A Mother Would Know (63)



When Leslie and I were friends, she was an incessant note taker. I used to tease her that she’d missed her calling. She should’ve been a reporter or gossip columnist. She’d laugh and say that she had been the editor of her school paper, and that before she dropped out of college, she’d been studying journalism. She had pads of paper throughout her house, to-do lists, reminders, but she talked often about keeping a diary. Said she had one for every school year growing up, and at that point the habit of writing was too engrained to stop. For a while—she laughed when she told me this—all she wrote was boring stuff about what she’d had for breakfast. But then she’d had an issue with some of our neighbors, Phillip and Diane, a couple who used to live behind her. Their dog was always getting out and tearing up Leslie’s flowers, digging up her yard or crapping on the lawn. Every time she tried to talk to them about it, they got angry, shut her down. She started keeping a log of dates and times that the dog got out, so she could file a formal complaint.

That’s when she got obsessed with chronicling things in the neighborhood. Once they left, bad dog in tow, she still kept diaries about her family’s scheduling, about PTA and school board disputes, about people’s comings and goings, new neighbors moving in, that sort of thing.

I’d bet that somewhere in her house there’s a journal where she’d jotted down the name of this mysterious suspect. If I can get in there, I might be able to find it. No doubt the police have gone through her stuff, but they might not have noticed it—almost all little girls keep diaries, but among grown women it’s much less common. I’m probably the only one who knows about them.

Or, maybe I’m not. Maybe the killer knows. Maybe he already found them. Or maybe he’s planning to look.

My mouth dries out at the thought.

There’s no time to waste. I can’t bank on the police finding them in time, even if I call in with the tip. If they’re still there, I have to find them now.

When I get home, I go straight to the junk drawer in the kitchen. I don’t bother with rifling through it. Instead, I pull it all the way out and dump the contents on the kitchen table. Somewhere in here is a key to Leslie’s house. We used to watch it for them when they went on vacation, water Leslie’s plants.

I sift through paper clips, receipts, old check logs, measuring tape, a gazillion pens—most with no caps—a package of pink birthday candles, a roll of stamps, and then voilà, I find them. Keys. About a dozen of them. I have no idea what they’re all for, but one of them has to be to Leslie’s house.

Two of them appear to be the wrong size for a house. Way too small. They might have been for the kids’ school lockers or a mailbox of some sort—maybe a key Darren used for work. I’m not sure, but I shove them to the side.

That leaves ten.

I pick up the one bearing the colors of the American flag, instantly recognizing it as our spare. I set it aside with the small ones.

Nine.

The next one I pick up is elongated, a Honda symbol on the top.

Eight.

The rest are all a mystery. Any of them could be for Leslie’s house. I just have to try them.

Palming all eight, I walk to the window and stare out. I’m anxious to race across the street and attempt to get in. But then I see Alex outside. He appears to be affixing something to his front door.

What is it?

I lean forward, straining to see.

He stands back to inspect his handiwork, and that’s when it hits me. One of those doorbell security cameras.

I close my fist around the keys. Everyone is on high alert. There’s no way I’ll get over there and inside undetected. As if confirming my assessment, Beth appears in one of the front windows, peering out the way Leslie used to do. Skin crawling, I move out of sight.

It’s probably not a good idea to try right now, anyway. Not in broad daylight with Detective Daniels poking around. I’ll have to wait until tonight.

I only hope Leslie never had her locks changed. And that Alex’s camera can’t see too well in the dark.





21





Third time’s the charm, I think as key number three seamlessly slides into the keyhole. Thank god, too. I didn’t want to be out here on Leslie’s front porch much longer. Not with everyone installing security cameras and special keypads in place of locks. Leslie seemed like the type to do something like that, or Leslie post-Heather, anyway. She suddenly, perhaps understandably, saw danger everywhere. It’s odd to me that she hadn’t changed her locks in ten years, especially knowing I had a key. Then again, neither have I, and I’m pretty sure she had a key to my house, too. I never even thought about it until now. Maybe she hadn’t either.

I glance around, worried someone will spot me, even though I’m wearing all black, and the hood to my jacket is pulled all the way up over my head in an effort to camouflage myself into the dark night sky. And it is two in the morning. Who would be up at this hour?

I had to set an alarm to ensure I would be.

Before falling asleep tonight, I’d done some research online about the doorbell cameras to find out how wide their scope was. Then, using a pair of binoculars I found in a box of Hudson’s old things, I stood in my front window, studying the positioning of Beth’s. So far none of our other direct neighbors have installed one, so I only have to worry about avoiding hers. I’m assuming it’s an initiative they discussed at the neighborhood watch, so soon they’ll probably all have one.

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