That night I slept in the guest room. I cried until morning, clutching those earrings to my collarbone like I used to do with my daughter when she was little.
Shortly before dawn, I finally fell asleep.
I was woken up by a knock on the door.
I put on my lab coat and opened the front door. Two officers were standing in the doorway, badges visible and worried expressions on their faces.
“Mrs. Rhodes?” one of them asked.
I slept in the guest room.
My heart raced.
“Yes?”
The same officer looked over my shoulder. I turned around. Rick was standing barefoot in the hallway, still wearing his old lab coat.
“Ma’am, we need to speak with both of you,” the agent said. “We have new and important information about Hannah. It concerns the earrings she found yesterday.
She had an obstruction in her throat.”
Rick was barefoot.
“Have you found Hannah?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, her gaze remained fixed on my husband.
Then he said calmly, “Madam, it’s time you knew what your husband has been hiding from you for the past ten years.”
Rick didn’t say a single word.
I was feeling unwell, so Inspector Palmer led me to the sofa while Inspector Gomez stayed near the door.
Rick hadn’t moved.
“Have you found Hannah?”
“Mrs. Rhodes,” Palmer said, “Cheryl, the woman from the flea market, called our tip line yesterday. She’d seen Hannah’s picture in one of those old cold case reports, and something about Hannah’s reaction to those earrings caught her attention. Her son told her where the casket came from. It belonged to a woman named Judith, who died two months ago.”
The name was barely familiar to me. I’d probably heard it twice in twenty years.
“Judith,” I whispered. “Rick’s sister?”
“She had seen Hannah’s picture.”
Palmer nodded slowly.
“She was her older sister. They had lost contact years before they met. She lived in a fairly isolated rural area of Ohio, with no neighbors or close relatives. Since Cheryl’s call, we have discreetly investigated this information, reviewing Judith’s file, coordinating with Ohio authorities, and confirming that a young woman was living in her house.”
