The Dead Husband by Carter Wilson (guided reading books .TXT) 📕

What had struck Colin as a red flag was how quickly Cora stopped the interview and left the room within just minutes. Patterson would have made sure the interviewee was comfortable when they began, likely suggesting she get something to eat or drink. Anything to relax her. So Cora leaving the room to get a drink was clearly a chance to regroup. And it came right after Patterson asked her what she and Caleb Benner had discussed.

No one would likely ever know the answer to that. Cora was probably the only person still alive who could say. But through his conversation with Chief Sike from the Bury PD and after reading the transcripts from some of the other kids at the party that night, Colin had pieced together the last known hours of Caleb Benner’s contact with anyone.

Caleb Benner, sixteen, was one of eighteen kids to show up at Ron Finch’s house for an impromptu Friday-night party. Finch’s parents were only out for dinner and a game night with friends, so all the kids knew the party was going to start and end early, and Finch had enlisted Caleb’s help in cleaning up any trace of the party before the parents came home. But Caleb had started drinking, and Finch said he knew early on he couldn’t rely on him to help, so he asked another friend instead.

After a few drinks, Caleb apparently told his friend Rick Mastington he wanted to try to get alone with Cora. That he was attracted to her and thought she felt the same way. Mastington didn’t think Cora and Caleb knew each other well and figured it was the alcohol talking. But sure enough, Mastington (and others) witnessed Caleb walk up to Cora, pull her away from the friends she was talking to, and lean in as they had a private, side conversation. This lasted until just before 8:00 p.m., at which point Caleb abruptly left the party alone. In his interview, Mastington told the police that wasn’t necessarily unusual. Caleb was known to be aloof and often would break away from a group to be alone. Mastington figured he’d struck out with Cora and left the party sulking.

Without any further transcripts from Cora, Colin could only assume whatever else she’d told the police didn’t shed any further light on where Caleb went after the party. If Cora and Caleb had gotten together after the party, that would likely have made her the last person to see him alive. That fact would certainly have been noted in the cold-case file, which it wasn’t.

Caleb wasn’t reported as seen by anyone else after he left Ron Finch’s house. He was reported missing by his parents around eight the following morning. Twelve hours after that, the search parties commenced. Over the following weeks, volunteers—many of them high-school students—searched parks, fields, and the vast woods that encased large swaths of the town. Divers from a search-and-rescue team checked the Bury reservoir. Flyers printed and posted. Nightly TV coverage from the Manchester network affiliates. Caleb’s case even earned a segment on America’s Most Wanted.

But nothing.

Not a single clue. Not a substantive lead. Nothing.

Caleb Benner vanished as completely as if he’d never existed in the first place. Four months later, the police announced they would be keeping the case open but suspected the teen was more likely a runaway than a victim.

After all his research into the case, Colin didn’t necessarily agree with the assessment. Usually there was a telltale sign of a runaway. Kids talk, and at least one of Caleb’s friends would have known something. But every single person expressed genuine shock at Caleb’s disappearance.

Colin checked—Caleb’s parents still lived in Bury, though they’d moved to a different house. Outskirts of town. What an awful thing, Colin thought. All those years. Just wondering. Waiting. Hoping for as long as you could, then losing hope along with your child.

Through all his research, Colin kept coming back in his mind to Cora Yates. And that made him think of Rose Yates.

These two.

Sisters of Bury.

Their protective father.

A disappearance twenty-two years ago.

A possible homicide four months ago.

All connected by the Yates name.

Without too much difficulty, Colin had been able to download the advance reader’s copy of J. L. Sharp’s upcoming book, The Child of the Steps. This was the only one of Rose Yates’s books he hadn’t read, and he planned to start reading it on his Kindle that night.

Step, Colin thought.

The word made him flash back to the end of Cora’s transcript, where Logan Yates mentioned having parts of the wood flooring and stairs refinished. It made him remember his brief time in the sprawling house on Rum Hill Road and how the energy inside its walls unsettled him, like a low wave of radiation.

Then he thought, Who only refinishes part of a floor?

Thirty-Five

Bury, New Hampshire

November 6

I’ve reached enough of a buzz to calm my nerves. It’s taken almost two whiskeys. Alec is still on his first beer.

A half hour ago, I walked into Rust, a tapas bar on the west side of Bury. Such an ugly name. Rust. Especially when combined with Bury.

Alec was waiting for me at the bar. Thin gray sweater, snug. Black denim jeans, spotless leather shoes. I hugged him like an old friend, and when I did, I had a moment of wanting to never let go. I forced myself to push the moment away rather than let it escape from me, just to give myself a little control over something.

On Halloween night, I told Alec I could use a friend to talk to, but the truth is I almost canceled tonight. I had the dream again last night, and with everything else in my head, I’m being turned inside out. I’m not sleeping well, have lost a good bit of my appetite, and am trying to quell my anxiety by running miles on end, the combination of which is threatening to crumble my sanity and my bones into dust.

At the last minute, I opted to