A Thousand Yesteryears (27 page)

By the time she reached the third panel without discovering anything, doubt had crept up her spine. Her aunt’s beloved curtains lay folded over the opposite end of the couch, ruined until she could have them repaired. She wanted to sob. She’d been so certain. How could she have been so utterly wrong?

Shifting, she stretched her legs under the coffee table, adjusting the panel on her lap. She was about to embrace regret when her movement dislodged a white triangle, pushing it through the half-open seam. For the span of a heartbeat, she didn’t breathe. “Caden!”

He stood on a chair by the window taking down the fourth and last panel.

“Caden, come quick. I found something.”

Without waiting, she snipped away the rest of the seam, exposing the edge of an envelope.

“I don’t believe it.” Caden peered over her shoulder, then quickly took a seat next to her.

Eve eased the envelope from the panel, suddenly terrified of what she would find inside. Plain white, without any markings, the envelope was the size someone might use to send an invitation or thank-you card. Her heart quickened as she clutched it in her hands. Is this why her house had been vandalized? This single innocuous-looking item? It certainly wasn’t money or jewelry. Perhaps it contained a message revealing the location to something of value. Or maybe it was connected to Wendy Lynch.

“Careful with it,” Caden said.

“Do you think we should give it to Ryan? If it’s related to the vandalism…”

“We don’t know that.”

“Then you open it. I’m too nervous.” The idea Aunt Rosie harbored secrets sent dread tunneling through her stomach.

Caden held the envelope up to the light, squinting to decipher what was inside. “Can I have the scissors?”

She passed them without speaking, consciously gnawing her bottom lip. The air in the room felt abruptly oppressive, ballooning in her lungs, pushing against the back of her throat. Placing the envelope on the coffee table, Caden opened the scissors on a butterfly. Carefully, while holding the white square in place, he slipped one end under the flap and slit the seal from edge to edge.

Eve held her breath.

Gingerly, Caden withdrew the contents of the envelope—a note-sized piece of paper folded in half. Like the cover that had contained it, the sheet was plain and without markings.

“What is it?” Her voice was strained in the weighted silence.

“Something’s tucked inside.” Even as he spoke, a small piece of transparent film dropped from the open edge into Caden’s hand.

Eve stared at the object incomprehensibly. “A negative?” Her aunt had been an amateur photographer and occasionally had even taken shots for the local paper, but they’d been simple slice-of-life and human interest type photographs. “Why would someone vandalize the place for a negative?”

Caden withdrew a small black and white picture from the envelope, his face draining of all color.

Eve’s gaze fell to the image she surmised had been lifted from the negative. Expecting to see a candid shot of Wendy Lynch or something that would tie Katie’s sister to her aunt, she recoiled at the ghastly sight in horror.

“Oh my God, Caden. Roger Layton killed Maggie!”

Caden bolted for the door intent on one thought only—
find Roger Layton
. He didn’t know why, but the bastard had killed his sister. He’d held the photographic evidence in his hands—an image of Maggie struggling to thrash free of the river. Roger Layton had loomed above her, knee-deep in the water, hands throttling her neck. All this time, Caden had thought the bridge collapse killed Maggie, but she’d survived the tragedy. If not for Layton, she would have been one of the lucky few pulled from the water.

“Caden, no,” Eve yelled behind him.

He barely heard, remembering those first raw moments of rescue—the sting of headlights in his eyes, screams and sobs reverberating through the night, the icy bite of wind cutting beneath his sopping clothes. He should have seen Maggie in the confusion. He should have saved her. A bonfire of anger and grief crashed over him. Ripping open the door, he imagined doing the same to Layton’s gullet.

“Caden, think!” Eve caught up to him and clutched his arm. “This isn’t the way.”

“Layton has to pay.” He didn’t recognize his voice, thick with hatred. The need for vengeance bubbled hot in his gut.

“I know that. I do.” Eve refused to release him, staring up into his eyes. Her gaze, troubled and beseeching, mirrored the pleading tone in her voice. “But if you go after Layton in a rage—if you hurt him—you’ll only make things worse, and it won’t help Maggie. Roger needs to be brought to justice for his crime. Call Ryan and let him handle this legally.”

