Crooked Little Lies Read online

  ALSO BY BARBARA TAYLOR SISSEL

  Safe Keeping

  Evidence of Life

  The Last Innocent Hour

  The Ninth Step

  The Volunteer

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2015 Barbara Taylor Sissel

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Lake Union Publishing, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Lake Union Publishing are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781503944848

  ISBN-10: 1503944840

  Cover design by Mumtaz Mustafa

  For David, aka Buddha Boy, whose shining light never fails to illumine my path, and for Jo, a sister of the heart and a kindred spirit.

  CONTENTS

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

  A CONVERSATION WITH THE AUTHOR

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  1

  Lauren didn’t know on that Friday in October, when she saw him walking alongside the road’s edge, that he would soon vanish, or that in the wake of his disappearance, dozens of people would feel compelled to search for him.

  When she spotted him that morning, it was in nearly the same instant she realized she’d turned the wrong way on the interstate feeder, and a fraction of a second later, there he was, mere inches from her bumper, so close her heart stalled. Her glance shot to the rearview mirror once she passed him, half-afraid of what she’d see. His outrage at the least. But his pace was unbroken, as if he were oblivious of how close he’d come to being struck down. Still shaken, she pulled onto the road’s shoulder, keeping an eye on him. She’d seen him walking around town before. In fact, her sightings of him were regular enough that if she were to go more than a few days without one, she would wonder about him, even worry a bit for his well-being. But she had never seen him here, where the traffic was constant and fierce.

  He was youngish, twentysomething, Lauren thought. Young enough that she could have been his mother. Young enough that watching him now, she felt pangs of distress. Who was he? Why was he on foot? The questions cut across her mind. He didn’t look as if he were a homeless person or a vagrant or a homicidal maniac. She felt his situation was something other than that. But what really scared her was how easily he could be killed. She could see it in her mind’s eye—his single misstep, the car coming on too fast, clipping him, knocking him hundreds of feet.

  On the following Wednesday, when the police questioned her in the wake of his disappearance, she would say it was her fear for him that caused her to stop that morning. But truthfully, she didn’t know. Maybe she’d stopped because she’d come so near to harming him herself, or maybe her own recent brush with death had heightened her sense of the fragility of life. Or maybe it was the mother in her. What if he were one of her children? She kept her glance on his reflected image. He seemed . . . not lost but isolated, solitary in a way that made her heart ache. He held himself with his torso awkwardly canted to the right, and the crookedness caused a hitch in his step, yet his pace was dogged, as if he were on a mission. And somehow it was the suggestion of commitment, of fidelity to purpose that hurt her heart worst of all. Did anyone know he was out here? Did anyone care? It was crazy, but when he was within feet of her car, she opened the door and got out.

  He stopped abruptly, his head coming erect on his neck, eyes widening, nostrils flared. He might have been an animal on alert, scenting air that was laden with car exhaust and carried a fainter underscore of fried food from the McDonald’s that was a little north of where they stood. Lauren closed the distance between them slowly, not wanting to frighten him, and lifted her voice above the sound of the traffic. “Are you okay?”

  He didn’t meet her gaze, looking past her instead at some point in the distance. He was an inch or two taller than she was, and slender, and his features were finely drawn. His eyes were dark and deep set, and his hair was rumpled and curled over his collar as if it hadn’t been cut in a while. But his clothes were clean and pressed. He wore a blue-plaid cotton shirt buttoned to the neck, over gray chinos. He looked cared for, Lauren thought.

  She introduced herself. “I’m Lauren Wilder,” she said. “I live here, in Hardys Walk. Do you live here, too?”

  He nodded and met her glance but only for a moment. Still, there was nothing in his demeanor that caused her to worry for her safety. What she felt, and she would say this to the police, was concern for him. She would tell them she would have stopped for a stray dog. She would say sometimes people and animals get lost and need rescuing. They need help to find their way home. She wouldn’t tell that she knew this from her own experience. The police would quickly learn of her accident though, and given the nature of her injuries and their lingering effects, they would question her regarding the accuracy of her memory, whereupon she would insist her recollection of the incident was as good as ever, as if insisting made it so. But what else was there to count on in this world other than your life and your mind and the rational way the two things worked together?

  The light changed, and the passing stream of traffic created a warm, oily wind that buffeted the legs of Lauren’s jeans, the loose hem of her shirt. She looked back at the boy. Man, really. Her son and daughter, Drew and Mackenzie, were fourteen and eleven respectively, but in a short handful of years, they would be in their twenties and considered adults. Her awareness that this stranger before her was no child gave her pause. Still, she asked for his name, then as quickly, she apologized. It wasn’t any of her business, and if she was using him as a distraction to forget her own woes, that was despicable.

  “My name is Bo Laughlin.” He answered her readily, still looking over her shoulder. “I live in a white house, yes, a white house. I have a big dog named Freckles. My sister’s name is Annie. Annie Beauchamp. I’m going to buy candy for her. I have enough. See?” He pulled out a roll of cash held together by a rubber band, showing it to Lauren.

