Don’t Talk to Strangers: A Novel (33 page)

“Anyone else see you?”

“I don’t know.”

“A neighbor?”

“I don’t know.”
I saw the moment he realized his voice had gotten too loud again. He’d nearly shouted
at me. I watched him reel himself in. “My neighbors work. They’re not usually home
in the afternoon.”

“And you got home sometime after four?” I asked.

“That’s right.”

“So that leaves a gap, doesn’t it? Skylar disappeared a little after three. I was
here at about three yesterday, by the way. Your classroom was locked. And you were
gone. In fact, I was told you’d left much earlier.”

His pupils expanded like I’d just hit him with a bucket of epinephrine. “I must have
gotten the times wrong,” he explained. He was a bad liar, the kind of guy who’d never
be able to ace a polygraph. His body had betrayed him repeatedly since I’d walked
into his classroom and begun to push. He looked at me. “I can’t really be a suspect.”

“What kind of vehicle do you drive, Mr. Tray?”

“A Honda. Why? It’s an Accord, a two thousand two.”

I got up and put one of my cards on the chair. “No plans to leave town, right?”

“No.” He said it quietly. He was staring down at his shoes.

“Have a nice weekend.”

He blinked up at me.

29

I closed the band room door behind me. School was in session, students and teachers
tucked away in classrooms. I stood there for a second in the empty hall, then reached
for my phone. “Sam,” I said when Meltzer’s lab tech answered. “Keye here. Listen,
that oil you found on the phones. No question at all it’s engine oil? Could it be
instrument oil?”

“No way,” she said. “You’ll remember in addition to the oil the sample was full of
engine dirt and metal filings. All consistent with the scenario we discussed.”

“How about the cloth? Could it have been a piece of chamois?”

“Totally different fiber,” she told me. “What’s up?”

“I’m not sure. I’m just trying to make the pieces fit, I guess.” I walked down the
hall and turned toward the administrative offices. “You been able to determine anything
else about the vehicle?”

“About all I can tell you right now is that it’s not a new car. Not with all the gunk
in that sample.”

“Thanks, Sam.” I disconnected and turned at the plaque that said
KATHY HILLYER—ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT
. Kathy Hillyer smiled like I was an old friend when I stepped into her office. Sun
was streaming through blinds that were tilted down, the long slats shadowed on the
floor. “Hi,” she said.
High-eye
. “And what can I do for you
today?” She was southern, my mama’s kind of southern. Sugary. I didn’t trust it, and
that probably had little to do with Kathy Hillyer, administrative assistant, and much
to do with Emily Street, mother.

“My name is Keye Street. I’m working as a consulting detective with the Hitchiti County
Sheriff’s Department.”

“Well bless your heart. Aren’t you cute? I am so glad they let women do that now,”
she added.

Life on Planet Kathy must be interesting. They had salons there, that was for sure.
Her hair and nails told me that. And she was so 1960—the heavy lipstick, the hair
twisted on top of her head, the square-neck dress cut almost a shade too low for school—as
if she’d just dropped by after a day on the set of
Mad Men
. “Would you like to sit down, honey?”

“Thank you.” I took a chair across from her desk. “Ms. Hillyer,” I began.

“Kathy,” she corrected me.

“Kathy. Do you keep the attendance records?”

“Why, yes. I do. Right here in my computer.”

I’m so glad
they
let women use computers
, I wanted to say. I bit it back. “Would you mind going back to last school year,
January seventeenth to be exact, and tell me if any teacher was absent that day?”

She hit a few keys, then stopped abruptly, as if she’d remembered something important.
“I may have to get permission from Principal Olsen to do this.”

Everything Kathy said sounded like it ended in a question mark. I didn’t want the
principal or any other paper pusher who might put the brakes on involved. Someone
would start demanding subpoenas. “Official business,” I said confidently. “Would you
like to speak with the sheriff?”

“Who wouldn’t?” Kathy cooed. “Mr. Dreamy.”

“I have Mr. Dreamy right here on speed dial.” I held up my phone and smiled.

She blushed a violent pink. “Oh Lord, I don’t want to bother him! Everyone knows how
busy he gets. I don’t actually have to turn the records over to you, correct?”

“Correct.” I nodded. “It’s just routine. All I need is the information.”

A few keystrokes later she looked up. “The music coach had an excused absence that
day.” She searched my face for a hint of what this news meant to me. “Dan Tray.”

I pretended to jot down his name like it was no big deal. “Is Mr. Tray usually here
every day?”

“Oh yes. Dan’s here every day. But only thirty hours a week. Even with students being
bused in from other areas, we still don’t have enough interested in music to warrant
a forty-hour week. So he works half a day twice a week.”

“I saw a lot of press and trophies in the display cases. Looks like the band program
is huge.”

“The band is a source of pride for us all and
very
accomplished,” Kathy assured me. “But let’s be frank: Unless you’re teaching classes
in smoking, cheating, and where to buy beer and condoms when you’re underage, most
of these kids couldn’t care less.”

“January seventeenth last year is the day Melinda Cochran disappeared,” I said.

“Poor Melinda!” she gasped. “That poor, poor little thing.”

“Did you ever see Melinda leaving school with anyone?”

If Kathy Hillyer looked to her right she could have seen the view of the front of
the school.
If
she looked to her right. And if she’d bothered to tilt her blinds up. “I never saw
Melinda take one wrong step. Sweet, smart thing. I was devastated to hear they’d found
her.”

