Cul de Sac
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“Ready to go check out the house?” Chloe asked.
“Not really,” Moulton said, the images he’d seen from that case file still clearly in his mind. “But I guess we’ve got to start somewhere.”
They got back into the car and headed back the way they had come. Right away, Chloe kept telling herself that it couldn’t be as bad as it had appeared in the pictures—all of that crimson red among the crisp white sheets.
***It took all of twenty seconds to get to the Hilyard house. The fact that it closely resembled the Lovingston house—and most every other house on the block—was creepy as hell as far as Chloe was concerned. They entered through the front door with the code Jerry Hilyard had given them and stepped into an absolutely still and silent house.
Knowing exactly why they were there, they wasted no time and went directly upstairs. The master bedroom was easy to find, the room all the way at the end of the hallway. Through the opened door, Chloe could already see streaks of red on the carpet and the sheets.
She was relieved, however, to find that the scene truly didn’t look as bad as it had appeared in the pictures Director Johnson had showed them. First and foremost, the body had been removed. Secondly, the bloodstains had been sitting longer, making them paler in color.
They walked to the bed, careful to step over any blood splashes left on the carpet. She could see areas in the blood splatter where the coroner and initial investigators had accidentally stepped in it. Chloe looked to the other side of the room, toward a dresser and where a small flat-screen TV was mounted to the wall. She was probably watching TV when it happened, maybe purging her head of high school reunion memories…
Chloe then went downstairs and had a look around. She could see no signs of forced entry and no clear indications that anything had been stolen. She looked around the living room, the kitchen, and the guest bedroom. She evens stepped out on the back deck and had a look around. There was a small patio table in the corner. An ashtray sat in the center of it, under the shade umbrella.
Chloe made a hmm sound as she saw the ashtray’s contents. There were no cigarette butts in the tray, but some other kind of ash and paper. She leaned down to it and took a light whiff. The scent of marijuana was unmistakable. She sorted through some things in her head, trying to figure out if this could be relevant in any way.
Chloe jumped a bit when her phone rang. Moulton, stepping out onto the back porch to join her, caught her look of momentary shock and smiled. She rolled her eyes and answered the call, not recognizing the number.
“This is Agent Fine,” she answered.
“This is Claire Lovingston. I thought you might want to know that I just got a call from one of my friends, Tabby North. She was one of the close friends that Jerry was telling you about. She asked if anyone else from the police had come to speak with me. I told them the FBI had just visited and she’d like to speak with you.”
“Does she have information for us?”
“Honestly…I don’t know. Probably not. But this is a rather small community. I think they just want to get to the bottom of it. I’m sure you’ll find them incredibly helpful.”
“Great. Text me her number after this call.”
Chloe killed the call and filled Moulton in. “That was Claire. She said one of Lauren’s other friends called her to see if anything new had developed. She’d like to speak with us.”
“Good. I won’t lie…I’m pretty much done here. That bedroom is giving me the creeps.”
It was a good way to explain it. Chloe could still see the pictures in her head, so seeing the scene without the body was like looking into some old abandoned place she was not meant to see.
Still, they went back to the bedroom and took some time to check the place over, looking in the bathroom, the walk-in closet, even under the bed. After finding nothing of interest, they left the house and, moments later, the Farmington Acres neighborhood. Chloe again thought that it was incredibly quaint—a perfect neighborhood to grow a family and shape a future.
So long as you were okay knowing that, from time to time, there might be a murder to contend with.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Tabby North was a redhead who had the kind of body that Chloe assumed saw the gym at least four days a week; it was also a body that, in Chloe’s humble opinion, could use a few more meals. She was gorgeous in a very obvious way, but she looked as if a strong wind might blow her away.
Chloe and Moulton met Tabby at her house and found that she had invited another close friend, a woman who apparently went to that very same gym with Tabby. This woman was Kaitlin St. John, who was crying when Chloe and Moulton showed up. They gathered together on Tabby’s screened-in back porch, where Tabby treated them to a pitcher of lavender lemonade. Chloe could not help the thoughts that blew through her head—of how pretentious it all seemed, these women quickly approaching forty, with their tiny waists and trendy health-nut drinks.
These thoughts are certainly not why Johnson stated he thought you had a knack for these small neighborhood-based cases, she thought to herself.
To be polite, she sipped from the lemonade. Despite her negative thoughts, it was actually delicious.
“I assume you ladies have already spoken to the police?” Chloe asked.
“Yes,” Tabby said. “And while I fully understand that they are doing their best, it was quite clear that they had no idea what they were doing.”
“They’re spooked, too,” Kaitlin said.
“Spooked by what?” Moulton asked.
“By the idea that it might have some sort of political reasoning. I guess you know about Lauren’s dad being all buddy-buddy with the Secretary of Defense. I’m sure the local police would rather avoid a media circus if they can help it.”
“So, is it politically connected?” Tabby asked.
“It’s far too early to know for sure,” Chloe said. Already, she was getting an uncomfortable vibe from these two. She did not doubt their grief; it was apparent in their expressions and the fact that Kaitlin had been openly crying since they’d showed up. But she also had no real problem picturing these two sitting around—perhaps with Lauren Hilyard and Claire Lovingston—gossiping about everyone in town. She wondered how much of what they might discuss right here and now would end up hitting the Barnes Point grapevine.
“Can you tell us when you last saw Lauren?” Moulton asked.
“It was the night before she died,” Tabby said. “We all met up at our high school reunion.”
“We practically had to drag Lauren to it,” Kaitlin said. “She always hated that kind of thing.”
“Well, she hated that sort of thing after school was over,” Tabby corrected. “She always wanted to try to leave the high school years in the past.”
“Did she seem any different that night?” Chloe asked.
“Nothing that I noticed,” Tabby said.
“Same here,” Kaitlin said. “I daresay she ended up having some fun later on in the night. Lauren…well, she was the heartthrob of our high school. All the guys wanted her and when Jerry Hilyard just happened to knock her up during senior year…man, it was like the place had exploded. She lost some of that allure, you know. But the way everyone treated her that night at the reunion…I think everyone forgot about that. And it was like she was the queen bee all over again. I think she needed that.”
“Was there a big crowd?” Moulton asked.
“Pretty big,” Tabby said. “This is sort of a strange part of town. Lots of people that went to our high school either graduated or ended up coming back this way after college. It’s not exactly a wealthy city, but this side of town is known for being the wealthy side, you know? Anyway, for a few moments, Lauren actually looked happy.”
“We understand that Lauren was among those that graduated and stayed around,” Chloe said. “Were you all friends in high school?”
“Yes. Hell…Lauren and Claire were friends from kindergarten.”
“So would you say they were the closest out of the four of you?”
“Probably,” Kaitlin said. “They’ve always been besties. We know they had their little private porch sessions. It’s sweet…but yeah, from time to time, I felt a little left out. How about you, Tab?”
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