Once again Reese found herself torn. Should she stay and coax her father to spill the beans or did she need to investigate Paul’s claim?

“Damn,” she muttered. She unsaddled the chair like she was dismounting a motorcycle. She cut around the table and rubbed her father’s back encouragingly. If she needed to play the supportive daughter, then so be it. “I’ll be right back, Dad.”

At the opened front door, Reese saw Paul standing on the front lawn looking mystified. He turned as Reese stepped onto the small portico. Parked in the driveway was a single vehicle, a blue Toyota Camry with Utah plates. Paul’s car was gone. Her heart skipped a beat. She stepped down to the lawn and approached Paul.

“What the hell?” She said. “Did you leave your keys in the car?”

“No. They were in my bag.”

“You must have had a spare in the car.”

“No. I didn’t. Where is everybody?” Paul started toward the garage. Reese followed him. On the other side was the gate to the backyard. It stood open. Surely she would have noticed when they pulled in, right?

“Mom,” Reese called out as she skirted past Paul and went through the opening. “Mom?”

The backyard was empty. One visual swoop was all she needed to confirm that. There were no hiding spots and no other exits. “Damn it!”

“Call Gregory,” Paul said just as Reese reached into her back pocket. She dialed Gregory and the call went directly into voicemail. She told Paul.

“This doesn’t feel right,” Paul said.

Reese thought no shit but then wondered if he meant on a psychic level. “Are you picking up on something?”

“Yes. The whole thing just feels wrong. Like we’re missing something obvious.” Paul slowly made his way further into the yard, glancing this and that way. His expression looked far away, like he was listening to a message from beyond human hearing. She watched as he traced his fingers across the back of the plastic molded lawn chairs. “Try Gregory again,” Paul said inattentively.

Reese did as Paul said. Still no answer; just straight into voicemail. This time she left a demanding message that he call her back at once.

Paul snapped out of his trance and turned to Reese. “Gregory had his hands on my bag at the table. Remember?”

Reese thought for a second. Gregory had pushed it out of his way. Could he have been so clever as to snatch them out without anyone noticing? But what was the point? “Let’s go check your bag. They’re probably in there. I still think you left a spare in your car.”

“I don’t have a spare. Do you have any idea how much those fobs cost to replace?”

“Are you for real, Paul? For God sakes, with the money you make?” She gave his arm a shove as she breezed past him. “Come on.”

Landon Caldwell was slumped at the table as if exhausted from all the crying. Reese went to him and stood behind the chair. She placed her hands on his shoulders and watched as Paul rummaged through his bag. First the outer pocket which Reese noticed was unzipped. He swiped from one side to the other and came out empty-handed. He shot a glance at Reese. She wanted to believe the keys were in the bag. What did it mean if Gregory had taken them?

“Reese, honey?” Mr. Caldwell twisted his neck to look up to his daughter.

“Yeah, Dad?”

“I think I’m going to take a drive to Casey’s and clear my head a little.”

“Oh, Dad,” Reese felt like a boulder just landed on her gut. “I’m sorry.” She pulled a chair close to him and inched forward. “Casey died yesterday.” God was it only yesterday he died?

Her father’s jaw went slack and his eyes widened with astonishment. “What?”

“I think it was a heart attack.” From the corner of her eye, Reese noticed Paul had stopped pilfering through his bag. She didn’t know if he had completed his search or if he was listening in on the conversation.

Mr. Caldwell shook his head. “That’s horrible. I was so excited to see him. I can’t believe he’s dead, especially when I just talked to him.”

The gears in Reese’s mind began spinning out of control. “You told Casey you were coming?”

“I did. I called him Monday morning from the road. Your mom couldn’t drive anymore and I was still tired so I was trying to keep myself awake. We had a nice long chat.”

“Jesus,” Reese murmured. She looked at Paul. “We’ve got to take this to my place. We need to talk to you know who.”

Paul nodded. “Do you think he has anything to do with Casey’s death?”

Reese shrugged as her father looked back and forth between her and Paul. “What are you talking about?” Now wasn't the time to discuss violent apparitions. It would only lead to explaining to her dad that he wasn't hallucinating all those years ago. She wasn't sure he was ready to hear the truth about hearing Luke's voice.

Reese reached out and sandwiched her father’s hand in hers. “Dad, did Casey know about you killing Mr. Albreck?”

He looked away and Reese felt him tugging his hand away from her. She gripped it harder.

“Dad? Did Casey know about Mr. Albreck?”

He whipped his head back to Reese. The scowl on his face was frightening. He looked like something from a horror flick. Reese lurched back, but held her clutched hands so he couldn’t pull away. “I don’t like what you are insinuating,” he snarled. "I did not get Casey killed. You said yourself you think he had a heart attack."

“I’m not accusing you of anything. Just answer the damn question, Dad.”

Reese gave him a few minutes to calm down. His expression eventually drained away and he physically relaxed a bit. “Yes, he knew. He’s known from the beginning.”

“So he must have told you about Mr. Albreck’s body being found?”

Her father nodded.

“Why did you do it? Why did you kill him? Did he kill Luke?”

Mr. Caldwell leaned back in his chair and tried to pull out of Reese’s clasp. But she wasn’t ready to let go. Not yet. She needed some answers.

One of his eyebrows arched as he watched his daughter.

“Dad, I’m not a little girl anymore. I need to know what happened. There are at least two young ladies who might be in serious trouble, including your other daughter, my sister. You need to start talking.”

He didn't hesitate another second. One child murdered was more than any parent should have to endure. A second child murdered was just plain cosmically cruel. “I killed the son of bitch. Your brother came to me and told me he thought something was going on between Aaron Albreck and Heather. When I accused Aaron of raping her, he threatened me and you and the whole family. Two days later, Luke went missing.”

