Echoes (38 page)

"We found Lydia Hughes this morning," he said in an offhanded tone, glancing back over his shoulder at Grant.

"Good for you," Grant answered.

"Found her in the kitchen."

"You're one hell of a detective."

Smith stopped so suddenly that Grant almost plowed into his back. He faced Grant with a stiff spine and a cold expression. "Found her
body
I guess I should've said."

Hector was watching Grant, so there was no mistake about his reaction. Grant floundered and caught himself against the wall. His face had paled to the color of his gray eyes which widened with horror.

"She's dead?"

"Either that or she's doing a mighty fine imitation of it."

Then Smith turned and continued down the hall. Hector watched Grant pull away from the wall. For just a moment, he met Hector's eyes and Hector saw something slice through Grant's shock. If pressed, he would have to say it was fear. But what struck Hector the most odd was that Grant didn't ask how Lydia died. He didn't ask when. He simply followed Smith down the hall.

Chapter Forty

Tess reached for the picture of Jesus and lifted it from its hook. It was so cheap that the flimsy frame wobbled in her hands. She took it to the kitchen and set it face down on the table.

When she saw the envelope taped to its back a feeling of irritation made her want to shout. From the moment she'd walked into Tori's house, she'd known that something was wrong with the picture being there. Why hadn't she thought to take it down and look at it before? Caitlin hovered at her elbow watching as Tess pulled the envelope free and opened it.

"What's that?" she asked.

Tess had half expected her niece to make another casual confession about knowing the envelope was taped to the back of Jesus, but Caitlin peered at it with open curiosity.

"Let's see," Tess said, opening it up. Inside was a key, a sheet of notebook paper, several photocopied documents as well as a newspaper article, and a hand drawn map. She set them all on the table.

She looked at the copied documents first. The words
Pine County were on the top of each one, followed by line after line of numbers. They appeared to be tax records of some sort. She scanned through several pages before setting them down and picking up the piece of paper that had been torn from a notebook. It was covered in Tori's loping scrawl. Tess scanned the page. Grant's name jumped out at her, next to it, the word money in all capital letters. Tori had listed dates. There were question marks next to every third one, then every other. What did that mean? And then at the bottom of the page, the words, church fire, circled.

Her mouth was dry as she reached for the photocopied article. It was from the Piney River Daily, dated December 20, 1978. Tess skimmed the clipping that detailed the fire and tragedy. The words furthered the images that Craig's telling had evoked.

"I know where the key goes," Caitlin said.

Startled, Tess faced her. "You do?"

Nodding, Caitlin led her upstairs to the rug in the hallway. She got on her knees and pulled it back. Under it was a hatch. Tess tugged it open to reveal a lockbox inside a cubby sized area. She pulled it out and took it downstairs to the table.

The box required both a key and a combination. She stuck the key in the lock and dialed the date of Tori's birthday, then Caitlin's, then her own. None of them worked.

"You don't know the combination, do you?" she asked Caitlin.

Caitlin shook her head. Tess closed her eyes and thought again. She tried the Colonel's birthday and then their mother's. Frustrated, she sat back. And then she had an idea. Carefully she turned the dial to eighteen, then four, and nine. 1849, the year Vanessa died. The lock made a small clicking sound and the lid popped open.

Inside were stacks of neatly bound one hundred dollar bills, each bundled with a ten thousand dollar band. There must have been over a half-million dollars in there. Brandon Forsythe's money. If Tori had left on her own, why hadn't she taken it with her?

"Wow. We're rich," Caitlin said.

"Did you know about this?"

"Mommy showed me the box, but I didn't know what was in it."

Tess pushed the safe back a bit and reached for the last item that had been taped onto the back of Jesus. The map was crudely drawn, with little triangle shapes representing mountains and stick figure houses grouped to represent towns. Pine County and its borders within were identified with a thick dashed line. Mountain Bend and Piney River perched like twin jewels in the midst of the mountainous setting. A large red circle enclosed the expanse between the two towns. Tori had written "Winter Haven" in its center. In a lighter hand, she'd outlined sections of property that butted up to "Winter Haven." She'd labeled the first sect Weston Ranch/to G. The ranch spread like a stain over the majority of the space. Off to the side was a substantial piece of property labeled L. Hughes. Beside that a larger oblong area was labeled E. Smith. And finally a tiny parcel that only just touched the Winter Haven area was labeled C. W. Tori had used the side of a pencil to shade in the pie shaped plot where this house stood.

With a feeling that combined disbelief and certainty, Tess went back to the notebook paper and scanned it again. There was a note scrunched in the corner. It said
Lydia, mortgaged out. Beneath it, Eugene Smith—where'd he get the money? Tess frowned, she knew who Lydia was, of course, but who was Eugene Smith?

She thought for a moment.
Sheriff
Smith?

She knew the number by heart now and without hesitation she dialed the sheriff's station. A woman answered and Tess asked for
Eugene.

"You mean Sheriff Smith?" the woman asked with a wicked cackle. "You better not call him Eugene or he's likely to shoot you. Hold on, I'll see if he's back."

Tess hung up as soon as she heard the line click to hold. Caitlin had seated herself at the table and waited patiently while Tess sorted through the papers again.

"Did you figure it out yet?" she asked after a moment.

"No, but... Have you ever heard of Winter Haven?"

"Uh huh. It's a place."

"What kind of place?"

"There's nothing there yet. Mommy and me went there to see it once. We had a picnic and Mommy said they were going to make it a place to go skiing right where we were sitting."

Tess nodded as a missing piece slotted into the puzzle. A proposed ski resort between Mountain Bend and Piney River. With resorts came tourists who needed hotels and restaurants. And, of course, that meant land to put them on.

