Chapter 5: What Linda Knew
Three days went by.
On the fourth morning, Detective Reyes called.
"We found something in the vehicle," she said.
"I'd like you to come in."
"What did you find?"
"I'd rather show you in person."
Karen came with me.
She was sixty-one, retired, and had the particular calm of someone who had raised four children and survived a house fire.
She held my hand in the waiting room without being asked.
Reyes brought us into a small room with a table and a laptop.
She turned the screen toward us.
"This was recovered from inside the spare tire compartment," she said.
It was a phone.
Photographed in an evidence bag, still coated in grime.
Cracked screen.
The kind of cheap prepaid model you bought at a gas station.
"It still had partial charge when we found it," Reyes said.
"Enough to extract the data."
She clicked to the next image.
A screenshot of a text conversation.
The contact name at the top read: *L.*
I leaned forward.
The last message in the chain, sent from Daniel's phone to L., was dated the night before he disappeared.
*I know what you two did.
I have proof.
If you don't tell me the truth by tomorrow I'm going to the police.*
Below it, one reply from L.
*Don't do anything stupid Daniel.
We can talk.
Come over tonight.*
He had never come home.
Karen's hand tightened on mine.
"L.," I said.
Reyes nodded.
"Linda," I said.
"We can't confirm that from the initial alone," Reyes said carefully.
"But we are executing a search warrant on your neighbor's property this morning."
I thought about the six months of driveway arguments.
The screaming.
The paint.
Linda standing on her lawn at 7 a.m.
in her pajamas, already knowing — I understood now — already knowing exactly what the police were going to find.
She hadn't poured paint on my car out of anger about the driveway.
She had poured paint on my car to hide those letters.
She had known for three years what was sitting twelve feet from her front window.
"She was trying to cover it up," I said.
"The whole driveway argument — she wanted access to my car.
She wanted to be able to get close to it without it looking strange."
Reyes said nothing.
But she didn't redirect me either.
"She waited," I said.
"She waited until she had a reason — the towing, the fight — and then she used it."
Karen spoke for the first time.
"She poured paint on a stolen car to hide a missing man's VIN number."
"Yes," Reyes said quietly.
The room was very still.
"What about Gary Pelton?" I asked.
"We've been looking for Mr.
Pelton since yesterday morning," Reyes said.
"He moved eighteen months ago.
The forwarding address he left with his landlord doesn't exist."
I thought about Ruth Marsh.
Waiting two years.
Calling the police.
Being told to be patient.
"Does Ruth know?" I asked.
"About the phone?"
"She's been notified that new evidence has been recovered.
I haven't shared the specifics yet."
"She deserves to know."
"She will," Reyes said.
"I promise you that."
I looked at the screenshot on the screen one more time.
*Don't do anything stupid Daniel.
We can talk.
Come over tonight.*
He had trusted her.
He had gone.
Outside, I heard the distant sound of a car door.
May you like
Then another.
The search warrant team had arrived at Linda's house.
