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“Maybe a month ago, on Sunday. After…” I was about to say the same weekend we had our group date, but instead I went with, “The day of Brett’s game against Minneapolis. It was thirty minutes to kickoff. Lo and I went on a walk down the driveway, and I saw a truck.”
“What kind of truck?” Travis asked.
I needed to remember. These details used to be easier to pull up because I catalogued them. I focused a minute, and then I saw it again, almost clear as day. “A blue Chevy truck. White on the sides. Blue top. Open back.”
“You didn’t get the license plate, did you?”
I shook my head. “First three letters were GWB. Maybe a four after? An eight? But I’m not sure. I’m sorry.”
“No. No.” He wrote that down. “This is great, actually. Anything on the man himself?”
“I thought he was a hunter. Sometimes they…” I tried to remember what the driver looked like.
Howard finished for me. “Sometimes they come around, checking out the land. Ask if they can use it.”
“Do you let them?”
“No. I’m saving it for myself and my son-in-law.”
Travis barely hid a smile. “Howard.” He inclined his head. “I know your son-in-law.”
Howard grinned before it faded.
“He had a ballcap on.” I could see him again. “Pulled low over his face. I was able to see his jawline, and it was clean. No beard. No mustache. White male. Trim body. Not skinny, just trim. Plaid shirt.” No. I remembered this too. “Blue and white plaid shirt. Grey also. He matched his truck. I thought that was funny, but I didn’t realize it until just now.”
Travis wrote everything down. “Anything else?”
“Yeah.” I squinted at the memory in my head. “He was holding the steering wheel. No! He was tapping the steering wheel. I stared at him.”
He stopped writing, his head rose.
“I stood on the hill and stared at him because I got a bad feeling. But I thought that was just because Brett had been concerned the night before, so that worry was in my head. Fresh. I shook it off, but yeah. I stared at him, and just before I turned around to go back to the house, he began to leave. I didn’t see him go, but I heard him.”
“You don’t know the direction he went, do you?”
I shook my head. “No, but the girls were riding bikes in the yard that day. Luna was riding up and down the driveway. She might’ve seen…” I trailed off, seeing the fury that lit his face.
His hand tightened over his pad. “Lo’s kids were outside?”
Oh no.
I swallowed over a knot. “Yeah.”
Travis closed his eyes before breathing in through his nose. “Okay. Okay.” He glanced to the living room. “Could we do the rest in there? Somewhere a bit more comfortable while Billie takes me through everything she knows about Ms. Wal—”
“Deandra and Martell.” I stood and led the way to the living room. “Their names are Deandra and Martell. Dee was my friend.”
31
BRETT
The detective sat down to finish questioning Billie, and once they got going, Howard cleared his throat and gave me a pointed look before disappearing into a back hallway.
Vicky sat down on the couch beside Billie.
“I’m good,” Billie assured me.
Right. I went in search of Howard, finding him in a gun room. He had a rifle in one hand and searched for ammo with the other. “You know how to shoot?” he asked.
