Beneath Blackwater River Leslie Wolfe (me reader txt) 📖

exterior of the windowsill, covered in the same thick dust as the rest of the house. She filled her lungs with air, then blew the dust away. It took a few more repetitions until she cleared most of the dust off, exposing clearly where the fingerprint brush had left its swirls of black powder.

On the inside of the sill there had been no fingerprints found. The traces of powder confirmed what was written in the case file. On the outside, no one had bothered to check.

A few spins of her fingerprint brush covered the exterior sill with dark powder, but there were no liftable prints. It wasn’t a matter of how much time had passed; forensic history had cases where fingerprints had been successfully lifted after forty years of exposure to air and dust. The fiberboard had shielded the windowsill from the elements, leading to one conclusion. There weren’t any prints whatsoever.

Not even Rose’s.

“Martha,” Kay called, looking at the woman through the open window, “did Rose spend any time by the window, looking outside?”

“She loved to do that!” Martha fidgeted in place, eager to enter the room, but mindful of the line she wasn’t supposed to cross. “She stood there, looking at the cars that passed by. Elroy used to tell her the car makes, and she used to squeal with joy and clap her little hands. I don’t know if she really knew the difference between a Chevy and a—”

“Did she ever touch the sill?” Kay asked, frowning at the layer of fingerprint powder that had found no greasy marks anywhere on the sill to cling to.

“Huh?” Martha reacted, but then added, “All the time. She grabbed it like this,” she demonstrated with her trembling hands. Her shawl fell to the ground. “Oh, dear,” she muttered, picking it up quickly and shaking it out vigorously before putting it back on.

There was only one possible explanation for the lack of prints on the windowsill.

Someone had wiped it clean after Rose was taken.

Slamming the lid on her case, Kay headed toward the car. “I’m done here, Martha, thank you very much!”

The woman caught up with her by the time she’d wiped her hands clean and put the case inside the car.

“Have you found anything?” Martha asked, her eyes fixed on Kay’s, her hand grabbing her sleeve like she’d done before.

“Nothing yet,” Kay replied, then turned to leave. There was no point in sharing her theories with the old woman. Martha let go of her sleeve and took a few shuffled steps to the side. “One question, though.”

Martha rushed back to her, stopping a couple of feet in front of her, smiling. “Yes, dearie, what is it?”

“Do you know if Shelley had ever met Bill Caldwell or anyone else from the Caldwell family?”

“Oh, yes,” she replied, patting Kay on the forearm as if she was about to share a piece of juicy gossip. “She worked for the Caldwells, for years. She was on their cleaning staff, because a house like theirs, they have more than one woman.”

Kay felt a wave of excitement rush through her veins, heating her blood, dissipating her migraine. They had met! That was the missing piece of information she’d been trying to find, the one piece of the game critical to solving the puzzle.

“Do you happen to remember when, or how long she worked for them?” Even if Martha couldn’t remember, now she knew what she was looking for, and could request the records of Shelley’s employment. It would take time, but she finally had a lead.

“Well, let’s see,” Martha replied, counting on her fingers. “Shelley had dated Elroy for a couple of years right after high school, and they got married the year before she had Rose.” A fleeting frown clouded the woman’s brow.

“What? What is it?”

“Eh, maybe nothing,” Martha replied, turning her eyes away from Kay, preferring to study her own slippers instead.

“Anything you share could prove helpful, you know that, Martha, right?” Kay grabbed her hand and gave it a little squeeze for encouragement.

She nodded, then started talking quickly, as if she’d barely refrained from sharing the long-buried secrets of her best friend’s child. “Shelley had been working for the Caldwells for a couple of years when something happened one night. I remember Edna and I spent a few nights worrying. That’s Shelley’s mother, God rest her soul,” Martha clarified, seeing Kay’s expression.

“What happened?”

“Shelley came home from work crying one day, and locked herself in her room,” Martha said, lowering her voice to a whisper as if there was anyone who could hear them. “She called in sick from work for a few days, and cried, my poor lamb, cried day and night. She wouldn’t even see Elroy.” She shook her head, emphasizing her statement. “Her mother and I worried so much; you have no idea. No idea unless you’re a parent yourself, dearie. Do you have children?”

Kay smiled and shook her head gently. “I still have time.” The thought of children hadn’t crossed her mind in years, ever since she’d justified her decision to skip maternity thinking her line of work wasn’t suited for a mother. But that was a different matter for a different time. “Do you know what was wrong with Shelley at the time? Have you ever found out?”

Martha brought her head closer to Kay. “She came out of that desolation after a while, and started dating Elroy again. A couple of months later, they were married. But,” she added, lowering her voice a little more, “exactly nine months after that strange crying spell of hers, Rose was born.”

Kay paused for a beat, thinking, allowing the pieces of her Lego game to rearrange with the new information added to the mix. Yes, Shelley had known the Caldwells. But what had caused Shelley’s extreme reaction to the news of Alyssa’s death? Even if she had been their housekeeper, maybe even Alyssa’s caretaker at some point, that didn’t justify the response that had caused her second stroke.

Unless…

There was another reason for Shelley’s reaction,