Chapter 3
Wren gripped the arms of the chair as if she were using it to maintain her balance. Luka shifted closer to my leg, his tail low, eyes fixed on her. He’d always been hypervigilant, capable of sensing a stressful situation even when no words had been spoken.
“Where would you like me to start?” Wren asked.
“From the moment Holly’s mother died.”
Wren nodded, shifting in the chair. “Celia was out on her back porch watering her flowers one morning, following her usual routine. She lost her footing on a step and went down hard, striking her head on a large rock she used as a hiding place for a spare house key.”
“I talked to a couple of my friends at the police department after it happened. They ruled her death an accident.”
“Sure seems that way. When the police called to let Holly know what happened, she packed a bag and left for Cambria right away. She was devastated, a complete mess.”
“I can imagine. What can you tell me about their relationship?”
“They were close. Holly spoke to Celia almost every day. When Celia died, I started to see a darker side of Holly’s personality, a side I had never seen before.”
I crossed one leg over the other. “Tell me more about that.”
“Holly was always the fun, cheerful one in our friend group, the one who didn’t seem to have a care in the world. After her mother died, she was much different. As if losing Celia wasn’t hard enough, she was shocked to find out she was adopted.”
“I take it Celia never mentioned the adoption to Holly?”
“She didn’t. Holly had no idea.”
“What about the father?”
“There was a man in Celia’s life when Holly was little, Lenny Cutler.
Celia was married to him for a short time, but they split up when Holly was a toddler.
Holly told me she remembered almost nothing about him.
When Holly grew old enough to ask about her father, Celia said he had been nothing more than a one-night mistake.
She claimed she didn’t know his last name or anything else about him. ”
Based on what I had gathered so far, Celia came across as someone who was guarded, a woman who may have never planned to tell Holly about her roots or about the adoption.
But why?
Why keep it a secret?
“Were there any names on the adoption paperwork?” I asked.
“Other than Holly’s name, no. But a few areas on the papers she found had been blacked out.”
Blacked out—even more secretive.
I tapped my pen on the desk. “How did she take the news about the adoption?”
“Holly was shaken. She felt like the narrative she’d been told her entire life was a fabrication, and she started questioning everything. She located the adoption agency, but it had closed down. It was like it existed one day, and the next, it didn’t.”
“What’s the name of the agency?”
“Cherished Connections. It was in San Luis Obispo.”
“Where are the adoption papers now?”
“I have no idea.”
“Other than you, who else did Holly talk to about the adoption?”
Wren gave the question some thought. “She contacted Celia’s closest friends, the people her mother trusted most. None of them knew about the adoption.”
“Can you give me some names?”
Wren glanced out the window as if trying to remember. “Let me think … Okay, there’s a woman named Chelle who went to school with Celia, and then another woman she used to work with a long time ago named Roxy. Sorry, I don’t know either of their last names.”
“That’s all right. You’re doing great.”
“Oh, and there’s something else you should know. In the last week of her life, Holly thought someone was following her. The first time, she was standing outside the adoption agency. Then it happened again when she was leaving Roxy’s house.”
“Did she ever see anyone?”
She shook her head. “It was more of a hunch, a sense that someone kept their eyes on her. She couldn’t prove it, but she wondered if word had begun to spread around town that she was searching for her biological parents.”
A tear trailed down Wren’s cheek, and she flicked it away.
I opened a desk drawer, removing a tissue and handing it to her.
“When Holly told me she thought she was being followed, I begged her to leave town and return to school,” Wren said. “She said she couldn’t yet. She needed me, and I should have been by her side. If I had been, maybe she’d still be alive.”
The tears kept coming, and she rested her hands in her lap, going quiet.
“You couldn’t have known what was going to happen,” I said.
“Yeah, but I should have been a better friend, and I wasn’t. There’s nothing I can do about the past, but there is something I can do about the future. That’s why I’m here.”
Wren’s cell phone buzzed.
She glanced at it, reading the text message that popped up on the screen.
“Everything okay?” I asked.
“Yeah, it’s just my boyfriend checking in.”
“Have the two of you been dating long?”
“Since we were thirteen. We’re supposed to be getting married next year. Holly was helping me with the arrangements. But now …”
Her voice cracked, and she lifted the tissue to her nose.
“I know how hard this must be for you, to come here and talk about what happened.”
“It was something I needed to do.”
“Have you spoken to the police?”
“After Holly’s funeral, I went by the house. I thought about going inside, but I was stopped by a detective. Think he said his name was Whittaker.”
“Could it have been Whitlock?”
“Oh, yeah, Whitlock. That’s the one. Nice guy.”
“Did he say anything to you?”
“We chatted for a while, and then again a couple of days later, when he called with some follow-up questions. He was nice enough to share a few things with me. He said the next-door neighbor found Holly. She heard a sound or something, and she went over to see if Holly was all right. Guess she was already dead. She’d been shot, but she also had some bruising on her face. ”
“Did he say anything else?”
She ran a hand through her hair. “He said they found Holly’s purse on the table. Her wallet was still inside, and her credit cards were still in it.”
So it wasn’t a robbery.
I paused a moment, allowing the information to settle. The details pulled at me in familiar ways, stirring up stories in my mind as I explored the various possibilities of who murdered Holly and why.
“I may have more questions for you later,” I said. “But I believe we’re done for now.”
She nodded and stood, shoving her cell phone in her pocket. “Please, say you’ll find the person who did this to my friend.”
I snapped my notebook closed and put my pen to the side. “You came here for help, and you found it. I’ll take your case, and I’ll bring Holly’s killer into the light.”