“Maybe,” Nate said. “And maybe he cut the posts. It’s just that she disappeared so completely. Rowan checked all files and she vanished.”
“She could have—” Terri broke off when they heard a shout. The car was coming up.
Nate took her shoulders. “You don’t have to see what’s in there. If you want to leave, you can.”
She didn’t answer and started back toward the group, but then she took Nate’s hand. It suddenly occurred to her that maybe she didn’t want to know the truth. All her life her uncle Frank had put doubts in her mind. He’d been fierce that Leslie had not run away. As for Brody, he’d refused to talk about his wife’s disappearance. Never a word spoken about it. Terri had made up a hundred scenarios of what had happened to her mother. As a kid, aliens and fairies played a part in the stories. She’d clutched onto anything rather than believe what people whispered about her mother.
The car came out of the water slowly, back end first. An old Toyota, rusted, covered in years of underwater debris, emerged.
Elaine with Brody, Nate with Terri, and Billy beside Frank, stood together as they watched Rowan look inside. He shook his head no. There was no one inside.
Terri could feel hope leaving her. Her mother had not been lost in the storm and accidentally driven off the pier. It looked like she’d hidden the car, discarded it so no one would find it. Did her lover steal the lake’s chain saw and cut the posts?
Rowan and the FBI agents and even the bystanders were looking at the group with sympathy. The poor Rayburns, their faces seemed to say. The wife ran away with another man and left them.
“Oh hell!” Nate said, and dropped Terri’s hand. There was a crowbar on the side of the big truck. He grabbed it, ran to the car and broke open the trunk.
The lid flew up—and everyone close enough to see inside froze in place, unable to move.
Frank shoved his way through them, then he too stopped. Immobile.
Brody was still standing with Elaine, and he didn’t seem to want to see what they were looking at.
It was Terri who stepped forward. Nate put his arm out for her and had it securely around her before he stepped back to let her see.
Inside the trunk was a skeleton. There was a rusted metal belt around its middle, shoe buckles by its feet—and handcuffs around its wrists.
When Terri’s knees weakened, Nate picked her up, carried her away from the car and set her on a rock nearby. Standing, he held her against him.
“That wasn’t natural. She was...”
“I know,” Nate said softly. Neither of them wanted to say the word murdered.
Terri was clutching him about the waist. “Someone did that to her.”
“Yes. And we’ll find...” He trailed off because that didn’t matter now. He and Rowan would move heaven and earth to find out who had done this to Leslie Rayburn, but that wasn’t going to bring back Terri’s mother.
Gazing over her head, Nate watched as Brody, holding hands with Elaine, went to the car. “I gave her that belt on our honeymoon,” he said softly. Rowan caught him when he almos
t collapsed, then he and Elaine led him to Terri’s boat. Elaine drove it as they went back to Club Circle.
Frank was still standing there. He hadn’t moved since he’d first seen what was in the trunk. Rowan looked at Nate and gave a sharp jerk of his head for him to come and get Frank.
To the left, Billy Thorndyke was standing back, waiting to be needed. Nate nodded to him, then he bent to Terri. “I’m going to help Rowan and Frank now, okay?”
She nodded.
“Thorndyke will see that you get home and I want you to stay there. Rowan called Jamie and he’ll be here soon and he’ll talk with you. He knows all there is to know about trauma and grief.” He kissed her forehead. “I’ll be with you as soon as I can and we’re going to dispense with this stupidity about what the town thinks. Understand me?”
All Terri could do was nod.
Billy was standing close and waiting.
“Take her home,” Nate said, then added, “and if you touch her I’ll break every bone in your body.”
“Good,” Billy said. “I’m glad she found you.”
Nate watched them walk away, then went back to the rusty old car. The others had moved away, but Frank was still standing and staring at the gruesome skeleton.