Once Forsaken

Blake Pierce

Blake Pierce is author of the bestselling RILEY PAGE mystery series, which includes seven books (and counting). Blake Pierce is also the author of the MACKENZIE WHITE mystery series, comprising five books (and counting); of the AVERY BLACK mystery series, comprising four books (and counting); and of the new KERI LOCKE mystery series.

An avid reader and lifelong fan of the mystery and thriller genres, Blake loves to hear from you, so please feel free to visit www.blakepierceauthor.com to learn more and stay in touch.

Copyright © 2017 by Blake Pierce. All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the author. This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return it and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Jacket image Copyright Pholon, used under license from Shutterstock.com.

BOOKS BY BLAKE PIERCE

RILEY PAIGE MYSTERY SERIES

ONCE GONE (Book #1)

ONCE TAKEN (Book #2)

ONCE CRAVED (Book #3)

ONCE LURED (Book #4)

ONCE HUNTED (Book #5)

ONCE PINED (Book #6)

ONCE FORSAKEN (Book #7)

ONCE COLD (Book #8)

MACKENZIE WHITE MYSTERY SERIES

BEFORE HE KILLS (Book #1)

BEFORE HE SEES (Book #2)

BEFORE HE COVETS (Book #3)

BEFORE HE TAKES (Book #4)

BEFORE HE NEEDS (Book #5)

AVERY BLACK MYSTERY SERIES

CAUSE TO KILL (Book #1)

CAUSE TO RUN (Book #2)

CAUSE TO HIDE (Book #3)

CAUSE TO FEAR (Book #4)

KERI LOCKE MYSTERY SERIES

A TRACE OF DEATH (Book #1)

A TRACE OF MURDER (Book #2)

A TRACE OF VICE (Book #3)

PROLOGUE

Tiffany was all dressed when her mother called out from downstairs.

“Tiffany! Are you ready for church?”

“Almost, Mom,” Tiffany yelled back. “Just a few minutes.”

“Well, hurry up. We’ve got to leave here in five minutes.”

“OK.”

The truth was, Tiffany had finished dressing several minutes ago, right after eating a delicious waffle breakfast downstairs with Mom and Dad. She just wasn’t ready to go anywhere yet. She was really enjoying a bunch of funny animal videos on her cell phone.

So far she’d watched a skateboarding Pekingese, a bulldog climbing a ladder, a cat trying to play a guitar, a big dog that chased its tail whenever someone sang “Pop Goes the Weasel,” and a herd of hundreds of stampeding bunnies.

Right now she was watching one that really made her laugh. A squirrel kept trying to get into a squirrel-proof birdfeeder. No matter how he approached the feeder, it would spin around and send him flying. But the squirrel was determined and wouldn’t give up.

The video kept her giggling until her mother called out again.

“Tiffany! Is your sister coming with us?”

“I don’t think so, Mom.”

“Well, go ask her, please.”

Tiffany sighed. She more than half wanted to yell back …

“Go ask her yourself.”

Instead, she called back, “OK.”

Tiffany’s nineteen-year-old sister, Lois, hadn’t come down to breakfast. Tiffany was pretty sure she had no intention of going to church. She’d told Tiffany yesterday that she didn’t want to go.

Lois had been doing less and less with the family ever since she’d started college in the fall. She came home most weekends and on holidays and breaks, but either kept to herself or went out with friends, and almost always slept late in the mornings.

Tiffany couldn’t blame her.

Life in the Pennington household was enough to bore a teenager to death. And church bored Tiffany more than almost anything.

With a sigh, she stopped the video and stepped out into the hallway. Lois’s bedroom was upstairs from hers—a luxurious room that took up most of the attic. She even had her own private bathroom up there and a huge closet. Tiffany was still stuck in the smaller second-floor bedroom that had been hers for as long as she could remember.

It didn’t seem fair. She’d hoped that she would inherit her sister’s bedroom when she went to college. Why did Lois need all that space now that she was only home on weekends? Couldn’t they trade bedrooms at long last?

