He studied her carefully.
“Mrs. Parker, do you know any of the other women?”
“No.”
The answer came too quickly.
Detective Harris opened the folder.
He placed three photographs on the table.
My mother looked at them.
Her face drained of color.
“Mom?” I whispered.
She touched the first photograph.
A silver-haired woman stood outside a small brick house.
My mother's lips trembled.
“That's Eleanor Price.”
Detective Harris glanced at me.
“And this one?”
He showed her another photograph.
My mother's eyes filled with tears.
“Dorothy Mills.”
I stared at her.
“You said you didn't know them.”
She covered her mouth.
Then she began crying.
And suddenly, I understood that the nightmare hadn't begun with Alex.
It had begun years before he ever entered Mrs. Wilson's life.
***
My mother sat at the kitchen table while Detective Harris questioned her.
She told us a story I'd never heard.
Twenty-six years earlier, she had been part of a community investment group called the Willow Creek Women's Trust.
