Once Gone (a Riley Paige Mystery--Book #1)

  Chapter 14

  They were just a short distance out of Sanfield when Riley suddenly crossed two lanes and veered onto an exit ramp.

  Bill was surprised. “Where are we going?” he asked.

  “Belding,” Riley said.

  Bill stared at her from the passenger’s seat, waiting for more of an explanation.

  “Margaret Geraty’s husband still lives there,” she said. “Roy’s his name, right? Roy Geraty. And doesn’t he own a filling station or something?”

  “Actually, it’s an auto repair and supply store,” Bill said.

  Riley nodded. “We’re going to pay him a visit,” she said.

  Bill shrugged doubtfully.

  “Okay, but I’m not sure why,” he said. “The locals did a pretty thorough job interviewing him about his wife’s murder. They didn’t get any leads.”

  Riley didn’t say anything for a while. She knew all this already. Still, she felt as if there was something yet to be learned. Some sort of loose end must have been left hanging in Belding, just a short drive away through Virginia farm country. She just had to find out what it was—if she could. But she was starting to doubt herself.

  “I’m rusty, Bill,” Riley muttered as she drove. “For a while back there, I was really sure that Ross Blackwell was our killer. I ought to have known better at first glance. My instincts are shot.”

  “Don’t be too hard on yourself,” Bill replied. “He seemed to fit your profile.”

  Riley groaned under her breath. “Yeah, but my profile was wrong. Our guy wouldn’t pose dolls like that—and not in a public place.”

  “Why not?” Bill asked.

  Riley thought for a moment.

  “Because he takes dolls too seriously,” she said. “They hold some really deep significance for him. It’s something personal. I think he’d be offended by little stunts like Blackwell’s, the way he posed them. He’d consider it vulgar. Dolls aren’t toys to him. They’re … I don’t know. I can’t quite get it.”

  “I know how your mind works,” Bill said. “And whatever it is will come to you eventually.”

  Riley fell silent as she mentally replayed some of the events of the last few days. That only heightened her sense of insecurity.

  “I’ve been wrong about other stuff, too,” she told Bill. “I thought the killer was targeting mothers. I was sure of it. But Margaret Geraty wasn’t a mother. How could I get that wrong?”

  “You’ll hit your stride soon,” Bill said.

  They reached the outskirts of Belding. It was a tired-looking little town that must have been there for generations. But the nearby farms had been bought up by wealthy families who wanted to be “gentleman farmers” and still commute to power jobs in D.C. The town was fading away and one might almost drive through it without noticing it.

  Roy Geraty’s auto repair and supply store was impossible to miss.

  Riley and Bill got out of the car and went into the rather seedy front office. No one was there. Riley rang a little bell on the counter. They waited, but no one came. After a few minutes, they ventured into the garage. A single pair of feet poked out from beneath one vehicle.

  “Are you Roy Geraty?” Riley asked.

  “Yeah,” came a voice from under the car.

  Riley looked around. There wasn’t another employee in sight. Had things gotten so bad that the owner had to do everything by himself?

  Geraty came rolling out from under the car and squinted at them suspiciously. He was a bulky man in his middle to late thirties, and he was wearing oil-stained coveralls. He wiped his hands on a dirty cloth and got to his feet.

  “You’re not local,” he said. Then he added, “Well, what can I help you with?”

  “We’re with the FBI,” Bill said. “We’d like to ask you some questions.”

  “Ah, Jesus,” the man growled. “I don’t need this.”

  “It won’t take long,” Riley said.

  “Well, come on,” the man grumbled. “If we’ve got to talk, we’ve got to talk.”

  He led Riley and Bill into a little employee break area with a couple of banged-up vending machines. They all sat down on plastic chairs. Almost as if nobody else was there, Roy picked up a remote and turned on an old television. He fumbled around switching channels until he found an old sitcom. Then he stared at the screen.

  “Just ask what you want and let’s get it over with,” he said. “These last few days have been hell.”

  Riley found it easy to guess what he meant.

  “I’m sorry your wife’s murder is back in the news,” she said.

