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“Fuck you too!”

What was wrong with her, driving like a maniac?

For a second he thought she'd seen him. That's why she was speeding; she was trying to outrun him. But a moment later he decided that was giving her too much credit.

Nope, she was just a teenager in a hurry.

He had to keep up with her without getting a ticket.

Fortunately, Stewart's Crossing was a small town, and it wasn't three more minutes before he was out of the city limits, the traffic thin as he kept her taillights in his field of vision. He followed her as she drove upward, into the hills, not knowing that she was heading right where he wanted her to go, closer and closer to the spot where he'd hidden the others, a barn that would become her new, temporary home, a place, ironically, very close to the damned Blue Peacock Manor.

 

Bellisario had gotten hung up at the station.

First, her sister had called with another report on Mom, then the security tape from the mall where Dana Rickert had last been seen had arrived, so she had taken the time to view it. As she watched, she felt sick. Sure enough, two men had approached Dana as she was getting into her car, her hands full of packages; while one had distracted her, the other had urged her forward, no doubt with some kind of small, hidden weapon, probably a pistol or knife, though it wasn't visible on the tape. The men's faces were obscured by the fog, but the camera had caught a clear shot of the vehicle and its Washington license plates. The out-of-state plates weren't a big deal. Every day, thousands of Washington residents drove across the bridges into Oregon, where they worked and/or shopped. Since Washington had a state sales tax and Oregon didn't, shopping centers and malls had sprung up on the south side of the Columbia to lure the out-of-staters and their shopping dollars.

A check with the Washington DMV and Bellisario discovered that the truck captured in the security camera's lens was registered to Evan Tolliver, the same guy whose cell phone was used to text Mary-Alice Eklund.

To top it all off, she'd discovered that Tolliver too was MIA.

His father had filed a Missing Persons report in Vancouver. The Vancouver PD had interviewed him, and he'd said his son had told him he was going to their vacation home in Sun River, Oregon. But according to the management service that maintained the home, he had never arrived. Nor had Evan Tolliver shown up for an appointment with a client who lived in The Dalles.

The other kink in the story was that Tolliver's old man had told the Washington cops who interviewed him that his son had been infatuated with Sarah McAdams, but that the relationship had died before it got started. He'd even speculated that Sarah's departure from Tolliver Construction, and ultimately Vancouver, had been sparked because of Evan's advances. “That boy is like a dog with a bone,” the father had said, “won't give something up until he's damned well ready.”

“We'll see about that,” Bellisario said to herself after she'd talked to the cops who had interviewed the old man. Was Evan Tolliver the abductor? Had he flipped out and started taking girls off the streets of the town where the woman who had rejected him had taken up residence? That didn't make any sense whatsoever, not that people couldn't be strange. The images from the camera weren't clear, but they were being compared to pictures of Evan Tolliver and other known criminals. Bellisario wasn't certain, of course, but the smaller guy looked familiar, a lot like Hardy Jones. She'd already put out a call to bring Jones back in because she wanted to see what he had to say, find out if he knew Tolliver, and rattle his goddamned cage.

Stuffing her arms into the sleeves of her jacket, she marched through the station to the back exit and shouldered open the door. Outside, feeling a sense of urgency, she jogged to her Jeep.

What did Evan Tolliver, a man who'd never been arrested in his life, have to do with the girls who'd disappeared from Stewart's Crossing?

She damned well was going to find out, and she knew where to start—back at Blue Peacock Manor.

 

The house was cold.

Outside, night threatened, the fog still hanging low.

And something pulled at Sarah's mind, irritating her, something she should now remember. She dropped her keys onto the dining room table, where they clattered onto an open, coffee-ringed copy of the architectural plans for the house; she spent the next five minutes feeding the fire, trying to warm up the first floor. With a poker she prodded the charred logs, exposing glowing embers, then placed a chunk of mossy wood in the firebox. As the coals touched the dry wood, the fire began to crackle hungrily, throwing off the beginnings of heat and casting flickering shadows against the far wall.