She complained about it often and loudly, but nobody seemed to care.

She stood at the bottom of the stairs that led up to the attic and called out.

“Hey, Lois! Are you coming with us?”

She got no reply. She rolled her eyes. This often happened whenever she had to fetch Lois for one thing or another.

She climbed up the stairs and knocked on the door to her sister’s room.

“Hey, Lois,” she yelled again. “We’re going to church. Are you coming?”

Again, she got no reply.

Tiffany shuffled her feet impatiently, then knocked again.

“Are you awake?” she asked.

There was still no reply.

Tiffany groaned aloud. Lois might be fast asleep or listening to music on headphones. More likely, though, she was just ignoring her.

“OK,” she yelled. “I’ll tell Mom you’re not coming.”

As Tiffany made her way back down the stairs, she worried a little. Lois had been a bit down during her most recent visits—not exactly depressed, but not as cheerful as usual. She’d told Tiffany that college was harder than she’d expected, and the pressure was getting to her.

At the bottom of the stairs, Dad was standing in the foyer checking his watch impatiently. He looked ready to go, warmly clad in an overcoat, a fur cap, a scarf, and gloves. Mom was putting on her own coat.

“So is Lois coming?” Dad asked.

“She says no,” Tiffany said, lying a little. Dad might get mad if Tiffany said that Lois wouldn’t even answer her knock on the door.

“Well, I’m not surprised,” Mom said, putting on her gloves. “I heard her car pull in late last night. I’m not sure what time it was.”

Tiffany felt another pang of envy at the mention of her sister’s car. Lois had so much freedom now that she was in college! Best of all, nobody cared very much what time she came home at night. Tiffany hadn’t even heard her come in at all last night.

I guess I was fast asleep, she thought.

As Tiffany started putting on her own coat, Dad grumbled, “The two of you are taking forever. We’re going to be late for the service.”

“We’ll be there in plenty of time,” Mom said calmly.

“I’ll go out and get the car started,” Dad said.

He opened the front door and stomped outside. Tiffany and her mother quickly got bundled up and followed him.

The cold air hit Tiffany hard. There was still snow on the ground from a few days ago. She wished she were still in her warm bed. It was a lousy day to have to go anywhere.

Suddenly, she heard her mom gasp.

“Lester, what is it?” Mom called out to Dad.

Tiffany saw Dad standing in front of the open garage door. He was staring into the garage, his eyes wide and his mouth hanging open. He looked stunned and horrified.

“What’s going on?” Mom called out again.

Dad turned to see her. He seemed to be having trouble saying anything.

Finally, he blurted, “Call nine-one-one.”

“Why?” Mom replied.

Dad didn’t explain. He headed into the garage. Mom darted forward, and when she reached the open door, she let out a scream that paralyzed Tiffany with fear.

Mom rushed inside the garage.

For a long moment, Tiffany stood frozen in her tracks.

“What is it?” Tiffany called out.

She heard Mom’s sobbing voice call out from the garage, “Go back inside, Tiffany.”

“Why?” Tiffany yelled back.

Mom came running out of the garage. She grabbed Tiffany’s arm and tried to turn her around to go back to the house.

“Don’t look,” she said. “Go back inside.”

Tiffany wrestled loose from Mom and rushed into the garage.

It took her a moment to take everything in. All three cars were parked there. In the back corner to the left, Dad was wrestling clumsily with a ladder.

Something was hanging there by a rope tied to a roof beam.

It was a person.

It was her sister.

CHAPTER ONE

Riley Paige had just sat down to dinner when her daughter said something that really startled her.

“Aren’t we just the picture-perfect family?”

Riley stared at April, whose face reddened with embarrassment.

“Wow, did I just say that aloud?” April said sheepishly. “Was that corny or what?”

