Rachel Goddard 01 - The Heat of the Moon

didn’t mention it.
    To cut her questions short, I said, “Would you mind if I use a tape recorder?”
    “No, of course not.”
    I removed it from my bag.
    I set the recorder on the table, at the same time watching her pour cream from a tiny blue pitcher into her coffee mug. Her fingers were long and slender, the nails painted red. I could feel my real mother’s hands working with my hair, weaving long strands into a braid. But the memory refused to mesh with the reality of the stranger across from me.
    With a spark of alarm I realized she was studying my face, her eyes slightly narrowed. I said quickly, “Thanks again for seeing me. It can’t be pleasant to talk about all this.”
    “I don’t mind,” she said, dropping her gaze to her cup. A barely visible wisp of steam danced above the coffee. “It’s easier now than it used to be.”
    I sipped strong black coffee from my own mug, using the moment to renew my courage. “What were your little girls like?”
    Her smile was soft, wistful. “They were great kids. Smart, both of them. Cathy was a real tomboy, but Stephie was turning out to be a little lady. She was very feminine, even at that age.” Barbara stared into space and murmured, “Great kids.” 
    “It must have been devastating to lose both of them at the same time.” I needed to hear her say how much she’d missed us, how much she still loved us, that we were irreplaceable.
    All she said was, “Yes. It was.” She sipped her coffee.
    I waited, but she said nothing more. “Detective Steckling told me a little about how it happened—”
    “I can just imagine what he told you,” she broke in. She leaned forward and plopped her mug onto the tray. Milky brown liquid slopped out and splashed the side of the coffee pot. “That’s one reason I wanted to talk to you, to set the record straight after you heard the police version.”
    “Oh? How do you mean?”
    “What happened to my girls happened because the world’s full of loonies, just waiting for the chance to do something crazy. Their father had nothing to do with it, I can tell you that for damn sure.”
    She gave her head an angry shake. The shining auburn hair slid against her cheeks.
    “I appreciate how hard Jack Steckling worked on this case,” she said. “I know he was just doing his job. But he was wrong, putting so much pressure on my husband. John loved our girls more than anything in the world. We had a happy family.”
    A string of angry words popped like gunfire in my memory. He doesn’t want you…Hate you!…Slut…Hate you, hate you, hate you! Then the voices faded and I saw my father smiling down at me. I’d felt safe with my hand in his, walking down a sunny street, escaping briefly from the misery of our home. Barbara Olsson couldn’t possibly believe what she said. She was giving me the version invented for strangers.
    Groping among my jumbled emotions and roiling thoughts, I tried to find the right response, the logical next question for an outsider to ask. “Was your husband’s death an accident, or…” I trailed off, leaving the rest for her to fill in.
    She gripped the chair arms, her body rigid. “I guess Steckling told you it was suicide. Well, it wasn’t. You can ask the insurance company. They sure as hell wouldn’t have paid out a claim if it was suicide. The police said he felt guilty because he hurt the girls, but that’s just crazy. I don’t believe for one minute he had anything to do with it. But it’s convenient for the police to blame him, so they don’t have to admit they never caught the person that did it.”
    I knew I was venturing onto dangerous ground, but I couldn’t stop myself from asking, “Do you have any idea who could have taken them? Maybe somebody with a grudge against you?”
    “No. I’m sure it was a stranger.” She drew a deep breath and let it out, then ran both hands up under her heavy hair and lifted it off her collar. “God knows the police investigated everybody that ever came into contact with the girls. Relatives, neighbors, friends. People started hating us for it. But it wasn’t anybody we knew. I never thought it was. Some nut saw two pretty little girls, and he took them. Just took them.”
    Memory threatened to overwhelm me, claim my mind and senses. I couldn’t let it. I had to stay in control. “You must have thought a lot about what might have happened to them.”
    “Oh, God,” she said, and brought a hand up to her mouth.
    With a wrench