What was it?

Rocking back on her heels, she studied the flames, but her thoughts were turned inward. Beyond Clint Walsh and what to do with him, and the continual worry over her daughters, there was something else toying with her, teasing at the corners of her brain.

Try as she might, she couldn't urge whatever it was from its hiding spot.

Straightening, she dropped the poker into its stand, then walked back to the dining room, where Gracie, her iPad at hand, was once again poring over the pages of Helen's journal. The tablet was propped against the family Bible, once again open to the mess that was the Stewart family history.

In her mind's eye Sarah envisioned a skeletal tree with naked branches all tangled and twisted by the intricate lies of generations.

“I just don't get why Grandma left you out,” Gracie said.

“Me neither.”

“It's as if you don't exist. Me or Jade either.”

“I know.” No more lying. No more excuses. Maybe Arlene had been busy when Sarah had been born, maybe her hands had been full, but sometime in the last thirty-odd years, she could have taken the time to write down the name and birth date of her daughter and her granddaughters . . . unless . . .

Unless you're not Arlene and Franklin's child,

“No,” she said aloud.

“No what?” Gracie asked.

“Nothing,” Sarah said, her mind spinning. That wasn't right. She'd been raised by her mother and father, and she looked like her siblings and . . .

And she confused you with Theresa when you visited her, didn't she? What if you've been living a lie all your life, Sarah? What if you're not who you think you are?

“Mom?” Gracie was staring up at her with wide, worried eyes.

“I'm fine, honey. It's all just a little weird.”

“I know.”

Anxious inside, she tried to concentrate. To calm down, she took the time to reheat a cup of coffee in the microwave and carried it into the dining room, where she promptly left it, untouched, on the table. How could she find out the truth, whatever it was, and really, did she even want to know? She glanced at the house plans, the reason she'd come here in the first place. Of course, there was no answer in the old drawings; there couldn't be. But she shoved her keys away from the scrolls of the plans and flattened the wide pages, her gaze skimming each one, searching for something, but not quite knowing what. Pages were labeled with different dates, showing the additions she'd displayed for her brothers the last time they'd come by. Drawings of roof lines and footings, walls and plumbing lines, rooms and walls, and finally, the last page, a map of the original homestead that included all the surrounding acres, including the legal description and the lot lines denoting ownership.

A creek wandered through the property, and a pond was located on Stewart land, near where it abutted the Walsh property. Somewhere along the line, someone had penciled in the existing buildings and landmarks, including the house, pump house, machine shed, and barns. There were notes elsewhere on the property where an old bunkhouse had once existed, complete with a stable; close to the Walsh property line, near the creek, was the old cemetery.

For the love of God, what was she doing? Searching house plans for a secret to her identity? Frowning, she walked to the window and looked out. Where the hell was Jade? She'd texted half an hour ago. Her teeth on edge, she decided to call. If they were going to make the party, they'd have to get going soon and—

Thud!

The sound echoed in Sarah's ears. Echoed through her heart. She looked upward, to the ceiling; the noise had come from an upper story.

Theresa's room,

Gracie didn't look up.

The dog, lying on the floor at Gracie's feet, didn't so much as move.

“Did you hear that?” Sarah asked, the hairs on the back of her neck prickling. No one else was in the house. At least no one was supposed to be.

Gracie placed a finger on the open page of Helen's journal, marking the place she'd been reading and shook her head. “No.”

“Probably nothing,” Sarah said, to keep her child calm, though she couldn't imagine how Gracie and the dog hadn't reacted. “But I'll check anyway.”

Gracie's attention had already returned to the journal.

Sarah took the stairs two at a time and didn't pause on the second landing. She headed straight to Theresa's room; despite that tinge of trepidation that always touched her when she was near her older sister's part of the house, she flung open the door.

