Page 60 of Justice Delayed

At the mention of Appalachia, Melender pictured the soaring cliffs of the majestic mountain range. All these years later, she could still tick off the states the range touched after memorizing them in school: Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, Maryland, West Virginia, and North Carolina. Homesickness washed over her like a breeze on a peak.

“Brogan said you grew up in the mountains.”

She nodded. “Every morning, I’d greet the sun rising slowly over the top of a peak. In the glooming of the day, I could hear the nightingale’s song. It was my home until Sudie died.”

“You must miss her very much.”

The soft acknowledgement of her still-sharp grief nearly loosened Melender’s hold on her emotions. “I do.” She cleared her throat. “Sudie left school at age nine when her father was killed in a mining accident, so she never read or wrote well. But she could tell stories like no one else in the hollow. I loved to listen to her as we shelled peas on the front porch or canned a batch of her famous huckleberry preserves.”

“She raised you?” Mrs. Trent passed Melender a mug, steam wafting up like fog on a mountain.

Melender held the cup as the memories flooded her mind. “My mother died when I was three. Complications from childbirth. My little brother died too.”

Mrs. Trent asked other questions, drawing out Melender’s family history and upbringing. Sudie had schooled Melender well in their family heritage. During the early years of the nineteenth century, her family had settled in the foothills in the Blue Ridge section of the range. Some of her ancestors had even been displaced when Shenandoah National Park had been cobbled together. Her home sat deep in Maple Hollow just outside the park borders.

“When Sudie died, my only living relative was my aunt, my father’s younger sister,” Melender said. “At sixteen, the Commonwealth of Virginia didn’t deem me old enough to be on my own. I didn’t realize until later that I could have petitioned the court for emancipation, but by that time…” She didn’t want to reveal she learned that tidbit of information in the prison library.

“Have you gone back to visit since your release?”

Melender shook her head. Even though the mountains called, were a part of her, she hadn’t dared venture back. Her years in prison had not diminished the burning need to return to her heritage or her longing for the quiet stillness of the forest.

Staring at the dregs of her tea in the bottom of her cup, Melender struggled to put into words why she couldn’t go home, not yet. “There’s something pure and clean about the mountains that I can’t contaminate with a felony conviction.”

She shook her head. “Until I find out the truth of what happened to Jesse, I can’t go home. The mountains should be used as a sanctuary, as a resting place, not as a hiding place. If I go back before this is completely resolved, the peace that the mountains give won’t be mine. It’ll be a facsimile of the rest I’m longing to have.”

Looking Mrs. Trent square in the eye, she added, “That’s why I won’t stop until I untangle the lies and bring Jesse home. Only then can I return to the mountains.”

* * *

Brogan’s heartsank as Fairfax County Police Detective Mark Livingston exhaled loudly into the phone.

“Can’t do it,” Livingston said. “The district attorney will not want to press charges against Jared Thompson for perjury. His testimony supported what others said, but it wasn’t crucial to the conviction.”

“That’s what I thought.” Brogan held the phone to his ear with his shoulder as he opened the car door. “But that’s not the only reason I called you.”

“If it’s related to the closed Thompson case, I don’t have time.”

“Jared knew Snake.”

Silence. Believing the detective hadn’t hung up, he went on. “Snake was Jared’s supplier around the time of the incident. On a hunch, I asked Jared why he met with Snake the night the man was killed.”

“What did Jared say?”

“He insisted we leave. Cleary the question scared him. A lot.” Brogan started the car. “Given some of the ransom money was found on Snake, I thought you might like to know.”

“Thanks for the tip. Gotta go.”

He’d planted the seed and hoped Livingston would water it. Jared was hiding something, but it could be nothing more than he had returned to his old drug habit. Brogan laid his phone on the front seat, then maneuvered out of the parking lot.

But his gut screamed that there was a lot more to the Jared’s fear, one that had the potential to blow the case against Melender wide open.

* * *

Brogan tuckedin his shirt with one hand as he searched around for his notebook on his desk. It had to be here somewhere. Fallon had requested an update on the Thompson case pronto, and his boss didn’t like to be kept waiting.

Seth rested his forearms on top of the short cubicle wall that separated their workspaces. “Anything new on the ransom money?”

“Nothing concrete yet.” When he spied his notebook under a pile of folders, he grabbed and stood. “Can’t talk now. Fallon called me in for a meeting five minutes ago.”

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