Chapter 4: Echoes of Rebecca
The hallway seemed to tilt violently on its axis. I grabbed the stair banister to keep from collapsing. The sterile smell of bleach suddenly smelled like a graveyard.
“Was he… was Ethan investigated when she disappeared?” I choked out, the words tasting like ash.
“I can’t discuss the details of an open cold case, ma’am,” Miller deflected smoothly. “I need to know exactly when you and Ethan started your relationship.”
“About seven months after she supposedly left him,” I replied, doing the brutal math. I had been the rebound. The safe, oblivious refuge he ran to after whatever happened to Rebecca.
Suddenly, a patrol officer burst through the front door, hand resting on his belt. “Boss. Suspect vehicle spotted. He parked two streets over. He’s approaching on foot.”
“Secure all entry points,” Miller barked. “Keep the women out of sight.”
I was pushed into the kitchen with Clare, the swinging door blocking our view of the foyer. I pressed my back against the refrigerator, holding my breath. Minutes crawled by like hours. Then a heavy, hesitant knock echoed at the front door.
I heard it creak open. I heard boots scuffle on the porch.
“Ethan Pierce,” an officer announced loudly. “Keep your hands where we can see them.”
I strained to listen, expecting Ethan to yell for me, to demand an explanation, to erupt in righteous indignation about cops in his house. Instead, I heard Detective Miller’s low voice say a single name.
“Rebecca.”
There was no shout of denial. No desperate plea of innocence. Only the horrifying sound of my husband’s voice, flat and utterly defeated.
“I will not say another word without my attorney present.”
That single sentence shattered the last fragile pane of glass in my mind. An innocent man screams from the rooftops. A guilty man calls a lawyer.
The police didn’t drag him in handcuffs. They kept him detained in the back of a cruiser outside while the house was systematically taken apart. Hours bled into late afternoon. Eventually, Detective Miller came back to the kitchen and laid out several glossy photographs on the island — images of the papers found in the sealed pouch.
“They aren’t letters,” Miller explained, tracing their edges. “They’re financial receipts.”
One receipt was for a long-term, cash-only rental at a remote storage facility, dated exactly six years earlier. The second was a hefty invoice for professional-grade floor sanders, biological solvents, and heavy plastic sheeting, purchased just three days after Rebecca Lane was officially reported missing.
But it was the third piece of paper that made my breath catch in my throat. It was a crude, handwritten deed transfer. It listed the address of the very house we were standing in.
“I don’t understand,” I whispered. “Ethan bought this house through a standard real estate broker. It was a normal sale.”
“According to county property records, it wasn’t a standard sale,” Miller corrected. “It was an off-market transfer. And your husband didn’t own this property when Rebecca vanished. Someone else did.”
He tapped a name at the bottom of the deed. Arthur Lane.
I shook my head, lost. “Who is Arthur Lane?”
Beside me, Clare let out a sharp gasp, hand flying to her mouth. She stared at the paper like it was a venomous snake. “Oh my god. I know that name.”
Miller looked at her sharply. “From where, Doctor?”
“From forensics seminars,” Clare breathed, eyes darting between me and the detective. “Arthur Lane was a person of interest in multiple case studies on missing persons. He is — he was — Rebecca’s father.”
