"I, er, I don't know if you...Well, the Sheriff will be around soon, I expect. You'd best get home," he blundered, running a hand through his greying brown hair.
Rosa heard Cam draw in a startled gasp and repressed the urge to throw the Mayor a reproachful look. He was a good Mayor, after all, even if he was sometimes incautious with his words.
"Sorry again, Mayor. Come on, Cam," Rosa managed, successfully playing the expected part.
Cam followed her in silence, neither looking left nor right nor noticing how the children were making the most of the bright summer sun or the people they had grown up with or among. It was as if they were encased in shadow, keeping them from the world the other's inhabited.
Once home, Rosa distracted her mind by carefully unpacking the tinned food she bought, mentally tallying how long it would last, while Cam sat at the table looking lost.
"Can you call Lucia?" Rosa said, unable to bear the strained silence. "If the Sheriff is coming, she should be here too."
Cam nodded but had barely pulled out her phone when the front door opened and shut. Lucia appeared in the kitchen a moment later, her hazel eyes sweeping over the tins and resting for a moment on each of her sisters.
"You know then?"
"Only that a body has been found buried at Turquoise Valley," Rosa murmured, earning a muffled denial from Cam.
Lucia sighed. "I'm sure the Sheriff will come here to fill us in later if... if he feels the need."
Rosa nodded, then asked the question she didn't want the answer to but would go mad if it remained unasked. "Is it a woman?"
Cam squeaked, but mercifully Lucia shook her head. "Sheriff said it was a male."
Rosa felt the weight in her chest lighten fractionally. With no body, there was still the tiny hope that their mother may be alive somewhere in the world.
In the next moment, Lucia had spoken, and the weight swelled twice as heavy as before. "It is the same. Exactly the same."
Rosa met her eldest sister's eyes. The same. The same as when their father, Henry Kay, who had been found buried up to his neck in the golf course. Their mother had not been seen since, and for three long months, there had been suspicion thrown at her feet, but ultimately the evidence had pointed to a man who lived on the edges of town, who'd had several public disagreements with their dad —a man who had been imprisoned for life, who should not be free to repeat his actions.
Unless they got the wrong guy.
Rosa put away the last tin and leaned against the counter, a real emotion blooming in her for the first time in twelve years. For so long, she had wondered if her heart would ever restart, now as it tightened painfully with fear, she wished it never had.
3
Sheriff Earl Hardy shook his head as his small forensic team finally finished the exhumation, laying the unidentified man's body on the tarp. This was the sort of deja vu experience most people would prefer never to have. He looked at the small man and latched on to any differences that would make the deja vu end.
This man was short and slim. He had dark hair and skin of a natural olive tan, like the people across the border, nothing like Henry Kay, who had been tall, blonde, and pale as snow. He’d looked like a lost Viking dropped in the arid expanse of Arizona by some capricious god's trick.
"Sheriff?"
He turned his blue eyes from the body to the leader of his lab rats. "Any identification?"
"No Sheriff, though given the obvious signs of violence, I didn't expect any."
"You think he was mugged and then buried here?"
Dr. Fell shook his head, light brown hair catching the light. "The marks, and the burial for that matter, look too deliberate for that, but I'll only know for sure after we can do a proper autopsy. He's been here for at least a few days."
Hardy pursed his lips, then moved on to the next question. "You got a C.O.D. for me, doc? Or will that have to wait too?"
The other man nodded. "Afraid I do," his voice grew heavy with reluctance, and Hardy tensed automatically. "Single stab wound to the heart, delivered from below the sternum."
"You sure?"
"As sure as I can be before we get the body stripped and washed down."
Hardy let out a bellowing sigh, waving down Fell. He didn't want detail. This was already enough. It was the same cause of death as Henry Kay. "Bag the body. I don't want this leaking anywhere until you're sure, got it?"
"Like it hasn't already."
He watched Dr. Fell bend and give the orders to the others all the same, then turned to his officers.
"Have you completed your sweep of the course?"
"Yes, Sheriff," they chorused.
"Nothing unusual?"
"No."
The Sheriff shook his head again and replaced his hat, dismissing his officers to go door to door and see if anyone saw or heard anything.
"I'll do the Kay's." He added, reluctantly, but he didn't see how he could avoid talking to the Kay sisters about all this. Everyone would come to the same conclusion he had, experience the same deja vu. This was all too similar. It would probably be better if they avoided town for a few days, at least until Mayor Goodwin was able to make a public statement.
