Chapter 12
The boxes sat on my dining table like vaults containing secrets that needed to be unearthed.
I hovered over them, taking a quiet moment to gather my thoughts before I dove in.
I heard a sound and turned, catching sight of my mother through the window as she marched up the driveway in a puffy jacket with a scarf snug around her neck.
Her shrill voice echoed through the house as she stepped inside, yelling, “Yoo-hoo. Georgiana, are you here?”
She rounded the corner, rushing into the kitchen with a small brown bag in hand.
Pointing at the bag, I said, “What’s in the bag?”
“I brought you a sausage and egg muffin sandwich.”
“When I messaged you earlier, I didn’t expect you to drop what you were doing and come over.”
“You said you wanted to talk about this Bernadette woman. So here I am.”
She set the bag on the counter, tipping her head toward the boxes. “What do you have here?”
“Answers to my questions, I hope. How well do you know Bernadette?”
She removed her scarf and draped it across a chair.
“I know her from the range, though I wouldn’t say I know her well.
She keeps to herself when she’s there. She shows up, shoots, and leaves.
Several of us have tried involving her in our conversations, but she never seems interested.
We’ve even invited her to join us for coffee afterward, but she’s never shown up—not once. ”
It occurred to me that I hadn’t eaten anything yet today, so I grabbed a plate and pulled the sandwich out of the bag, taking a bite. “Thanks for this, it’s great.”
“Oh, I know. Made it myself this morning. Why are you asking about Bernadette?”
“I spoke to her earlier. Did you know she lived next door to Celia Honeywell?”
“Is Celia the mother of that poor girl who was murdered?”
I nodded. “Bernadette told me she and Celia hadn’t gotten along for a while.
When I asked why, she said her husband had died a few years back, and after that her daughter hit a rough patch and bullied Holly.
Bernadette said Celia blamed her for it, treating her like she hadn’t raised her daughter the way she should have. ”
She pulled out a chair and sat. “It seems harsh to blame a mother for her child’s choices.
Then again, some parents fall short. I don’t know Bernadette well enough to judge.
I can say she tends to keep people at a distance.
Maybe she’s hiding something, or maybe she values her privacy. I’ve never been sure.”
“Bernadette is the one who found Holly right after she was shot. She also admitted to searching the house after she called the police. She thought the killer might still be there. She said she didn’t touch anything, but that’s not true.
She searched the house with a knife she’d taken from the kitchen. ”
My mother raised a brow. “I don’t believe that was all she touched either.”
“I agree, and I’m not sure what to think of her. When I was about to leave, she made a point of asking me to tell you she said hello.”
My mother cocked her head to the side. “How strange. She’s never given me more than a head nod as an acknowledgement.”
It seemed clear the mystery that was Bernadette wouldn’t be solved today, and I decided my time would be better spent going through boxes.
I reached for the nearest one. “Well, thanks for coming over. I better get started on these boxes.”
My mother rolled up her sleeves and smiled. “All righty, I’ll help.”
“I appreciate it, but you don’t need to help.”
“I know I don’t need to, but I’m going to, dear. Best you accept it.”
I exhaled and slid the first box toward her, letting her know what we were looking for, and why.
We worked through several boxes without much luck, sifting through old forms, intake logs, client notes with black marker smudged across names, and several file folders with pages out of order.
It was as if someone had scattered a bunch of pages across the floor and put them back together without any attempt to sort them.
“I visited Celia’s ex-husband, Lenny, and he told me he’d gone to Celia’s funeral,” I said. “After, he wanted to reconnect with Holly, but he was nervous to do it, so he followed her around, trying to work up the nerve.”
“That doesn’t sound creepy at all,” my mother said, with a smirk.
“Yeah, he should have gone about it another way. But the day she went to the old adoption agency, he said he saw a surveillance camera outside. When I stopped by, it was gone, but I could see where it had been.”
My mother moved a hand to her hip. “What do you make of it?”
“It’s hard to know how long the camera sat there, who placed it there, or why it came down, but I doubt whoever did it knew about the hidden room behind the bookcase or these boxes. I think they believed the paper trail had been destroyed.”
“Well, we still have a few boxes to go,” she said as she reached into the next one. “Maybe we’ll get lucky. If Holly’s murder ties back to her adoption, it’s a good thing the killer doesn’t know you found that hidden room.”
She blinked at me, and I blinked back, and for a moment we stared at each other, saying nothing.
“Georgiana, is there something you need to tell me?”
“Need to—no.”
“You’ve got the same look on your face you always get when you’re hiding something. Come on, out with it.”
As a private detective, I took pride in my skills.
A poker face had never been one of them.
“I think the killer knows I have the boxes. When I was taking them to my car, I found a note under my windshield wiper, warning me to stop the investigation if I wanted to live.”
My mother pressed a hand to her chest, her voice going up several octaves as she said, “Why didn’t you mention that from the start?”
“Because I get threatened all the time. You know that.”
“Have you told Giovanni?”
“He’s out of town. I’ll tell him tonight when he gets back. It’s fine. We’re safe here.”
“Just because you have a security guard out front, doesn’t mean you’re safe. The minute you drive out of this place you’re exposed, and I don’t believe for a second you wouldn’t leave if there was a clue you needed to follow up on.”
“I know. I’m being careful.”
I reached for the last box and tugged at the lid. Inside, I found shredded strips of paper, curled and tangled like dry weeds.
“What in the world,” my mother said as she looked over my shoulder.
I sank my hands into the shredded pieces and lifted a fistful. “Something tells me we found what we were looking for, just not in the way we expected to find it.”
“I’m sorry. I know how hopeful you were that you’d find answers. You will, but maybe just not here.”
Irritated, I tossed the shredded pieces to the side and dug deeper.
“Hang on,” I said. “I think I feel something under this mess.”
At the bottom of the box was a torn folder, ripped clean down the middle. Half the tab remained intact. The other half hung by a thin strip.
We set the folder on the table and began pushing the shredded pieces aside.
“It looks like someone tore the folder apart before shredding what was inside,” my mother said.
“Or for whatever reason they ran out of time,” I said. “Maybe they hid what they could and hoped no one would notice.”
She slid the two halves together like puzzle pieces, tapping them straight.
A faint couple of words written in pen stretched across the tab.
A name.
Ro Ster.
My stomach tightened.
“You recognize the name, don’t you?”
“Celia’s friend Chelle told me something when I was at her house,” I said. “She claimed Celia once admitted Holly’s biological father was famous. At the time, I was thinking if she was right, her father might be an actor or a singer.”
“And now?”
I reached for my phone and typed a surname into a search bar.
A page filled the screen.
Wyatt Sterling’s father, Sebastian, had once been a well-known politician who stood at the edge of a presidential run. His campaign ended before it began when he had a heart attack and died.
Scanning the page to find the date of his death, I gasped.
It turned out Sebastian died the same year Celia moved back to Cambria.
“What is it?” my mother asked.
“I found a connection,” I said. “One I never expected.”
“Does this mean one of the Sterlings fathered Holly?”
“It seems so.”
I pushed back from the table and grabbed my coat.
“Now, hold on just a minute,” my mother said.
“Mom, I have to go.”
“I’m not trying to stop you. But I’ll not let you go alone.”
“I can handle myself.”
“I know you can,” she said as she picked up her scarf. “This isn’t up for negotiation.”
I stood still for a moment, even though I knew there was nothing I could do, no sense in trying to talk her out of it.
“Fine,” I said.
I killed the dining room lights, took one last look at the shredded box on the table, and stepped into the cold night determined to push my way into the Sterlings’ perfect world and force it to crack.