forgotten (Twisted Cedars Mysteries Book 2) (18 page)

Wade didn’t share any of his speculations with Waverman. At this point they had better focus on facts.

“How far is the Caruthers’ cottage from the Interstate?”

“About five miles to the 66.” The detective gave him the coordinates for the cottage, and Wade went to the map of Oregon on his wall. Taking a red pin, he marked the location.

“And do the Caruthers have a house in Ashland?”

“Yup. Just sent an officer over there, too. With Caruthers’ permission she’s going to give the place an initial search. Think you could get one of your men to interview your Jane Doe on our behalf? Maybe if you mention her husband and baby, she’ll start to remember.”

The puzzle pieces of Birdie’s life were coming together fast and furious.

Birdie... He shouldn’t think of her that way anymore.

“What’s her name? The missing wife?”

“Hang on.” There was the sound of papers being shuffled. Then, “The daughter is Josephine. The woman—Joelle Caruthers.”

* * *

Wade had heard of the Ashland Shakespeare Festival, though he’d never been. A few times his Mom had taken trips with a group of women from town, though. She’d raved about it.

He found the official website for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, and froze at the sight of the logo. It was the capital letter “O” with a short dash on the top left corner.

Birdie’s tattoo.

In his mind this cleared away any doubts that the woman the Ashland police were looking for was Birdie. But still he clicked on “OSF Company” and from there searched through the list of artists until he found a picture and biography for Richard Caruthers. The man had lots of thick, dark hair and might have been good looking except for an overly generous chin.

The attached biography had no personal details, other than listing his educational background which comprised a BA from the University of Michigan and an MA from Northwestern. Richard had been with the OSF for twelve seasons, the first eight as assistant director, and now as director. He was currently involved in a production of Henry V.

With a bit more trepidation, Wade looked up Joelle Caruthers. He found her listed in two places. In the Production Department under wigs and makeup, and also as an actor, where her credits included being the understudy for Biondello in The Taming of the Shrew and Cordelia in King Lear.

For a long time he stared at her photo.

There was no doubt this woman was Birdie. But there was also something fundamentally different between the photograph as she’d been then and the woman who’d survived that truck accident.

This Joelle Caruthers was confident, beautiful, with a hint of the siren in the gleam of her eyes. She was obviously focused directly on the camera. But Birdie, as she was now, rarely looked anyone in the eye. She was perpetually distracted by something in the distance, or off to the side.

Or, perhaps, back in her past?

* * *

Wade filled Duane in on the update, but when his deputy offered to interview Birdie, told him he’d handle it. “She’s still emotionally fragile. And at least she knows me.”

As Wade drove to the women’s shelter, the clouds that had been building since last night finally began expelling a fine mist. He turned his wipers on at their slowest speed and they’d only managed to sweep across the windshield about ten times before he arrived at his destination.

Four children, with a watchful mother, were on the playground to the left of the building. To the right, a group of six women were smoking and casting worried looks upward.

Birdie—Joelle—wasn’t in either place.

Inside, Wade checked in at the front desk. A few minutes later, Birdie—Joelle—came to the reception area, looking relieved to see him.

“I have a bad feeling about this rain,” she said, clutching his arm.

“It won’t last long. Rain in July is rare.”

She didn’t look reassured.

“We need to talk,” he said. “Someplace private.”

She studied his eyes, as if trying to get a hint of what was to come. When he remained quiet she said softly, “We can talk in my room.”

Wade followed her down the hall, then up the stairs. Her room had very little in it. One of Dougal Lachlan’s books was on the bedside table, turned so he could see the author photo, but not the title.

“Have you ever met him? Dougal Lachlan.”

She nodded. “I shampooed his hair a few days ago.”

“I mean before that. Before the accident.”

When she shrugged helplessly, he had to remind himself to be patient with her. Just because they’d found out who she was, didn’t mean she knew any more about her past now, than she had the last time he spoke to her.

All he could do was hope Waverman was right. That when he told her what he knew, her memory would be tweaked.