She let out a deep breath and looked back at papers on the table. From the tax records she learned that last year
Lydia and Smith had both bought up the parcels of land between the two towns like it was beach front property on the golden coast. But the miles that divided Winter Haven from everything Smith and Lydia now owned had belonged to Frank Weston. Up until his death that is. Now they belonged to Grant.

Not liking where that took her, she studied the map some more.
If
Winter Haven became a resort, the property around it would be valuable. However, without the Weston Ranch in the loop, the land belonging to Lydia and Smith would be outreaches, accessible only by roundabout routes that would make them seem more distant than they actually were. The Weston Ranch was key.

The records of sale for both Smith's and
Lydia's purchases were not top secret information. County records could be accessed over the internet. So why had Tori felt the information needed to be guarded, hidden behind Jesus? Had she discovered the sheriff and Lydia involved in some kind of swindle? Perhaps Frank Weston hadn't been in favor of turning his ranch into a tourist trap and the two had—what? And where did Grant and Craig fit into it? She looked down at Tori's writing. Weston Ranch/to G.

Craig had told her that Grant didn't want the ranch tied up in probate by a lengthy investigation. And then he'd said maybe Grant didn't want the investigation for other reasons.

What other reasons? Could Grant have been in partnership with Smith and Lydia to pull the ranch into their business venture regardless of his father's wishes? If so, to what lengths had he been willing to go to secure his investment?

Tess's mouth felt dry. Surely not as far as murder? God, no. No. Everything inside her rebelled at the very idea of it. He wasn't capable of murder. He couldn't be.

But that wasn't true. He could, whether or not she wanted him to be or not. Tori had a reason for hiding these documents. It didn't take a leap to connect them with her disappearance. The question was, which of the cohorts had suspected her of gathering this information about them? And what had they done about it?

And what about Tori's money? Did Grant know that in addition to funding her job at the ranch, Brandon Forsythe had paid Tori a large chunk of change? Could Grant be that desperate for money?

She looked out the window, seeing nothing but her own confusion. A rush of images came at her, mixing past with present. Tori, Vanessa, The Reverend, The Colonel, Adam, Brodie— And then the images honed down to only the past, only Molly and her group of travelers as they straggled across the miles of openness. In snapshots she saw them reach the South Pass, cross the Continental Divide, spend day after day in the futile hope for better water, better feed for their animals, less sickness, less death. Each day filled with filth and stench. Tess could smell the alkali poisoned waters, so deadly that even the grass at its banks could kill, though it was Molly who trudged by them.

In a blink of Tess's eyes, Molly and the rest reached the
Great Salt Lake Valley, where the mountains coddled the enormous lake, keeping it hidden like a magical place. Steep canyon walls and tight, rough turns marked every step. The dust was thick yet light as powder. It coated them all from head to toe, making them look like they'd been floured for the frying pan.

"We're there," Caitlin whispered.

Her voice came through the onslaught of imagery, but it wasn't strong enough to pull Tess back. Still, she managed to turn her head, managed to meet the rounded eyes of her niece. Caitlin's expression sent a shudder through Tess even as Molly forged westward. Wherever "there" was, they'd reached it together.

"Where, Caity? Where are we?"

"Bad guy," Caitlin breathed.

A sound at the door joined the melee in Tess's head. She felt sluggish as she turned away from Caitlin's terrified face to find Craig standing just outside the screen. They must not have pulled the door closed all the way and it had blown open, giving Craig a bird's eye view of them.

Bad guy.

Here or there?

Tess managed to the gather up the papers still strewn on the table, but the overpowering sensations of being pulled back to Molly would not recede. In Caitlin's face, she saw the same battle waged and lost. She just managed to convey a silent,
Don’t say a word...
as she settled the Jesus picture over the papers and glean an acknowledgment from Caitlin before utter blankness blanched her small face.

How she managed next, she'd never know. But somehow she banked the past long enough to guide Caitlin into the other room and give her the nudge it took to settle her on the couch.

Still Molly fought for control. Tess couldn't keep this up, she couldn't fight it off.

Craig looked weary and grim as he watched her through the door, but he seemed oblivious to her turmoil. The dark screening made his features gritty, but through it she could see his eyes held a bright sheen and redness rimmed them. "I need to talk to you," he said in a voice that was dry and gravelly.

She nodded, but it was already too late. In a moment she'd be gone, blank like Caitlin. She let him in, hurrying to the kitchen where she sank in a chair as the past roared and pulled.

Craig's voice came from far away. His words followed her down, but there was nothing she could do to stop the plummeting fall. Nothing she could do until it was over.

"Tess, I've got bad news."

Chapter Forty-One

On Sunday, the women did their washing. It was a backbreaking, tedious and necessary chore. The fact that they all had to do it made the task a little more bearable. Sunday was, after all, supposed to be a day of rest. But the very notion was laughable. There was no rest on the trail.

Molly had been determined to conquer the mending as well as the wash this Sunday, but there were only so many hours in the day and the sun set earlier and earlier. Her nightmares had become more frequent and disturbing until they leached into the mornings and hung over her
throughout the afternoon. She couldn't focus on anything beyond Arlie's whereabouts and safety. Even having him at her side was not enough. She worried constantly and carried dread like a stone in her heart. A storm was on the horizon and she knew when it struck the outcome would be terrible.

Dusk had glazed the sky with silver and gray by the time she removed the last of her clean clothes from the line and folded it. Armed with soap and towel, she took Arlie to the river as twilight deepened, turning the world into a mysterious place of shifting shadows and night sounds that played with her tension and dogged her steps.