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Rafe's money was still on Buckner.
The man had means and opportunity. Motive was murky though. Still, Dani had worked for Buckner for a long time so it was possible she had uncovered something about him that had gotten her killed.
Rafe looked up from the report he’d been reading on Sandy Lynn when Bree pulled the cruiser to a stop in front of a small one-story house. It was in a modest but clean-looking neighborhood where all the houses were pretty much the same.
There was a white Ford Focus in the driveway, and according to the info Rafe had learned from the multiple calls and texts he’d made in the last couple of hours, the vehicle was registered to Nancy. It was still parked in front of the house, which meant she should be at home since this was her day off.
Bree hadn’t called ahead to let the woman know they were coming because they hadn’t known if Nancy might try to dodgethem. After all, she would know there’d be questions about her daughter’s paternity, and she might not want to answer them.
They got out, went to the door, and Bree rang the bell. They waited. Then, another ring. By the third ring, Rafe was figuring Nancy wasn’t home after all, but the door finally eased open, and a woman peered out through the sliver of space of a slide lock.
“No soliciting,” the woman said. Her voice was timid and cautious.
“We’re not.” Bree tapped her badge. “I’m Sheriff O’Neil, and this is police consultant, Rafe Cross. Are you Nancy Franklin? If so, we’d like to speak to you.”
The one gray eye that Rafe could see widened, and the woman made a hoarse gasping sound. “This is about Sandy Lynn,” she muttered. “You’ve found her. You found my daughter.”
So, this was indeed Nancy, and he could hear the grief now in her voice. The dread. It’d been similar to Wade’s reaction when he’d thought the bones in the grave had belonged to Tessa.
“We’d like to come in and speak to you,” Bree repeated.
That didn’t get Nancy moving. She stood there, the dread now an avalanche over her face. After several long moments though, she closed the door, and Rafe heard the rattle of the chain to let him know she was disengaging the lock. She then opened the door, stepping back.
She looked at them with those teary, fear-filled eyes that weren’t a genetic copy of her daughter. In fact, Rafe didn’t see much resemblance at all. Sandy Lynn clearly took after Wade.
“Did you find her?” Nancy asked, but then she waved that off. She went into the adjacent living room, sank down onto a floral sofa, closed her eyes, and lowered her head. “Give me a second first.”
They did. Rafe and Bree went into the living room as well, sitting across from her in two chairs that were the same color yellow as the flowers in the sofa pattern. They stayed there for at least a full five minutes before Nancy finally lifted her head, her gaze spearing Rafe’s.
“You knew my Sandy Lynn?” she asked him.
Rafe hadn’t been expecting that. “Why do you ask?”
“Uh, because I think I saw a picture of you on her computer. Something from social media, I think. You were obviously a lot younger in the photo since Sandy Lynn ran away eighteen years ago. And you were with a pretty blonde woman in the picture.”
There was a lot to consider in that handful of comments. The blonde with him in the photo had to be Tessa. And if Sandy Lynn had such a picture, then she likely knew who Tessa was.
What else had she known?
Hell, what else did Nancy know?
Rafe started with something easy. “Sandy Lynn ran away?”
Nancy nodded. “When she was twenty. She had a bad breakup with her boyfriend, and I think some girls at college were being mean to her. Sandy Lynn’s, well, sensitive and doesn’t always hold her tongue. That sometimes causes her to clash with people.” She stopped. “Just tell me if you found her.”
Bree pulled in a long breath. “Miss Franklin, I’m sorry to inform you, but Sandy Lynn is dead.”
Rafe steeled himself up for Nancy to fall apart. But she didn’t. Her eyes did fill with tears, but she blinked them back and swallowed hard.
“Yes,” Nancy finally murmured. “I knew she was. I didn’t want to believe it, but I knew it.” She pressed her right fist to her heart. “A mother knows.”
Rafe figured that could be true, but for those who “knew,” he’d seen others where it’d been the worst kind of hellish shock. He got a flash of just such a notification. Of a mother so consumed by the sudden grief that she’d been inconsolable.
That was a memory he had to quickly push aside though. He could barely deal with that when he was alone and had time to wallow in his emotions. For now, the focus had to be on Nancy and Sandy Lynn.
“How did she die? Did she suffer? Please tell me she didn’t suffer,” Nancy begged. “And when can I see her?”
Those were standard questions, but Rafe knew that Bree was not going to have an easy time answering them. Death was one thing. Murder was an entirely different matter.