Legally? He grunted at the bothersome thought. The justice system hadn’t been worth a damn when Layton wrapped his hands around Maggie’s neck and choked the life from her. “Eve—”

“Listen to me.” Anger mingled with the desperation in her voice. “Do you want Roger to go free because you acted impulsively and did something stupid?”

“He
killed
her.” For fifteen long years he’d held himself accountable for his sister’s death. Even saying the words sent a stab of pain through his gut. “Killed her. An innocent child who’d done nothing wrong.” Wrenching his arm free, he stalked onto the porch.

“You know I’m right,” Eve yelled, trailing behind him. Her voice was choked, as if she fought tears. “You were a cop, Caden. Think like one!”

Her admonition was a slap to the face. He drew up short at the bottom of the porch steps, the first nagging tentacles of doubt dampening his inferno of anger. Vigilante justice wasn’t the answer, but the system was slow. The system would take time. It would be so much easier to settle the score with Layton personally. But committing such a crime would only hurt his mother and brother, who’d already suffered the tragedy of loss. And it would do nothing for his sister.

Raising his hands to his face, he dug his fingers into his skull. Eve was right. Of course she was. But—
oh, God, Maggie!

Sucking down a lungful of air, he bent double, hands braced on his knees. Every time he closed his eyes, all he could see was his sister’s trusting face. He shook his head. “This is shit.”

Hovering behind him, Eve slid a hand onto his bowed back. “Think of what Maggie would want.”

That was the problem. His sister wouldn’t want him to toss his life away in a violent hell-bent act of retribution, but he needed to avenge her. The conflict made him want to kick something. To punch. To drive his fist into the hardboard siding and feel pain explode the length of his arm.

Instead, he pulled Eve close. His voice of reason. His sanity. She folded willingly into his arms, burying her face against his neck.

“I’m sorry.” He stroked a hand over her hair, conscious of her tears on his skin. Beating Roger to a pulp might selfishly satisfy his need for vengeance, but it wouldn’t help Maggie, and it wouldn’t put the banker behind bars where he belonged. The man deserved to rot in prison. For the first time since he’d made the decision, Caden regretted turning in his badge.

Slipping a finger beneath Eve’s chin, he tilted her face up toward his. Her gaze held a mixture of love and concern, as starkly visible as the tears on her face. A sense of calm washed over him. From the start, she’d been a healing tonic for his soul, soothing the anger and grief that had kept him bound in darkness for fifteen years. She believed in him, and that belief made him take a harder look at himself.

“I’ll call Ryan. We’ll go through the proper channels and do this legally.” He thumbed the tears from her face. “I’m sorry I lost my head.”

“You had a right.”

Cupping her face in his hands, he kissed her. What might have he done if she hadn’t been there to stop him? Now that he could think rationally, a new troubling thought wormed into his brain—Layton had killed Maggie, but why hadn’t Rosalind Parrish reported him for his crime?

* * * *

Eve waited in the living room for Ryan to arrive. She’d chosen not to eavesdrop on Caden’s call when he’d retreated to the kitchen to phone his brother. It was hard enough managing the tumbleweed of emotion in her stomach. The ghastly photo she and Caden had discovered lay face-down on the coffee table in front of her. She couldn’t bear to look at it, but the grisly image remained seared into her mind.

Tears burned Eve’s eyes.

What had motivated Roger to kill Maggie? And why was he still free if her aunt had witnessed, even photographed, the crime? The sick feeling rooted in her stomach mushroomed into a wave of nausea. Shocked, angry, and scared, she wanted to demand answers, but Aunt Rosie was gone, taking the ugly secret to her grave.

Why, Aunt Rosie? How could you have let Roger get away with something so monstrous?

And he
was
a monster. Suddenly, it all made sense.

Maggie had never seen the Mothman in the Witch Wood. She’d come face to face with a human monster. A man who’d already committed murder and was digging a grave to conceal the body of his victim. In her terror, Maggie had turned him into a creature that couldn’t be real, and thus, couldn’t hurt her.

But Roger had seen her. Chased her. When she’d told everyone she’d seen the Mothman, making no mention of him or a body, he must have felt momentarily safe. Like so many others, he’d probably wandered to the river the night the Silver Bridge fell to help with the rescue efforts. When he’d come upon Maggie struggling from the water, he used the opportunity to make certain she could never betray him.

