Page 96 of Buried Too Deep

That sent a chill down Alan’s spine. The death of her husband had been only two weeks before his own trip to Baton Rouge, twenty-three years ago. Jack Elliot had to have been involved.

The clincher, of course, had been the name of her child. John Robert VanPatten. She’d named her son after the man who’d rescued her from domestic violence. That John Robertson, a.k.a. John Winslow, a.k.a. Jack Elliot, had killed her husband was undeniable fact in Alan’s mind.

Cora Winslow and Broussard’s people had found one of Jack’s clients. According to Sage, Cora had been stunned as she’d left the VanPatten household.

So now she knew what her father had been.

And if she’d found one client, there was a chance she’d find more.

A chance she’ll find me.

He hadn’t given his legal name to John Robertson and he’d paid the man with cash a week before the job, so there was no linkage there. But there were plenty of other ways this could come back to cage him.

He couldn’t allow that to happen.

Cora Winslow absolutely could not find the Caulfield family, who still lived in the same house in Merrydale with the green door and the tidy front yard. They weren’t trying to hide from anyone. They’d simply been living their lives for twenty-three years.

Alan knew this because he’d driven by a time or two over those years. Just to be sure. Just to see for himself.

Another thought occurred, stealing Alan’s breath. The Caulfields could have been of the same mind that he’d been twenty-three years ago. Two can keep a secret if one of them is dead.

Mr. Caulfield could have followed “John Robertson” away from the house with the green door and the tidy lawn that night. Caulfield might have been the one to witness Alan killing the man who’d been the go-between in their deal.

Their illegal deal.

Caulfield might have been the one to move the body to the foundation of the Damper Building. He might be the one responsible for the search of Cora’s attic tonight.

Or it could be someone completely unrelated.

Alan didn’t know and couldn’t care. He just knew that Cora could not be permitted to locate that family. And if she did, she couldn’t be permitted to speak with them.

There was no statute of limitations for murder.

Slowly he rose from his desk, his PI’s report in hand. He opened the hinged bookcase and twisted the dial on his safe. One-zero-fifteen.

He put the report in the back of the safe with all the others his PI had generated over the years. He started to close the safe, then paused, his heart racing, his mind spinning. Carefully he pulled out the most recent photo he’d taken.

Of her. Ashley Caulfield.

One-zero-fifteen.

He stared at her face for a long, long moment, sorrow and regret weighing him down like bricks. But he couldn’t change the past.

With a heavy heart, he put the photo back into the safe, closed the door, and spun the dial.

Ashley was innocent. She was just living her life.

But she and her family had to be silenced.

That this was all bubbling to the surface now was Cora Winslow’s fault. If she’d just left well enough alone, everything would have been fine.

Now, he had secrets to bury so deep they’d never be found again.

But he couldn’t do this himself. There was no way. He’d barely been able to drive to Medford Hughes’s house in Mid-City. Driving to the Caulfields’ home north of Baton Rouge was out of the question.

He’d ask Sage for this last thing.

If Sage agreed to his request, Alan would know that his grandson was irredeemable. If he didn’t agree, Sage would have even more to hold over Alan’s head.

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