Page 15 of The Hanging Dolls
Keith turned around to repeat the question but his eyes fell on the picture. He didn’t say anything. Zoe wondered if it meant nothing, but then why would Rachel have kept it all these years?
The color drained from his face. Slowly, he lifted his head and narrowed his eyes. “Who are you?”
“I’m Zoe Storm. Her daughter.”
His eyebrows almost touched his hairline. “Daughter? Wow… I didn’t know she had a kid.”
“Two kids. My sister lives in Vermont.”
“Right…” He leaned on a hand and touched his lips with the other, as he stared at the photograph. “Well, where is she?” Before Zoe could form the words, her face gave it away. Fear registered on his face. His eyes widened a fraction and his lips parted. But it was gone in the blink of an eye, replaced by a crumpled forehead. “I’m so sorry… what happened?”
“She killed herself.” A lie.
“Suicide? Rachel?” He wrestled with the words, finally shaking his head. “I guess you don’t know what goes on in anyone’s head, right?”
“How did you know her?”
“I just met her at a concert in 1977. We spent two weeks together. I was just passing through the Midwest. It was a fling,” he added bashfully. “We never saw each other again. I had to go back to California and get my shit together. I even forgot about this picture.”
Something was amiss. “She kept the photo all these years.”
His eye twitched. “She did, huh? That’s sweet of her, lady. Look, I got some work to do?—”
“Do you remember anything she told you about her past or anyone else in her life?” Zoe pressed. “Parents, cousins, siblings, boyfriends, anything?”
Keith stared at her dumbfounded. “No. I frankly don’t remember. It was forty years ago.”
Before she could probe further, he went back to the kitchen.
Zoe’s hands curled into fists. Another dead end. She slammed her laptop shut and marched out of the bar, fighting back tears. Sometimes she wondered if this was all Rachel’s doing. How she must be influencing the events in her life to ensure that Zoe was as far from the truth as possible. How was it that an FBI agent was unable to find outanythingabout her own past?
Thin clouds stretched across the horizon, their edges tinged with the faintest traces of pink and lavender, remnants of the sun’s last rays struggling to hold on. The sky over the town was a soft, muted gray, the color deepening as the day slowly gave way to evening.
Zoe was heading to her car when she decided to sneak a last peek at the only person she had found who was in some wayconnected to Rachel. Through the window, she spotted Keith back at the bar. His hands rested on the counter, his head hanging low. As he raised his head, he wiped away a stray tear racing down his cheek.
Alarm bells went off in Zoe’s head. She thought back to his reaction to learning about Rachel’s death and how she had died. He’d looked positively shaken, disturbed. Why would he cry over someone he knew for just two weeks forty years ago? Why would Rachel keep this photo?
He was lying.
But why did he lie to her?
She was contemplating going back in and confronting him again when her phone trilled. “Hello?” She answered without checking the caller ID.
“Agent Storm, it’s Scott.” His voice was low and measured. “We found Lily.”
EIGHT
Zoe’s heart was in her mouth. The only light came from the screen of her phone, its soft glow illuminating the brown carpet of soft earth under her boots. She hated the woods—always had. Ever since she was a kid, there was something about so muchgreenthat unnerved her. And then there was the constant fear of someone jumping out of those tangled branches.
It was some karmic debt she must have owed that made her go deep undercover for two years, living as part of a cult in such a place. Now the woods reminded her ofhim—the sick man who often got high and chased her in the woods.
“Your heart is racing, Zoe,” Aiden said. He was right next to her. For a second she had forgotten he was there. But that’s how he always was—a quiet but formidable presence.
“How would you know that?”
“Your breaths are deliberate and your face is turning red,” he said dryly.
She ignored him and focused on her surroundings.
