Beneath Blackwater River Leslie Wolfe (me reader txt) 📖

Whether those girls were dead or alive, it mattered not; they didn’t care anymore, and she would soon share their fate anyway.

There was no escape.

Unless she could turn the tables on him somehow.

He seemed obsessed with something, the darkness, the cold, the chilling shower routine that precluded their endless nights together. Perhaps she was there to remind him of someone else, like all the other girls could’ve been.

Then, maybe, there was a way to trick that man into falling in love with her. If she could only figure out who she needed to become.

Roaming the house in the dimming light of the afternoon with a clear purpose in mind, she noticed the portrait of a young girl dressed in a pink blouse with ruffles and a simple black pencil skirt. It hung on the wall in the bedroom where he’d taken her every night, and while she pretended to be asleep in his arms, he stayed awake, not taking his eyes off that image. She remembered how he looked at that portrait sometimes, right before leaving the room, a long and yearning gaze as if saying goodbye.

Kirsten resembled that girl. She was a tall, thin blond with long hair like hers, and a kind, loving smile, a little shy. She wore pink nail polish and light pink lipstick. Her wavy hair hung loose, brought over her right shoulder, causing her head to tilt just a bit, playfully.

Running her hands through her hair, Kirsten brought it over her shoulder, then imitated the girl’s shy smile.

She could do it. She could be that girl.

30Thoughts

Kay started her drive toward Redding, but after crossing the valley she reached the top of the hill and pulled into Katse Coffee Shop’s parking lot. The sun was shooting side rays, already too weak to fight the chill rolling down from the mountain slopes. Soon it would disappear behind Mount Chester, starting a long twilight that commenced two hours before the actual sunset. A trip to Redding and back would put her into early evening, and she’d already skipped lunch. Deciding to grab a coffee refill and a fresh croissant, she mitigated her guilt by making it a working lunch.

The outdoor patio had been closed for the season and the tables had been piled up one on top of another, chained against the fence. The chairs were gone, probably stored somewhere inside. Out of quiet options for a peaceful working lunch, she decided to go inside after all.

She took her order from the counter and found a table, but the place was crowded, and the loud chatter drowned her own thoughts. Realizing that wasn’t going to work as planned, she opted for the SUV instead, and sat behind the wheel with the door open, to let the crisp air of the afternoon fill her lungs while she munched on the warm butter croissant. No one made croissants just like Katse; crisp, flaky, light pastry, perfectly golden and delicately sweet. Through the windshield, the chilly sunshine still managed to warm her up and lift her spirits, giving her confidence she could decipher the entangled mystery of the Blackwater River Falls girl.

Who was she, really?

Was she Rose Harrelson? Then why had she become Alyssa Caldwell, and how? Did someone snatch Rose and replace Alyssa, without anyone in the family––parents, grandparents, siblings––noticing the difference? Why would anyone do that, and what happened to the real Alyssa Caldwell?

Because one thing was absolutely certain: even if, at some point, Rose had become Alyssa, originally, there used to be two little girls, born four months apart from each other. There were full hospital records on file for both of them, with photos and all.

Staring in the distance at the snow-covered peaks of Mount Chester profiled against the blue sky, she let her mind wander, playing with scenarios the way children play with Legos. Putting them together, to see if she liked the configuration, if it fit, then taking it apart and building another with the same pieces.

There used to be two little girls, Alyssa and Rose.

Then there was just one.

She finished the croissant and stretched her legs outside the SUV, brushing off the crumbs that littered her pants and sweater. After wiping her hands on a tissue dipped in hand sanitizer spritzed from the small bottle she kept in the second cup holder between the seats, she waved her hands in the air, to dry them out, then fired up her laptop.

She reviewed the case notes from Rose Harrelson’s file, and looked at the aged photo. Then she pulled one of Alyssa’s older pictures from the internet, taken at her fourth birthday party. For a place like Mount Chester, the birthday of the Caldwell Farms heiress was newsworthy, and had been so since she was born, making it even less likely for Alyssa to have been replaced with Rose without anyone noticing.

No… The entire scenario was stupid, a contrived fabrication of her mind because she couldn’t find out the truth.

Although the girls did sort of look like each other.

The same chestnut brown hair or close enough, cute little chin dimples, and the same brown eyes. Coincidence? Possibly. A large enough percentage of the population had that trait, and the two girls weren’t the only ones to have chin dimples in Mount Chester. As for hair and eye color, neither was unique.

Kay sighed. She had nothing.

But maybe Shelley Harrelson’s path had crossed the Caldwells’ path. She’d asked Carole about that, but, before she could answer, they were distracted by Bill’s arrival. If she was to solve the original kidnapping, she needed to map the timeline of all those interactions from fourteen years ago, and for that, she needed a lead she could follow. She needed to go back and revisit the Caldwells, whose unusual behavior was a surefire indication of carefully guarded secrets, one of them potentially being the answer she was looking for.

Going back to her imaginary game of Legos, she collapsed all the theories she’d built and decided to split the facts