Bitter Falls (Stillhouse Lake)(7)

They now see Sam as a traitor, and still believe I was a participant in my ex-husband’s crimes. But I know Sam. I trust him completely with the most precious of all things to me, my children. And with my scarred, scared, closely guarded heart.

That frightens me sometimes. Letting anyone that close, giving anyone that power over me . . . it’s both thrilling and terrifying. But at moments like these it’s precious indeed.

I submit my finished reports, photos, and financial findings in the Kingston investigation to my boss. J. B. Hall owns the private detective agency I work for, and she’s a hell of a smart, tough woman.

She acknowledges receipt, and she’ll be the one to review the work, document the findings, and present it in a client-friendly way to the final customer. The board of directors won’t find it very palatable, though they’ll almost certainly hear about his arrest well before the report arrives.

I’m just as glad to not be on that end of things. I have too much drama in my life.

J. B.’s already sent me more work, I realize. I open her message. This is an odd one, she says. Cold case of a missing young man, and you’d think it would be the parents hiring us, but it’s not. It’s a nonprofit foundation. Maybe on behalf of the parents? It’s unclear, so go carefully. It’s so thin that really all we need to do is check the boxes. And it’s in your neck of the woods. Take a look?

I download the file attachment. It’s a not-very-thick police report about a missing person: a young man who vanished from a bar on a night out with his friends. He is—was?—a senior at University of Tennessee in Knoxville. The facts are slight and sketchy. Remy Landry, twenty-one years old, white, originally from Louisiana.

Remy had gone out with six friends on a Friday night and hit two different bars with the group. When they finally regrouped at the second bar, Remy was nowhere to be found. They’d all assumed he’d hooked up with someone and left, but texts and calls to his cell hadn’t been answered. He had his own car. It was found parked and locked back at the campus. That made sense; he’d ridden to the bars with his friends.

Surveillance footage attached to the digital file shows Remy at the first bar; the compiled footage shows him ordering drinks, dancing with his friends, chatting up girls. Seeing him makes me feel cold inside: he’s a handsome kid with an easy smile, strong and lean and agile. He looks like he’s on top of the world. The only odd thing is that he’s carrying a backpack. I wonder if that’s why the police assumed he was a runaway.

The second bar doesn’t have as much footage, but it catches Remy and his friends arriving at the club, and the friends leaving. There’s a note on the file that says the back exit had no surveillance camera, but that they’d viewed every minute of footage from the front. Remy had come in. He’d never left, not by that door. And he’d taken that backpack.

The police had done a thorough search of the club and turned up nothing. They hadn’t acted immediately, of course. The search had been done days later. Nobody takes missing college students—particularly missing young men—that seriously, especially if they don’t come home from a bar. Not when there’s no obvious evidence of a crime.

He’d been gone a long time before anyone believed it was a problem. And he’d vanished into thin air. No clues. No witnesses that the police had been able to locate.

And that was when I realized the date of the disappearance.

Three years ago.

I text J. B. This thing is way cold. Are there any new leads?

My business cell rings a minute after I send the text, and I pick it up to hear J. B.’s warm, confident voice. “You’re asking about new leads in the Remy Landry case, and we don’t have any. I’ll be honest, the police did a pretty decent investigation once they got on it. Not sure who this nonprofit is that’s paying for our work, but it seems like it’s church-related. I’m digging into it.”

“You sound like you have a bad feeling about this one,” I say. I know J. B. pretty well by now, and her instincts are razor sharp.

“I do. And yet . . . something happened to this young man. Regardless of the people who are putting up money, finding out what happened has to be a good thing for his parents.” She sighs. “You’re a mother too. You know.”

I do. The thought of one of my kids disappearing, never to be seen again . . . it keeps me awake at night. I know how much darkness there is out there.

I know the predators swimming in it like sharks.

“I can start by talking to the parents,” I tell her. “They’re in Louisiana?”

“The mom’s in Knoxville, which is why I’m sending it to you. The dad’s still living in their house in Louisiana. Running the business.”

I’m already nodding. “In case the kid shows up at the family home,” I say. “I’ll talk to the mom first, then.”

“Tread lightly, and be gentle. Their marriage isn’t in good shape.” That’s also not surprising. A lot of couples fall apart after the disappearance or death of a child. Especially an only child like Remy Landry.

“I’ll be careful. Did they ever find anything else? Something that didn’t make it to the file?”

“No. No cell phone traces, no leads from friends, nothing from bar patrons. Nobody saw anything. Like I said . . . it’s frustrating. Like chasing shadows. But if we can offer some closure to this family . . .”