Page 72 of Fatal Witness

She put her art supplies away. The truth of what happened the night her parents were murdered was locked away in her mind. If only she could find the key to unlock it.

Maybe the key was at the house where she grew up.

33

A low growl took Mark from sleep to awake in seconds. Gem stood at the foot of the sofa bed, the hair on the back of her neck raised. “What is it, girl?”

She ran to the door that provided privacy for the living room and scratched to be let out. Mark grabbed his gun and followed. He opened the door, and she shot through it to the kitchen door. He let her out and followed as she ran in a zigzag pattern, sniffing the air as Mark scanned the backyard under the security lights.

Soon she returned and sat at his feet, cocking her head—Gem’s signal that she’d found nothing. Whoever or whatever had disturbed her was gone. “Good girl.”

After Mark and Gem checked the perimeter, they returned to the kitchen to find Alex sitting at the kitchen table. Gem circled and lay down in the corner.

“Everything clear?”

“Yeah.” He checked his watch. “What are you doing up at five o’clock on a Saturday morning?”

“I heard you go out and decided to get up since I was awake. Chattanooga PD is couriering over the burglary ring files this morning—they’re paper, and as soon as they’re scanned, I’ll sendyou a copy.” She nodded toward the counter. “I made a pot of coffee if you’d like some.”

“Sounds good.” He poured a cup and took it to the table, where he sat across from Alex. “What’re we doing about Dani?”

She sipped her coffee and set the cup down. “It won’t take long for word to get out that she’s Danielle Bennett, and I figure the killer will double down on silencing her. So, I need you to stick with Dani when she leaves this house, and when you can’t, call in Jenna Hart.”

He nodded and took another sip of coffee. “Dani wants to go to her family home today. Thinks it might jar her memory.”

“We can only hope. Knowing who we’re looking for would greatly simplify everything. I can spare Hayes to go with you as backup.”

“Good.”

Alex wrapped her hands around her cup. “I located the murder files in our archives and reviewed them with Gramps. I’d like for you to talk to Kyle Peterson, see if you can get any information out of him about Bobby’s last burglary—he was the manager of the jewelry store where the DeBeers diamonds were taken and lost his job right afterwards.”

“You think he had something to do with the murders?”

“He would’ve known Toby Mitchell was arrested for the burglary. It would’ve been easy for him to put Toby with the Bennett brothers.”

Mark leaned back in his chair. “You think that would’ve been motive enough to kill Dani’s parents and Keith?”

“People have killed for less.”

“How did Toby get involved in the burglary ring?” Mark asked.

“Nobody knows. Toby never would talk about it to Gramps. But he and the Bennett brothers worked in construction together. After Toby’s wife left him, he started drinking and hanging out with them all the time, and Gramps believes he joined the burglaryring thinking if he flashed enough money, his wife would come back. Instead, he went to prison.”

Everyone in town knew Toby. “So he had a drinking problem then?”

“I think it’s worse since he got out of prison—he pled guilty and served five years with time off for good behavior. He probably could’ve avoided prison altogether if he’d given the Chattanooga district attorney the names of everyone involved in the burglaries, but he refused.”

“Did they keep working the case after Toby’s confession?”

“Not really. According to Gramps, Chattanooga PD believed the ring broke up after the murders because the break-ins stopped, as well as the pattern, and they moved on. You know the drill—there’ll always be more cases than you can solve, and at least they could point to some success with the arrest and confession of Toby.”

He completely understood. Not that Russell County had anything like the cases Chattanooga worked, but they had enough. “Have you interviewed Toby?”

She shook her head. “Haven’t been able to find him—he’s not at that shack he calls home or at the beer joints.”

“I’ve seen him hanging around Peterson’s Grocery. Maybe Mr. Peterson knows where to find him?”

“That’s a good idea. You have good rapport with Mr. Peterson. See what he’ll tell you about Toby when you go see Kyle.”

---