Deeper Than The Dead by Tami Hoag Read Free Book Online Page A

this?”
    “Just making sure the machine is working,” he said, turning the thing off, rewinding, playing back the sound of Anne Navarre’s voice. She sounded highly suspicious of him.
    “And where were the kids then?”
    “Tommy and Wendy were away from the scene. Dennis Farman was right there, trying to see what was going on. His father was there. You know him, I suppose. Frank Farman.”
    “Did any of the kids say they had seen anyone else in the woods?”
    “No,” she said. “They talked about a dog.”
    “I don’t think a dog buried her there.”
    “That isn’t funny.”
    “I didn’t mean for it to be. I was being sarcastic.”
    “Nothing about this is funny,” she snapped. “And you weren’t being sarcastic, you were being facetious.”
    “Yes, ma’am.”
    “I’m sorry,” she said, looking away from him, crossing and uncrossing her arms. She reached up and tucked that strand of brown hair behind her ear again. “This situation . . . I’m a little rattled.”
    “I understand. It’s okay.”
    She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. She probably didn’t mean for him to see it, but she was wary of him. He got that a lot. Even the most innocent people could become nervous around cops. It went with the territory.
    “You’re not a suspect,” he announced.
    The eyebrows snapped downward again. “Of course I’m not.”
    She sighed again and looked at the ceiling, turning her head as if she was trying to get a kink out of her neck.
    “Do you know who she is—was?” she asked.
    “Not yet.”
    “No one has missed her yet. How awful is that?”
    The door opened then, and Principal Garnett ushered in a blonde woman and a little girl who was her spitting image in miniature.

9

    Wendy walked into the big conference room with its big windows and big table, and felt as if she were getting smaller and smaller. Even though she was way over having to hold hands with her mom, she was glad to be doing so in that moment.
    Miss Navarre looked angry at first—she was looking at the man at the end of the table—but then she turned and smiled a little.
    “Hi, Wendy. Hi, Mrs. Morgan,” she said. She had dark circles under her eyes, just like Wendy’s mom did. “How are you doing today?”
    “I’m okay,” Wendy said. “I’m just weirded out, that’s all.”
    “She had bad dreams,” her mother confessed. “So did I.”
    “So did I,” Miss Navarre admitted.
    “So did I,” said the man at the end of the table. He came around and offered his hand to Wendy’s mom. “I’m Detective Mendez from the sheriff’s office.”
    “Sara Morgan.”
    “And you’d be Wendy,” he said, offering his hand to her.
    Impressed, Wendy shook it. He was very cute. He looked a little like Magnum P.I. with the dark hair and the mustache—only he was shorter, and he probably didn’t drive a red Ferrari or live on a fabulous estate. And he was wearing a coat and tie instead of shorts and a Hawaiian shirt. That was the difference between being a TV star and working in Oak Knoll, she supposed.
    “I’m the detective assigned to investigate the case,” he explained as he motioned for everyone to take a seat. “So one of the first things I need to do is ask you and your friends some questions about what happened in the park yesterday. There’s nothing for you to be worried about. You’re not in any trouble.”
    “I didn’t do anything to be in trouble for,” Wendy said, taking the chair nearest to the detective at the head of the table. She straightened her acid-washed denim skirt and matching jean jacket, wanting to look appropriately grown-up and hip. Copying the style from a picture of Madonna in a magazine, she had pulled half her thick wavy hair up into a ponytail on top of her head.
    “Dennis touched her,” she said. “He should be in trouble for that, right? Touching a dead person. Isn’t that illegal or something?”
    “That depends,” the detective said.
    “It was all Dennis’s