too long, “the girls weren’t sexually assaulted. They were apparently suffocated with something while they slept.”
Gerard nodded slowly. “The strangest part was that they appeared to have been attacked by a person or persons who didn’t inspire the slightest fear or hesitation. Neither Joanna’s nor Sherry’s home had been broken into. Dana and her sister were lying on blankets from their own beds in the woods behind their home. There was no evidence of a struggle, none of any sort, not even a suspicious fiber. There was a pillow at the scene in the woods. According to Mrs. Hall, the pillow had come from Dana’s bed.” Gerard hesitated. “A pillow was the one consistent item at each of the scenes.”
Dana jerked as if startled.
“No footprints, other than those of the victims?” Spence prodded. “No indication anyone else had been at the scene?”
“Nothing,” Gerard confirmed. “It was as if they’d just stopped breathing or…been suffocated by an invisible assailant. The inconsistency was Donna’s head injury. The autopsy results suggested she’d been struck on the head.”
“Any speculation on the head injury? Was that a contributing factor in her death?” Spence prodded. Dana hadn’t mentioned the head injury.
“She could have fallen and hit her head before the attack,” Gerard offered. “There’s no way to know.”
Dana shot to her feet. “I…excuse me.” She rushed from the room.
Spence resisted the urge to go after her. To see that she was okay. But the chief’s reaction to her abrupt departure was something he needed to analyze first.
“That poor girl,” the man muttered. “Waking up alive and finding her sister dead was just about more than she could take. She wasn’t the same after that. You know her daddy killed himself barely six months later.”
Who would be the same after that? “I can only imagine,” Spence agreed.
“She was suffering from exposure. Shock. She didn’t speak for days. And then her mind just blocked whatever she might have heard or seen. Her mother tried everything. Even some kind of regression therapy. But the child reacted so adversely to the treatment that Delores, her mother, was afraid to try a second time. She didn’t want to risk the only child they had left. They’d already lost one.”
“No one close to the girls was considered a suspect? Nothing they had in common that might have proven a viable link to their deaths?”
Another sad shake of his head. “Four good girls with no enemies. This is a small town, Mr. Spencer. There wasn’t a soul I knew then or now—and I personally know every citizen in Brighton—that would have hurt those girls.”
“Yet,” Spence countered, “someone killed three of them.”
OUTSIDE, DANA STRUGGLED to catch her breath. Her heart pounded so hard that the effort was impossible.
How could she have thought for even a minute that she could do this? She had to have lost her mind.
Every word had sent another surge of adrenaline roaring through her veins.
No signs of forced entry or a struggle…just stopped breathing. Suffocated by an invisible assailant…
Dana closed her eyes and tried her level best to banish the images that accompanied the words echoing inside her head.
“Dana? Dana Hall?”
Her eyes snapped open and her attention jerked to the left.
“That is you.” A big burly man stepped into her personal space and crushed her in an embrace. “Lord, girl, how long has it been?”
The scent of his familiar cologne and freshly chopped wood assaulted her nostrils. Dana’s head was spinning like a top when he released her.
“The last time I talked to your mama she said you was living in the big city. I’ll bet she’s real…”
Dana’s brain wouldn’t absorb the rest of what the man said. Every fiber of her being was focused on his face…his massive frame. Carlton Bellomy. Her former neighbor. He’d lived across the street from her childhood home for as long as she could remember.
He’d found her in the woods…picked her up and carried her all the way back to her house, leaving another searcher with Donna’s body.
Dana shuddered. She tried to slow the quaking but that wasn’t happening.
“You all right, Dana?”
She blinked, told herself to respond, but it wasn’t happening.
When Spence stepped into her line of vision, she sucked in a ragged breath. He looked from her to the man still hovering over her.
“William Spencer,” he said as he thrust out his hand.
Mr. Bellomy, his expression cluttered with new worry, glanced from Dana to Spence. “Carlton Bellomy.” He pumped Spence’s hand.
“I’m a friend of Ms. Hall’s,” Spence explained. “We’re in for a short visit from Chicago.”
Bellomy’s wide smile slid back into place. “Why I’ve known this girl and her family since the day she was born. Was their neighbor until they moved away.” He made a pained sound in his throat. “After the tragedy.”
“Mr. Bellomy,” Dana squeaked out, “lived…right across the street.”
“Still do,” Bellomy said. “I sort of keep an eye on the place. Tack down a loose shingle now and then, keep the grass cut. Stuff like that. I check in with her mama three or four times a year.” He set his hands on his hips. “Has your mama finally decided to sell that place? Are you here to get the process started?”
Dana shook her head. Her mother didn’t know she was here. She would be extremely distressed if she heard.
“I’m certain we’ll see you again while we’re here,” Spence offered.
“Why sure you will,” Bellomy insisted. “I expect you two to come to dinner. Why not tonight?” He looked from Spence to Dana and back. “Unless you already have plans. The diner’s ’bout the only place around here to get a decent meal, and it’s nothing to compare with the wife’s.”
Spence looked to Dana for the right answer. “That would be nice, Mr. Bellomy,” she managed to squeeze out. Nice was nowhere near the proper description, but she couldn’t be rude to the man. Not after what he’d done for her—and her mother—all these years. They hadn’t wanted to sell the home that had been in her father’s family for three generations. Her mother paid the property taxes, insurance and utilities while Mr. Bellomy took care of everything else. He’d done so for sixteen years. The least she could do was accept his kind invitation.
“Right fine,” Bellomy said with a nod. “I’ll let the wife know, and we’ll expect you folks around six-thirty if that’ll work.”
Spence said something else…yes and maybe goodbye. Dana wasn’t sure if she said goodbye or not as Mr. Bellomy walked away. She could only watch the big bear of a man stride toward his truck. The same one he’d had sixteen years ago.
He would tell his wife Dana was back in town. His wife would tell her friends. By sundown everyone would know.
The only survivor of the town’s tragic murders was back.
And just like sixteen years ago, it was obvious that she still wasn’t right.
That was another thing Dana hadn’t worked up the courage to tell the Colby Agency.
Most folks in her hometown thought that night in the woods when her sister was murdered had stolen her sanity.
Poor, crazy little Dana.
She wouldn’t ever be right again.
Chapter Four