Sure enough, the Madonna statue was on the floor, having somehow fallen off the mantel and rolled to the window, where cold air seeped into the room. “What is this?” Sarah said aloud, and before she picked up the ceramic idol, she did a slow spin around the room. “Are you here?” she demanded in a low voice. “Angelique? We know what happened to you, so please, just . . . go. Cross over. Do whatever you need to find peace.”

She sounded like a crazy person, and catching her reflection in the cracked mirror over the fireplace, she thought she looked like one too.

In an instant, she felt the temperature in the room drop.

Sarah froze, and the spit dried in her mouth.

Oh, Jesus . . .

Goose bumps broke out on her flesh. Murmured voices seemed to swirl around her, whispering in quick, short sentences she couldn't understand. No. The sound was just a breeze seeping in through the window that wouldn't close, or rushing past in choppy, noisy gusts from within the chimney's flue.

Right?

It's all in my mind, This is just nuts . . .

The air seemed to swirl around her.

What the hell?

She remembered her mother telling her that she should never enter this room, that it was still Theresa's, and that these things all belonged to her.
Don't you ever go inside, Sarah, don't you touch any of Theresa's belongings, You've done enough damage as it is, I won't have you harming her things,

What damage?

Why did her mother seem to blame her for something she couldn't remember? Turning, Sarah stared at the statue. What had Mother said recently, when Sarah and her daughters had visited Arlene at Pleasant Pines?

“Don't you know that the Madonna is the key to your salvation? The Holy Mother? She's the key! Are you a heathen?”

It had sounded like incoherent babbling at the time, her mother's dementia and deep faith ruling her tongue, but now the little figurine of Mary was so close, staring at her, smirking at her. The statuette seemed to mock her somehow.

Without another thought, Sarah spun and grabbed the figurine, her finger curling around the cold ceramic as if she were clutching the tiny religious icon for . . . for what? Strength? Guidance? Peace? A renewed faith?

Or answers?

“What is it?” she demanded, talking to the ceramic doll as if it could hear, as if it would actually talk to her. “If you're the key, then . . .” She caught a glimpse of herself again in the mirror, a raving lunatic talking to an inanimate statuette.

“Oh for the love of God!” she cried and hurled the figurine at the mirror, at the lunatic of a woman she'd suddenly become.

Crash!

Reflective glass shattered, cracking into a thousand shards, jagged pieces flying through the air.

Instinctively she turned, arms up, protecting her face and head. Splintered shards rained over her, tiny pieces catching in her hair, slicing her arms, littering onto the floor.

Sarah was shaking, taking in one breath after another, trying to pull herself together. What had she been thinking? What the hell had she done?

The room went eerily quiet, only her own ragged breathing and the frantic beating of her heart disturbing the silence. Slowly she turned, glass clinking as it fell from her shoulders.

There on the mantel, in front of what remained of the mirror, the tiny statue stood.

Sarah's heart nearly stopped. No way could the figurine have survived unmarred, balanced on its base, staring serenely at her, saintly smile in place.

Oh, God, Oh, God, Oh God!

Sarah's heart clutched.

What was this? What
was
this?

The statue should have hit the mirror and shattered, or bounced back onto the floor, gravity pulling it downward to smash against the floorboards, but no, it stood motionless on the mantel.

Swallowing back her terror, her breathing coming in short, sharp breaths, Sarah stumbled back a step. Again, the now-familiar noise, the whispers were hissing and whirling around her. Words barely intelligible . . . “daughter . . . baby . . . mama . . . no . . . no! . . . father . . . don't . . . kill.”

“Who are you?” she whispered, her heart thudding, the room feeling as if it were closing in on her. Cold. Tight. The atmosphere thick. “What do you want from me?” Her breath fogged as she started to back up toward the door, her shoe crunching on the glass, her gaze fixed on that small painted figurine.

“I'm not leaving,” she whispered, while inside she wanted to run like hell. “We're staying.” She sounded like a fool! “So . . . so you can damned well deal with it.”