Riley laughed and looked around the table. Her ex-husband, Ryan, was sitting at the far end of the table from her. To her left, her fifteen-year-old daughter, April, was sitting next to their housekeeper, Gabriela. To her right was thirteen-year-old Jilly, a newcomer to the household.

April and Jilly had just made hamburgers for Sunday’s dinner, giving Gabriela a break from cooking.

Ryan took a bite of his hamburger, then said, “Well, we are a family, aren’t we? I mean, just look at us.”

Riley didn’t say anything.

A family, she thought. Is that what we are really?

The idea took her just a little bit by surprise. After all, she and Ryan had separated almost two years ago, and had been divorced for six months now. Although they were spending time together again, Riley had avoided giving much thought to where that might lead. She had put aside years of hurt and betrayal in order to enjoy a peaceful present.

Then there was April, whose adolescence had been anything but easy. Would her desire for togetherness last?

Riley felt even more uncertain about Jilly. She’d found Jilly in a truck stop in Phoenix, trying to sell her own body to truck drivers. Riley had rescued Jilly from a terrible life and an abusive father, and now she hoped to adopt her. But Jilly was still a troubled girl, and things were touch-and-go with her.

The one person at the table Riley felt surest about was Gabriela. The stout Guatemalan woman had been working for the family since long before the divorce. Gabriela had never been anything other than responsible, grounded, and loving.

“What do you think, Gabriela?” Riley asked.

Gabriela smiled.

“A family can be chosen, not just inherited,” she said. “Blood isn’t everything. Love is what matters.”

Riley suddenly felt warm inside. She could always count on Gabriela to say what needed to be said. She gazed with a new sense of satisfaction at the people around her.

After being on leave from BAU for a month, she was enjoying just being here at home in her townhouse.

And enjoying my family, she thought.

Then April said something else that surprised her.

“Daddy, when are you going to move in with us?”

Ryan looked quite startled. As she often did, Riley wondered whether his newfound commitment was too good to last.

“That’s kind of a big topic to take on right now,” Ryan said.

“How come?” April asked her father. “You might as well live here. I mean, you and Mom are sleeping together again and you’re here almost every day.”

Riley felt her face redden. Shocked, Gabriela gave April a sharp poke with her elbow.

“¡Chica! ¡Silencio!” she said.

Jilly looked around with a grin.

“Hey, that’s a great idea,” she said. “Then I’d be sure to get good grades.”

It was true—Ryan had been helping Jilly get up to speed at her new school, especially with social studies. He’d actually been very supportive of all of them in recent months.

Riley’s eyes met Ryan’s. She saw that he was blushing too.

As for herself, she didn’t know what to say. She had to admit that she found the idea appealing. She’d grown comfortable with Ryan spending most of his nights here. Everything had fallen into place so easily—perhaps too easily. Maybe some of her comfort came from not having to make decisions about it.

She remembered what April had called everybody just now.

“A picture-perfect family.”

They all certainly seemed like that at the moment. But Riley couldn’t help feeling uneasy. Was all this perfection just an illusion? Like reading a good book or watching a pleasant movie?

Riley was all too aware that the world outside was full of monsters. She’d devoted her professional life to fighting them. But for the past month, she’d almost been able to pretend they didn’t exist.

A smile slowly crossed Ryan’s face.

“Hey, why don’t we all move into my place?” he said. “There’s plenty of room for all of us.”

Riley stifled a gasp of alarm.

The last thing she wanted was to move back to the big suburban home that she had shared with Ryan for years. It was too full of unpleasant memories.

“I couldn’t give this place up,” she said. “I’ve gotten settled in so comfortably here.”

April looked at her father eagerly.

“It’s up to you, Daddy,” she said. “Are you moving in with us or not?”

Riley watched Ryan’s face. She could tell that he was struggling with his decision. She understood at least one reason why. He belonged to a law firm in DC, but fairly often worked at home. There wasn’t room for him to do that here.

Finally Ryan said, “I’d have to keep the house. It could still be my local office.”

