Page 118 of A Forgotten Mistake

I hurry into the kitchen, but she’s not there, leading me to look down the hallway. I see the lab wagging her tail at a closed door that I rush toward. Not seeing me, the lab darts in front of me, and I immediately trip over her in an attempt to not plow into her.

The dog looks confused about why I’m suddenly right next to her but happy nonetheless and proceeds to want attention when I want through the door. I push it open and see that the window is open.

“I take it that wasn’t really his girlfriend,” Gabriel says.

“I’m thinking not.”

“I’m going around back.”

“Be careful,” I say as I head to the window and look out. The window screen is gone, flung out into the yard and then bent, telling me she landed on it and isn’t waiting somewhere in the room for us to slip out. I hurry toward the front door, hoping to cut her off if she went that way. I call for backup, unsure if Gabriel already did so.

I don’t see any movement, but there are so many fences and bushes that make it even harder to see someone in the dark. Quickly, I slip out onto the street, unsure which way she’d have gone. If she’d originally come through the door toward the front of the house, it tells me her car was parked somewhere in this direction.

Gabriel catches up to me. “I don’t think she could have gone out back. There’s a tall fence, and if she’s the one who was shooting at you in the barn, I know I shot her.”

“Shit. She didn’t have that much of a head start on us,” I say.

“No, she didn’t, so why don’t you go right, and I’ll go… is that smoke?”

I look back at the house as I see smoke drifting out through the window she’d gone through.

“You don’t think Anthony’s still in the house, do you?”

“She might have been preparing to burn the house when we arrived. I didn’t smell anything, though, did you?”

“No, but we weren’t in the back of the house for very long. We have to get the dog out and make sure Anthony’s not in there,” he says as he rushes back to it.

“I’m coming,” I call, refusing to let him go in alone in case she actually is still inside. I quickly follow him back in through the door as I hear him calling for the fire department and any police in the area. I hurry back to the room smoke was coming from and find that the flames are nothing too concerning, just some paper burning inside the closet that was next to the window.Gabriel’s faster than I am and dumps enough water on it that it’s out in seconds.

As I step out of the room, I reach the only door that I hadn’t yet snooped inside and find it locked. The door’s pretty flimsy and I manage to bust it open with a few kicks.

I hit on the light, but I don’t need to, I can smell the death before I even see Anthony strapped to a chair. There’s a large projector screen on, but nothing playing. The blue glow of it gives Anthony’s dead eyes a unique hue.

Blood has pooled in his lap from where he’d been stabbed, but my attention isn’t on the dead man, it’s on the safe sitting open.

“Look what we have here,” I say as I reach the projector behind him. It’s hooked up to a videotape player, and when I press play, the blue screen shifts. The quality is horrible, but I can tell there’s someone in a large body of water. They’re getting close to the camera, and when they come into view, I immediately recognize the person as Christa.

“Well… guess we know who killed Steven, Mitch, Cameron, Jessica, and now Anthony,” I comment.

“I take it that’s Christa,” Gabriel says as I watch her reaching out to the person recording. The projector isn’t giving off any sound, but I can only imagine that she’s begging for help.

“Sure is.”

“Do you think Marissa is her sister?”

“Looks like it. I never got a good look at Christa’s sister back then. I’m not even sure I’d recognize her in a lineup, but who else would it be?”

“You said Christa mentioned her sister was a biology student… do you think she realized the same thing you did? That the sediment that was found during the autopsy wouldn’t have come from the ditch near their house?”

“It’s possible. We need a name and address on her,” I say as I notice a cloth mask on the ground. She probably wore it when she entered the house, but her brawl with Anthony must have caused it to be torn off. It looks like it was ripped, so it’s no wonder she ended up outside the house without it on. The two of us head out of the room and Gabriel nearly trips over the sleeping dog that is oblivious to what’s happening.

“Hey, sweetie, it’s going to get really chaotic for a second, but someone will come get you shortly, okay?” Gabriel says as he guides her over to a bed in the living room while I open the door for the police to enter.

“Room in the back, last door on the right,” I direct them before I rush out to the car.

Gabriel isn’t far behind me as I quickly set to work identifying that Marissa’s real name is Sadie Williamson. It doesn’t take me much to find her address, so I get backup ready to assist us as we head for her house. When she pretended to be Anthony’s girlfriend, she clearly had no idea who I was. A fleeting moment twenty some years ago is not enough for her to recognize me now. I doubt she ever knew my name. It’s not like Abby or Christa and I were that close. If Sadie thinks she lost us, she’s likely gone back to her house believing she’d have at least some time before we’d have an ID on her.

“So a group of people were involved in her sister’s death, and now she’s picking them off one by one?” Gabriel asks. “Why now?”

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