Page 21 of Fatal Witness

The K-9 officer grinned his agreement as Nathan took a pair of the black gloves from his back pocket and pulled them on. Then he stepped up on the porch. “What are we looking for inside?”

“Evidence someone was here,” Alex said. “When Mark checked to see if Mae could’ve fallen, he noticed a photo had been moved. Of course, Mae could’ve moved it herself.” The screen door creaked as Alex pulled on it. “I don’t know how many times I opened this very door when I was a kid. Even after Morgan moved and Danielle disappeared, I came with Gram to visit Mae.”

“I’ve heard Judith speak often of Mae,” Mark said. “Mostly of ways to get her to move to town.”

She laughed. “I’ve heard it too. She and Gram have been friends ever since grade school.”

Alex and Nathan stepped inside, and she scanned the room. Everything looked neat and tidy as always. If someone had searched this room, they went to a lot of trouble to put things back the way they were.

She ran her gaze over the books on the shelves and walked closer. Alex rubbed her chin and scanned each title. Mae’s fiction titles were on one shelf, a collection of poetry books on another, and several Bibles were lined up beside a set of commentaries. If anyone searched through the books, they’d been careful to put them back in the right order.

“I don’t see anything wrong here,” Alex said. “I’m going to check out the rest of the house.”

Nothing looked out of place in any of the other rooms. Could Mae have been wrong about someone being in her house? But why would anyone break into her house? It was the question she asked Nathan and Mark when she returned to the living room and they moved outside under the shade of an old oak tree to wait for the forensic team to arrive.

Mark kicked a rock. “I’ve been asking myself that very question. Mae told me once she didn’t keep much cash here, that her customers usually paid with a check or credit card. A lot of her orders are online.”

Nathan chuckled. “Mae has always amazed me the way she taught herself how to operate a computer.”

Alex smiled. “She’s never been afraid to tackle anything.”

“Including a murder investigation,” Mark added. “Have you seen her crime board?”

Alex nodded. “You think this could be related to her daughter’s murder?”

“That was twenty-five years ago,” Nathan said. “Why now?”

11

Dani was late for her breakfast meeting. She flicked a wayward curl out of her face and jabbed the elevator button again, trying to forget Lizi’s sigh when Dani told the Puli to stay.

Why had she forgotten to set her alarm for her breakfast with Evelyn Engels, her former professor and mentor? A certain phone call, probably. And a couple of hours searching the internet for articles on dissociative amnesia.

“There’s a 95 percent chance you’remy friend’s granddaughter, Danielle Bennett.”

Mark Lassiter’s words had looped through Dani’s mind as she scoured the internet for articles on the memory disorder. If what he said was true, her parents had been murdered. Had Dani witnessed it? Was that the reason she couldn’t remember them?

“Your past is best left alone.”She punched the button again. Keith knew about her parents’ murder, had known all along. Was he there? Her mouth went cotton-dry.

Had he killed her parents?

The elevator doors slid open, revealing the black marble interior. Her feet refused to move as her mind teetered on the edge of a black hole. One step and it would swallow her.

“Lady, you getting on?”

The man’s voice snapped Dani back to reality. “Sorry.” She waved him on. “I, ah, forgot something.”

The silver doors closed, and she took a deep breath.Get a grip.Of course Keith hadn’t killed her parents. If he had, he wouldn’t have taken her to live with him. He would’ve killed her too ... unless, maybe it was harder to kill a child.

She shook the thoughts off, hard-pressed to understand why she even entertained them. A message dinged on her phone. Evelyn.On my way, she texted. Once again she punched the down button.

Maybe it wasn’t true. Maybe she wasn’t this Danielle Bennett. She massaged the muscles in her neck. No. Deputy Mark Lassiter wouldn’t have contacted her if he hadn’t been convinced she was, and the DNA test would be a mere formality.

The elevator doors slid open again, and she focused on getting to the lobby and out the door, where the Navigator waited. Dani had already programmed the GPS app on her phone for the Cozy Sisters Restaurant. Maybe she could get there before Evelyn called looking for her.

Five minutes later her phone rang, and she answered without looking at the ID. “I’m almost there.”

“You’re almost home?”

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