Without a Trace. Carissa Lynch Ann

       Criminal Confinement.

       Strangulation.

      “Holy shit.”

      I leaned back in my chair, full of disbelief. My mind floated back to the wispy, stuttering woman I met this morning. She seemed so fragile, so anxious. Could she be the real abuser in this situation? I wondered, incredulously. My gut was saying: no.

      “Mom, you’re the best. I was so focused on him and whether the child was in danger, that I never looked up more info on her. It sounds like there are some major issues going on in the family and I need to figure this out.”

      I expected my mom to make a crack about my investigative skills or get on me for cussing, but she just looked tired and worried. She patted me on the shoulder and stood up.

      “Don’t go out there by yourself. You know what happened last time…”

      I stiffened. “What happened to Ezra Clark wasn’t my fault. I was doing things by the book…”

      “This is a small town, Ellie. And everyone in it knew Ezra was a mean drunk.” My mother’s back was to me, her hand resting on the doorknob in the dark.

      So, even my mother thinks I’m a cop killer, I thought, squeezing the arms of my computer chair.

      “Whether he was a drunk or a well-known cop, doesn’t give him the right to hit his wife. And it certainly didn’t give him the right to grab for my gun when I went to arrest him,” I hissed, waiting for her to turn around.

      “I know, honey. I know,” she said, letting herself out and pulling the door closed behind her.

      Turning back to the computer screen, I stared at the list of Nova’s charges until the words turned blurry through my tears. Maybe she really was a criminal. A reckless woman who assaulted her husband and skipped town with their child…

      Maybe she wasn’t all that she seemed. Or…maybe she just got a bad rap like I did when I’d defended myself against Ezra Clark…

       CHAPTER SIX

       The Neighbor

       CLARA

      I stopped sleeping after Krissy left. The house had gone quiet ever since she moved to Texas with her husband, Tim. Now twenty, she was no longer my little girl, but a woman on her own with her own family to take care of and worry about.

      It had been two years since she left, but still, sometimes I thought I could hear her—the tap tap tap of her typing. That girl was always typing, either writing a story or doing research for some cause she wanted to fight for. And sometimes I heard the younger versions of her—Krissy with her Hot Wheels, the metal wheels scraping on the hardwood floors and running up the sides of the walls. It used to aggravate me to no end. I’d be reading a book or cooking supper, and here she’d come, buzzing down the hall with those obnoxious cars.

      And Annie, too. Sometimes I still heard Annie. Unlike Krissy, Annie never aged—her sounds were always that of a three-year-old. Sucking on her bottle that I never got the chance to break her from. Giggling. Her laughter, a cute little snort. I’d open the bathroom door, expecting to find Annie in there taking a bubble bath, running little rubber duckies around the porcelain walls of the tub…

      There were pieces of them all over the farm, like pieces of old ghosts. I couldn’t sleep in my own bed because Andy would be there waiting. I could feel the pressure of his weight, lying on his side of the bed…

      Lately, I’d taken to leaving the TV on. Twenty-four hours a day someone was talking—Ellen DeGeneres, Dr. Phil, Judge Judy…But tonight, I couldn’t bear to listen. There was something about listening to other people’s lives that I could no longer stand. It felt stupid, really, living vicariously through other people. Meanwhile, I was wasting away, turning into a ghost myself, here on the farm.

      It was late, nearly three in the morning, and nothing good was ever on at this time. A pale sliver of light poked through the curtains and there was a tightening in my throat. I hadn’t smoked in hours, but still, my mouth and throat felt dry.

      Quietly, I tiptoed closer to the dining room window, peeking through the small gap in the curtains. Praying my new tenant wouldn’t catch me spying on her again.

      But there wasn’t much to see, just a slippery shadow moving around behind the curtains in her bedroom window.

      News of Nova’s missing daughter hadn’t made the nightly news. I’d seen her wandering the property in the middle of the day, but she hadn’t been out there long. I was so worried she’d come to my door and knock, but she never did. She’d ran around, frantic-like, then ran back inside.

      Suddenly, the back-porch light of the cabin popped on and off. Then on again. From across the field, I watched my tenant emerge through the back-screen door. She was bent at the waist, dragging something over the threshold and then, she pulled a large object across the ground.

      In the dark, it looked like a long, black bag.

      I couldn’t see her face as she tugged and pulled, but her hair whipped around wildly in the wind until eventually, she disappeared through the trees at the back of the property.

       CHAPTER SEVEN

       The Cop

       ELLIE

      Northfolk’s police station was a small brick building, reminiscent of a 1940s school house. On a Sunday morning, there was no one manning the front desk, the entire building deserted. I let myself in, using my key, then flipped on lights as I juggled my coffee and purse.

      Working on Sundays wasn’t typical for me. Usually, there was no reason to. The four other officers and I rotated the on-call cell phone every weekend, and responded to emergencies as needed, calling for back-up when necessary.

      But rarely did the phone ever ring.

      This was Roland’s weekend, but I didn’t expect to see him either. He didn’t come in on weekends; sometimes he didn’t even work on weekdays.

      The hallway was cold and colorless, one smoky lightbulb flickering in and out. I used another key to let myself into my office, then frowned at my neatly arranged desk. In the movies, police officers always had messy desks because they were too busy out in the field to deal with paperwork. But most days, I had more than enough time to finish my work and clean my office, too.

      The organization in my office felt like a niggling sign of failure.

      I took a seat behind the desk and fired up my computer. At home, my searches were more limited. I needed to know more about Nova Nesbitt. Needed to see that police report from when she was charged with all those awful crimes.

      The computer was taking forever to load, probably installing some useless update. That’s when I heard the front door to the building click open and shut. Hadn’t I locked it behind me?

      “Yooo-hooo!” a man’s voice bellowed. Roland. He’d probably seen my cruiser parked out front and decided to stop in just because. I released an internal groan.

      Roland was nearly forty, and balding, but still acted like a frat boy, always telling inappropriate jokes and flirting with the women he was supposed to be protecting.

      “What’s up, Sharp?” Sharp was short for Sharp Shooter, another stupid nickname because I wasn’t as experienced or interested in guns as some of my male compatriots. And also, a more sinister reference…they still looked at me as that cop, the one who had shot a fellow officer. A superior officer, to make matters worse.