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Marj apparently didn’t share my reasoning. “Why would you assume that?” she asked.
“I don’t know. It just seems implausible that someone could get away with so much and never get caught if there was only one brain behind it.”
That seemed to satisfy Marj. But not me. He was still red. And he was still lying.
“How come you guys never mentioned Luke Walker? I mean, I’m your sister, and I’ve never heard of this until now.”
“I was just a kid myself. He wasn’t really my friend. He was Talon’s. You know Joe’s friend, Bryce Simpson? The mayor’s son? He was Luke’s cousin. Their mothers were sisters. So Joe had an interest. I just tagged along.”
“Talon has never mentioned Luke Walker,” Marj said.
“Talon never mentions anything.”
Well, Ryan had us there.
“So what kind of things did you guys do?” I asked. “I mean, when you were playing detective.”
“We talked to Luke’s parents. But that didn’t work out very well because they were so distraught, understandably. They didn’t have much to say, and it was too painful for them to talk about. So that didn’t last long. We never went back to them after the first time.”
“Did your mom and dad know you were doing this detective work?” I asked.
Ryan nodded. “Yeah, I think they did. Remember, I was a kid myself. Joe would be the one to ask. He was the oldest, and he would have the best memories.”
If Talon had been almost ten, his memories would be as good as Jonah’s. Funny that Ryan didn’t say to ask him.
“So what did you guys do after talking to the Walkers?” I asked.
“I remember going into town to the police station with Jonah and Talon. We asked to see the chief of police, because we wanted to know what was being done to help our friend. They gave us toy badges and sent us on our way.” He rolled his eyes. “Jonah was so pissed. Remember, he was almost thirteen, and he considered himself a man. He demanded to see the chief, and then we were ushered out, and they threatened to call our parents.” He shook his head. “Crazy stuff.”
“Do the Walkers still live here?” I asked.
Ryan shook his head. “They’ve been gone for a while. A couple months after Luke went missing, they sold the property here and moved to Ohio, where Mrs. Walker was from. I don’t know what happened to them after that.”
“Do you remember their names, Ryan?” I asked.
“I was seven, Jade. To me they were Mr. and Mrs. Walker.”
“It’s right here in the article,” Marj said. “Luke Walker, son of Chase and Victoria Walker of Snow Creek. They owned a small ranch north of town.” She bit her lip. “North of town. I think that’s part of the Carlt
on Dairy land now.”
“Yeah, it is. The dairy bought it about a year later. Before the Walkers left, Talon and I used to—” Ryan stopped abruptly, his face going white.
“What?” Marj asked. “What did you and Talon do?”
“I don’t want to talk any more about this.” Ryan walked briskly toward the bed and gathered the articles in a sloppy pile. “This isn’t any of your business. I’m taking these back to Joe’s.”
He walked out without another word.
“What was that about?” I asked.
Marj let out a heavy sigh. “Damned if I know. There’s something that he’s not telling us. And now we don’t even have the articles. How are we going to figure out what they mean?”
I smiled. “We don’t need the articles. Your best friend just happens to be a city attorney and has access to all archives in the state. I can pull up copies of those articles tomorrow at work.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Talon
