FOUR

Whatever favors Chief Henderson could call in, he did. By the time the sun slipped behind the Oquirrh Mountains, someone from the Pleasant View City Police Department had looked at every inch of Heber’s car. As expected, most of the prints weren’t in any databases. Aside from Heber’s own prints, they were able to identify only one other set, from a man named Caleb Monson. Those prints were on the driver’s door, both inside and out, and on the left side of the steering wheel.

Clarke was sitting at the computer in the conference room. Abbie had scooted her chair close enough for them both to look at the screen. Caleb Monson had been in the Special Forces, but his record was sealed. No explanation. Abbie stared at his image glowing from behind the glass computer screen.

He looked familiar.

Was this their mystery caller, the driver of the white sedan?

Clarke’s stomach growled, loudly, for the third time in the past hour. Abbie and Clarke had worked through lunch without stopping, and if Clarke’s stomach was any indication, they had also worked through dinner. The lights in the parking lot outside blinked on.

“Let’s call it a night,” Abbie said. Clarke wouldn’t leave unless Abbie suggested he do so.

Clarke agreed. “See you tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow,” Abbie said.

After Clarke left the room, Abbie went back to look through the database. She had to be sure that her instincts weren’t wrong. She typed in the name BRYCE STRONG. He had a record. When he was nineteen, he’d been arrested for possession of marijuana—two joints—and underage drinking. He’d done community service. His fingerprints were in the database. They were not anywhere on Heber’s car.

Abbie had never really suspected Bryce Strong. When Abbie had spoken to him last night, he hadn’t triggered any red flags. Once he was comfortable that she wasn’t there to get him in trouble for the campfire or the marijuana, he’d told her the truth.

“Detective Taylor.”

Abbie turned around to see Chief Henderson standing in the doorway to the conference room. Judging from the scowl on his face, he was in a thoroughly foul mood. “Heber Bentsen’s funeral is scheduled for next week. The ME promised to have his report finished tomorrow. I want this entire investigation wrapped up before the burial.”

“Yes, sir. I do, too.”

“I know you knew President Bentsen personally.” Both counselors to the President of the Church were also referred to as President. “I’m really sorry for your loss.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Good night, Detective.”

“Good night.”

It was late. Time had outpaced progress today. Abbie knew on an intellectual level that her body was tired, exhausted even, but her mind was jumpy. She wouldn’t be able to sleep now even if she tried.

Instead of heading home, she found herself driving south. A little over an hour after she’d left the station, she pulled into the parking lot on the campus of Brigham Young University.

Abbie’s dad, aka Professor Taylor, was a creature of habit. He would be in one of two places on a weeknight: his office or home. Her mom was the one who had planned social engagements. When she was alive, her parents could have been anywhere on a weekday evening: a screening for a new film, an art exhibit, a concert, or a dinner party. Now, Abbie could predict with a disturbing degree of accuracy exactly where her dad would be at any given moment. It was still early for him to be home. He’d be sitting in his cramped office, working.

She stepped onto the sidewalk in front of the Religious Studies building and walked through the front door, down the hallway to the office her dad had occupied since he got tenure decades ago.

Abbie knocked on the open door. “Hello, Professor Taylor.”

Her dad jumped in his chair when Abbie walked in. “Abish?”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“No, no. That’s quite all right. It’s good to see you. I’ve been meaning to call you. Eliza called me early this morning. It’s terrible. Just terrible.”

“Yes,” Abbie agreed, “it is.”

“Give me a minute to finish this up.” Abbie watched as her father typed something on his keyboard. He still had an old black rotary-dial phone on his desk, but it looked like it wasn’t connected to anything. There was a new phone right next to it. For years, the administration had been trying to persuade him to use the same phone everyone else had upgraded to. It was easier for receptionists to use and, unlike the rotary phone, allowed for conference calls. Her dad had never been an early adopter.

He kept typing, and then he pressed the power button on his monitor. “Done.”

“New phone?” Abbie asked, trying to suppress a smile.

“Not by choice,” he grumbled.

“Ready?” Abbie asked.

“Just about.” Her dad put some papers into a scuffed leather briefcase. Abbie would have sworn it was the one her mom had given him when he first started teaching at the Y.

“Did you walk?” she asked.

He nodded.

“I’m right outside,” Abbie said. They left the deserted building and walked to the parking lot. Her dad climbed into the passenger seat. In just a few minutes, Abbie pulled into her old driveway.

The Taylor house was close to campus by design. As a kid, when her dad lost track of time, Abbie’s mom would send her or one of her brothers or sisters to his office to escort him home for dinner. Most nights, he returned to campus afterward.

When Abbie’s mom was alive, their house had been on the “Historic Buildings of Provo” walking tour. Hannah Taylor had meticulously restored the public rooms on the first floor. She was a gifted gardener, so their little yard off Center Street was in constant bloom from early spring through the fall. It had an English cottage-garden look that made it seem like the mass of flowers was a beautiful, messy coincidence. In fact, every delphinium, bellflower, and foxglove had been carefully planned and tended. The house still looked beautiful today, but passersby would probably describe it as “having seen better days.” They would be right.

Abbie’s dad opened the unlocked front door and walked in. He took an inordinate amount of time to gather the mail and find a place to set his worn briefcase.

“Have you eaten?” Abbie asked.

“Uh, no, I guess I haven’t. I’m sure we can find something.”

Abbie did not share her dad’s optimism. He looked gaunt. His clothes were hanging on him too loosely. She headed to the kitchen and opened the fridge. There she stared down a jar of Dijon mustard, a carton of 2% milk, and a sealed package of ham that had taken on a greenish tinge. The pantry wasn’t much better. Abbie found a few cans of tomatoes, a loaf of sliced white bread with a sell-by date of two weeks earlier, rice, a jar of peanut butter, some honey, and a case of black cherry Shasta.