  “The papers say there have been two more like it,” Geraty said. “I can’t believe it. My phone’s been ringing off the hook with reporters and just plain assholes. My email inbox is flooded too. There’s no respect for privacy anymore. And poor Evelyn—my wife—she’s really shook up about it.”

  “You’ve remarried?” Bill asked.

  Geraty nodded, still staring at the TV screen. “We tied the knot seven months after Margaret …”

  He couldn’t make himself finish the sentence.

  “Folks around here thought it was too fast,” he said. “It didn’t seem too fast to me. I’d never been lonelier in my life. Evelyn’s been a gift from heaven. I don’t know what would have become of me without her. I guess maybe I’d have died.”

  His voice grew thick with emotion.

  “We’ve got a baby girl now. Six months old. Her name’s Lucy. The joy of my life.”

  The sitcom laugh track on the TV erupted with inappropriate laughter. Geraty sniffed and cleared his throat and leaned back in his chair.

  “Anyway, I sure can’t figure what you want to ask me about,” he said. “Seems to me I answered every kind of question you can think of two years ago. It didn’t do any good. You couldn’t catch the guy then, and you’re not going to catch him now.”

  “We’re still trying,” Riley said. “We’ll bring him to justice.”

  But she could feel the hollowness in her own words.

  She paused a moment, then asked, “Do you live near here? I was wondering if we might be able to visit your house, have a look around.”

  Geraty knitted his brow in thought.

  “Do I have to? Or do I have a choice about it?” he asked.

  His question took Riley slightly aback.

  “It’s just a request,” she said. “But it might be helpful.”

  Geraty shook his head firmly.

  “No,” he said. “I’ve got to draw a line. The cops practically moved into my place back in those days. Some of them were sure I’d killed her. Maybe some of you guys are thinking the same thing now. That I killed somebody.”

  “No,” Riley reassured him. “That’s not why we’re here.”

  She saw that Bill was watching the mechanic very closely.

  Geraty didn’t look up. He just went on. “And poor Evelyn—she’s home with Lucy, and she’s already a nervous wreck from all the phone calls. I won’t put her through any more of it. I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be uncooperative. It’s just that enough is enough.”

  Riley could tell that Bill was about to insist. She spoke before he could.

  “I understand,” she said. “It’s all right.”

  Riley felt sure that she and Bill probably were not likely to learn anything important from a visit to the Geraty home anyhow. But maybe he would answer a question or two.

  “Did your wife—Margaret, your first wife—like dolls?” Riley asked cautiously. “Did she collect them, maybe?”

  Geraty turned toward her, looking away from the TV for the first time.

  “No,” he said, looking surprised at the question.

  Riley realized that no one would have asked that particular question before. Of all the theories the police might have had two years ago, dolls wouldn’t have been among them. And even in the harassment he was undergoing now, no one else would have made a connection with dolls.

  “She didn’t like
them,” Geraty continued. “It wasn’t like she hated them. It’s just that they made her sad. She couldn’t—we couldn’t—have children, and dolls always made her think about that. They reminded her. Sometimes she’d even cry when she was around dolls.”

  With a deep sigh, he turned back toward the TV again.

  “She was unhappy about it during those last years,” he said in a low, faraway voice. “Not having kids, I mean. So many friends and relatives, having kids of their own. It seemed like everybody except us was having babies all the time, or had kids growing up. There were always baby showers to go to, mothers always asking her to help out with birthday parties. It really got her down.”

  Riley felt a lump of sympathy form in her throat. Her heart went out to this man who was still trying to put his life back together after an incomprehensible tragedy.

  “I think that will be all, Mr. Geraty,” she said. “Thanks so much for your time. And I know it’s awfully late to be saying so, but I’m sorry for your loss.”

  A few moments later, Riley and Bill were driving away.

  “A wasted trip,” Riley said to Bill.

  Riley looked in the rearview mirror and saw the little town of Belding vanishing behind them. The killer wasn’t there, she knew. But he was somewhere in the area that Flores had shown them on the map. Somewhere close. Perhaps they were driving by his trailer right now and didn’t even know it. The thought tortured Riley. She could almost feel his presence, his eagerness, his urge to torture and kill that was becoming an ever more compelling need.

  And she had to stop it.