Beneath Blackwater River by Leslie Wolfe (love story books to read txt) 📕

since the two people who had slept in that bed had moved out. Why had they left behind their entire wardrobe? Who would keep a house like that, frozen in time like an antique, yet let it decay?

Or had he?

The windows were new and unbreakable, and all light fixtures were operated by the remote control he kept in his pocket. The man had means to keep the property a certain way, and all decay he had allowed to happen must’ve been on purpose.

The third room seemed to have belonged to a boy, based on the clothes she found, on the simple, cotton sheets and the lack of throw pillows on the bed. The boy had enjoyed reading the classics, as evidenced by the countless titles placed on the shelves, had been engaged in college sports, and had been a fan of rock and roll bands of the eighties. But what mattered the most was that the bedroom window was equally unbreakable.

She was trapped.

The thought of it twisted her stomach in a knot and sucked the air out of her lungs, panic rampaging through her body. She couldn’t think of what the future held; she pushed the thought out of her mind, the questions that came with it, willing herself to breathe and accept she couldn’t run. Not now.

Resigned, she went into the living room and curled up on the sofa, looking outside through the picture window, now basked in sunlight. She’d obsessively tried not to think of what all that meant, to push the horror of her discoveries away, but her racing thoughts wouldn’t be silenced anymore.

Where were all those girls who’d left behind their clothes and their shoes?

Then, the stark realization of her circumstances hit her like a fist in the pit of her stomach.

He was never going to let her go.

24Identification

Time had slipped away, despite Kay’s efforts to catch up with it and be at the morgue before Bill Caldwell’s arrival. She’d hoped she could catch a minute or two with Doc Whitmore, just the two of them, to figure out what could’ve happened with Rose Harrelson’s DNA. Was there something more going on? A fleeting memory of the Caldwells’ unusual behavior the night before brought a frown to her forehead as she was pulling into the morgue parking lot, right by a luxury sedan that must have been Bill Caldwell’s.

She sucked in a last breath of fresh air right before opening the door and stepping into the morgue. In the reception area, the lights were dim, and the air didn’t reek of formaldehyde and death as badly. A lab assistant fidgeted, pacing back and forth between the autopsy room door and the reception desk, visibly uncomfortable with her assignment, which, by all appearances, was to stall Bill Caldwell until her arrival. The moment she recognized Kay, she let out a loud, relieved sigh.

“Good, you’re here,” she said, shoving her hands in her lab coat pockets, leaving just her thumbs outside in a gesture quite common among medical personnel.

Bill Caldwell had been sitting on one of the chairs lined up against the wall, leaning against the backrest, with his arms crossed at his chest and his eyes closed. He sprung to his feet and pounded toward her, his eyes dark, menacing. “Finally, you’re here,” he said, his voice low, threatening. “I would’ve expected you to be punctual, at least,” he added, drilling his angry gaze into her. “Especially since I can’t even see my own daughter without having a cop present.”

“I apologize for my tardiness, Mr. Caldwell,” she said, knowing better than to be riled up by the justifiable frustration of a mourning parent. “This is the procedure we have to follow. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll check quickly with Dr. Whitmore, and we can proceed with the identification.”

She didn’t wait for him to reply; rushing through the autopsy room doors and finding the medical examiner propped on a four-legged stool in front of his desk, his tall forehead nested in the palm of his hand.

Her sudden intrusion startled him and, until he grounded himself, he seemed lost for a brief moment, as if he’d been careening downhill without being able to stop.

“I—I can’t explain it,” he whispered, defeated, skipping the usual greetings. “I looked at the data all night, trying to construct scenarios that could’ve explained what happened, and there are none.”

She nodded, silently, knowing just how much an error like that could weigh on the reputed medical examiner, and how much was hanging in the balance for him, after forty years spent hunched over autopsy tables. If the glitch in Alyssa’s identification couldn’t be explained, he risked having all his cases reopened, all his work scrutinized, and all the felons he’d helped put in jail using DNA evidence or forensics would have new grounds for appeal.

“Let’s do things one at a time,” she said, taking his hand and tugging gently. He rose with a weary groan, his head hanging low under the weight of shame. “Let’s finish this ID and then I’ll stay behind. We’ll look at everything together, one more time, and we’ll sort this out somehow. There has to be a logical explanation for this mess, and we’ll find it.” She stopped briefly right before reaching the autopsy room swing doors, and dropped her voice to a whisper. “I believe in you, in your work. I’ve seen how rigorous you are, how disciplined and organized and thorough. Whatever the heck the explanation is for this mess, you and me, Doc, we’ll find it.”

He shot her a long gaze filled with questions and doubt. Then that gaze shifted ever so slightly, and she thought she deciphered an unspoken thank you and a hint of a smile that creased the corners of his tired eyes.

She gave his hand one more squeeze, then exited the room and stopped in front of Bill Caldwell, whose impatience was running thinner than a wisp of smoke. “If you could follow me, sir,” she said, then led the way