“You guys are probably right. Ok, we tell everybody we hang out with. Let them know what’s going on. Let’s call a kick the can game tonight and spread the word.”
Ellie smiled and leaned against him. He hoped they weren’t making a huge mistake.
Jaxon and Sally arrived at June Littleton’s house in Reston late that afternoon. She was expecting them. Sally had called and asked if they could come by and talk to her about her son’s case. Sally said she seemed somewhat distant, but agreed to see them.
Knocking on the door, Jaxon said, “You got this, right?”
Sally nodded.
The door opened and a woman in her late fifties scowled at them from behind a screened door. She wore a cheap flower print dress with a mismatched belt cinched around her waist, tight, so that her belly hung over it. Her feet were bare and she held a dishrag in her right hand.
“You the police officers?” she said.
“Yes ma’am,” Sally said. “I’m Detective Winston and this is Detective Jennings. May we come in?”
“I’d rather you didn’t. My Mister is napping and I don’t want you wakin’ him. What do you want?”
“Is your ‘Mister,’ Stewart’s Father?”
She seemed to flinch a little at the mention of her son’s name. She wrung her hands in the dishrag and said, “No. That man is long gone. Hell, he wasn’t around much anyway when he was here. Why?”
Sally nodded. “Things like this are never easy, ma’am and I know you’ve been waiting a long time for something to surface in regards to your son. I think we’ve found him, but we need you to come with us and identify him. Could you do that?”
Her face did not change, but her hands stopped the constant wringing of the rag and she sagged against the doorframe. “Is he…?”
Sally nodded. “I’m sorry Mrs. Littleton. I know you must be upset, but it is very important you identify him for us. To be sure. Can you do that?”
She nodded her head slowly, eyes transfixed on some distant object. Then, she seemed to remember they were there. “I’ll get my things,” she whispered, and disappeared back inside. She returned a moment later with her purse and a pair of flat white shoes that clashed with the off-white patterned dress. She shuffled along next to them as they escorted her to the car.
At the morgue, Boris alerted Dr. Barstow and he got Stewart ready for them as they helped her back to Bay C. Before they entered she said, “Will I be able to tell it’s him?”
“I believe so, Mrs. Littleton,” Sally said.
“June. Call me June.”
Sally smiled. “Yes, June. I think you’ll be able to tell us if he’s your son or not.”
She nodded and seemed to shrink a little as they pushed through the door. Dr. Barstow waited for them next to the sliding tray and introduced himself to her before pulling back the plastic sheet.
She gasped.
She reached out to touch his face and then recoiled ever so slightly at the feel of him. Then, she began softly crying. Jaxon felt that was as good a confirmation as anyone could give.
“He’s still so young,” she said. “Have you had him here this whole time?”
“No ma’am,” Sally said. “He was found in a neighborhood swimming pool five months ago. We weren’t able to identify him until today.”
“But how can he look the same? Shouldn’t he have…uh…”
“We think his murderer kept him frozen all this time,” Jaxon said, and she flinched at his voice. It was the first time he had spoken since they met.
“Frozen?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Why would anyone do that?”
“I don’t know, June,” Sally said. “Whoever did this to your son is a very demented individual.”
“You don’t know who did this?”
“Not yet,” Sally said, “but we’ve made some progress and we will catch him.”
June turned back to her son. “Twenty seven years. He would be thirty nine now.” A single tear tracked down her face and then she began to sob. Sally went to her and put an arm around her. Jaxon knew exactly how she felt.
Chapter 22
That evening, everyone was there, even Patrick. Luke wasn’t sure if Patrick was still sore at them and he guessed it didn’t matter. This was more important than any petty differences they may have had.
All the kids knew about most of the stuff, but the Facebook friend William Smith, and the text messages and phone calls Luke and Ellie had gotten were all new to them. ‘George,’ the pool dummy, drew a few laughs but most were shocked at how the dummy had been traded for a real dead boy.
“That must have been a shocker for you guys,” Ralph said.
“I about crapped my pants,” John said.
Luke’s older sister, Deana, looked mad. “I think you guys are stupid,” she said. “The police need to know about this and you idiots are keeping it from them.”
“Didn’t you hear a single word I said?” Luke asked. “He threatened Ellie and me, and said that if we told anyone, he would kill us. Don’t you think we would have done something by now if we didn’t have that hanging over our heads?”
“The police can protect you,” Deana said.
“Like they protected Paul?” Alan shot back.
“Paul was out all by himself. No one could have helped him,” Deana said.
“That’s right,” Luke said. “Paul was out all by himself and that’s what we need to make sure doesn’t happen to the rest of us. We stick together. Nobody goes anywhere alone. Nobody talks about what we know unless it’s with each other. Nobody keeps any secrets from the rest of the group. Something happens, you tell us.”
“I still don’t like it,” Deana said.
“Deana, we’re trusting you,” Ellie said. “Luke didn’t want to tell you all because he thought the group couldn’t keep it to themselves. Please don’t prove him right. We need help, and we wanted to make sure everybody else was safe. I convinced him to break the silence, but if you involve any adults at this point, you could be hurting your brother. And me.”
Deana was quiet for a minute, then finally said, “Alright, I’ll keep quiet for now. But if I feel like you guys are being dumber than normal, I’ll involve the police.”
“Come to us first,” Luke said. “If we go to the police, it will be a group decision. Ok?”
Everybody agreed, even Deana.
“Now that’s out of the way,” Jimmy said, “let’s play.”
Luke thought it had been the best game they had played in a long time.
Chapter 23
Luke, Ellie, Jimmy, and John were always the first at the pool in the morning. It was their job to open up. Jimmy pulled the keys from his gym bag and unlocked the gate. They split up with Luke and John opening the locker rooms, while Jimmy checked the pump house and Ellie started working on the lane dividers.
Luke was singing in the locker room, the echo creating a cool sound, when he heard Ellie scream.
