Chapter 2 - THE WOMAN WHO CAME BEFORE ME
Luke was still staring at my phone when Detective Grant asked me to put the call on speaker.
Daniel immediately shook his head.
“Not with them in the room.”
Grant heard him.
“Mr. Price?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Get them out.”
Luke’s expression sharpened.
“This concerns my house.”
Daniel stood.
“It concerns my client.”
“It’s my wife.”
“Not relevant.”
Celina grabbed Luke’s sleeve.
“We’re leaving.”
Barron did not move.
That frightened her more than anything.
“Barron.”
He looked seventy-eight instead of sixty-eight.
His shoulders had collapsed.
His face was gray.
“Seven years.”
He whispered.
Celina stepped toward him.
“Stop.”
Barron looked at me.
Then said the name.
“Emily.”
Luke crossed the room fast.
“Dad.”
Daniel moved between them.
“Back up.”
Luke stopped.
His hands curled.
Not fists exactly.
Close.
Barron stared at his son.
“She was twenty-nine.”
My skin went cold.
“Who?”
Nobody answered.
Detective Grant did.
“Clover, we need to speak privately.”
I looked at Barron.
“He knows.”
“Yes.”
“Luke knows.”
“Yes.”
“Celina knows.”
Grant paused.
“We believe so.”
Luke shouted:
“Believe what?”
Daniel opened the hospital door.
“You’re leaving.”
“I’m not leaving my wife alone with police accusing my family of something because they found a driver’s license.”
“Luke.”
I looked at him.
He stopped.
“You came here to make me lie about how my leg broke.”
His face tightened.
“That is not—”
“You told me to say I fell.”
“Because you did.”
I smiled.
Then reached toward the recording device.
Luke went silent.
Good.
“Leave.”
He stared at me.
For six years, that stare had worked.
Not because it contained magic.
Because I loved him.
Because marriage taught me to read his disappointment as a problem I needed to solve.
Because Celina had taught me that keeping peace was the price of staying in the family.
Because Barron showed me what happened to people who stopped resisting completely.
The stare had no power anymore.
Luke left.
Celina followed.
Barron remained.
“Dad.”
Luke’s voice came from the doorway.
Barron looked at him.
Then at me.
“I’m staying.”
Celina’s face transformed.
“You pathetic coward.”
Barron flinched.
But did not move.
Daniel closed the door.
Detective Grant waited a few seconds.
Then:
“Clover, Emily Foster was reported missing seven years ago.”
“By whom?”
“Her sister.”
“Where?”
“From this county.”
My heart accelerated.
“Did she know Luke?”
Barron closed his eyes.
That was answer enough.
Grant continued.
“According to the old case file, Emily was in a relationship at the time.”
“With Luke?”
“Yes.”
Everything inside me became still.
“Relationship how serious?”
Grant glanced at Barron.
Then answered.
“They were engaged.”
I stared.
Luke had a fiancée before me.
Not an old girlfriend.
Not somebody he dated casually.
A fiancée who disappeared approximately a year before he met me.
And in six years of marriage, nobody had ever said her name.
Not Luke.
Not Celina.
Not Barron.
No cousins at Christmas.
No old photograph accidentally discovered.
Nothing.
“They erased her.”
I whispered.
Barron started crying.
Celina had probably cleaned every trace of Emily from the house.
Photographs.
Cards.
Clothes.
Stories.
Luke once told me he had never been close to marriage before me.
I had believed him.
Of course.
“What did police find?”
I asked.
Grant answered carefully.
“During the search of the basement, officers found a concealed cavity behind a finished wall panel.”
“The license?”
“Yes.”
“And other personal items.”
“What items?”
“A wallet.”
“Some jewelry.”
“A scarf.”
“An old cellular phone.”
My pulse pounded.
“Anything else?”
Grant hesitated.
“A dark stain on fabric stored inside the same container.”
My stomach turned.
“Blood?”
“We don’t know yet.”
Then:
“The basement floor also contains an area that appears to have been repaired at a different time than the surrounding concrete.”
Barron made a sound.
Almost a sob.
Everyone turned.
“What?”
I asked.
He shook his head.
Grant stood.
“Mr. Wade.”
Barron stared at the floor.
“Mr. Wade, if you know something, now would be an excellent time to stop protecting it.”
Barron’s lips trembled.
“I told them we should call.”
Every hair on my arms lifted.
“Call whom?”
I whispered.
He looked at me.
“An ambulance.”
The room disappeared.
My leg throbbed beneath the blankets.
The recorder sat beside me.
Luke’s voice remained inside it.
Leave her there.
The broken leg can be her punishment.
I stared at Barron.
“What happened to Emily?”
He started crying harder.
Grant moved one chair closer.
“Barron.”
“It was an accident.”
The oldest sentence in the world.
Daniel said nothing.
Good.
Let him talk.
Barron rubbed both hands over his face.
“She and Luke were fighting.”
“When?”
Grant asked.
“Seven years ago.”
“The night she disappeared?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“At the house.”
My stomach tightened.
Same house.
Same kitchen?
Barron continued.
“Emily had been living with us for about eight months.”
I almost laughed.
So had I, after Luke convinced me moving in temporarily would help us save for a home.
Temporary became years.
“She and Celina didn’t get along.”
Of course.
“Why?”
“Emily didn’t like Celina opening their mail.”
My breath caught.