April was almost bouncing from excitement.

“So are you saying yes?” she asked.

Ryan smiled silently for a moment.

“Yeah, I guess I am,” he finally said.

April let out a squeal of delight. Jilly clapped her hands and giggled.

“Great!” Jilly said. “Please pass the ketchup—Dad.”

Ryan, April, Gabriela, and Jilly all started chattering happily as they continued eating.

Riley told herself to enjoy this happy glow while she could. Sooner or later, she would be called upon to stop another monster. The thought sent a chill up her spine. Was some evil already lurking, waiting for her?

*

The next day, April’s school had a shortened schedule to allow for teacher meetings, and Riley had given in to her daughter’s pleas to let her cut the whole day. They decided to go shopping together while Jilly was still in school.

The rows of stores in the mall seemed endless to Riley, and many of the shops looked very much alike. Skinny mannequins in stylish clothes held impossible poses in every window. The figures they were passing right now were headless, adding to Riley’s impression that they were all interchangeable. But April kept telling her what each store carried, and which styles she’d loved to wear. April apparently saw variety where Riley only saw sameness.

A teenage thing, I guess, Riley thought.

At least the mall wasn’t crowded today.

April pointed to a sign outside a store named Towne Shoppe.

“Oh, look!” she said. “‘AFFORDABLE LUXURY’! Let’s go in for a look!”

Inside the store, April pounced on a rack of jeans and jackets, pulling out things to try on.

“I guess I could use some new jeans myself,” Riley said.

April rolled her eyes.

“Oh, Mom, not mom jeans, please!”

“Well, I can’t wear what you wear. I’ve got to be able move around without worrying that my clothes are going to burst or fly off. No wardrobe malfunctions for me, thank you.”

April laughed. “A pair of slacks, you mean! Good luck finding anything like that here.”

Riley looked around at the available jeans. They were all extremely skinny, low-waisted, and artificially ragged.

Riley sighed. She knew of a couple of stores elsewhere in the mall where she could buy something more her style. But she’d have to endure all kinds of teasing and nagging from April.

“I’ll look for mine another time,” Riley said.

April grabbed a bundle of jeans and went to the changing room. When she came out, she was wearing the kind of jeans that Riley loathed—skin-tight, ripped in places, with the navel fully in view.

Riley shook her head.

“You might want to try mom jeans yourself,” she said. “They’d be a lot more comfortable. But then, being comfortable isn’t your thing, is it?”

“Nope,” April said, turning and looking at her jeans in a mirror. “I’m getting these. I’ll go try on the others.”

April returned to the changing room several times. She always came back with jeans that Riley hated but knew better than to forbid her from buying. It really wasn’t worth a battle, and she knew she’d lose one way or another.

As April posed in the mirror, Riley realized that her daughter was almost as tall as she was, and the T-shirt she was wearing revealed a well-developed figure. With her dark hair and hazel eyes, April’s resemblance to Riley was striking. Of course, April’s hair didn’t show the streaks of gray that had appeared in Riley’s. But even so …

She’s becoming a woman, Riley thought.

She couldn’t help but feel uneasy about the idea.

Was April growing up too fast?

She’d certainly been through a lot just during the last year. She’d been taken captive twice. One of those times she’d been kept in the dark by a sadist with a blowtorch. She’d also had to fight off a killer in their own home. Worst of all, an abusive boyfriend had drugged her and tried to sell her for sex.

Riley knew that it was all too much for a fifteen-year-old to have had to deal with. She felt guilty that her own work had put April and other people she loved in mortal danger.

And now here April was, looking remarkably mature despite her efforts to look and act like a normal teenager. April seemed to be over the worst of her PTSD. But what kinds of fears and anxieties still troubled her deep down? Would she ever really get over them?

Riley paid for April’s new clothes and wandered out onto the mall balcony. The confidence in April’s walk made Riley feel less worried. Things were getting better, after all. She knew that right then Ryan was moving some of his own things into her townhouse. And both April and Jilly were doing well in school.

