The Dollmaker(The Forgotten Files #2)(51)

“Aunt Grace will kill you if she sees this mess,” Tessa said.

Holly sat up and muted the television. An old T-shirt brushed past her knees, and her long hair hung wild around her shoulders. Grinning, she said, “She won’t know if you don’t snitch.”

“When is she due back?”

“Cruise ship docks in Miami next Tuesday, and then I think she’s visiting friends in Tampa. Home by next weekend. Plenty of time to clean.”

Tessa picked up a couple of Holly’s rumpled shirts from one of the club chairs and sat. “How’s school?”

“Third-year law isn’t taxing. Mostly clerking for the judge these days.”

“Anything of interest?”

Holly yawned. “No.”

Holly was five years younger than Tessa and would graduate law school in the spring. She was near the top in her class and the “not so interesting job” she referenced was a prestigious clerkship with a federal judge. Her mother fully expected her to be running the world one day.

“Hey, do you know where your mom stowed all my junk from college?”

“She was threatening a major purge last year, so not sure if it survived.”

“She’s been threatening to toss my stuff for years. What did she do with all my boxes when she had my room remodeled?”

“They’re in the room over the garage. I know because she made me haul all your crap up there when she had the painters come through.”

“Great.”

“What are you looking for?”

“Some photos that I took right before my accident. I know I took pictures and Aunt Grace developed them, but they aren’t in my storage bin.”

Holly yawned. “And why the walk down memory lane?”

“Just want to have a look.”

Holly rose. “I’ll give you a tour of the junk piles. If Mom hasn’t done another purge, I can find your boxes.”

“Thanks.”

Holly shoved her feet into slippers. Outside, they crossed to the garage and entered by the side door. A short flight of stairs took them to the second floor. Holly clicked on the light, which illuminated a collection of random items no one likely wanted to deal with, including holiday decorations, clothes, furniture, and boxes from college.

Holly picked her way through a narrow trail toward the back of the room. She searched a couple of boxes and said, “Here it is. All the college crap you saved that you should have thrown out years ago.”

Tessa knelt and opened the first box filled with textbooks.

“So why do you care about the photos?”

“I’m looking for pictures of the girls in my freshman hall.”

“Why?”

“One was murdered this week.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah.” Finding nothing of use, Tessa closed up the first box and dove into the second and then a third. It was at the bottom of the third box where she found an album covered in red cloth. She lifted it out, half amazed it still existed.

When she opened the album, the first pictures she saw were taken before her mother died. For a moment she sat, silently staring at her mother hugging her in an apple orchard. “I miss her.”

“Yeah. She was pretty great.”

Clearing her throat, she turned the page. The album’s spine creaked in protest.

“Why don’t we look at this in the kitchen? It’s a little bit of a mess in here.”

“Sure.” Tessa closed the album, grateful for the pause. She straightened and backed out the narrow path. Holly followed and shut off the lights.

Back in her mom’s kitchen, Holly pulled a couple of mugs out of the cabinet and set the coffeemaker to brew. Tessa sat at the counter and opened the album, unleashing scents of popcorn and lavender, which had once permeated her freshman dorm room. A pressed daisy lay in the crook of the middle pages.

“It’s not like you to travel down memory lane,” Holly said.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about Kara lately.”

Holly’s gaze sharpened. “What brought her up? Her birthday?”

“We had a case in the medical examiner’s office. I didn’t recognize the patient during the autopsy and only found out from one of the agents that she was on my freshman hall. The victim’s name was Diane Emery.”

“Wow. I remember her. I was in middle school when you two were seniors in high school.”

“That’s right.”

“I also remember her from the time Mom and I visited you in your dorm room. She was kind of stuck-up.”

Diane had had no interest in making nice with the thirteen-year-old Holly. “You never forget a detail, do you?”

“That’s what happens when your astrology sign is Cancer and you have an eidetic memory,” she joked. The coffeepot gurgled, so she turned to pour some coffee in a couple of mugs. She pushed a mug toward Tessa and set a carton of milk beside it. “Why couldn’t you recognize her?”

“Her face was covered in tattoos. Which isn’t to be shared. The cops haven’t released the details, so keep it quiet.”

“Understood.” Holly sipped her black coffee. “How does this relate to college pictures?”

“Dakota thinks her death shares similarities with Kara’s death.”