Celina opened mine.
“She wanted her own bank account.”
Mine too.
“She wanted Luke to move out.”
I closed my eyes.
Same architecture.
Grant asked:
“What happened that night?”
Barron’s mouth opened.
Closed.
Then:
“Emily found out Celina had transferred money from an account Emily shared with Luke.”
“How much?”
“About thirty thousand.”
“To where?”
“I don’t know.”
“Barron.”
“I swear.”
He cried.
“Celina handled everything.”
Emily confronted her.
The argument moved from the dining room to the kitchen.
Luke sided with Celina.
Emily said the engagement was over.
Said she was leaving.
Celina blocked the back door.
Luke took Emily’s car keys.
My chest tightened.
Grant’s pen moved.
“Then?”
Barron whispered:
“Emily tried to take them back.”
“From Luke?”
“From the table.”
“Celina grabbed her.”
“How?”
“Arm.”
“Then?”
Barron looked like he might vomit.
“There was a fireplace poker.”
My heart stopped.
“The kitchen had an old wood stove then.”
“Celina picked it up.”
“She said Emily was not walking out after stealing from the family.”
“Stealing?”
“Celina said the thirty thousand was family money.”
Barron swallowed.
“Emily laughed.”
That was when Celina swung.
Once.
The poker struck Emily near the shoulder.
She fell.
Hit the edge of the basement stair opening.
Then disappeared downward.
I could hear the story without hearing the sound.
Maybe because my own bones remembered falling.
Barron covered his mouth.
“She was alive.”
Grant leaned forward.
“After the fall?”
“Yes.”
“Conscious?”
“At first.”
“Could she speak?”
“Yes.”
“What did she say?”
Barron looked at me.
“Hospital.”
My stomach twisted.
“She asked Luke to take her to a hospital.”
I started crying.
Not loudly.
Barron continued.
“Luke wanted to.”
“For maybe a minute.”
“Then Celina said if they called an ambulance, Emily would tell police she’d been attacked.”
“That Luke would lose his job.”
“That Celina would be arrested.”
Grant’s voice sharpened.
“So they withheld medical care.”
Barron nodded.
“I kept saying we should call.”
“Did you?”
Silence.
“No.”
Exactly.
Same as me.
A glass of water six feet away.
I can’t.
Not couldn’t.
Wouldn’t.
“What happened to Emily?”
I asked.
Barron shook.
“She got worse.”
“How long?”
“Hours.”
I closed my eyes.
“How many?”
“Maybe four.”
Grant asked:
“Then?”
“She stopped answering.”
Silence.
No one moved.
“Did she die in the basement?”
Barron cried.
“Yes.”
The word fell into the room like something physical.
I thought of a woman I had never met.
Twenty-nine.
Engaged.
Trying to leave.
Asking for a hospital.
Listening to the same people decide consequences mattered more than her body.
And she died.
“What did you do?”
Grant asked.
Barron’s answer barely carried.
“Celina said we couldn’t call anyone.”
“Luke was crying.”
“He kept saying his life was over.”
Not Emily’s.
His.
Of course.
“What happened to the body?”
Grant asked.
Barron looked toward the window.
“The old cistern.”
My whole body went cold.
“There’s a sealed cistern beyond the tree line behind the barn.”
“The farmhouse used to use it before the county water connection.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
Grant stood immediately.
“Did you place Emily Foster’s body there?”
Barron started sobbing.
“I helped.”
The words became difficult.
“Luke carried her shoulders.”
“I carried her legs.”
“Celina held the flashlight.”
For several seconds, the only sound in my hospital room was the machine beside my bed.
Grant stepped toward the door.
Then stopped.
“Barron Wade, I need you not to leave.”
He laughed bitterly.
“I wasn’t planning to.”
She called another officer.
Within minutes, police took Barron into custody for questioning.
As they escorted him out, he looked at me.
“I’m sorry.”
I stared.
Not cruelly.
Not kindly.
“You had seven years.”
His eyes closed.
“Yes.”
Then he left.
Daniel sat beside my bed.
Neither of us spoke.
My phone vibrated.
Rachel.
I could not answer.
Not yet.
I looked at the cast covering my leg.
Then the recorder.
Then the door where Barron disappeared.
“I almost became Emily.”
Daniel’s face changed.
“No.”
“I did.”
“If Mrs. Patterson hadn’t heard me…”
My voice broke.
“If the recorder battery died…”
“If I couldn’t reach the door…”
Daniel said nothing because lies would not help.
That night, police searched the wooded section behind the Wade farmhouse.
They opened the sealed cistern at 10:41 p.m.
Detective Grant called me shortly after midnight.
“We found human remains.”
I closed my eyes.
“Emily?”
“We need forensic confirmation.”
“But?”
“The remains are female.”
“Clothing is consistent with what Emily was last seen wearing.”
I started crying.
Seven years.
Under trees.
Behind a house where the Wades ate Sunday dinners.
Celebrated birthdays.
Opened Christmas gifts.
Watched television.
Seven years while Luke slept beside me and told me I worried too much about his mother.
Grant continued:
“There’s something else.”
My stomach tightened.
“What?”
“Near the remains we found a metal object.”
“What kind?”
“A fireplace poker.”
I stopped breathing.
They had buried the weapon with her.
May you like
Not because they believed nobody would find it.
Because they believed nobody would ever be allowed to look.
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