AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Was this woman sure it was Gidget she saw?” Brogan prompted.
“She was sure. Even then, Vera suspected the girl was a runaway, looking a little doe-eyed and overwhelmed.”
Brogan traded looks with Lucien. “At eighty, Vera still suffered from guilt over this? Why would she feel that way? Is that a normal response to such a minor encounter?”
Marley answered for him. “For some people, guilt festers. It wasn’t such a minor incident to Vera. And the older a person gets, the more regrets they have. Logic doesn’t always play into the scenario. Vera never married and never had children. She was thirty-six when this happened and still had fifteen years to run her snack stand, fifteen years to dwell on what she might have done to prevent Gidget from ending up like that. In retirement, as age crept up on Vera, she began to dwell on this, obsessively so. In my opinion, she suffered from deep guilt over her lack of intervention.”
“I’ve been to that old train station,” Lucien remarked. “It’s like a ghost town over there. Someone should do something about fixing it up.”
“If you’re serious, you should talk to Nick Harris and Logan Donnelly about it,” Marley said. “They have discussions all the time about how to turn the property into something useful. But in 1978, trains were coming and going as often as buses. The depot was a thriving hub of activity. Vera saw all kinds of things. All sorts of people came into town on day excursions to the beach or to see family. They either stayed for a vacation or left the same day to return home. That teenager was the only person who didn’t seem to have a home to go back to. Vera’s words, not mine. And Gidget Jane Doe stayed here permanently without a choice in the matter.”
“So this girl was definitely from out of town?” Lucien quizzed. “If she didn’t know anyone, where did she stay during the week she was here?”
“I asked the same question. It came up during our sessions. Vera claimed she had no idea. But she did admit to seeing her collect money from Western Union. So someone must’ve known where she was. That was when Western Union was located inside the depot and not on Main Street. Another observation is that Vera swears she often saw the girl hanging out at the beach with an older male surfer known as Zephyr. I checked my notes before I came over here. Vera mentions this guy frequently, like fifty times. Vera was very specific about the name.”
“Do you think Vera would talk to us?” Brogan asked.
Marley shook her head. Her eyes kept studying her coffee cup. “I doubt it. Vera passed away last spring. I’m only here because the patient can no longer share what she knows herself. That’s why I needed Gideon’s input. I wanted to know if it was ethical on my part to share what Vera told me. Gideon and I concluded that if Vera held even a tidbit of information that could help identify this child, sharing the info was the right thing to do.”
Brogan laid a hand on Marley’s shoulder. “We’re glad you did. As vague as the information is, it’s a place to start.”
“Yes, but just because Gidget came in from Denver doesn’t mean that’s where she was from,” Lucien pointed out. “She could’ve caught a train in Chicago headed for Los Angeles and changed her mind midway through the trip. We need to check trains from 1978. Isn’t that train line called the Southwest Chief? Was it called that back then, too?”
Marley let out a sigh before taking a sip from her coffee mug. “You guys have a tough case to figure out. I don’t envy that, especially since I couldn’t give you much. All I know is that what happened to the girl haunted Vera until the day she died.”
“Do you think she knew more than she revealed?” Lucien asked.
“I mentioned that very thing to Gideon. I think it’s possible she held back certain details. But why would she come to me for help and then not tell me everything? It doesn’t make sense.”
“The guilt doesn’t make sense to me,” Brogan lamented. “Forty-five years later, this woman is still dealing with it. Sounds odd to me.”
Marley’s eyes clouded with regret. “I should’ve asked more questions. I must admit to treating Vera with kid gloves. At times I had to prod her into continuing, especially when she wanted to quit coming to therapy.”
Brogan shifted on the barstool. “Was her age a factor in handling her with kid gloves?”
“Not that. It seemed like it hurt her too much to talk about it, to revisit that time in her life. I know something about returning to a traumatic experience, even in your head. It hurts like hell. I didn’t want her to go through that. But in doing so, I obviously didn’t get down to the real problem. I do know she regretted not getting married. She revealed that she broke off an engagement once and never considered marrying again. She regretted not having children. Sometimes I used too many softball questions without digging deeper and getting to the gist of what haunted her. I should’ve pushed her more. She was reaching out to me. I let Vera down. I let Gidget Jane Doe down.”
“Don’t beat yourself up,” Lucien cautioned.
“Wait a sec,” Brogan realized. “You might’ve just hit on Vera’s major issue. Why was this so traumatic for her? Could she have witnessed Gidget’s murder? Could she have known the killer? Maybe the killer was this guy named Zephyr.”
Lucien started to pace around the kitchen. “We’ll need to ask around about any surfers from that timeframe who went by that nickname.”
“Guys,” Marley began, “surfers have all kinds of weird monikers. I doubt you could track him down by that. Vera did mention that young people back then hung out at the old arcade that used to be next door to the fish hatchery before the building burned down.”
“Sounds like the town’s changed so much that we’ll need an old layout of what it looked like in Gidget’s day,” Lucien concluded. “Murphy should be able to provide one for us.”
Marley slid off her barstool. “In the meantime, I’ll keep looking back over my notes and replaying the sessions I had with Vera.” She held up her hand. “Not on tape. I don’t record any of my sessions. Not anymore. It makes clients uncomfortable. But you could try interviewing Vera’s friends—if they’re still around. There’s always a chance she talked to someone other than me.”
“It’s almost as if Vera needed to get all this off her chest about Gidget before she left this world,” Brogan concluded. “If only Vera had shared all of it. Did she have any relatives? What happened to her house and her possessions after she died?”
Marley raised a brow. “Good questions. I’m not a lawyer. Maybe Kinsey Wyatt would know. She’s everyone’s attorney. Or you could ask Brent. The top cop is always the heartbeat of a town.”
Lucien nodded. “Great suggestions. We’ll make the rounds this morning. Maybe someone’s heard of this Zephyr dude.”
“Good luck,” Marley murmured as she headed out the back door before turning around. “There is one other thing you should consider. If Gidget was here in Pelican Pointe to see a relative and that person never came forward, someone is holding on to a mighty big secret—one they don’t want anyone to know. Whoever it is won’t be happy about you looking into this. And by now, you can bet the news is all over town.”
“What are you saying?” Brogan asked.
