“Well, before the cops get here, do you want to take a look?”
Her face paled, but she nodded grimly.
“If nothing else,” he said, “you could identify her, whether your sister or not.” He led the way upstairs and into the bedroom.
A few seconds later, Petra timidly stepped around the corner, reacting to the smell. When her gaze landed on the bed, she cried out, her hand slapping across her mouth.
Taking a step toward her, Cain wrapped his arm around her shoulders and asked, “Is it her?”
Tears poured out of her eyes, as she looked up and nodded.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, then motioning to the door, he escorted her back outside and closed the door.
“She’s been here all this time?” she asked, her voice little more than a whisper.
“Yes, it looks that way,” he said. “A sealant was put around the door and the windows, probably hoping to curb the smell, but also so the body would dehydrate and mummify versus decompose.”
“I know it’s hot here but still—”
“The flies already found it, and that was a long time ago,” he said. “So her body has decomposed some already.”
She shuddered at his words, but the sight of her sister was worse.
He just hoped she hadn’t noticed the incredible mass of worms and maggots in various stages on the bed.
“How could there even be anything left of her after all this time?”
“Depends on how many months she has been here. The forensic specialists will have to figure all that out,” he said.
She gave a bitter laugh. “Small town. This won’t be very pretty.”
“Maybe not,” he said. “But it doesn’t mean that it shouldn’t be dealt with.” He paused, frowning at Petra. “Didn’t you say something about a baby?”
She nodded. “Well, there was a pregnancy. Did it end in a baby? No, maybe not,” she said slowly. “I’m not exactly sure what the end result of that was.” Still obviously in shock, she just stared up at him. “For these last few months at least, she’s been right there,” she said. “That’s just crazy.”
“I know,” he said. “But nothing to be done about it now. Nothing more to be done for her, except to get justice.”
She stared at him. “This is—it’s just too unbelievable.”
“I’m sorry, Petra,” he said. “That’s the reality we have to deal with.”
She gazed at the scene out the front door. Then her focus landed on the old man, still outside on the ground. “Did he know?” Her voice was louder and angrier, as if she’d found a target responsible for the atrocity done to her family.
“I don’t know,” he said. “That’s something we may get some answers to, once he is conscious and sober. But honestly it’ll be a bit of a mess when the cops get here, which won’t be long from the sounds of it.”
She shot him a hard look and dashed out the front door.
Chapter 5
Petra bent over the old man on the ground and started ripping into him. She flipped him onto his back, partially mindful of his head wound, but, at the same time, desperately in need of answers. She gave him a hard shake, and, when he groaned, she spoke loudly. “Morgan, wake up!” she snapped. “I need answers.” His eyes fluttered open, and he glared at her. She snapped back. “A dead woman is in your house.”
But it didn’t seem to filter through the fog in his eyes. Yet he finally reacted when he saw Cain, standing behind her. The old man’s eyes widened in fear. She looked back and saw Cain standing there, like an avenging angel, his hands on his hips, glaring down at the old man.
“Who is he?” Morgan asked in his native language.
She answered in the same. “He’s here looking for your son.”
“My son is gone,” he said, tears coming to his eyes.
“No, not Barlow. Chico,” she said impatiently. “Chico.”
“A bad seed.”
“Well, that bad seed has been hiding my sister in his bedroom,” she said, her voice hard. “She’s dead.” He stared at her, and she saw the truth in his eyes. “You knew!” she gasped. “You knew and did nothing?”
He just closed his eyes and sagged back.
Cain reached out and placed a hand on her shoulder. “Didn’t you say he started drinking really heavily a few months ago?”
She looked at Morgan and then back at Cain. “You think he found out then?”
“I think he found out but didn’t know what to do about it. He said his son Chico took off, and he obviously wasn’t planning on coming back, if that’s what was here waiting for him.”
“Dear God,” she whispered, sitting back on her heels, her hands over her eyes. “This is the one time I’m glad my father won’t know or understand what’s going on.”
“I’m so sorry,” Cain said.
The sounds of the sirens grew closer.
She stood up slowly and looked at Cain. “I just … I just—” She stopped, completely at a loss for words.
He smiled, nodded, and opened his arms. She walked into them and burrowed against his chest. “To know that she was right here in recent months. I thought she was somewhere across Europe. I wondered about the baby, but I didn’t know and had no way to find out.”
“I didn’t see any evidence of a child,” he said, “so maybe that’s a good thing.”
“It’s definitely a good thing,” she murmured. “But now I feel like I should go back up there and make sure there isn’t a dead child.”
“You know there won’t be a live one,” he said, “and, if there’s a dead one, we’ll find out when the forensics team and the cops get here.”
She just shuddered and nodded. “They won’t like you having gone into the bedroom.”
“Maybe not,” he said. “We’ll just say that this guy said something to justify our actions.”
She thought about it for a moment, then nodded. “Let me talk to the police first.”
“The trouble with that is, we won’t know what you said, so what we say later could contradict you,” he warned. “You’ll need to keep it simple.”
“Okay,” she muttered.
When the cops arrived, she quickly explained what had happened. They took one look at her, at the old man on the ground, and at both Cain and Eton, then raced into the house. She knew that would be the focus from now on. It wouldn’t matter what Morgan had done. Not the shooting today or the heavy drinking he’d kept up steadily, because all Morgan wanted to do now was drink some more, so he wouldn’t have to deal with the next few months.
As it was, an ambulance arrived and checked him out, but he refused transport to the hospital to get any care for his head injury. He didn’t say very much of anything. Once they got him upright, he just sat on the porch steps and stared into space, with almost the same blank look that her father had.
Petra sat down beside him, speaking in their native language. “You knew all this time,” she said. “You knew how much my family had suffered.”