Page 82 of Husband Missing

Alec’s head reared back slightly. “What are you—you want photos of Erica’s mother? What’s going on in there?”

A few people sauntered down the street. Josie moved closer to him. “Erica is still being interviewed. That’s all I know. Someone will call you when it’s finished. I need to know about her mother. Do you or Erica have photos of her?”

He eyed her skeptically as he lit a new cigarette. “This is weird, you know that, right?”

“Please,” said Josie. When he didn’t acquiesce, she added, “I think I might have known her.”

Alec waited until a woman walking her golden retriever passed. “Does this have anything to do with Lila Jensen?”

Josie nodded.

With a sigh, he said, “I never saw any pictures of her. My brother didn’t have any when he brought Erica around. We live in the digital age so it’s not like people print them out anymore. He always used those cheap, pay-as-you-go phones. It’s not like his shit uploaded to the cloud. There were only a half-dozen pictures of Erica when she was a baby. Always bothered me. But none of her mom.”

Lila had rarely let herself be photographed. Before leaving Denton, she’d destroyed every picture she could find. The only photo Josie had of Lila from back then had come from Dex.

“Tell me about her,” Josie said.

“You’re persistent, I’ll give you that.” Alec inhaled deeply, holding the smoke in his lungs for several seconds before exhaling. “I’m not sure I should. It’s not really my story to tell. Erica doesn’t talk about her much, but I can tell it’s a sensitive subject.”

He had no idea.

“It stays between us,” Josie said. “Just like what you told me today.”

“Awww shit,” he muttered. “My brother—his name was Kiernan, by the way—said they met at a bar. Hit it off, although from the way he talked, the only thing they had in common was drugs.”

Lila had struggled with addiction the entire time Josie knew her. That wouldn’t have changed after she left Denton.

“The pregnancy was accidental,” Alec went on. “They’d only been seeing one another for a few months. Kiernan didn’t know what the hell to do but he was ready to step up. As much as he could, given his issues.”

Josie did the math. Lila would have been forty-three when she gave birth to Erica. At that age, it was sometimes difficult to get pregnant or to carry to term and complications could occur. Illicit drugs wouldn’t have helped. An ugly thought took root. Even at the ideal age and physically healthy, Josie couldn’t have a baby, but Lila—older and using drugs—had done it with ease. The unfairness of it felt like a knife in Josie’s back. Lila had done nothing but rain destruction over countless lives. Josie had spent her career making her city safer and protecting the most vulnerable.

Lila was the one who’d been rewarded with a child.

“Kiernan said Erica had some problems when she was first born but they seemed to resolve. Doctors didn’t think the drug use would have any long-term effects.”

“Lucky,” Josie muttered.

Alec puffed smoke in little bursts. “No shit. Kiernan tried to make it work with this woman, do the whole family thing, but she got bored or started seeing someone else. Maybe both. He couldn’t remember. She took Erica and left. Kiernan was too strung out to notice or even care, apparently.”

“How old was Erica?” Josie asked.

“I think he said about a year old, maybe two. He saw her a few times over the years. When Erica’s mother needed something. No regular contact.”

That also fit Lila’s pattern. Still, Josie couldn’t imagine Lila wanting to keep a baby, much less care for one. Maybe she’d used Erica as a way to get things or scam people. Who could resist a down-on-her-luck single mother with an adorable little girl? Or was it as Erica had described: Lila had liked being worshiped by her daughter? Perhaps a bit of both.

Josie wondered what it had been like to be parented by a Lila who didn’t hate your guts for becoming more than a pawn in her stupid games. Or for unwittingly being competition for a man’s attention. By keeping Erica away from Kiernan Slater, Lila had ensured that she never had to compete with her daughter for his affection. There was a difference between Josie and Erica. Eli Matson believed he was Josie’s father and, as such, he’d always prioritized her over Lila whereas Erica’s biological father didn’t appear to have bonded with her. Whether that was because of his struggle with addiction or because Lila kept Erica away, they would never know.

Erica was Lila’s biological daughter. Josie couldn’t help but wonder if that had made Lila treat her differently. Better, in some small way. Had Lila cared that Erica was her own flesh and blood? Had it mattered to her that she’d carried Erica in her body for nine months?

Josie shook off the thought. “What was Erica’s mother’s name?”

Alec squinted as he tried to remember. “Bonnie something. Romero, I think.”

Bonnie Romero.

B.R. Lila’s signature in choosing her aliases.

Belinda Rose, Barbara Rhodes, Bea Rowe, Bethany Rounds. Bonnie Romero.

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