Page 24 of The Lost Bones
They marched toward a house with a broken flowerpot lying on the porch.
“Our last lead with Sophie,” Nick admitted, checking his reflection in a window.
“Let’s hope we catch a break.” Mackenzie knocked on the outer door, which had frosted glass.
There was a squeak and a click. The wooden door behind opened, the hinges protesting. A short, pudgy woman glared at them from behind the frosted glass.
“We’re looking for Ethel Gedrick.” Mackenzie flashed her badge.
The woman opened the outer door—a new installation in the otherwise ancient and disintegrating house. “I’m Ethel. What—” Her eyes widened at the broken flowerpot on the porch. She looked over her shoulder and barked, “Tom! Control your stupid cat! If you don’t train her, I’ll put her down myself!”
Tom shouted back something incoherent. Ethel rolled her eyes and focused back on Mackenzie and Nick. “Yes?”
“We’re following up on the disappearance of Sophie Fields,” Nick said.
Ethel’s face didn’t change, but her grip on the door tightened till her knuckles were white. “Did you find her?”
“Yes,” he answered apologetically.
Her face fell. She took out tobacco and popped it in her mouth. “Guess I shouldn’t be surprised. What are the chances of a young woman being alive after all this time?”
“You said you were a family friend,” Mackenzie said, watching Ethel closely. “But we found no trace of you in Sophie’s life. She never mentioned you to her fiancé.”
“She had a fiancé?” Ethel asked, and gestured to them to move back. Closing the door behind her, she limped toward a brittle-looking swing and sat on it. “It’s my hip. Standing for too long is painful. I knew Sophie and her family when they lived in Colorado.”
“When was this?”
“Oh, Sophie was around twelve years old when they moved. We lost touch.”
“So you never spoke with her or had any contact with her after that?” Nick asked.
“No. When I heard from mutual friends that she was missing, I called the police a bunch of times, but they had no answers for me.”
Mackenzie and Nick looked at each other, disappointed. They had been hoping that Ethel would perhaps know something new, but it seemed like another dead end.
“You don’t know yet who killed her, do you?” Ethel spat out the tobacco next to her feet and drew a pack of cigarettes from her pocket. “What a fucking shame. That entire family got destroyed.” She growled when she couldn’t find a lighter. Nick held his out. “Thanks. Poor child. What a fate. First her sister, then her parents and now—”
“Her sister?” Mackenzie quizzed. “Sophie didn’t have a sister.”
Ethel took a drag, her eyes sharpening. “Oh, she did. A twin. Aria. She went missing when she was only eleven. That’s why the family moved away.”
“What happened?” Nick asked.
“She didn’t come home from school one day. There was a huge search. She was never found. A year later the family left Colorado to escape the painful memories.”
The wheels in Mackenzie’s brain spun. Could Sophie’s murder have anything to do with her missing sister? But something else niggled at her. Why wouldn’t Sophie confide in her fiancé about her sister? Or was Austin hiding something?
FIFTEEN
“The disappearance of Courtney Montenegro has come to a heartbreaking end,” Debbie said to the camera with a rehearsed concern etched on her face. “The Lakemore PD confirmed her demise. Although the details are being kept under wraps, we have been told that Courtney was found murdered in an abandoned stable near the border with Riverview. Our sources have confirmed that this homicide has a personal connection with the Lakemore PD, even though the nature of that connection currently remains unknown. Meanwhile, in good news, the Lakemore Sharks have started shooting an ad for the sports entertainment company chaired by Rafael Jennings…”
Mackenzie walked past the lounge. “Didn’t I see this segment a few hours ago?”
“Jesus, are all the other reporters dead?” Nick shook his head. “They’ve been replaying her segment on a loop.”
“If she finds out that the connection is me, she’ll crucify me.” Mackenzie shuddered, remembering the sour looks Debbie was throwing her way at the Mayor’s party.
They saw Andrew standing by the espresso machine, trying to work the buttons. The machine kept making a grating sound.