  “Oh, you should put that away.” Her heart contracted with misgiving. Something was wrong, but exactly what wasn’t obvious to her. His speech was precise and clipped, and while he didn’t quite meet her gaze, his eyes were clear, and she saw intelligence behind them.

  He said, “I should go now.”

  “Does Annie know where you are?”

  He didn’t answer Lauren, only blinked rapidly at something, real or imagined.

  She captured his gaze again. “Could I call her for you?”

  “There.” He gestured to the convenience store some fifty feet beyond where they were standing. �
�Going there for candy, thank you. Good-bye,” he said formally, and then he brushed by her.

  Lauren turned, watching him go, and she felt helpless and confused in equal measure. Unlike her, he seemed so sure of his objective and so completely unaware of his limitations. Given her recently lamentable track record, who was she to judge what those limitations were? And yet once he disappeared inside the store, she got into her car, took her cell phone out of her purse and sat staring at it for a moment. She should do something about him, shouldn’t she? But calling 911 didn’t feel right. It wasn’t that sort of an emergency.

  She dialed Tara’s cell number, leaving a message when her younger sister didn’t answer, and then, keeping the phone in her hand, she considered calling Jeff. Not that long ago, she wouldn’t have thought twice about it. But it was different now. Jeff was wary of her. Cautious. He claimed to have forgiven her, but even if that was true, he hadn’t forgotten, and he didn’t trust her. Why should he? Most people were careful around addicts, even recovering ones.

  Lauren didn’t blame them. She watched herself; she had to, after the way she’d slipped up. Panic was her constant companion, and it was as rough as a prizefighter who kept throwing punches long after the bell had rung. Even now, she felt the wild swing of its clutched fist battering her ribs and bit down hard against it. She couldn’t allow it, couldn’t believe in fear that was groundless. It would take her sanity and run, if it had not already.

  Searching the Internet, she found the nonemergency number for the Lincoln County Sheriff’s Office and entered it. The woman who answered identified herself as Marilyn Wingate, and when she asked how she could help, Lauren described Bo Laughlin and her concern.

  “What’s your location?” Marilyn asked.

  Lauren told her she was on the northbound feeder of I-45 just north of Bayberry, the intersection that bisected Hardys Walk, near the town’s center. “I would never have seen him at all if I hadn’t turned the wrong way. Too much on my mind, I guess.” Glancing at herself in the rearview, she thought what an understatement that was.

  “We’ll send a patrol car, if there’s one in the area,” Marilyn said. “The trouble is he’s likely to be gone by the time a deputy can get there.”

  “Other people must have seen him. I know I’ve spotted him any number of times at different places around town. Maybe there isn’t any cause for concern. He doesn’t seem mentally challenged, really.” Lauren was remembering the concise manner of Bo’s speech, his neat appearance. Was she interfering, then? Indulging in some delusional fantasy? That’s what Jeff would say. He’d assume she was on something, probably tear up the house, hunting for her stash. It sickened her to think of it, that this was what they had come to. This was the place where they lived, on the dark, unraveling edges of doubt and lost faith, love that was uncertain.

  “I don’t recall other reports, but that doesn’t mean there haven’t been any,” Marilyn said.

  Lauren mentioned the cash Bo had shown her.

  “Was it a lot?”

  “I don’t know, but people have been killed over a dollar, less even.”

  Marilyn asked for contact information, and when Lauren said she and Jeff owned Wilder and Tate Commercial and Architectural Salvage, there was a bit of a pause before Marilyn said, “Really?” in a tone Lauren recognized, the knowing one that caused her to steel herself for the inevitable questions. I heard about your accident, Marilyn would say. I can’t imagine what you’ve been through, how you survived. Hardys Walk was small enough that when Lauren had fallen thirty-seven feet down the shaft of a church bell tower and lived to tell about it, it had briefly made the local news. Her own terrible fifteen minutes of fame . . .

  But Marilyn only said, “Can you hang on? Just for a sec. While I give this information to dispatch, okay?”

  Relieved, Lauren answered, “Fine,” even though she had a laundry list of errands to run. She kept an eye on the store while she waited. Bo had gone inside, but so far, she hadn’t seen him come out.

  Marilyn came back on the line. “They’ll try and find an officer in the vicinity who can do a welfare check.”

  It wasn’t a priority. Lauren could tell by the way Marilyn sounded. She would tell the police that, too, when they questioned her Wednesday about her sighting of Bo—what would turn out to be the second-to-last-known sighting of him. Lauren would say that if an officer had come when she’d called, Bo wouldn’t have disappeared.

  “Wilder and Tate, huh? My husband and I have bought vintage windows from you for our bungalow. We were told they came out of an old farmhouse you took down. I can’t even imagine how you do that, deconstruct an old building.”

