Page 49 of Whispers Left Behind

She stared at the dark liquid in her mug, waiting impatiently for her father to continue. Everyone in the family would have agreed that this conversation was long overdue, but it wouldn’t solve anything. Most of her anger was pointed inward, but he shared the blame for what transpired last year.

What would his opinion be of her if he knew the truth?

She took ahold of the cinnamon stick and began to stir the apple cider. The crackling of wood punctuated the stillness, and it was as if the flickering flames used the rising tension as fuel to reach higher into the chilled air.

“Your mother and I went to high school with Mary Gantz.”

“I know your reasons for defending Gantz. We don’t need to—”

“Mary was the reason I became a lawyer.”

Kinsley stilled the cinnamon stick, eventually releasing it to wrap her hand around the mug. Everyone had been privy to the reason George Aspen defended Calvin Gantz, because her father had stood on the courthouse steps and announced to the world that the two victims hadn’t been the only ones raised in Fallbrook.

Calvin Gantz had been raised on a farm, only to lose his father in a tragic farming accident. Mary had sold the farm and moved her young son to a neighborhood where she wouldn’t be so alone in raising him. Calvin had thrived in his new life, never having been one for physical labor. He preferred to rely on his charm and intelligence. It was a lethal combination for someone so inherently evil.

Mary had been diagnosed with breast cancer shortly thereafter. Those years hadn’t been kind to her, but she had managed to hold on until Calvin graduated from the community college. Her funeral had been held a month later.

“Mary got pregnant in high school. Her parents despised Frank,” George revealed with a shake of his head. It was clear from his disapproval that he hadn’t agreed with such a summation. “They did everything they could to talk Mary into giving up the baby, but Mary loved Frank. She wasn’t about to leave him, but that didn’t stop her mother and father from looking for ways to change her mind.”

Kinsley bit the side of her cheek to keep from asking questions. Her father always had a way of telling a story and leaving thelistener hanging on to his every word. Once Gantz had been arrested, neither Kinsley nor her father had spoken about the case to one another. Every detail she had learned about the man had been through her own investigation and the media.

“During Mary’s seventh month of pregnancy, some of her mother’s jewelry went missing. They called the police. Blamed Frank Gantz, saying at the time that he had been the only one with the means and motive to take the missing items.” George paused to take a sip of his apple cider. He held up his mug. “Tasting this makes me miss her, you know.”

Maybe that was why her father was sitting outside with Kinsley while everyone else was watching the football game. He missed Nana, and he was overcome with sentimentality. He always said that Kinsley reminded him the most of his mother.

“I don’t recall Frank Gantz having a record,” Kinsley said, hoping to delay or avoid altogether the issues between them. She would have preferred not to speak of Gantz, either, but that wasn’t the way these past two weeks had panned out. “I’m sure the prosecutor was aware of it, not that it would have made any difference. Whatever Frank did or didn’t do as a teenager had no bearing on Calvin’s crimes.”

“The police arrested Frank, but his family didn’t have enough money for a private defense attorney. He was given a public defender who was wet behind the ears. The guy tried to force Frank to take a plea, but it was Mary who begged and finally convinced him to stall.”

Kinsley sipped her cider, the warmth doing little to soften the chill that had settled inside her. Her father had an entire year to sit down with her, not that she had made such opportunities easy. Surely this heart-to-heart was at the urging of her mother.

“Mary asked a few friends for some help, and that’s what we did,” George replied with a glance toward the sliding glass door. “Your mother and another friend of theirs put together atimeline of who was in and out of the house during that period of time. I hit the law books in the library, looking for anything that could help Frank avoid jail time.”

“You found it, didn’t you?”

“I did, but it didn’t matter in the end.” George had been staring at the bright flames of the fire while telling his story, but he raised his eyes to meet hers. “Mary discovered that her cousin had been at the house the day her mother’s jewelry had gone missing, so Mary convinced your mother and a friend to sneak into the girl’s room. They found the necklace and ring that had been taken, so the police were forced to drop the charges. Frank was released, he married Mary on her eighteenth birthday, and Calvin was born three weeks later.”

There were no crickets to offset the silence, and the rest of the wildlife appeared to have called it a night. Even the rustle of the leaves from the slight breeze wasn’t loud enough to cause a distraction.

“I went into law because of Mary Gantz.”

“You went into law because of Mary Reeder,” Kinsley corrected him by utilizing Mary’s maiden name. She hadn’t meant for her voice to have such an edge, but the buried emotions from last year had been exposed at Terrapin Lake today. “Don’t confuse the two, Dad. Calvin Gantz murdered two women who were born and raised in Fallbrook. What about them? Their families? Don’t they deserve justice?”

“Of course, they do,” George replied just as sharply. He looked out into the darkness as if he needed to regain his train of thought. After a few seconds, he turned his attention back toward her. “It’s about legacy. About defending those who have no one else.”

“Even when the cost is so high?”

George rested his mug on his leg with his left hand while rubbing his lower lip with the other. Everyone had a tell, andher father had just shown his. Her question had hit from many different directions.

“I owed it to Mary to give her son a defense. You told me the day you clipped that badge to your belt that you wanted to be treated no differently than any other officer on the force. Had I overheard such a discussion from anyone else, I would have done the exact same thing—investigate the allegations myself. I did precisely that, and I won’t apologize for doing my job.”

Kinsley leaned her head back in disappointment and stared up at the stars. The world was such a vast place, yet Fallbrook was like one of those tiny towns encapsulated in a snow globe. She hadn’t expected her father to apologize, but his refusal to do so hurt nonetheless.

“What I do apologize for was how I handled the situation,” George stated gruffly before clearing his throat. “I should have given you some warning that I had overheard your conversation with Lanen. Instead, I called a private investigator to confirm that the forensics tech had taken a bribe and allowed a journalist into Gantz’s residence. Hell, the guy should have ended up behind bars instead of receiving a slap on the wrist.”

“You won’t get an argument from me there,” Kinsley muttered in disappointment. “He was also fired, not that the punishment fit the crime.”

The temperature had dropped enough that her breath had begun to form tiny clouds in the air. The heat from the firepit could no longer prevent the cold from seeping through her jacket. Her father probably wouldn’t have put up much of an argument if she decided to go inside, but he had chosen to extend an olive branch. In reality, the olive branch was firmly in her mother’s hand.

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