Business. Meeting with a client. He was in advertising.”

“Go on.”

“I spoke with every service station within twenty miles. Nobody got a call. I asked around town, put up flyers, haven't gotten a nibble. I told her that.”

Matt moved around her chair and perched on the edge of the desk, facing her. “So, what do you think? She's screaming foul play.”

“So where's the body?” Avery asked. “Where's the car?”