  Ah. Here it is, Lauren thought. Marilyn was taking the back way in. Rather than coming across as nosy, she managed to sound somehow reverent and wary.

  “There aren’t many women doing that sort of work, are there? It must be so difficult.”

  Lauren said it could be, that the jobs were often tedious, hot, and dirty. She might spend entire afternoons doing nothing but yanking nails out of a pile of hundred-year-old siding or beadboard. Being a woman made her an oddity, too. The men in the trade had trouble believing she could do as good a job. But she was stronger than she looked, or she had been, and her slighter frame allowed her to work in tighter places, like church bell tower shafts. She said, “I mainly work the smaller jobs.” Lauren was drawn to the salvage end of the business, the preservation of historical treasures. “My husband works the big commercial jobs. He’s into heavy equipment and dynamite.”

  Marilyn laughed. “Just like a man.” She paused, then said something about needing a door.

  She meant a vintage door, Lauren realized. “We have several,” she said. “Actually more than several.” She laughed, thinking of the rows of old doors stacked like soldiers at the warehouse. It would take a person days to get through all of them.

  “Maybe my husband and I will come take a look this weekend. Will you be open? It would be fun to meet you.”

  “We’re open, but I’ll be out of town over the weekend, unfortunately.”

  Marilyn expressed regret.

  “I don’t guess you know anyone who wants to buy a house on eighty acres in the country?” Lauren didn’t know why she asked—as if there could be any chance it would be so easy.

  “Whereabouts?”

  “About an hour’s drive north. It’s my grandparents’ farm near Lufkin. Between Lufkin and Nacogdoches.”

  “Beautiful country,” Marilyn said. “Seems as if it should sell quickly.”

  “I hope so,” Lauren said because that was the expected response, the one everyone—especially Jeff and Tara—wanted. They didn’t need more trouble from her, more argument and unhappiness. They were fed up with all that. Lauren would feel the same way, she guessed. Still, the idea of strangers living in her grandparents’ beloved house was so foreign, so beyond comprehension—like selling your arm or your heart, your family’s legacy. So much of their childhood was framed by that house—its porch posts and sun-warmed floorboards, the hidden nooks that only they knew. Who else would love it as much? Who else would hear the echo of their laughter around every corner?

  “I’ll check into this young man’s situation a bit more, see if I can follow up with the sister. Annie Beauchamp, right?” Marilyn asked.

  Lauren thanked Marilyn, stowed her phone, then pulled onto the feeder and took a quick right into the convenience store parking lot. That’s when she caught sight of Bo again, what would turn out to be her last glimpse of him, coming out of the store and climbing into a car, a sedan. Was it a Cadillac? Lauren wasn’t good with cars. Something black and sleek. She drove a Navigator, not because she wanted to drive a vehicle that was huge and gas guzzling but because she was always hauling something. She slowed as she passed the car, long enough to see that a woman was driving it, an older, white-haired woman, and that Bo was in the front p
assenger seat, laughing. Clearly, he was fine, perfectly fine.

  Lauren slowed even further, openly staring, taking in Bo’s smiling face, the woman’s white, white hair, done in a French twist. She gave off an air of elegance, of the sort other women envy. She was the kind of woman who made you feel you wouldn’t mind getting old so much if you could do it like her, with her sort of grace. Lauren bet she would be wise, too. Too wise to do anything so foolish as to waylay a young man who was a stranger and then call the police on him.

  A horn honked. Lauren’s glance jerked to the rearview mirror, and her eyes collided with the driver of a blue pickup behind her, then lifted to travel the line of vehicles snaked behind him, all of them waiting on her. She set her foot down on the accelerator harder than she meant to, making the Navigator leap forward, adding to her agitation. This was the sort of thing Jeff meant when he said her mind wasn’t all there yet. Six weeks after she’d been discharged from the hospital, Dr. Bettinger had cleared her for driving on the condition that she keep the distances short and the routes familiar, but even with Bettinger’s okay, Jeff thought it was too soon. Sometimes when she looked at him across a room or when they were out shopping or on a job, he’d tap his temple. Think. He wanted her to think, to be aware, to be reasonable. He wanted her to be herself again. So did Lauren, in the worst way.

  She got packing boxes at the U-Haul store and, before leaving there, contacted the sheriff’s department again, hoping to reach Marilyn, to say never mind about Bo Laughlin. I overreacted, she would say. She wasn’t prepared for it when an answering machine picked up and stumbled through an awkwardly worded apology. She tried to forget about the incident after that, but she couldn’t, not entirely. She didn’t know why, and when she learned the following week that Bo Laughlin was missing, she was shocked yet she also felt vindicated. Maybe she wasn’t crazy after all. It would seem sensible then to contact county law enforcement and remind them of her encounter with Bo. Jeff would argue she should leave it alone, that she didn’t need more stress. He would say the moment she saw Bo get into the car—which turned out to be a Lincoln, not a Cadillac—it was too late to save him.