“We should sit down,” he said.

Birdie waved him toward the only chair—wooden, with a spindle back—then perched on the edge of her neatly made bed.

“Is it bad news?” she finally asked.

He realized he’d been quiet for a long time. “Has anything come back to you, yet? Your name? Where you came from?”

“No.” Her expression changed from trepidatious to fearful. “Have you heard something? Did someone from my past finally come looking for me?”

“You have a husband, and he called the Ashford police department today to report that you were missing.”

With trembling fingers, Birdie—Joelle—tucked her hair behind her ears, revealing a flash of her tattoo.

He pointed to it. “That symbol on your arm. It’s the logo for the Shakespeare Festival in Ashland.”

She cupped her hand protectively over the tat, and nodded. “Shakespeare. Yes, that sounds right. These lines have been popping into my head. They were old English, and seemed so bizarre. But of course, they were lines from a play.” She blinked. “So I wasn’t a hair stylist, after all? I was an actor...?”

So she was still not remembering. Or, he forced himself to consider, still pretending not to remember.

“You were both. You did hair and makeup for productions and you were also an understudy for a couple of plays.”

“And my name—?”

“Joelle Caruthers. Your husband is Richard.” He’d paused to see if the names would jolt her brain into remembering.

But she only blinked. “Joelle,” she repeated softly. “Joelle Caruthers. It’s a pretty name. But I don’t think it’s me.”

“There’s a picture of you on the OSF Company website. You look exactly like Joelle Caruthers.”

“But—I don’t think I’m married.”

His gaze went to the pale line on the finger on her left hand. “Looks like until very recently you wore a ring on that finger.”

She rubbed at the tan line, as if she could make it disappear. “I don’t like this,” she said.

“There’s one more thing, Joelle,” he said, deliberating using her name. “According to the missing person’s report filed by Richard Caruthers, the two of you had a baby. A ten-month-old girl named Josephine. She’s missing too.”

Joelle’s face had turned very pale. But she didn’t say a word.

“According to your husband, he left the two of you alone at your cottage on Hyatt Lake last Friday. I’m going to need you to come with me and give your statement.”

Wade felt like a jerk, as Joelle just sat there looking shell-shocked.

He tried a gentler tone. “Do you remember Josephine?”

Slowly her eyes filled with tears. Eventually she got up and pulled something from under her pillow. Then she turned and handed him the yellow flannel blanket that had been in the truck when it crashed.

He accepted the blanket, remembering how he’d used it to stench her wound. The blood was gone. It smelled of fabric softener.

“How did you get this?”

“One of the nurses told me it came in with me when I was admitted. She asked if I wanted to keep it. And I did.”

“Where is your baby, Joelle?” He handed the blanket back to her and she pressed the soft fabric to her check.

“I don’t know.”

eight days after the accident

w
ade had arranged with Duane, to drive to the Caruthers’ cottage on Hyatt Lake early the next morning. Wade made a stop outside the Buttermilk Café so his deputy could pick up sandwiches and coffees for the drive, and Duane came back with a veggie wrap for himself, cheddar and beef for Wade, as well as two to-go cups.

“Forgot you like your coffee black, and I asked for two lattes,” Carter apologized as he filled the cup holders. “Want me to run back and change the order?”

“Don’t bother. This is fine.” As Wade took a sip of the rich, creamy latte, he wondered if his deputy was on to him. One day he might have to publically admit he preferred these things.

They arrived at the Caruthers’ cottage just before two in the afternoon. The log building was nestled into a grove of aspen and the short driveway was so jammed with emergency response vehicles they had to pull in on the shoulder of the main road. Parked near the house was a cherry red Mazda, which Wade assumed to be Joelle’s vehicle.

He stopped to glance in the window and felt his chest tighten at the sight of a baby’s car seat in the rear. A take-out cup from Starbucks was in the cup-holder, but apart from that, the interior was neat.

As he straightened, one of the officers from Ashland, a tall, blond man, obviously the one in charge, approached him.

“I’m Wade MacKay.” He showed his badge, then introduced his deputy.