“He’s the one in the painting,” Reese said barely above a whisper.

“What painting?” Mr. Caldwell asked.

Reese ignored his question and said, “So then what happened?”

“That next day, Mother’s Day, I went to his house and demanded he tell me where Luke was. He just looked at me smugly and said he hadn’t a clue what I was talking about. I went nuts. I started tearing through the house, looking in every room, every closet. His wife was screaming she was going to call the police. Aaron told her to shut up and mind her own business. He was a cold motherfucker. He just let me rip his house apart trying to find some evidence of where Luke was hidden while he sat like a king in the living room." Mr. Caldwell shrugged. "After a while, I left. I couldn’t find one damn shred of evidence. A week later the prick sent me a cleaning bill.”

“Did you ever go to the police and tell them what you thought?” Reese asked. She released her father’s hands, confidant he would complete the story without further prompting from her.

“Of course I did, Reese. But missing kids back then was treated differently. They assumed like everyone else in town that Luke had just run away. And they certainly didn’t believe Aaron Albreck was raping a twelve-year old. Every cop on the squad was probably having fantasies about Mrs. Albreck. Why would he choose a child over his wife? Those kinds of things were unheard of.”

Reese leaned back, stretched her arms behind the chair, and took stock of what her father was telling her. Paul took advantage of the quiet and sat at the table. Reese considered asking if he found the keys but didn’t want to interrupt the flow of her father’s story. She released the stretch and leaned forward with her elbows on her knees.

“When did you kill him?”

“That day at the creek. When you took the gun from me.”

“Why then? Why not right after Luke’s body was found?”

“I didn’t know for sure if he killed Luke. I suspected it alright, but wasn’t convinced. I couldn’t kill a man for thinking he was guilty. But I knew damn well that little girl was pregnant with his child.”

“Heather?”

Mr. Caldwell nodded. “Casey told me. Said Mrs. Albreck confided in him one night at the bar. She was drunk and threatening to kill the son of a bitch herself. Said he had tried to make Heather have an abortion. When her mother wouldn’t allow it, he paid them off to keep quiet.”

Reese’s father slouched, looking defeated. “Luke had been right about Aaron. And somehow or another me blurting about it got my boy killed.”

Reese looked over to Paul. He was stoic with his hands clamped one on top of the other and scooted close to the table. “Mr. Caldwell, how did it come about that you and Heather have a child together?” Paul asked.

“Casey told me she tried to commit suicide some years back. He used to keep tabs on her, you know. Like he did with you, Reese.”

Reese contorted her face into a frown. “What do you mean?”

“Nothing intrusive. It wasn’t like he was spying on you are anything. But when we talked, he’d always update me on what was going on with you guys. Your mom too. She still wasn’t talking to me at that point. I knew you didn’t want me in your life, so he would just let me know is all.”

She was mortified. All those years with no word from her dad, she thought he just didn’t care.

“So you went to see her?” Paul redirected the conversation.

Mr. Caldwell pulled away from staring at the horrified look on his daughter’s face to look at Paul. “I did. I figured her depression was a result of her childhood trauma. I was right about that. So I told her the truth. I told her I killed him, that he hadn’t been missing all those years but rather was rotting in the ground.” He looked off like he was remembering something. “I don’t know. I guess between the relief of telling her and her feeling relieved she didn’t have to worry that he would someday come back to attack her, it just happened. She was a woman by then with a daughter nearly a grown woman. It didn’t feel wrong at the time. Afterwards I wished we hadn’t, but by then it was too late.  I told Casey to stop checking in on her, that she was fine. I would have felt like a stalker if he had. And we never spoke again until recently when she called me.”

“That’s when you found out about Addie?” Paul said.

Mr. Caldwell nodded.

Reese sighed. Mr. Albreck had nothing to do with Lucy’s disappearance and now Addie’s. He was dead. But she figured he knew more than he was sharing. He had to be the ghost haunting her house, having his little temper tantrums. It was too coincidental that his body was recently found. And if he could use enough energy to throw a phone at her head, he certainly could materialize enough in a medium’s presence to divulge what he knew, which Reese was certain was plenty.

“Did you find your keys?” Reese asked, even though she knew the answer.

“No. Gregory must have taken them,” Paul said.

Reese nodded in agreement. “Gather your stuff. We’re taking this to my place.” She turned to her dad. “Dad, you’re coming with us. We need your car and you need to be there.” She didn't bother to add she also wanted to go home so she could get her gun.

Mr. Caldwell fished his keys out of his jacket pocket and handed them over to Reese. He looked like he had aged ten years in the past twenty minutes.

“Shouldn’t we call the police?” Mr. Caldwell said. He rose from his chair, looking stiff and achy. He pulled on his jacket.

Reese studied her dad for a minute. He would go to jail if he ever admitted to killing Mr. Albreck. Reese was a firm believer in justice, but in this case, she had no qualm with keeping a murderer from going to prison. And not just because he was her father, but because he had done what she would have done if she had been in his shoes.

“No, Dad. No police.” She checked the table to make sure Paul had collected all the candles. He had said the muffins would be helpful in a séance, so she found a plastic gallon storage bag and dropped six of them into it.

Her father scurried the best he could behind her as she headed to the front door, with Paul bringing up the caboose.

“Reese, I know I did wrong. If I have to suffer the consequences …”

Reese turned around and stared hard at her aging father. "We’re not calling the police, and that’s the end of that. If we got them involved now, the girls might not survive this little game." She glanced over his shoulder to Paul and said to both of them, "This isn’t about them, Dad. It’s about you.”