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But Leigh knew the truth. She couldn’t explain it as anything more than an intuition she and Troy had shared their entire life. It felt as real as the wet paper towel in her hand. Like the sensation she’d read about in a news story where a twin had known the exact moment the other had died, even though they weren’t together. She and Troy might not have come from the same egg, but their bond was stronger than most. They spent every day together. Making trains out of cardboard boxes, coming up with disguises and backstories for characters they’d created, getting him to eat his vegetables. She’d done that. She’d been with him his entire life.
He hadn’t just walked out of the church on Sunday night and disappeared.
He’d been taken.
Someone had taken her little brother.
Soft sobs trickled through her cracked bedroom door. Mom was crying again and… there wasn’t anything Leigh could do. She’d tried. Really. She’d offered to take over the cooking, to keep the house clean, to run the errands. None of it made a damn bit of difference.
She patted the long scrape from her bike pedal with the paper towel again and sucked in a hiss. Her bike had launched right out from under her when she’d gone down to the old mill on the river. She’d caught Troy there alone a few times, even when he knew he wasn’t supposed to venture that far from home by himself. By the time she’d figured out which way was up, the sun had started going down, and she’d been bleeding.
“No.” Her mother’s voice raised. Glass shattered, causing Leigh to flinch. “No! Don’t touch me!” Wracking sobs filled the house. “I just want him back. I want my baby to come home. You’re his father. Bring him home, damn it! Do something!”
A door slammed. Then silence.
Leigh tried to creep to her bedroom door, only managing to remind her parents she was home when the creaking floor gave her away. She froze. A knock sounded, and she jumped back. Her father wedged the door open, and her heart gripped in her chest. He looked so… broken. Hopeless. She’d never seen him like this. Neither of them.
“I’m taking your mom on a walk. Stay in the house. Don’t answer the door. Okay?” Her father threaded one callused hand into the hair at the back of her neck and tugged her in for a hug. “We’ll be back soon. In the meantime, I’m sure your mom would appreciate it if you could clean up the plate that broke.”
Leigh only managed to nod. Embarrassment spread hot up her neck from being caught eavesdropping, and she pulled away. “Sure, Dad.”
“Good girl.” He kissed the top of her head. “Be back soon.”
He left after that. Probably trying to convince Mom to come home. She got like that these past couple of days. Angry. Leigh made quick work of cleaning up the plate behind the dining room table. There were still shards in the wall. It hadn’t just broken. Her mother had thrown it. She took the dustpan outside to empty it into the big garbage can. No point in spilling more glass trying to get it into the bin in the kitchen.
The pieces clinked to the bottom, but one still managed to fall out. “Great.”
She bent to feel for the piece of glass, faced with nothing but darkness.
There was one place she hadn’t looked for Troy these past three days. He’d go there sometimes when he was upset. Especially after Derek’s body had been found in that shed in the Garrisons’ backyard. Troy didn’t know she knew about it. Everyone needed their space, and she’d tried to give him his, but he hadn’t been down there for months as far as she knew.
Leigh backed away from the garbage bins. Dragging the broom and dustpan back inside, she listened for her parents. No one was home. Her parents’ bedroom was off-limits, but she’d sneak in there sometimes to test her mom’s makeup or see what parents hid in their closets. What secrets they were keeping.
She cut through the house into the bedroom. The closet door was closed, and she tested the doorknob as quietly as possible. Just in case her parents came back. The hinges screamed, but if she kept moving, they’d stop. Grabbing the flashlight her dad kept on the closet shelf in case of emergency, she gripped the ring for the crawl space access leading beneath the house and swung it open.
A thread of panic flicked through her stomach. The black hole seemed to breathe. Leigh compressed the flashlight’s power button and shined the beam down into the hole.
She screamed at the small half face staring up at her.
But it wasn’t Troy’s.
Concord, New Hampshire
Sunday, March 14
9:00 a.m.
Visiting hours had ended during the week, but there were perks to carrying federal credentials.
New Hampshire State Prison for Men was the oldest prison facility in the state, housing minimum-, medium-, and maximum-security inmates. The building itself was starting to show its age. Worn red brick—cracked in places, missing in others—lined with curling barbed wire and chain-link fence stood guard. Chimney stacks on each building looked as though one soft earthquake or an artillery training from the National Guard would dislodge them and send them crumbling through the patched roof. Even the interior walls couldn’t be cleaned anymore.
The feeling of being watched prickled along the back of Leigh’s neck as she counted eight cameras mounted to columns set throughout the cafeteria/visitors’ area. White tile, minimalistic furniture, fluorescent lights. Not a window in sight. Too much of a risk. Sweat odors and something metallic settled at the back of her throat, and she worked to breathe through her mouth. It was no use. Bright blue chairs around rectangular tables and artwork suggested calm and a brightness, but she was circling through nerves and excitement at a mile a minute. She’d been stripped of the pen she’d brought to take notes and her phone. All she had now was the case file. Nothing to wring with her hands as the seconds ticked by.
Would he want to see her?
A heavy metal door swung open at the opposite end of the room, and two men stepped over the threshold. Manacles dragged along the floor as he moved. A connected strand of links hung from between his wrists.
Leigh stood, the chair biting into the backs of her knees. The navy uniform and white tennis shoes her father wore were so different from the plaid shirts and jeans she’d grown up around. Outside these walls, Joel Brody had been a god of home projects, keeping elementary-aged kids from killing each other, and taking care of his family. But in here… There was something missing. A spark she’d always been able to rely on.