“You made good time. Todd Waverman.” The tall blond main offered him a hand. Todd looked to be in his fifties. He had rough features and a no-bull-shit manner about him. “The baby is still missing. We’ve contacted the usual babysitter, but the husband already spoke to her and she has no clue. As for the husband, he’s still being questioned up in Ashland. Have you spoken to Joelle?”

“We got her statement, but it’s not helpful. She didn’t recognize her name when I told her who she was. She has no memory of her husband or baby either—though the fact that she had worked for the Shakespeare Company seemed familiar to her. According to the neurologist who treated her after the accident, unpredictable memory loss is not uncommon with the sort of severe head injury she sustained in the accident.”

“That could be.” Waverman’s eyes narrowed in the bright sunlight. “Or she feels guilty about something and she’s faking amnesia.”

Wade pushed aside an unexpected—and inappropriate—urge to protect Joelle. “That’s possible, of course.”

“Has your team found anything in the cottage?” Duane asked. He had out his pen and notebook and had been busy jotting things down since they arrived.

Wade gave the cottage another look. It was an attractive place, but small. At best it would have two bedrooms.

“No sign of a struggle, no traces of blood. Nothing. We found her purse and her phone right where her husband said they would be. We’ve also recovered her laptop and we’ve got someone going through her recent calls and emails. Top priority is searching the grounds—there’s a lot to cover. The cottage comes with about five acres of land, stretching back to the lake.”

Wade followed the line of Todd’s finger. The lake wasn’t far, maybe three hundred feet from the home. A sandy path cut through the woods toward it. About seven or eight suited-up searchers were visible from where he stood. He imagined more were fanned out over the property.

“Mind if we take a quick look inside?”

“Suit up, then go on in. It’s a peculiar case. If you see anything we missed, let me know.”

Wade stepped inside, feeling more curious than normal about a potential crime scene. Homes revealed a lot about the people who lived there. And he knew so little about Joelle and who she’d been before the accident.

Hopefully he’d fill in some of the empty blanks here.

The air inside was stale, at odds with the cheery pale-green paint and bright-red fabric on the sofa and chairs. Sandals and running shoes were piled by the door and several colorful baby toys were strewn on the living room carpet. Other than that, the entry and living room looked neat.

Wade passed through an arched opening to the kitchen, which had pine cabinetry and white appliances. A high-chair was parked next to the table and several plastic bowls and bottles had been left on a rack to dry by the sink.

On the fridge were about a dozen photographs, most of them of a baby girl, from infancy to what Wade presumed was close to her current age of ten months.

Cute kid.

But what really drew his interest were the three photographs of Joelle and Richard Caruthers. One had been taken on a beach, another at a restaurant and a third on stage. In the third photo, Joelle was wearing a period costume and Richard was dressed in black jeans and shirt. He appeared to be giving her instruction about something.

Duane stuck close behind him as he gave the rest of the cottage a quick tour. There were other framed photos in the bedroom projecting the same image of a happy couple and their new child. Two nightstands flanked the queen-sized bed. One was tidy, with only a lamp and a small bowl containing change.

The other had a bottle of hand cream, a half-empty glass of water, a pair of pink reading glasses and a book that gave Wade a sense of
déjà vu
. It was one of Dougal’s,
A Murder in the Family.
With gloved hands, Wade picked it up and turned it over.

He was pretty sure this was the same book he’d seen in Joelle’s room in the women’s shelter. As he flipped through the pages, the story came back to him. It was about a man who’d killed his wife and gotten away with it for fifteen years before the cops finally built a case against him.

When he flipped all the way to the back, he saw a page had been ripped out. No doubt this was the author bio page he’d found in Chet Walker’s truck.

He pointed out the find to Duane, who made a note of it, then took the book to one of Todd Waverman’s team members to be filed as evidence.

Meanwhile Wade moved on to the bathroom. There were several baskets containing an astonishing large number of beauty projects. He supposed that made sense given that Joelle had done hair and makeup for a living.