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“Oh, yes. In fact, she was in here before I was. I found her here after I called the police.”
She had the presence of mind to look around after finding a dead body, thought Gibson.
Gibson’s gaze roamed over the words until she came to where Clarisse had tried to obscure the writing.
“What happened there?” she said, pointing.
“I don’t know. Guess the folks who wrote it did that.”
“Did the woman give you her name? I think Detective Sullivan forgot to ask.”
“Yes, she did. I asked for that in case the police would want to know even though I ended up not mentioning her. It was, let me think, yes, Julia, Julia Frazier. That’s what she said.”
Frazier. The same name used by the lady on the phone talking to Clarisse.
“It seems that she’s gone missing.” That’s what was said.
Clarisse’s mother, perhaps?
CHAPTER45
T?HE DEPUTY SHERIFF WAS NAMEDBilly Dawson. He was tall with broad shoulders, and around forty-five.
Dawson said, “Fauquier County is pretty big, but very rural and safe. Now, you have some areas that aren’t as safe as others, but most of what we see here are property crimes.” He looked at the blood on the walls of Oxblood’s bedroom. “Not this.”
“I’m sure,” said Sullivan. “What can you tell us about Oxblood?”
“So you had a murder down in your neck of the woods that had similar elements?”
“The writing on the wall principally, yes.”
Dawson led them into that room. “Heard the phrase a million times. But you don’t see it written on the walls of homicide scenes. So you think it’s the same killer?”
“Trying to piece that together. So, Oxblood?”
“I knew Daryl. He worked on my truck and a couple of my ATVs, and some of my brother’s stuff, too. He kept to himself. His mother was the same. Just nice, quiet people.”
“Did you know anything about them before they came here?”
“No.”
“How long had he been dead?” asked Gibson.
“A few days, the ME said.”
Gibson looked at Cole. “You didn’t get suspicious when he didn’t leave the house?”
“I was gone for nearly a week. Visiting family over in West Virginia. And like Billy said, Daryl kept to himself.”
“Didn’t where he worked report him missing?” asked Gibson.
Dawson said, “I talked to them. They said Daryl had taken a few days off.”
“Any family pictures in the house that would show his father?” asked Gibson.
Dawson said, “Funny thing, no family photos. In fact, no photos at all.”
“You find his phone?” asked Sullivan.