“Was she awkward and shy in your opinion?”

“Heavens no.”

She visibly recoiled when I showed her Peele’s picture. She recognized him because
she’d followed the court case, she told me. She’d known one of his victims, the daughter
of a close friend. Peele had never been near the school, she assured me. Not that
she would have known through closed blinds. “Did you know Melinda well?”

“No. But we get a sense of the kids and who they are. Some of them are special.”

“So they’re not all beer-swilling, rubber-buying vandals?”

Her painted lips curved. “Ten percent. Maybe.”

“How about Skylar Barbour?”

“So it’s true,” she whispered. Her face went white. “Principal Olsen told me this
morning that Skylar didn’t go home.”

“She tried to get home,” I said, and got up, took the plastic rod on the side of the
window, and twisted it to tilt the blinds up. Kathy swiveled her chair around but
didn’t rise. “She walked right through there.” I pointed at the park. “And through
that line of trees and then she disappeared. She had a crush on a boy named Robbie.
Do you know him?”

“Oh, well, I wouldn’t take that too seriously. I bet half the girls in town are fantasizing
about him. His little band plays almost all the dances.”

“You’re telling me he’s a heartthrob?”

Her smile came back. “He must have gotten that from his mother.” She lowered her voice
into something like a whisper, the way southern women do when they’re about to slander
someone. “The mother passed away when he was little and Mr. Raymond never remarried.
Maybe that’s why he’s such a grouch. We had to deal with him once on a behavior issue
with Robbie. Just boys being boys, but Mr. Raymond made it
very
difficult. For us and for his son.”

Detective Raymond hadn’t been a big help to me either. “Ms. Hillyer … Kathy, did you
happen to notice what time Dan Tray left yesterday?”

“Two o’clock,” she said without hesitation. “I remember the time because Principal
Olsen had an appointment with a vendor who was waiting in my office and I had to step
out in the hall. I’m sure it was two o’clock. He had his violin case.”

I put my card on her desk. “Thank you for your time.”

I walked out of Hillyer’s office and pressed the metal bar on one of the double doors,
pushed it open. A hot wind hit my face. The bell rang. I glanced back inside and saw
the halls filling with a rush of students. Twenty-four hours ago Skylar had been one
of them.

30

One of the double doors in front of the school pushed open. From my seat on the park
bench, I raised my binoculars and zoomed in. Daniel Tray was moving fast. He was carrying
his violin case and fishing around in his front pocket. He pulled out a mobile phone,
dropped his keys on the school steps. He balanced the phone between his chin and shoulder
and picked up the keys. I could see his face, see him talking, see his hands moving.
He was upset. I watched him disappear around the corner where faculty parked, and
headed quickly to my car.

Five minutes later, his silver Honda pulled out of the school and turned left. Behind
the wheel of my car, I pulled out and followed him.

A ’69 convertible is a terrible choice for a tail. I might as well pipe music out
through a loudspeaker and put a snow cone on my antenna. Tray turned at a granite
sign etched with a cross-and-flame symbol. Whisper Methodist Church. The letter board
had a message about making God the director in your personal movie.
HE KNOWS HOW THE STORY ENDS
.

“Catchy,” I muttered. I don’t like thinking about how the story ends. Not my story.

I pulled onto a drive that split into two massive parking areas, one
below the church, one to the side. The lawn was shaded by giant water oaks and magnolias.
The church rose up to an arch in the center, granite and stately, enormous. A window,
stained glass and alive with color, depicted Jesus with his shepherd’s staff, cradling
a simpering lamb. I could see the parsonage to the right. In front of it, a sign said
WHISPER COMMUNITY GARDEN—HELP US FEED THE HUNGRY
.

Skylar had written about helping with the garden, going inside for cookies, the Hutchinses’
daughter, Robin, younger but still fun. She’d written about walking home with her
dog, Luke, and a bag of homegrown tomatoes. The rectory was six, maybe seven blocks
from the school and not much farther to the Barbour home off Cottonwood Road—an easy
walk for a kid with a dog on a summer day.

I watched Tray park, run up the church steps, and pull open one of the heavy wooden
doors. I followed. The room I’d entered was long and narrow with stairs on each end,
carpeted in deep red. Floor-to-ceiling curtains blocked my view into the church. I
heard the quiet murmurs of male voices. I parted a curtain. Daniel Tray was on his
knees. Pastor Hutchins stood before him, holding both his hands.

“It’s going to be all right, Daniel,” I heard Ethan Hutchins tell Daniel Tray. “But
you have decisions to make. Listen to God. Remember He always works things out for
our good.”

I stepped through the curtains into the church. Ethan Hutchins’s head turned. Daniel
Tray rose to his feet, his eyes never leaving mine as I walked past rows of polished
wooden pews toward them.

“This is outrageous!” Daniel Tray blasted me as soon as I got near. “Is nothing sacred?
Did I forget that I forfeited some right to privacy?”

“Daniel, please,” Ethan Hutchins said gently.

“I’m surprised to see you here, Mr. Tray,” I said. It probably wasn’t the only lie
I was willing to tell in church. “I was just coming to speak with the minister.”

Tray pushed past me and stalked up the aisle, swept curtains out of his way with an
annoyed flourish. I looked at Hutchins. “I’m sorry to interrupt, Reverend Hutchins.”
Lie number two.

“This is God’s house. You’re not interrupting. We are always open.”

“Is that right,” I said.

His smile widened. “Not big on the God stuff, huh?”