Page 37 of The Girl in the River

“How about the wife?” Ellie asked.

“Parents died when she was young and she and her sister were raised by the grandmother who passed about six years ago. I searched the house for papers, but like I said the place was torn apart. One of Jo-Jo’s coworkers said her sister died a long time ago. She had no other family.”

“Maybe she and Mia were friends,” said Ellie.

“I’ll re-question the neighbors and their workers and ask if anyone heard of Mia Norman,” the detective offered. “This is one case that’s haunted me for years now. I don’t like not having answers.”

“Me neither,” Ellie said. She understood the way an unsolved murder could get under your skin.

FORTY-SIX

Before they drove back to town, Ellie and Derrick stopped at a little place called The Catfish House for lunch and seated themselves at an outdoor picnic table. As they ordered shrimp po’boys and fries and drank sweet tea, the river gurgled behind them, blending with the sound of children laughing and families chattering.

Ellie’s phone rang. Laney. She connected and put her on speaker. “Are you finished with the autopsy?”

“Yes,” Laney said. “As we thought, Tori James died of blood loss due to the gunshot wound. The blunt force trauma to the back of the head was not severe, and it could have occurred while she was trying to escape an attacker.”

“He shot her while she was trying to run away.”

“That fits,” Laney said. “I also have some lab results that are puzzling.”

Ellie tensed. “What do you mean?”

“About the champagne. I found traces of Rohypnol in the bottle.”

“So Mia and Tori were drugged.”

“Yes, I found traces in Tori’s bloodstream as well. But there’s something else. The DNA from the glasses. Tori’s matched one of them. But DNA from the second glass is confusing.”

“How so?”

“It matched DNA from the system belonging to a woman named Jesse Habersham.”

FORTY-SEVEN

RED RIVER ROCK

Ellie’s head spun. “I don’t understand. Unless Jesse Habersham was in the room with Mia and Tori… Then she could have had something to do with Tori’s death and Mia’s disappearance.”

“I suppose that’s a possibility,” Laney continued. “But here’s the odd part. Just to be precise, I ran it against the DNA from Mia’s toothbrush the ERT sent over, and it also matches that DNA.”

Ellie rubbed her temple. “Are you sure?”

“I ran both of them three times myself just to verify,” Laney said. “And I’ll compare their dental records when I get them.”

“How is that possible the DNA is the same?” Ellie asked.

“Well, if Mia and Jesse were twins, their DNA would match.”

“As far as I know, Mia had no family,” Ellie said, her thoughts racing. “Unless Mia and Jesse are the same person.” Or she’d lied about not having a family or being a twin. But why would she do that?

“That would explain it,” Laney agreed.

What the hell was going on? “Thanks, Laney. Let me know if you get any new information.”

“Will do.”

After hanging up, Ellie washed down the lump in her throat with another swig of tea.

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