Did that mean Roger had killed Wendy Lynch, too? If he’d been the “monster” in the Witch Wood and the remains proved to be Wendy’s…

Overcome with grief, Eve bit her lip to hold back tears. When Caden returned from the kitchen five minutes later, his face was grim but calm. Thank God, the worst of his anger had passed.

“Ryan’s on his way.” He sat beside her and wrapped his arm around her shoulder, drawing her against him.

She needed his strength every bit as much as he needed hers. Maybe it would have been better for both of them if they’d never learned the truth. As soon as the thought surfaced, she banished it. Caden needed the truth to be free of guilt, and Roger Layton had to be made accountable for his crimes.

A steely sense of determination washed over her. The resolve was still there fifteen minutes later when Ryan arrived, breathless and flushed.

Caden took him aside, speaking swiftly and urgently as he showed his brother the gruesome photograph. Ryan’s initial reaction—anger and a personal need for justice—was much like Caden’s had been, but his brother eventually managed to calm him down.

“We’re going to get this bastard, Ryan,” Caden said. “But we’re going to do it legally. I want you to arrest the S.O.B., and I want to be there when you read him his rights.”

Standing in the middle of the living room, the picture clutched in his hand, Ryan shook his head. His face relayed his shock. “I don’t understand. Why would he do this?”

“I think I have an idea.” Eve had been quiet since Ryan’s arrival, allowing Caden to explain how they’d discovered the photo and negative. As brothers, they’d needed those moments without her, a brief time to absorb the horror, anger, and grief. She wasn’t a police officer, but she’d been a little girl once and could easily understand how Maggie had twisted witnessing a horrific act into something that wasn’t real. Drawing a deep breath, she steeled herself for their reaction. “It goes back to what Maggie saw that day in the Witch Wood.” Quickly, she shared her thoughts about the Mothman, Maggie, Roger, and why he’d killed her.

Silence reigned when she was through.

Finally, Caden exchanged a glance with his brother. “She might be onto something.”

“So why didn’t Rosie go to the police with this evidence?” Ryan lifted the photograph between two fingers.

“I wish I knew.” The omission left a raw wound in Eve’s heart. Moving from the sofa, she joined them in the center of the room. A short while ago, the surroundings had comforted her with memories of her beloved aunt, but now they brought bitterness. Maggie had been Eve’s closest friend. How could her aunt have protected the man who’d taken her life? “I can only guess she couldn’t bring herself to turn Roger in, even knowing what a monster he was. She loved him too much. Now I understand why she broke off her engagement.”

“Well, I don’t care how much she loved him,” Caden snapped. “The man killed my sister.”

She understood his venom, the dread in her gut slithering into something thorny. “It’s why Aunt Rosie didn’t seek treatment for her cancer.” Suddenly her aunt’s willingness to let the disease claim her made sense. “She viewed it as payment for her sins. According to Katie, she prayed God would forgive her at the end.”

“God might, but I won’t.” Caden’s expression was hard, his mouth compressed in a rigid line. She couldn’t fault his bitterness. At the moment, she wasn’t even sure
she
could forgive her aunt, regardless of how conflicted Rosie might have felt.

“A deathbed confession more or less,” Ryan said quietly. He shook his head, looking down at the photo. “She must have planned to take the secret to her grave, but had a change of heart at the last moment.”

“Maybe.” Caden raked fingers through his hair. Hands on hips, he paced off a small circle. “So if it was Amos who trashed the place, why did he want the negative?” He paused only briefly. “To blackmail Roger?”

“Not a smart move considering how he ended up,” Ryan observed.

“Which could explain the money clip,” Eve said.

Ryan shot her a glance. “What money clip?”

Withdrawing it from her pocket, she explained how Glenda Whitmore and her husband had found it near the pond where Amos’s body was discovered. “See?” She passed it to Ryan. “Roger’s initials are on it— R-A-L.”

“A judge would say that’s circumstantial.” Examining the clip, Ryan turned it over in his hand. “It could belong to someone else.”

“I’ve seen him with it before,” Caden said. “All we’d have to do is ask to see his clip. If he can’t produce it, we know this belongs to him. The lab might be able to lift his prints, too.”