Page 163 of Secrets Along the Shore
None of the people identified have names I recognize, and the one name I’m desperately hoping to find—L.A. Haynes—isn’t on the list.
That leaves a dozen fingerprints unaccounted for. No trace evidence of note was detected. No blood, no signs of foul play.
“Good news, I hope?” Grace says, optimism lacing her voice.
“Neutral.” I sigh. “Just an update on some testing. It doesn’t make the way forward any clearer.”
“Well, no point in you starving to death.” She nods pointedly at my plate. “We don’t waste bacon in this house.”
I pick up my fork and stab the syrup-drowned pancakes as my phone buzzes again. It’s another email, but this one’s about evidence derived from Kamden Avery’s body and the burial site.
The lab identified DNAnotbelonging to Kamden Avery and partial fingerprints on the tarp used to wrap her body. Neither the DNA nor the prints had matches in the system. The preliminary autopsy report cites strangulation as the cause of death.
I review the results again, cold dread washing over me as an idea materializes. It’s a path forward, but not one I want to go down.
Regrettably, I don’t think I have a choice.
I shove a few bites in, down a piece of bacon, then swig back the last of my orange juice. “Grace,” I mumble through a full mouth, “I’ve gotta go. Sorry about this.” I swing my jacket back on, grab my backpack off the floor, and head to the door.
“It’s fine, hon. Let me know how you are. And my door’s always open.”
That door hits the frame hard as I hustle to the Jeep. I’m so focused on what I need to do that I don’t notice my phone buzzing until I’m at the bottom of the driveway. The call switches over to the Jeep and when the number pops up, I don’t recognize it. The caller ID is blocked.
I frown and answer. “Sophie Walsh.”
“Sophie Walsh?” The voice is deep and unmistakably agitated. “This is L.A. Haynes. I hear you’re looking for me.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FIVE
“Mr. Haynes,”I say, my tongue nearly tripping over the words, I’m so shocked. “Thank you for calling?—”
“Why you got the police looking for me? You know what kinda heat that brings down on me?”
I swerve over to the shoulder and throw the Jeep into park. “I understand, Mr. Haynes?—”
“I don’t think you do. But if you aren’t careful, you’re gonna.”
Great. A threat on my life. The perfect sprinkle of gasoline on this dumpster fire of a day.
“I’m an investigator with the Mitchell County Sheriff’s Department, looking into the death of Kamden Avery. I was told you might have information about her, and I’d like to meet with you to?—”
“No. Uh-uh. No way. I ain’t meetin’ with you. You got a question to ask, you ask it now. I want this over and done with. I know you’re askin’ ’round about Kamden, and I know you think I know somethin’, but I don’t. You need to stop hasslin’ me and get the police off my back. That’s theonlyreason I called.”
I don’t want to do it this way. I want to see him face to face, but it doesn’t sound like that’s going to happen. I glance at my phone, wishing I could record our conversation. “I understand you knew Kamden?”
“’Course I knew Kamden.”
“You were at a bar not long before she disappeared, trying to sell her”—I pause, working out how to put this delicately—“supplies for her hobby? You and Kamden got into a fight. Witnesses saw you.”
“Lady, what, you think I killed her or something ’cause she hit me? Please. If I did that every time a woman clapped me upside the head, you’d have a whole lot more bodies to be lookin’ into. Wasn’t a fight. It was just for show. She come up and slapped me so everybody would think she didn’t want nothin’ to do with me, but that was so Reggie wouldn’t flip out and make things tough for her in her own neighborhood.”
“Reggie Banks?”
“Yeah, and I heard you been talkin’ to him too.” A sniff of disdain comes over the line. “Reggie got a thing for Kamden. Didn’t like her workin’ with, eventalkin’ to, anybody else. He got you chasin’ the wrong ball for sure.”
“So Kamden was…working…with you, but she didn’t want Reggie to know?”