Riley was about to suggest that they find a place to eat when April’s phone buzzed. April abruptly walked away to take the call. Riley felt a flash of dismay. Sometimes that cell phone seemed to be a living thing that demanded all of April’s attention.

“Hey, what’s up?” April asked the caller.

Suddenly April’s knees wobbled, and she sat down on a bench. Her face went pale, and her happy expression collapsed into pain. Tears began to roll down her face. Alarmed, Riley rushed over to her and sat down beside her.

“Oh my God!” April exclaimed. “How could—why—I can’t—”

Riley felt a jolt of alarm.

What had happened?

Was someone hurt or in danger?

Was it Jilly, Ryan, Gabriela?

No, someone would surely have called Riley with such news, not April.

“I’m so, so sorry,” April said over and over again.

Finally, she ended the call.

“Who was it?” Riley asked anxiously.

“It was Tiffany,” April said in a stunned, quiet voice.

Riley recognized the name. Tiffany Pennington was April’s best friend these days. Riley had met her a couple of times.

“What’s the matter?” Riley asked.

April looked at Riley with an expression of grief and horror.

“Tiffany’s sister is dead,” April said.

April looked as though she couldn’t believe her own words.

Then in a choked voice she added, “They say it was suicide.”

CHAPTER TWO

Over dinner that evening, April tried to tell her family what little she knew about Lois’s death. But her own words sounded strange and alien to her, like someone else was speaking.

It doesn’t seem real, she kept thinking.

April had met Lois several times while visiting Tiffany. She remembered the last time clearly. Lois been smiling and happy, full of tales about being away at school. It was just impossible to believe that she was dead.

Death wasn’t a complete stranger to April. She knew that her mom had faced death and had actually killed when working on FBI cases. But those had been bad guys, and they’d had to be stopped. April had even helped her mother fight and kill a sadistic murderer after he had taken April captive. She also knew that her grandfather had died four months ago, but she hadn’t seen him in a long time and they had never been close.

But this death was more real to her, and it made no sense at all. Somehow it didn’t even seem possible.

As April talked, she saw that her family was also confused and distressed. Her mom reached over and took her hand. Gabriela crossed herself and murmured a prayer in Spanish. Jilly’s mouth hung open with horror.

April tried to remember everything that Tiffany had told her when they had talked again that afternoon. She had explained that yesterday morning Tiffany and her mom and dad had found Lois’s body hanging in their garage. The police thought it looked like suicide. In fact, everybody was acting like it had been suicide. Like that was all settled.

Everybody but Tiffany, who kept saying she didn’t think so.

April’s father shuddered when she finished telling them everything she could think of.

“I know the Penningtons,” he said. “Lester’s a financial manager for a construction company. Not exactly wealthy, but comfortably well off. They’ve always seemed like a stable, happy family. Why would Lois do such a thing?”

April had been asking herself that very question all day.

“Tiffany says nobody knows,” April said. “Lois was in her first year at Byars College. She was kind of stressed out about it, but even so …”

Dad shook his head sympathetically.

“Well, maybe that explains it,” he said. “Byars is a tough school. Even tougher to get into than Georgetown. And very expensive. I’m surprised the family could afford it.”

April drew a deep sigh and said nothing. She thought that Lois had been on scholarships, but she didn’t say so. She didn’t feel like talking about it. She didn’t feel like eating, either. Gabriela had fixed one of her specialties, a seafood soup called tapado that April normally loved. But so far she hadn’t taken a spoonful of it.

Everybody was quiet for a few moments.

Then Jilly said, “She didn’t kill herself.”

Startled, April stared across at Jilly. Everybody else was looking at Jilly, too. The younger teen had crossed her arms and was looking very serious.

“What?” April asked.

“Lois didn’t kill herself,” Jilly said.

“How do you know?” April asked.

