Born to Die - Lisa Jackson [86]
The room was a mess. Toys and books scattered everywhere, clothes near, but not in the hamper, his twin bed unmade. Light from the window, that eerie gray/white of a snow-crusted night, spilled over the rumpled quilt.
Gently, Trace lowered him onto the bed, then tucked the quilt around him. Sighing in his sleep, Eli rolled onto one side.
His son.
Trace’s jaw tightened at the secrets he’d kept from Eli. Someday he’d have to come clean, he supposed. It was Eli’s right to know that Trace wasn’t his biological father. But when Eli learned that unforeseen bit of information, the questions would start, and they would be as difficult as the ones fielded the other night, when Eli had been upset and demanded to find his mother.
And Trace wouldn’t have answers.
The truth of the matter was that Leanna had never revealed Eli’s biological father’s identity. Trace had surmised she might not know, and even if she had, she certainly hadn’t cared. Theirs had been a white-hot romance that had started in a bar with one too many drinks and ended with a brandnew pregnancy. Trace had done the right thing: he’d married Leanna and adopted Eli. He’d then eventually come to grips with the fact that she’d either miscarried or lied, because the baby she’d claimed to be carrying, Trace’s child, never came to fruition.
Not that it had ever mattered.
The fights had begun, the accusations flung, and one night she’d just up and left. He’d woken up to an empty bed. Her car was gone; her clothes had been cleaned out of the closet; her phone, laptop, and makeup were missing.
All she’d left was her boy.
Which was just as well.
As he stared into the room where Eli lay sleeping, he couldn’t imagine that he could love any child more. He didn’t understand why she’d left, but when the divorce papers came, and she gave up all custodial rights to her son, Trace had signed quick and fast.
There had been a few phone calls and a handful of visits, but they had petered out over the years. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d talked to Leanna. When Eli had called her six months ago, the phone had been disconnected.
You should have tracked her down.
He deserves to know his mother, no matter what kind of a heartless bitch she is.
For all you know, she could be dead.
Like Shelly Bonaventure.
Like Jocelyn Wallis.
He decided he would make a few calls about Leanna in the morning. He had a couple of ancient numbers he’d found on a scrap of paper in the desk drawer just last month, when he was searching for a new book of checks. One was a number in Phoenix—hadn’t she had a girlfriend who’d relocated down there?—and the other number was for somewhere in Washington, which he didn’t understand.
His thoughts turned to Acacia “Kacey” Lambert again, and he told himself to give it up for the night. Nothing sinister was going on. Strange things sometimes happened. Stripping off his shirt, then kicking off his jeans and socks, he fell onto the bed, closed his eyes, and let out a long sigh.
Kacey Lambert’s face formed in his mind, and he told himself he was a damned fool.
From her cell phone, Alvarez left a message for Jonas Hayes at the LAPD. Though she didn’t expect the detective to be working on a Saturday morning, she knew he’d hear his voice-mail message eventually and, she hoped, get back to her. She didn’t really believe that the deaths of Shelly Bonaventure and Jocelyn Wallis were linked, but she believed in being thorough.
And the fact that the victims resembled each other troubled her.
She left some food out for the skittish Jane Doe, but the cat was hiding again. Give it time, she told herself as she downed a power shake of frozen blueberries, banana, yogurt, and some wheat germ blended into a froth. “Breakfast of champions,” she said under her breath, then grabbed her gym bag and headed outside.
Of course the snow had iced over, glazing the walkways and gardens, but she eased her Jeep out of the slippery lot and onto the county road, which had been plowed sometime during the night.
Fortunately, traffic into the heart of Grizzly Falls was light