Girl, Forgotten (Andrea Oliver 2)

7

Andrea watched the screen door close behind Ricky Fontaine. The only way to access the laundry in the garage was via the outside stairs. Ricky’s sandals slapped the concrete as she walked down the zigzagging flights to get the towels out of the dryer.

The shit that’s happening at the farm is the same shit that happened to Emily Vaughn forty years ago.

As a parting line, it packed a punch, but it didn’t hold up under scrutiny. Emily Vaughn hadn’t been starved nearly to death. She was seven months pregnant on the night of her attack. She was wearing a turquoise or teal prom dress, according to the witness statements, not a yellow shift. Her shoulder-length hair had been permed, not long and stringy to her waist. She was barefooted, but maybe Andrea’s southern roots were showing because she assumed that a lot of people on farms ran around barefoot.

So how was one like the other?

Andrea thought back to the beginning of the conversation. Ricky was the person who had told Bible about the dead body at the farm, but a US Marshal had knocked on her door four hours later and all Ricky wanted to talk about was Emily Vaughn. It was the same thing Wexler had done in the truck, but he’d been such an obvious asshole that Andrea had seen right through him.

“Fuck,” Andrea muttered.

She went to the screen door. Ricky had made it to the first landing. Bible was still in his SUV on the street. Andrea found his contact info in her phone.

He answered on the first ring. “Yep?”

“Tell me when she’s heading back up.”

“Will do.”

Andrea shoved her phone back into her pocket. Her nerves were jangling. Ricky had invited her into the house, which meant the woman had consented to entry and waived her Fourth Amendment rights.

The house was fair game.

Andrea’s phone came back out of her pocket as she headed to the console table. She took photographs of the framed photos. Then she knelt down and found the 1981–82 Longbill Beach Senior High School yearbook. The printer had left the first few pages blank so that classmates could sign them. Ricky hadn’t had a lot of friends, but Andrea took photographs of the signatures and short notes. There were lots of K.I.T.s for Keep In Touch and several Go Longbills!

She looked at the closed drawers. Her heart ticked like a stopwatch. The scope of Andrea’s authority was limited to what a reasonable person would think they were consenting to. Was it reasonable for Ricky to believe Andrea would open the drawers where they had just been standing? Ricky had freely talked about the group, the photos, Emily Vaughn, her brother.

The justification felt shady, but it was still a justification.

The left-side drawer took some work to get open. Andrea found scraps of paper, old receipts, a snapshot of Ricky and Blake blowing out candles on a birthday cake, another of Nardo and Clay sitting at the counter at the diner. Andrea documented as much as she could. She clocked the time on her phone. She had no idea when Ricky had gone downstairs, but it didn’t take hours to unload a dryer, load it back up with wet towels, fill up the washer and walk back up the stairs.

Andrea’s hands were sweating when she jerked open the right-side drawer.

More memories. Some wedding snapshots showing a much younger Ricky and Nardo. A silver Zippo lighter with the initials EAB on them. A New Mexico death certificate for Eric Alan Blakely. A burial policy for Al Blakely. A $200 receipt from a Longbill Beach funeral home with ashes in the description. A receipt from Maggie’s Formal Wear marked with a faded red PAID and the clerk’s initials. Andrea reached into the back of the drawer and felt a flat metal box that was slightly larger than her hand. She pulled it out.

Andrea had no idea what she was looking at.

The metal case was around 4x6 and painted a cheap brown. She thought it might be meant to hold smaller cigars, but there was a thermometer-looking window cut out of the top. Instead of numbers, there were paired letters of the alphabet on a white background. A silver metal pointer slid up and down the window.

Andrea was still clueless. She turned the box over in her hand, trying to find a clasp or a button or a logo or even a serial number.

Her phone rang.

Bible said, “Heading back up the stairs.”

“Fuck.” Andrea took three quick photos from different angles before dropping the metal case back into the drawer. She had to use her hip to slam it shut. And then she sprinted across the room so she could meet Ricky at the front door.

“Let me help,” Andrea offered to take the basket, but Ricky pulled away.

“I’ve got it, hon.” She was chomping on a wad of chewing gum again. Her entire demeanor had changed. Andrea wondered if Ricky had made a call in the garage, or maybe she’d realized that she’d said too much. “Sorry, I need to ask you to leave. I’m already late for work.”

Andrea wasn’t going to leave. “What you said about the farm—that the same thing that happened to Emily is happening there. What did you mean?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Ricky dumped the towels onto the couch and started folding in syncopation with the gum-popping and the clanging of her silver bangles. “Honestly, you caught me at a bad time. It’s obvious that I can’t stand Dean and Nardo. I’m not what you’d call a reliable witness, especially considering the restraining order.”

Andrea watched her quick, practiced movements. Ricky was talking faster than before. Maybe she hadn’t called someone. Maybe the two pills she had dry-swallowed in the kitchen had finally kicked in.