“I met her, remember? I could tell. She wasn’t the kind of girl who would ever want to do that. She didn’t want to die.”

Jilly paused for a moment.

Then she said, “I know how it feels to want to die. She didn’t. I could tell.”

April’s heart jumped up into her throat.

She knew that Jilly had been through her own share of hell. Jilly had told her about how her abusive father had locked her out of the house one cold night. Jilly had slept in a drainpipe, and then she had gone to a truck stop where she tried to become a prostitute. That was when Mom had found her.

If anybody knew what it felt like to want to die, Jilly sure did.

April felt a flood of grief and horror ready to erupt inside her. Was Jilly wrong? Had Lois felt that miserable?

“Excuse me,” she said. “I don’t think I can eat now.”

April got up from the table and rushed upstairs to her bedroom. She shut the door, threw herself down on her bed, and sobbed.

She didn’t know how much time passed. But after a while, she heard a knock at the door.

“April, can I come in?” her mother asked.

“Yes,” April said in a choked voice.

April sat up, and Mom walked into the room carrying a grilled cheese sandwich on a plate. Mom smiled sympathetically.

“Gabriela thought this might be easier on your stomach than tapado,” Mom said. “She’s worried that you’ll make yourself sick if you don’t eat. I’m worried too.”

April smiled through her tears. This was very sweet of both Gabriela and Mom.

“Thanks,” she said.

She wiped her eyes and took a bite of the sandwich. Mom sat down on the bed beside her and took her hand.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Mom asked.

April gulped down a sob. For some reason, she found herself remembering how her best friend, Crystal, had moved away recently. Her father, Blaine, had been badly beaten right here in this house. Even though he and Mom had been interested in each other, he’d been so shaken that he’d decided to move.

“I’ve got the weirdest feeling,” April said. “Like this was my fault somehow. Terrible things keep happening to us, and it’s almost like it’s contagious or something. I know it doesn’t make sense but …”

“I understand how you feel,” Mom said.

April was surprised. “You do?”

Mom’s expression saddened.

“I feel like that a lot myself,” she said. “My work is dangerous. And it puts everybody I love in danger. It makes me feel guilty. A lot.”

“But it’s not your fault,” April said.

“So how come you think it’s your fault?”

April didn’t know what to say.

“What else is bothering you?” Mom asked.

April thought for a moment.

“Mom, Jilly’s right. I don’t think Lois killed herself. And Tiffany doesn’t think so either. I knew Lois. She was happy, one of the most together people I’ve ever known. And Tiffany looked up to her. She was like Tiffany’s hero. It just doesn’t make sense.”

April could tell by her mother’s expression that she didn’t believe her.

She just thinks I’m being hysterical, April thought.

“April, the police must think that it was suicide, and her mother and father—”

“Well, they’re wrong,” April said, surprised by the sharpness in her own voice. “Mom, you’ve got to check it out. You know more about this kind of thing than any of them do. More even than the police.”

Mom shook her head sadly.

“April, I can’t do that. I can’t just go in and start investigating something that’s already been settled. Think how the family would feel about that.”

It was all April could do to keep from crying again.

“Mom, I’m begging you. If Tiffany never finds out the truth, it will ruin her life. She’ll never get over it. Please, please do something.”

It was a huge favor to ask, and April knew it. Mom didn’t reply for a moment. She got up and walked over to the bedroom window and looked outside. She seemed to be deep in thought.

Still looking outside, Mom finally said, “I’ll go talk to Tiffany’s parents tomorrow. That is, if they want to talk to me. That’s all I can do.”

“Can I come with you?” April asked.

“You’ve got school tomorrow,” Mom said.

“Let’s do it after school then.”

Mom fell quiet again, then said, “OK.”

April got up from the bed and hugged her mother tightly. She wanted to say thank you, but she felt too overwhelmed with gratitude to get the words out.

If anyone can find out what’s wrong, Mom can, April thought.