Given the options, she toasted the stale bread, spread peanut butter and honey on top, and sliced the sandwiches into triangles. One whiff of the milk inspired her to grab two cans of Shasta.

Her dad took his plate into the dining room while Abbie poured the dark purply-brown soda into glasses. She opened the antique wood sideboard and took out two cloth napkins. They were pressed. Abbie felt heat behind her eyes. She blinked and looked at the ceiling. Unless one of Abbie’s sisters or sisters-in-law had done the ironing, it was her mom who had last touched these squares of cream damask.

Abbie’s dad put his arm around her shoulders. “It sometimes hits me like that, too. Out of the blue. I smell lilies of the valley or see cherry-lime rickeys on a menu.” Virgin, of course.

Abbie handed her dad the napkin. They ate in silence.

Her dad popped the last bit of white bread into his mouth, swallowed, and then cleared his throat.

“I’m glad you’re here. I think I need to tell you something.”

Professor Taylor, Abbie’s dad, was a man of few words and even fewer emotions. Unless he was lecturing, he was content to eschew conversation altogether.

“I had lunch with Heber last week.” Abbie knew Heber and her dad had maintained a standing lunch date. They’d been doing it for years, off and on. Since Abbie’s mom had passed away, it was always on. Heber made sure of it.

“One of my top students dropped out. She was applying to PhD programs. I’d already made phone calls to some old friends at Yale. She knew she was going to get in and get funding, too. Then, out of the blue, she told me she was leaving. I tried to convince her not to give up. She had such promise.”

Abbie’s dad had a tendency to meander when he told stories. You were never quite sure where the beginning, middle, or end was.

“People drop out of graduate school all the time.” Abbie didn’t mean to sound terse, but she didn’t know why her dad was bringing this up to her now.

“I know they do. That’s what I told Heber.”

“Why were you telling Heber about it?” Abbie asked.

“That’s just it, I didn’t tell Heber. He asked me.”

Now Abbie was interested.

“I’m not sure exactly when—a few years ago, maybe—Heber asked me about my students, my female graduate students, the unmarried ones. He asked if any of them had dropped out. I couldn’t remember. He asked me to check my records and keep a notebook of who left.”

Abbie’s heart skipped a few beats. This was interesting. “And?”

“I went back and checked my records and kept a notebook, just like Heber asked me to. Last week I showed it to him.”

Abbie took a few deep breaths. It probably meant nothing. After all, Provo was a tough town for a single woman. By the time you were in your early twenties, a lot of your friends not only were married but were well on their way to starting families. Being a single graduate student in religious studies at the Y could be lonely.

Her dad continued. “When he looked through my notebook, he got really quiet and he lost all the color in his cheeks.”

“Did he say anything?”

“I’ve been trying to remember his exact words. Something like ‘I can’t believe he already started.’”

“Do you have any idea what he meant?” Abbie asked.

“I’ve been turning those words over in my head ever since Eliza called to tell me about the accident. The last student who dropped out stopped by my office to thank me before she left. Then she blurted out something about being called to serve a special mission. I don’t think she meant to say it. She bolted from my office and I haven’t seen her since.”

“Did you tell Heber that?”

“Yes. He told me not to tell anyone.”

“Any idea why?”

“No.” He paused, eyes wide. “The thing is, this particular student was a returned missionary. It didn’t make any sense that she would go on another mission.”

Abbie leaned toward her dad and cleaned a smudge of peanut butter from his chin. Her mom would have done that if she’d been here.

Her dad had managed to live the first seventy years of his life in a bubble where he focused on the things he wanted to and the rest of his life was magically taken care of by the women around him. First, it was Abbie’s grandma. Then it was her mom. Now he was on his own, sustained by peanut butter, stale bread, and black cherry Shasta. Being an absent-minded professor had not provided him with the life skills necessary to live on his own.

“Do you have the notebook?” Abbie asked.

“Yes.” He pushed himself up from the dining room chair. “As a matter of fact, I do.” He walked through the French doors leading from the dining room to the main hallway, crossing the hall to his office. When he returned, he handed her a slim black notebook. Abbie opened it. Her father had drawn a table with the headings NAME, DATES OF ATTENDANCE, THESIS/AREA OF STUDY, REASON FOR LEAVING, and DATE OF LEAVING.

Abbie opened her bag sitting on the chair beside her. She pulled out her phone and took pictures of each page. Then she handed the notebook back to her dad.

“Did the students have anything in common?” Abbie asked.

“Almost all of them had gone on missions, they were single, and they had extremely strong testimonies. Some of my students have crises of faith when they first encounter the more obscure parts of Church history or doctrine. They come in during office hours. We talk. We pray. We ask for guidance. These young women didn’t have struggles like that. They had no doubt the Church was true. They were grateful for the Restoration, for the Gospel. That’s why it was so surprising when they left. These were the last students I’d expect to quit.”

Her dad tried to stifle a yawn. Abbie glanced at her phone. It was late and it would be even later by the time she got home. This was all mildly interesting, but Abbie wasn’t sure what exactly it had to do with Heber’s death. It could wait for another day.

She stood up from the table. Her dad did, too, and they both walked to the door together. “Abish, you don’t think there’s any connection between all this, my lunches with Heber, and his crash, do you?”

There was fear in her dad’s voice, not fear of some nefarious force, but fear that he somehow could have prevented his friend’s death.

“No, Dad. I don’t think there’s anything you could possibly have done—or not done—that would have stopped Heber’s crash.”

She opened the door and walked into the night. She hoped she hadn’t just lied.