Too Close to Home Read Online Free Page B

and had narrow noses, even white teeth and golden tans. Each wore short-sleeved designer-label knit shirts—his white and hers pale pink—over khaki shorts and athletic shoes designed for a fitness-club workout, not trekking through rough terrain. But their appearance made it clear that they had, indeed, been in the woods. Their clothing was grubby and perspiration-stained and their shoes were streaked with grass stains. Socks, which he wore and she didn’t, were hung with burrs and her ankles were raw with mosquito bites.
    Tina’s mother and father were also both bloodied by the wild roses and raspberries that invaded sunny boundaries between cultivated yards and the forest. Away from tended trails, their whiplike branches were difficult to avoid, especially if one wasn’t paying attention to them. The couple’s bare arms and legs were crisscrossed with long, thin scratches, and a tear on the back of Mr. Fisher’s shirt still had a few large thorns embedded in the ragged fabric.
    I tipped my head, considered the possibilities. Hope and instinct supported Chad’s assessment—ignoring their own welfare, Mr. and Mrs. Fisher had searched frantically through the nearby woods for their missing child. Missing because she’d wandered off, or because some human predator had exploited an unlocked back door or an untended child in the yard.
    Bitter experience suggested an alternate scenario. Tinawas murdered in the house and one or both of her parents had been so intent on hiding her body that physical discomfort was irrelevant.
    “Please, honey,” the husband was saying, “don’t do this to yourself. I didn’t know she’d figured out how to unlock the back door. Did you?”
    “No,” came his wife’s muffled reply. “But she’s smart.”
    “Yes, she is. So she probably went outside and saw a butterfly or a bunny and followed it into the woods. Nobody’s fault. So now, what we need to do is help Officer Tyler find her. Okay?”
    “Okay,” she sobbed.
    A moment later, still remaining within the circle of her husband’s arms, Tina’s mother turned her tearstained face back in my direction.
    “I’m sorry,” she said, still sniffling but once again coherent. “What else do you need to know?”
    I shook my head.
    “Nothing else. But I do need a piece of Tina’s clothing. Something she’s worn recently. That hasn’t been washed. Like socks. Or pajamas. Or underwear.”
    “I’ll get it,” she said eagerly.
    As she scurried into a nearby room, I opened the small, unused paper sack I’d carried with me into the house. When Mrs. Fisher returned, she had a pair of socks clutched in her hand. They were pink, ruffled at the cuffs and obviously worn.
    “Thanks,” I said, dropping the socks into the sack.
    With the Fishers in tow, I walked to the front porch where I’d left Possum waiting. With my body propping the door open, I held the open bag at his level. He nosed the fabric, memorizing the scent of this particular human being.
    “Possum, find Tina,” I commanded.
    As I tucked the sack into one of the exterior pockets of thesearch pack, Possum trotted past me to nuzzle each of the Fishers, his tail moving in a rhythm that I recognized as concentration. They stared, unmoving, probably unbelieving, as Possum walked past them and into the house.
    “Possum’s comparing your scent to Tina’s, sorting Tina’s smell from yours,” I explained. “Now he’s following Tina’s scent.”
    “Why doesn’t he keep his nose on the floor?” Tina’s father asked.
    “Sometimes he does, but mostly he picks up scents carried by air currents. When you’re searching for someone who’s lost, it’s more efficient not to have to follow the—”
    I caught myself and didn’t say victim. But the truth was that Tina was in terrible danger.
    “—Tina’s exact route.”
    Even without the possibility that her parents were involved in her disappearance, there were plenty of deadly natural hazards in the deep forests,